Page 18 of Save the Last Dance (Take the Backroads #1)

Once she started that sentence she had exactly nowhere to go with it. She didn’t want to admit she’d been staring at him and Rachel for the better part of an hour, watching them laugh together while her heart broke.

“You must have left before I could talk to you. Didn’t you see everyone from school over by Davy’s truck?”

Should she ask about Rachel and risk looking jealous when he wasn’t even her boyfriend? Or just fake like nothing unusual had happened?

“I must have been distracted.” She kept her hands tucked behind her.

“How’s tonight?” Ethan jerked a thumb toward the truck in the driveway. “I’ve got some wheels. You want to…take a drive?”

Her heart raced. “Really?”

She kicked herself for sounding like a twelve-year-old goofball.

Ethan shrugged. “If we’re leaving town together, we ought to at least hang out first. Don’t you think?”

Ally had been waiting forever to hear him say something like that. How could a day that started out so awful turn out so amazing?

Too bad she didn’t have a chance in hell of escaping the house tonight. For a second she considered sneaking out after her parents were asleep, but she worried about the medicine she’d taken and the rawness of her arms that still throbbed.

“I would like that.” Her voice caught on the words, her emotions all tangled as she turned toward him. “But I can’t tonight because I’m…grounded.” It was the first thing that came to mind. “But I could tomorrow.”

“Grounded?” Ethan’s hazel eyes roamed over her. “Your life sure isn’t anything like I imagined, Ally.”

Was that good or bad? She was finally starting to get Ethan’s attention, but now she was lying to him about some things and keeping him in the dark about others.

If only she’d waited to freak out about Rachel Wagoner’s stupid announcement, Ally might have been having the best day of her life right now.

“Believe me, it’s not the way I want it to be.” She edged closer, just in case he was thinking about kissing her. “But soon, I’m going to change all that.”

“If you’re going to dream, dream big.” Ethan reached and smoothed a strand of hair away from her cheek. “And I like how you dream.”

Ally’s mouth went dry at that small, barely-there touch. She swayed closer. Longing. Hoping.

“When can I pick you up?” he asked, surprising her out of her swoony moment.

“Hmm?” She blinked.

“Tomorrow. When do you want me to come by?”

“Um. Anytime after lunch.” Maybe by then she’d have slept off the sedative and today’s scary moods. She wanted to be able to focus on Ethan.

Maybe even snag that kiss.

“See you then.” He lingered for a second and she licked her lips.

Just in case.

“Yup, see you then.” She didn’t make any move to head inside, either.

A breeze stirred the scent of moonflowers twining down a nearby column. Stars filled the sky above the horizon. For a moment, she breathed in the scent of cinnamon gum as Ethan leaned closer.

“Night, Ally,” he said softly before he turned and stalked off into the night.

She leaned onto the rail with her elbows for a second until pain splintered through her sore arms. Straightening, she watched Ethan get into his truck and reverse out of the driveway.

It should have been the happiest night of her life.

Ethan had come over to ask her to go somewhere with him. He’d touched her.

Except that she hadn’t told him about the crushing weight on her chest that made her feel like the world was folding in on itself some days.

She hadn’t mentioned that seeing him laughing with a classmate had sent her into the ER.

It was the wrong way to start a relationship. Because this was Ethan, her crush.

Somehow, she’d find a way to make it work. By the time they left town together, they would be a couple and they would be old enough to be on their own. Ally couldn’t wait to start a new life far away from Heartache.

“So I can put you down to make some sandwiches?” Nina’s finger hovered over the touchscreen keyboard on her digital tablet.

She’d visited the Owl’s Roost diner on the outskirts of Heartache in the hope that she could get help with the Harvest Fest food.

“That turkey, Swiss and pear combo sounds great.”

Rodney Baker had been running the Roost since she was a kid.

He stared at her now as they sat in his office behind the kitchen.

Just outside the door, the scent of bacon and sausage hung in the air while the cook shouted for wait staff to pick up their orders.

Beyond the kitchen, Gram sat in a corner booth visiting with Mrs. Baker, who was an old classmate of Gram’s.

Rodney turned to consult a calendar on the wall.

