Page 11 of The Fall Back Plan
Jolie
Myphoneringsaround9 AM, which means I’ve gotten six hours of sleep. Thatshouldbe enough for me to not feel so grumpy when I answer it. I survived at the hedge fund on way less, fueled by caffeine and a fear of failure that drove me to work hours even a surgical intern would question.
But it’s not enough. Because a certain sheriff occupied my thoughts for an extra hour of twisting and turning after I climbed into my bed. Does it even count as a bed if it’s a mattress on the floor because the frame turned out to be backordered?
I grope for my cell and squint at the number. Maybe five people have this number, and all of them work at the bar except my property manager, so there’s an eighty percent chance this has something to do with the Mockingbird.
Yeah, those are the brilliant math skills that would have made me a fortune if I’d stayed at Blue Slate and let my soul be sucked dry.
Not that I’m prone to drama. The woman who gets dumped by her boyfriend because his parents think she isn’t good enough, so she runs away to buy the bar she hates most in the hometown she loathes so she can be exactly what his family thinks she is?
Who, me? Dramatic? Nah.
It’s Ry. I mash buttons until the ringing stops. “What, Ry?”
“Good morning!” He’s working so hard to be cheerful that I know something’s wrong.
I sit up and blink into full wakefulness. “What’s going on?”
“Everything is fine,” he says. “Kind of.”
I’m already cursing while I look around the room for pants. “Talk.”
“We had a little vandalism,” he says, the way you might say, “It’s sprinkling outside.” “Nothing that won’t come off with some . . . soap?”
“Soap? What kind of vandalism are we talking?” I tuck the phone against my shoulder and rummage through my drawers for something to wear.
“Uh, graffiti?” There’s a wince in his voice. “That comes off with soap, right?”
“Why are you asking me? I’ve spent exactly zero time as a hoodlum.”
“Aren’t you the hoodlum whisperer?” he asks in a not-so-veiled reference to Lucas Cole’s appearance in the bar the other night.
“Wasn’t then”—what an understatement—“and I’m not now. Be there in twenty.” That’s how long it takes to drive into town. I should have bought something closer, but that wouldn’t have been hick enough to match my ex’s perception.
Also, I sort of fell in love with my stupid house the second I saw it.
I end the call and look around for something to wear, but my wardrobe is either a closet full of business clothes or a dresser full of workout gear. I only have one setting: all out. Board room. Gym. If I’m not asleep, I’m grinding.
I slept in an oversized Duke T-shirt, so I grab a pair of leggings, jam my feet into my Nikes, and snatch my purse from the hook by my garage door. I use the four-way stop I missed last night as a ponytail-making pause, then drive the rest of the way to the Mockingbird in exactly fifteen minutes. I park in the lot behind the bar, which looks normal. Graffiti must be out front.
It’s empty inside, dim light coming through the shuttered windows, but when I push open the front door, I walk right out to Ry and Lucas Cole.
“Hey, Jo,” Ry says. Lucas tips his hat at me. His cowboy hat. The same one he wore Monday night when he came in, uninvited.
It’s so stupid. We are not the Wild West, or the Deep South, or a Hollywood version of either. Hat tipping is not a thing in a town that gets tourist overflow from chichi ski resorts and granola-stuffed hippie hikers.
It’s even more irritating that he looks good in that hat. And that uniform. Aren’t they made of polyester? Isn’t it supposed to be unflattering? But I’d watched him walk back to his patrol car in the dead of night—allthe way back to it—because no one had given his backside the memo about polyester.
I’m petty. Not dead.
I’m also very annoyed with myself for finding Lucas attractive, so I ignore the hat tip and turn to look at the bar front. Drippy rust-colored letters spell out “Sullivans” across the wood, brick, and glass, a full twenty feet wide.
“Gee, Sheriff. I wonder who could have done this.” I give Lucas a flat stare, and he nods.
“Yeah. Seems I owe someone a visit.”
“Great. Let him know I’ll send him the bill.”
