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“No,” I said, still aiming the broom at him, “I’m pretty sure it still counts.”

He chuckled and held up a black shirt with bold red font that said, “Kill it Red Wild Style.” “Uncle Red likes us to wear ’em when we work for him.”

“He’s really your uncle?” Ugh! What a stupid tagline.

“Yeah. His brother’s my dad. Or my dad’s his brother, or… well, you get the gist.”

“So why didn’t you come in the front door?” I asked, realizing I must’ve forgotten to lock the back door. Oops.

He stepped around the box in front of him and touched the end of the broom, but I didn’t lower it. I didn’t know this joker. He could be lying.

“’Cause the shirts are back here. They have been since I was a kid. I used to work for my uncle when I’d come down on the weekends in high school.” Hanging the T-shirt over his forearm, he pulled his phone from his back pocket. “Here,” he said. “I have a voicemail from him.” He tapped the screen a few times, and then Red’s rude, growly voice filled the storeroom:

“Yeah, Ryder, this is your Uncle Red. I need you to come work the store for a couple days. There’s some rude girlie gonna be there fillin’ in for me, but she don’t know shit about sellin’ sportin’ goods. She probably doesn’t know how to work a register. I need you to keep an eye on things for me. I’ll be across the damn street at the community center. Don’t ask, and don’t tell your pappy a damn thing. But get your ass to the store tomorrow mornin’. Nine a.m.”

“God, he’s such a dick! I do too know how to work a register, and I’m not some ‘girlie.’”

Ryder laughed. “Sounds like you know my uncle, alright.”

I rolled my eyes. “You don’t need to stay, Ryder. I’ve got things covered.”

“Everybody calls me Rye,” he said, “and are you sure, ’cause it’s almost deer season. There’s bound to be some guys comin’ in for ammo and new guns. I can help with that.”

“You can?”

“Yep.”

Relief filled every cell in my body. I’d barely made it through the sale of bullets. How the hell was I supposed to know anything about guns? “Thank you. That’d be great.”

He pulled the animal murder T-shirt over his head, then wiggled out of the blue one underneath that he’d been wearing, tossing it behind him onto the box of mac and cheese as he followed me back into the main part of the store.

Rye’s rock-hard pecs stretched the shirt. He had a boy-like charm, I could already tell, but he oozed manliness, and the veins on his forearms looked like they were ready to pop off his skin. I was sure he’d fit right in at Red Wild.

“There’s women’s shirts in that box, too, and,” he said, catching on quickly, “some say ‘Hike it Red Wild Style,’ instead of ‘Kill,’ if you like that better.” He stopped dead in his tracks when he saw the big, boarded-up Main Street window. “Whoa! What happened here?”

“Don’t ask,” I groaned.

“Uh, okay, but you know I could walk outside and ask the first person I saw, and they’d tell me.”

“Fine! I broke the damn window. That’s why I’m stuck in this stupid store. My lawyer said the judge wants Red and me to work through our differences on our own time, and he thought me workin’ here was a good idea, and Red’s workin’ my job as assistant director of Ace’s House. It’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard of, and I think all this stuff”—I motioned to all the hiking and hunting crap with a flick of my hand—“is stupid, but here I am.” I held my arms out wide. Just shoot me now.

I couldn’t take a whole week of this.

“Alright, alright, I get it. You are diametrically opposed to huntin’,” Rye said with a wry smile. “It’s not so bad though. Most of the stuff Red sells is pretty harmless. It’s mostly just outdoor stuff and T-shirts. You know, that kinda thing.”

“Oh yeah,” I said. “I know about the damn T-shirts.”

“Okay, that’s a bit of an extreme reaction. What’s so bad about ’em?”

“Never mind.” I didn’t really want to get into it and risk making the only person willing to help me at the moment uncomfortable. Then again, what was the saying? The truth will set you free? “But your uncle’s a jerk, and I really don’t wanna be here. I’ve already had to sell bullets. It made me feel violated.” I pointed behind him at the dead elk curtain. “And what’s with that curtain? It’s so inappropriate!”

He turned to see what I was pointing at and then laughed at me. “It’s not inappropriate for this store. That’s a prized bull elk. It inspires the hunters when they come in. That’s the kinda kill they’re all hopin’ for.”

“Ugh.”

He laughed again, his easygoing demeanor making me want to punch him in the solar plexus. So were his honey-brown curls. He kept swiping them off his forehead, pushing them up and away from his face. “What’s your name, anyway?”

“Oh, right, sorry. It’s Devo.”