“The festival is coming up soon,” he observed, scrubbing a hand over the bristly gray whiskers along his jaw.

“I only just came on board to help with the food service, but I’m sure we can pull it off.

” Especially if he said yes to the sandwiches.

She had vendors who’d signed on to provide country ham, smoked catfish, barbecue ribs and a few other specialties, but Owl’s Roost had sandwiches that would help round out the offerings for festival-goers.

“If you choose to have your own booth, you can provide whatever menu items they want to feature, of course. Then we’ll fill in with whatever foods we still need through the kitchen on-site. We’ll make some seasonal fare, too.”

She’d already researched pumpkin and apple recipes and planned to visit with local farmers about providing fresh produce.

“How about a Heartache Cupcake?” Rodney teased, tapping the edge of her tablet. “You should make a note in there about that.”

She hadn’t realized her cupcake bakery was so well-known in Heartache. She shouldn’t be surprised; news traveled fast in a small town.

“I’m not sure if people would want a cupcake called Heartache.” Although it wasn’t a bad idea. It could be fun for the festival.

“Why not?” He straightened and shrugged his wiry shoulders. “It’s not like you’re calling it the ‘heartburn cupcake.’”

He chuckled and teased her some more, but in the end agreed to supply three kinds of sandwiches at his booth during the festival. Nina made some notes with his contact information and stood to leave when a waitress burst through the open door to Rodney’s office.

“Ms. Spencer, your grandmother fell?—”

Nina didn’t wait to hear the rest. She sprinted through the kitchen, darting past a busboy with a tray of dirty glasses.

“Gram!” she called, shoving through swinging double doors that led into the restaurant.

“I’m fine,” her grandmother’s voice came from behind a wall of concerned diner patrons and wait staff who crowded around a booth. “Just took a little spill, is all.”

“Excuse me.” Nina edged by a young woman to see for herself. “What happened?” She circled Gram’s shoulders with one arm, searching her face to see if the older woman was in pain and trying to hide it.

Gram was pale as she rubbed her good knee. “I wanted to grab a dessert menu from the next table over?—”

“Oh, Gram—” Nina began.

“We can bring you one,” Rodney Baker said at the same time.

“I know.” Gram shook her head. “I just put a little too much weight on the wrong foot and then I twisted my good knee—” She stopped, blinking fast, the expression on her face uncharacteristically defeated. “Sometimes I forget that I shouldn’t do those things. Inside, I still feel eighteen. ”

“Me, too, Daisy,” Rodney assured her, giving her arm a gentle squeeze. “But you look a lot closer to eighteen than me.” He made an exaggerated frown that made his wrinkles more pronounced. “Aren’t you glad you’re not all craggy-faced like this?”

The two of them laughed while a couple of the younger men offered to help Gram out to Nina’s truck. Nina carried her walker while Gram protested all the help, but she could see her grandmother leaned heavily on the extra arms.

Half the diner ended up in the parking lot.

The couple from the table beside Gram’s carried her purse and a doggy bag for Taz the cat.

A waitress carried a makeshift bag of ice and ran ahead to open the truck door.

Rodney and Mrs. Baker wanted to be sure their friend got to the truck safely.

Then, there were the well-wishers who just wanted to tell Gram to get better before the Harvest Fest.

As she watched them all settle Gram in her truck, Nina felt touched.

She’d met many wonderful friends in New York.

But there was something special about a hometown, where your classmate owned the business down the street and you had history with everyone.

Good and bad, the people around her had shared a lot with each other.

Climbing into the driver’s seat behind her grandmother, she was more than a little grateful.

“Give me a shout if you need anything,” Rodney Baker told Nina as he waved. “Take care of our girl.”

“Thank you. I will,” she called through the window.

And she would.

Glancing over at her grandmother in the passenger seat, Nina knew now she needed to be more of a consistent presence in her grandmother’s life.

Heartache was her home. Her grandmother was her family.

So if spending more time here would help Gram, Nina would find a way to make that happen.

And after seeing the way the town turned out to give her a hand just now, maybe Heartache wouldn’t be so bad.

If she could really put the past to rest with Mack like he’d suggested, if they could have the same kind of friendship they’d had once, Nina could learn to like it here just fine. She pulled out her phone.