Page 19

Hadley

I lay on the horn outside of Lincoln’s house. The door flies open, and Lark and Lily Foxx come pouring out. On their heels is Faye looking like she just rolled out of bed as she leans against the porch pillar and waves in her colorful kaftan robe—even at the crack of dawn, that woman is stunning.

“Are you our surprise today, Auntie Hadley?” Lily shouts in my face, excited and laughing. Honestly, her energy instantly erases the messes I need to figure out. I get to just live in the present and have fun with these two rascals.

Unlocking the doors, I open and step out so Lily can hustle into the back seat. I look over the hood of my car at Lark, who I know is going to ask...

“Hadley, please let me sit in the front.” She smiles and mouths, please, please, please on repeat.

I point at her. “You need to convince your dad. I’m on strict orders that you two are only to be in the back seat, and I need to stick to the speed limit. Otherwise, I don’t get to do surprise mornings.”

Lark rolls her eyes as she folds the front seat back and huddles into the back seat with her sister.

“Your dad, however, never gave me any rules ’bout what we could do this morning.” I wiggle my eyebrows in the rearview. “Where we going, girls?”

They both look at each other and smile. I know exactly where they’re going to say before they shout, “ Church !”

Lincoln called me and asked if I’d hang out with the girls for a while this morning.

He usually lets Faye sleep in on weekends, and he got called to Griz and Ace’s house for an impromptu meeting.

It was the perfect excuse to spend some time with my favorite littles and then bring Griz a sweet treat.

We roll down the windows, and I lay on the horn again as I back out of the driveway, “Time for CHURCH !!!”

It's just a house on the edge of town, perched alongside the Fiasco River. Its sliding glass window faces the main road, with white blinking holiday lights strung around it. The flower boxes at every window of the farmhouse are filled with a happy mix of colors, from gold daisies and purple cone flowers to the white and pale-yellow plethora of chamomile and aster huddling in the spaces between. It’s the most unassuming spot in Fiasco, where fields of flowers are harvested in late summer for bouquets that sell for far less than they should along the most aggressive side of the Fiasco River.

Tourists who sought out the best donuts in the southeast call it by its name, The Holey Donut.

Blasphemous locals, like myself, call it Church .

“We need to bring Griz his favorites,” Lily says. “But what about everyone else—Dad and Uncle Ace. Is Uncle Grant there too? How many can we get, Hadley?”

I shrug my shoulders. “However many you want.”

The truth is, I’m anxious to run into Ace.

It’s been enough time since the wedding for us to pretend like my hands on him never happened.

But I’m angry, and a little hurt too. My ego took a massive nose-dive when he walked away from me.

A part of me hoped he’d knock on my door, slip into my room, and finish that too-close conversation between my legs, but no such luck.

I need to stop thinking something’s going to happen, because as much as I want him, I don’t want someone who doesn’t want me.

I don’t know why I can’t just let that sink in.

I should be feeling confident and just tell myself, Fuck it, I met him toe-to-toe, grabbed his dick, and pushed him for a reaction.

I got one—no big deal. Except, all of it was big.

Jesus . Expelling a breath and letting out a laugh with it, my cheeks feel heated just thinking about it.

Then, as some kind of abhorrent payback, he soaked my panties with a few words and new curiosity about the kinds of things that wind him up and get him off.

Yeah, all of this is a big deal. And pulling me into a dark corner of the wedding, to what?

Make me stop pushing him? Okay, Ace, let’s see how many mixed signals you can fire off in a matter of hours.

“Presh, please tell me you still have glazed,” I say as we make our way to the window.

If there’s a person who embodies a small-town, upbeat sprite of a woman, it’s Prestley Timkins.

Her French accent isn’t one people find often in Kentucky, but it’s one of the many things that makes her truly original.

Tack onto that, her impeccable use of scarves woven or wrapped in her hair, and the way her donuts taste like beignets, and she’s a treasure.

She’s one of my favorite people, not much older than my mom would have been.

Presh makes me feel like she cares—always listens to me carry on about mundane things, like boys and makeup, when the Foxxes aren’t interested.

