Page 1 of Fake It Till We Fall
Chapter One
Grayson
There are two things I know for certain:
You can’t untangle last year’s Christmas lights without swearing.
You can’t untangle your feelings for your first love, either—not when she walked back into town like she never left.
Which was why I was up to my elbows in busted light strands instead of dealing with…other things.
The front counter of the hardware store was buried under a tangle of wires and burned-out bulbs. I’d already cut the hell out of my thumb trying to fix a plug that should have been thrown out years ago.
But sorting out the mass of knots and lights was a hell of a lot easier than attempting to sort out the mess in my head.
Harper was back in Trickle Creek.
It had been more than fifteen years since I’d seen her, if you didn’t count social media posts that I tried and failed not to look at. And I didn’t.
Viewing her exotic life, traveling around the world, working as a chef in beautiful locations and on super-yachts through the lens of a screen was one thing. Seeing her in person, well…that would be a whole different situation.
A situation I wasn’t looking forward to.
Or maybe I was.
I still couldn’t figure out how I felt about having my first love—hell, my only love—back in town.
I tugged on a twisted knot of lights, yanking harder than I should have. A plastic snowflake snapped off and skittered across the floor, landing under a shelf.
“Dammit.”
I abandoned the mess on the counter and went to grab the missing snowflake, right as the bell over the door jingled. I exhaled slowly and stayed crouched a little longer than necessary when I heard the familiar, overly chipper voice call out.
“Grayson Lyons. I hope you’re not hiding from me.”
I sighed and stood. There was no point in trying to hide. She’d find me. “That depends. Do you have that damned clipboard again?”
Tilley Beckett grinned and waved the aforementioned clipboard in the air. “What do you mean, again? I was never without it.”
“Of course you weren’t.” I shook my head and retreated behind the counter again, as if it might offer me a little bit of protection from the never-ending to-do list the head of the town festival committee always seemed to have for me. “What can I help you with today, Tilley?”
The older lady smacked her bright-red lips, which matched the scarf tightly wound around her neck, and wiggled her eyebrows.
I knew that my day was about to get a whole lot busier.
“It’s not what you can do forme, Grayson.” She reached up and tugged on a candy cane earring. “It’s what you can do for the town.”
“Of course.” I tried not to roll my eyes. “Whatever the town needs.”
“I’m glad to hear you say that.” She lifted the clipboard and pretended to scan the list before landing on the new tasks she had for me. “The tree lighting ceremony is two weeks away, and we’re already behind schedule.”
