And if Olivia’s right—if Steve did this, then I have fucked up so badly I might never know true sunshine in my life. Not ever again.
“I’m a dumbass,” I mutter.
Blake winks at me. “Happens to the best of us. You just took a long time getting around to your turn.”
Cassie’s never going to forgive me.
Hell, I wouldn’t forgive me if I were her. But I have a more pressing matter to take care of than begging for her forgiveness.
I need to make sure she’s safe. “Do you know where she is?” I ask Olivia.
“At the bakery. Maud’s the only person in town the sheriff’s afraid of.”
I leap up off my seat on a new adrenaline high.
I’ve let her down too many times already.
This time, I’m going to get something right.
Her life might depend on it.
Twenty-Nine
Cassie
* * *
“Here, honey.” Maud Hutchins sets another fresh blueberry cupcake with extra cream cheese icing on the table in front of me. “It’s okay to have two on days like today.”
“Or three,” Gerald grumbles from the other side of the bakery’s cheery—and abandoned—counter. Everyone’s too busy milling around the farmers’ market in the square, gossiping about my “latest” arson attempt to have time for cinnamon rolls and sugar cookies.
But Maud and Gerald have made it clear that I’m welcome here. Even Gerald, Sunshine Toy’s most passionate detractor, believes I’ve been framed. Even Gerald, who thinks I’m part of a deviant conspiracy to steal decent women away from their husbands with battery-powered orgasms, is on my side.
But Ryan just…walked away.
He made sure I was alive, shook his head at me like I was the one who’d broken his heart, and. Walked. Away.
No looking back.
Tears rising in my eyes for the tenth time since I left the hospital, I dig into my cupcake with my already icing-sticky fork. Better enjoy sweet treats and my freedom while I have them.
By the end of the day, the sheriff could have a warrant for my arrest.
“Don’t cry,” Ruthie May says, patting my hand from across the table. “We’re going to take care of this. Savannah’s lawyer is the best in the state. You know that. That’s how she got away from Steve with all her money still in her bank account.”
“Deborah’s a shark,” Maud agrees. “She’ll take care of you, honey.”
“But she’s not a criminal attorney.” I sniff hard, refusing to start sobbing again. My lungs are strained after all the smoke inhalation, my throat raw, and my eyes itchy enough without adding tears to the mix. “She’s just coming to chat as a favor to Savannah. I’ll have to find someone else to represent me if I’m actually arrested.” I press my lips together, throat working as I fight for control.
But the fact that the words “warrant for arrest” might soon apply to me is too much.
I’m a rule follower. A law-abiding nerd from way back. I’ve never had so much as a parking ticket. And now, thanks to Savannah’s evil ex, I might be going to jail.
“And I don’t even smoke,” I whisper. “I’ll have nothing to trade for protection in prison.”
“You are not going to prison,” Gerald says firmly. “I’ll wring a confession out of Steve with my bare hands before that happens.”
I shift my gaze to the big man with the kind eyes and smile. “Thank you, Gerald. I appreciate your support.”
“Of course,” he says, looking flustered by my gratitude. “A fair fight is one thing. But when one side starts playing dirty, decent people have to stand up for what’s right. I don’t want to live in a town with a sex toy factory, but I want to live in a town where innocent women go to jail even less.”
“You’re a good man, honey,” Maud says, her eyes shining. “I always knew you’d come around.”
“Speaking of coming around,” Ruthie May murmurs, nodding toward the picture window looking out onto the street. “Looks like someone’s pulled his head out of his backside.”
I turn to see Ryan—looking gorgeous in faded jeans and a tight red tee shirt—pushing in through the door to the bakery. Immediately my heart pumps faster for reasons having nothing to do with the cupcake-fueled sugar rush laying claim to my system.
I meet his eyes across the room, steeling myself against the stupid wish that we could go back to how things were a few hours ago.
He left me. Right when I needed him the most.
Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice…
His blue eyes are soft. Searching. And something that looks a lot like regret tightens his features as I double down on the resolve to be strong for myself this time.
“Can we talk? Maybe…outside?” he asks. “Please?”
“I don’t think we have anything left to say to each other.” The words hurt like ripping off a bandage. I thought heartbreak was bad when I was a teenager, but this is worse. So much worse.