She has that streak of misbehavior too that a part of me connects with.

It isn’t a secret that Presh inherited her former husband’s business of forgery and fake IDs.

It isn’t a serious hustle; if I had to guess, it's mostly underage college kids looking to finally get into bars and clubs. It’s how I got mine.

But everyone in Fiasco seems to have some kind of hustle; it doesn’t matter if it’s above or below lines.

People do what they have to do to make life work for them.

“Hadley, my love. I know to always save extra for you.” She smiles, leaning over the window ledge. It isn’t a formal storefront. Just a specialty window that she had installed in her kitchen for easier access to take orders and keep tabs on her ovens.

“Hi, Presh, what's special today?” Lily asks as she tries to see inside and past where Presh had been leaning. “Lark says it’s something chocolate, but I’m guessing it’s something with raspberries since they’re just in season.

“Lily, my goodness. You look more mature every time I see you. Lark, you as well. Absolutely beautiful.” She looks at me with a smile. “You always, Hadley.” Her eyebrows raise as she asks, “You doing alright these days?”

She, along with the rest of the world, knows about my father’s arrest and his charges.

But only a few people have taken the time to ask how I’m doing.

The anger I hold for him is eating away at me, and even though I’m trying my hardest not to show it, I’m getting awfully tired of the weight of it all.

“I’m thriving. Obviously,” I say with sarcasm and a smile.

I have no interest in tearful truths while I’m responsible for Lincoln’s girls.

They’re two of my favorite people, and I believe they need to be kids for as long as life allows.

They don’t need to overhear, let alone sense, the burdens I’m carrying.

So I do what I’m exceptional at—I push it aside.

Focus on the things that make me feel good and normal.

And right now, that’s donuts. A lot of them.

She gives me a nod and a smile, hearing loud and clear that I’m only willing to show my surface today.

Then she brings her attention back to Lily with a wink.

“Lily, you’re smart to think about what’s in season.

But you and Lark are both right. My special is a dark chocolate with a raspberry ganache filling. ”

Lark looks at me with a smirk, because she already knows what I’m going to say.

“Presh, we’re going to need a dozen of those and a dozen glazed. Plus, three for our drive,” I say with a smile. “I’m bringing the girls to the distillery, and I know as soon as people see the mint-green boxes, everyone’s going to be begging for one of these.”

“Absolutely. I’ll put a powdered jelly in there for Griz too, then,” she says.

“You mind telling Griz that I had a question about an order he placed? I don’t have a phone number for him, only Ace.

” Lowering her voice, she whispers, “I got the impression he didn’t want Ace knowing about what he was doing, so. ..”

Now I’m intrigued.

The girls move around the patio and try picking up the ducklings waddling around the little pond. The small inlet is calm and quiet compared to the river at the edge of her property.

She moves around the kitchen, pulling out trays from the oven and turning off timers.

“Are you thinking you might stop by the distillery for Ditch the Derby day?” I ask.

“Maybe,” she says. But I know, like most of her “maybes,” that she won’t.

“Laney, Faye, and I are going to do some cocktail experiments tonight. I bet the girls would love to have you join us.”

She smiles as she folds up the mint-green boxes for our donuts.

“I like being here. I have everything I need. But you and your girlfriends are always welcome to come visit me.” The gossip in this town has buzzed for years about Prestley.

After her husband disappeared, she became a bit of a recluse, never leaving her home.

Bold rumors ran rampant around the time that happened—whispers about her being a black widow and giving a man who was too rough what he had coming.

I’d met men like him, got too close, and they conveniently disappeared too.

It isn’t something that makes me think negatively of her.

Lark lays on my horn and yells out, “Auntie Hadley, can I ride in the front seat? Please, please?”

Presh passes me the small stack of too many donuts and smiles. “Thanks for coming to see me. It always brightens things around here.”

“How long have you and Dad been friends, Hadley?” Lily asks with donut glaze shimmering from cheek to cheek. She just turned ten, and while her attitude doubled, along with a newfound interest in skincare, thanks to plenty of YouTubers, moments like this are nice reminders that she’s still a kid.