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13

Calista

After

I’d ignored Fane for the entire week. Sort of.

I didn’t speak to him. I didn’t really look at him. Not even when he wedged himself between me and the stove while I stirred a sad can of pumpkin soup.

I just continued to stir and look right through him, which was, frankly, very difficult to do.

Fane wasn’t a small man, and I may have willed myself into feeling nothing but disdain for him, but I challenge any living, breathing human to have someone who smelled the way he did and looked the way he did quite literally rub himself up and down the front of your body and remain statuesque.

I didn’t so much as make a peep when he left the toilet seat up—something I knew he did just to see if I’d crack. Instead, I continued to funnel that energy into crafting the perfect plan to get through to him.

List after list, detail after detail, I worked like a woman possessed. Perfecting, revising, obsessing. My game plan was going to be bulletproof.

It would’ve been flawless, too—if only it didn’t require me to spend time in the vicinity of the man in question.

Okay. Look, I noticed him once.

Crap. Twice.

He’d tailed me like some speed racer when I caught wind of the meeting that had been unofficially pulled together at town hall on Wednesday afternoon.

“I object!” I yelled the moment I pushed the doors open.

“That’s not a thing here,” Fane whispered next to my ear, so close I could feel his breath on my skin.

I turned, smacking my hands against his chest, ready to…I don’t know. Kick his ass? Sure, let’s go with that.

“Trouble in paradise?”

The voice made me freeze. I looked to my right just as Fane did, catching only a split second of the man’s face—dark eyes, dark hair—before Fane’s broad chest shifted into my line of sight, blocking him completely.

The split second I’d seen him, the man’s smirk looked both sharp and lazy. He tutted before crooning, “Come now, Fane. Introduce me to the woman who’s captured your heart. I won’t bite.”

Fane’s grip on my arm tightened almost painfully. When I tried to look around him, he shifted us further down the middle aisle of seats. The man’s laughter followed us like oily tendrils that were fighting to grab onto me. Goose bumps rose on my skin, and immediately, I wanted to step into the searing spray of a too-hot shower and remove the residue of it from my skin.

I didn’t fight Fane as he dragged me toward the front of the room, but as soon as the haze of wrongness loosened its grip on me, I smacked his hands away and straightened my shirt.

“I want to speak to the mayor,” I said to…I had no idea. I’d never been to a town meeting before.

“That would be me.”

My head snapped to the front of the room, where a fairly young-looking guy with dull brown eyes and equally dull brown hair sat next to a woman who could have been his sister.

“You’re Mayor Brown?” I deadpanned. I’d never met anyone who embodied their name so thoroughly. The literal poster child for beige.

“I am.”

“Right.” I cleared my throat, trying to step back but immediately bumped into Fane, forcing me to step forward. “I would like to object to the developmental work being considered.”

“That’s—”

“It’s all right, Matilde.” He put his hand on the lady’s arm to settle her, and though her body relaxed, she didn’t remove her glare. “I’ll hear her out. Go on…”

“Calista.”

“Go on, Calista.” He nodded, and it was hard to take him seriously because, honestly, he looked about seventeen.

“Changing anything about this town will ruin the very things that make it so great.”

A small chorus of agreement hummed from behind me, making me stand up taller.

“This town has a history. Generationally owned businesses. Character. It’s the way it is because the people here care for it. If you make it into some money grab, that will all change.” I was trying not to sound desperate. But I was.

“And that’s why there is an assessment period,” the mayor said smoothly, his gaze darting to Fane. “As Mr. Mackenzie behind you can attest.”

I whirled on Fane. “You’ve met this cheese ball already?” I hissed, attempting discretion but very clearly failing based on the gasps that rippled around the room.

Fane just stared down at me, arms crossed, his expression unreadable. “Briefly.”

“When?”

“When I got into town.”

“That’s right,” Mayor Brown interjected, his tone now noticeably frostier. “And as a town, we’ve agreed to entertain the proposal.”

“Who’s ‘we’?” I shot back. “Because I live in this town, and I didn’t agree?”

The mayor ignored me. “In any case,” he continued, “the only person at this point who can decide whether or not the project will move forward—something that would be very good for this town, mind you—is your husband.”

I scoffed. “He is not my husband.”

God. Fucking. Dammit.

You could’ve heard a pin drop.

“Yet!” I blurted, my voice way too loud. Mayor Beige jolted in surprise. “He’s not my husband… yet .”

Well, this was fucking awkward. “Congratulations…in advance.”

“So, that’s it?” I turned, scanning the room. Familiar faces stared back at me—neighbors, regulars at Sunshine Café, people I’d shared countless conversations with. Yet now, they avoided my gaze, their attention fixed on their hands or the scuffed floorboards.

The mayor cleared his throat, slipping back into his polished, dismissive tone. “If you don’t have a productive comment to contribute, I suggest you take a seat.”

“Mr. Mackenzie,” the mayor added, “Perhaps you can encourage your wife to—”

The most aggressive snort I’d ever heard flew out of Fane’s mouth and cut him off.

Fane’s posture shifted, his presence radiating something sharp and dangerous. “What, exactly, do you think I should encourage her to do?” His tone was cold and razor-edged, making the room fall silent.

I glanced back, catching sight of the dark-haired man again. His hand lifted in a mocking wave, his smirk slipping into something darker. The ease with which he reeled it back sent an unwelcome chill down my spine. Like by his will alone, he could make Fane snap.

This was going nowhere.

“Whatever,” I muttered, grabbing Fane’s arm. When he didn’t budge, I yanked harder. He leveled the mayor with one last scalding look before following me toward the exit.

As we passed the dark-haired man, he crooned, “See you soon, boss.”

Fane’s jaw twitched, his entire body coiled tight. For a second, I thought he might stop, turn back, and say something. Instead, he glanced down at me, his gaze still unreadable, then all but lifted me off my feet and hauled me out the door.

Once outside, because I was ignoring him— of course —all I could do was scream silently in my head, slap his hands away and flip him a double dose of the bird.