“Cassie—”
“Please leave.” It’s killing me to stay strong, but when you discover the person you love doesn’t care enough to be at your side through better or worse, the only thing to do is to get out while you can.
“I know you didn’t set the fire,” Ryan says.
I can’t keep the bitterness out of my voice when I reply, “Oh, really? So you were just pretending like I did to protect me? Because you care so much?”
He hangs his head and rubs a hand over his jaw like he’s feeling a fresh bruise, like I physically slapped him. “I wasn’t thinking straight. Jessie had just played me this phone conversation between you and Savannah and—”
“What? What phone call? Jessie recorded my private calls?”
“What in the hell is this world coming to?” Gerald growls. “Last time I checked, this wasn’t a surveillance state!”
Ryan holds a hand up. “Someone sent it to the sheriff, who shared it with Jessie. I don’t know who, but I can guess.” He sighs. “Olivia told me about you seeing Steve’s shoes. He probably—”
“So you believe Olivia, but you couldn’t even stay and talk to me?” Now I feel like I’m the one being slapped in the face.
Over and over. With a sock stuffed with a brick. Or concrete dildos.
“You need to leave.” My voice is stronger this time, even though my heart is crumbling into pieces.
He’s not the man I thought he was. The man I wanted to believe he was.
I almost hope the sheriff does come and arrest me.
There’s no chance I’ll fall in love with anyone in prison.
“Cassie, please, I—”
“The lady asked you nicely,” Gerald says.
“More than nicely,” Maud agrees.
“I think you best be gettin’ on,” Ruthie May chimes in. “I’ve always liked you, Ryan. Don’t make me change my mind.”
He opens his mouth like he’s going to argue, but instead, he turns, shoulders drooped, and heads for the door.
I barely keep the sob in check until the bells stop jingling behind him.
“Aw, honey,” Maud says.
Ruthie May squeezes my hand.
And Gerald quietly sets another muffin before me.
It’s heartbreak medicine, and I’m going to need a lot more before I’m healed.
If I ever heal.
Thirty
Ryan
* * *
I’m done letting Cassie down. I’m going to fix this. All of it.
Her being framed for trying to destroy Sunshine.
People judging her and Savannah because of Sunshine.
That broken look on her face when I told her about Jessie and Olivia and Steve.
I’ll prove to her that she comes first for me, no matter what it takes. Starting with the sheriff.
I track him down outside the factory, where today’s shift is still doing recon on the fire that took out the east wing. “Sheriff. Cassie didn’t do this.”
Briggs lifts an uninterested brow. “I think you’re thinking with parts of you best left out of this discussion.”
“She saw Steve—”
“She told me her story.”
My jaw slips, because it’s clear he thinks she’s lying. “Have you talked to Steve yet?”
“Son, how I do my job is none of your damn business.”
“I can’t believe this.” I shake my head. “You’re believing a guy who fucked a sheep over Cassie? Just because she’s running a sex toy factory?”
“I didn’t find any evidence of a sheep being violated by Steve Bennington.”
“Because the sheep didn’t report it?” I scoff.
He ignores my sarcasm. “Steve’s been an upstanding member of the community for years. A lot longer than this wart on our community has been here, that’s for sure. Happy Cat ain’t the place for a sex factory.”
“That’s not your call to make,” I say, voice tight. “And you owe it to the entire town to get to the truth.”
He puts a sympathetic hand on my shoulder. “Them Sunderwell girls really know how to screw a guy up good, don’t they? But you’ll be all right, son. Give it a few days, then come on over to the house. The missus wants you to meet our Geri Lynn. She’s home from college, got her bachelors of fine arts and everything.”
I shake his hand off.
If he won’t investigate Steve, I’ll have to do it for him.
I call my brothers for backup, and they meet me at my house with Olivia in tow. Olivia and Jace keep casting covert, longing glances at each other when the other isn’t looking, and it’s getting a little weird, but I have bigger issues to sort out than whatever’s going on between them.
For once, I’m putting my problems first.
No, I’m putting Cassie first.
The way it should be.
“We need his shoes,” Blake says. “If he was at the factory, they’ll probably have the lighter fluid all over them.”