Page 2 of Midnight Between Us (The Timberbridge Brothers #4)

The thing about small towns is that everyone swears they know you.

Not just who you are now—but who you were in second grade. What your mom wore to the PTA meeting that one time. They remember that time she stumbled in straight from the principal’s office to the cafeteria to volunteer right after giving him a blowjob.

They remember everything: the exact brand of shoes you wore to church. How your cousin tried stealing lip gloss from the corner store when you were twelve—and how it somehow became your scandal, too. The way you left without saying goodbye, like a runaway teen.

People don’t forget in a place like this. They recycle your worst moments until they’re worn down and warped, passed along like heirlooms no one asked for.

People love towns like Birchwood Springs for their timeless charm—the way the mailman knows your dog’s name and sometimes brings treats along—the familiarity that makes outsiders twitchy and locals feel like they own the place.

But familiarity isn’t always comfortable.

Sometimes, it’s confinement dressed as belonging.

Especially when your identity was carved for you before you were old enough to know how to say no. When your last name carries more baggage than a small-town airport carousel, and people already have made up their minds about who you are—and who you’ll never be.

In a town like this, reinvention isn’t an option.

You get labeled. Sorted. Filed away in a drawer that’s been collecting dust since the eighth grade.

You’re the shy one.

The brain.

The girl whose dad disappeared.

The one whose mom drank too much, slept around, and treated morals like a suggestion, she never got around to reading.

The harlot’s daughter.

The preacher’s granddaughter.

The cautionary tale.

Birchwood Springs is that town. And I grew up right in the thick of it.

And I hated it. I hated all of it.

It wasn’t the place.

How could it be when the trees are beautiful in October, and the lake’s always still in the morning? It’s not the landscape I wanted to escape—it’s the version of me that lived inside its lines.

I was never my mother. Never my grandmother either. But that didn’t stop anyone from making up their minds before I even had the chance to grow into my skin. The whispers never stopped. They followed me like smoke.

“She’s Nina’s daughter. She’ll end up just like her mother.”

It didn’t matter that I left.

It didn’t matter how far I ran or how long I stayed gone.

The moment they realized I was here, it started again.

Same looks. Same stories. Same people wondering how long it’ll take before I unravel, just like she did.

I told myself I’d never come back here.

Swore it.

I wrote it in invisible ink on every lease I signed and slipped it between the boxes when I packed up and moved states away.

But here I am.

Back in the place that defined me before I ever had the chance to define myself.

Back in Birchwood Springs.

This is repayment. Not penance, exactly, but not far off, either.

I owed a favor. When the time came to pay it back, they sent me here.

Honestly, I didn’t come willingly. My first response was nope.

Hell no. Really, nope. I even offered my soul in a half-joking, half-serious kind of way. Apparently, that wasn’t quite enough.

Turns out, that my services as a doctor are more valuable in this town than my poor little soul.

So I packed up what was left of my pride and returned to the last place I ever wanted to see again.

It’s strange how quickly a place can strip you down.

The moment I crossed the town line, I felt it—that low, familiar pulse of judgment humming in the air.

Like Birchwood Springs had been waiting for me, arms crossed, and memory honed to a fine point.

And suddenly, you’re not a person anymore. You’re a story—a cautionary tale.

It’s easy to believe you’ve changed when you’re somewhere else.

When surrounded by strangers who never knew your history, you get to reinvent yourself.

Outside of this small town, I’m Dr. Simone Odette Moreau.

I’m capable, smart, and reliable. No one sees the cracks.

They don’t know about my mother’s rebellion.

About the string of men. About how her life was a middle finger raised to the man who stood at the pulpit every Sunday.

They don’t look at me and wonder who my father is.

But here in Birchwood Springs?

I’m just Simone.

Nina’s daughter.

The preacher’s granddaughter. The one whose mother got pregnant at sixteen just to piss off the church. The girl no one could quite place, because there were too many candidates to figure out who put me in her belly in the first place.

To be clear, my mom didn’t charge for sex. She just didn’t pretend to be ashamed of having it. And in this town, that’s all it took.

They called her a whore anyway. Because it made them feel better. Because it gave them something to say behind cupped hands at potlucks and PTA meetings.

And still, I came back. Even when I was fully aware that nothing stays buried here. Not reputations. Not memories.

Definitely not the past. I worked so damn hard to outrun it. I’m fine with all that though, as long as Keir Timberbridge doesn’t set foot in this town, because if he does, there won’t be enough lies in the world to save me from what’s still bleeding underneath my skin.