Page 20 of Hand Picked
Damn. Word of the bugle blowing must’ve spread quickly.
I looked over her head to the packed diner. Sure enough, Webb was sitting at a horseshoe-shaped booth at the back along with his sister Emma, their uncle Drew, and a guy named Marco, who I was pretty sure was Drew’s boyfriend.
Webb didn’t look nearly as gravely injured by the Rusty Spike shenanigans as I felt. In fact, he looked… good. Really good. His hair was neatly combed, his Henley—a gray one this morning—strained across his muscular shoulders, and his eyes had lost a little of the tightness they usually carried in the corners. He grinned at something Emma said, then balled up his napkin and threw it across the table at her, and I couldn’t help smiling dopily, remembering him looking at me like that the night before.
I wished I could remember how much of Webb’s warm, friendly demeanor from the night before had been real. Given how long and heartily he’d disliked me, I figured it had mostly been the alcohol.
A memory surfaced of Knox driving us home in my car—with all the windows rolled down despite the subzero temperatures, just in case anyone felt sick—while Emma and Hawk followed behind us, driving Webb’s truck. Webb had sung an unforgettably terrible, tuneless rendition of “Sweet Caroline”nearly the whole ride, while Gage and I did theba-ba-ba’sin the back seat, and Knox muttered, “Jesus Christ, Webb,” every time Webb attempted a high note… which was often.
I wanted that. That feeling of friendship. That feeling offitting. Badly.
“M’kay, you’re gonna need to ogle him on your own time,” Katey snapped, which was rude and vaguely horrifying and not at all what I’d been doing… was it? “Let’s go.”
She stomped around the podium, clearly expecting me to follow, so I did, trailing after her through the restaurant with all the speed of a reluctant, arthritic tortoise.
“Good morning, Luke!” a woman called from a nearby table.
I blinked and turned my head slightly to see if there was another, better-liked Luke standing behind me, but no.
“Uh. Morning?” I offered.
“Morning, Mr. Williams,” a woman I recognized from the town hall permit office said… which was funny since I’d seen her at the store the other day and she’d walked right past me. “I meant to thank you for the book you sent home with Jasmine the other day. She loves it.”
“Oh. Hey.” I raised a tentative hand. “That’s… great to hear.”
“Luke, my brother!” A guy I recognized from the bar the night before stood, grabbed my hand, and pulled me into the kind of dude-bro handshakey-back-thumping-hug ritual I’d seen other guys perform my whole life but had never actually participated in. “Habs gonna beat the Pens tomorrow night or what?”
“Wow, okay, that’s my lung. Yeah, we… we sure are,” I agreed. I wasn’t sure exactly what I was agreeing to, but the guy seemed to approve, judging by the way he set his hands on my shoulders and shook me like a maraca.
“Fuck yeah. See you at the Bugle tonight for the football?” he demanded. “Rusty Spikes on me!”
“Oh. Ha. Maybe not quite so soon? Gotta forget the last round first.” I pressed a hand to my head, which was ready to explode like a shaken soda can from all the unexpected jostling.
“That’s the damn truth! But you’re a Hollowan, Williams,” he said inexplicably. “You’ll learn to love ’em.” He lovingly thumped me twice more before I managed to extricate myself.
I was a Hollowan?Was that actually what people here called themselves?And was it the drinking that made me a citizen? Or the hockey?
This town was so weird.
By the time I caught up to Katey, she was already standing beside Webb’s booth, twirling a lock of her blonde hair as she batted her eyelashes at him. Webb nodded and smiled along.
See that? He’s perfectly friendly. This is gonna be fine, I chastised myself.Get a grip, Luke.
Except then Webb caught sight of me over Katey’s shoulder as I sidled up to the table, and his green eyes darkened with some emotion I couldn’t quite identify. Not anger, not at all, but for sure not let’s-blow-a-bugle friendship either.
Awesome.
It was too late to turn back, though, so I put on a big smile and moved forward, because that was what I did.
“Hey,” I greeted softly, directing the word to the condiment caddy in the center of the table.
I hated sounding so unsure. I hatedbeingso unsure. I straightened my spine. “Is it okay if I sit here?”
“Luke!” Drew’s genuine smile made his face crease beneath his tie-dyed headband. “What a treat.”
“Of course you should come sit,” Emma invited, pushing down around the horseshoe so I could take a spot on the end of the booth across from Webb. “You look like you need some coffee.”
“You look like you might keel over,” Marco corrected with a kind of waspish fondness. “Much like this one did a little while ago.” He elbowed Webb, who grunted.
