Page 38 of Sunkissed Colorado

I sighed. “I don’t want you to.”

“Why?”

“I just want to put it all behind me. Like I should’ve done a while ago. What happened back then doesn’t matter.”

Ha. I was so full of it. Those wounds ran a lot deeper than anything Callum might’ve caused. But I didn’t want to share the rest of what happened our senior year.

“You do believe me, though?” he asked. “I didn’t do what you thought.”

“Yeah, I believe you.” I’d spent all these years thinking that Callum was one of the villains. The whole thing was confusing. But to my surprise, I didn’t have a doubt that he’d told me the truth.

Other doubts, sure. But not about this.

“Good.” He seemed genuinely relieved. “So you’ll stop avoiding me at Hearthstone? We can work together? Or I can keep following you around and bugging you…”

“Callum,” I groaned.

“Zandra. I’m not going to let up.”

Maybe there was a reason everyone else in Silver Ridge seemed to like this man.

Either way, there was no use fighting him. On top of everything else, I didn’t have the energy for it.

“I’ll work with you. Sorry I was so difficult.”

He grinned. “Difficult?You? I hadn’t noticed.”

I chuckled, the stress of everything lifting another few degrees.

We continued around the store, and he asked, “So what do you actually eat? Besides quinoa and broccoli and shit?”

I rolled my eyes, though his grin said he’d been kidding. “I like the usual things. I just have to worry about cross-contamination. So eating out at restaurants can be hard unless I trust the kitchen.”

“Why didn’t you mention your food allergies before, though? Especially when I shoved danishes in your face. My bad for that. A lot of people have food issues these days, and at the brewery, we’ve been talking about modernizing the kitchen for a while.”

“Because I was diagnosed in college, and my parents never wanted to be bothered with it. Same with my ex.” Even though our business had been built around modernizing systems to help people with food allergies. Only the money had mattered to him. “I’m used to people not caring.”

“Then your parents are jerks. And your ex is a dick.”

A giggle snuck into my throat. “You might just be right.”

We reached the checkout counter. Callum unloaded his basket. Bran Bites, some gluten-free pancake mix, and a carton of coconut yogurt.

“That’s all you’re getting?” I asked. “Really needed to shop, huh?” I was unloading my items on the belt, along with the reusable bags I’d brought.

“Yep, I was all out of pancake mix.”

“More like you wanted to harass me.”

He grinned. “Worked, didn’t it?”

The checkout girl, who couldn’t have been older than twenty-one, practically purred when she saw Callum approach. “Find everything you needed today?” She batted her eyelashes so hard I was surprised she didn’t create a small breeze.

He up-nodded. “Sure did.”

“Ex-girlfriend?” I whispered.

“Don’t really have any of those.”