Fakers (Licking Thicket 1)

“We could ask General Partridge for more time—?”

“No way,” I said, swinging the car into a parking space about a block down from where we needed to be. “You don’t get clients by asking for extensions, Paul. Remember you said there’s no line I won’t cross to get ahead?”

Paul sighed and reached for the door handle. “If you say so. Don’t forget your dad’s binder of stuff. You promised him you wouldn’t forget it.”

I rolled my eyes but collected the overstuffed folder from the back seat just in case. The Lickin’ Committee met all year round, so I couldn’t imagine there was much left to iron out. This would be more of a pep rally thing, where we’d all stand in a circle and yell “Go team!”… or possibly moo, which was the Thicket’s version of an encouraging cheer.

“So,” Paul said when I joined him on the sidewalk. “What’s the deal with you and, ah… Ava?”

I shot him a side-eyed look. “I think we covered that in-depth yesterday. She’s my ex-girlfriend. We dated in high school.”

“And you broke her heart.”

I stopped outside the Melt, the Thicket’s burger joint, and stared at him. “Who told you that?” I didn’t think he’d been in the hallway for that part of the conversation yesterday.

“Gracie. I-wen. Maureen. Penelope. Ladli.” He ticked the names off on his fingers. “Everyone at the barbecue, basically. They all pity her.” He wrinkled his nose and had to fix his glasses. “Which is stupid because she’s fucking gorgeous, and smart as hell, and has great taste in tea, and is a licensed esthetician. And she’s clearly leveled up in the boyfriend department since you, too, but whatever.”

Leveled up. Pfft. Leveling up would involve a boyfriend who didn’t come to his girlfriend’s hometown and flirt with other people, a reality I planned to make clear to Malachi the next time I saw him.

“Ava has every reason to be mad at me,” I told Paul. “I didn’t break her heart, not really, but I bruised her pride for sure. I’d suspected I was gay for a while, but I didn’t know how to tell anyone, you know? I was convinced folks would turn on me, and it was easier to just… smile and nod and not make waves. But that meant Ava had expectations for us. Hell, the whole town did.”

I felt the same fiery-hot tingle of anxiety crawl up my spine that I’d felt back then, and I rubbed at the back of my neck to get rid of it. Even years later, the sinking knowledge that I would disappoint someone just by being who I was killed me.

“I knew I needed to leave the Thicket if I was ever going to become comfortable with myself, but every time I tried to bring it up, Ava would tell me some great plan she had for our future, and I’d tell myself the timing was wrong. Then somehow it was just a few days before I was supposed to be in New York for school, and I panicked. I blurted out the truth at the worst possible time, in front of the whole town at the Lickin’ Dinner Dance that Saturday night.”

“Damn, Brooks.”

“I know.” Just telling the story made me cringe. “But that boyfriend of hers is worse than I ever was.” My free hand clenched into a fist, and I shook my head and resumed walking. “I might not have been in love with Ava, but at least I didn’t cheat on her.”

Mal had no right being all warm and funny and intelligent and sexy when he was taken, damn it.

I stepped around an older couple coming out of the Feed and Seed.

“I dunno. I thought he seemed nice,” Paul said glumly. “In the kitchen last night, I mean. He was really attentive to Ava.”

“You think everyone’s nice, Paul. I told you, he flirted with me in the hall ten minutes before! He’d damn well better—”

I stopped dead and stared at the vestibule in front of the community center, where Mal, that asshole, was looming over a wide-eyed Ava, who looked unusually tired and fragile this morning.

“No!” Mal said sharply, and Ava’s blue eyes widened. “You listen to me and listen good. Get your shit together, princess. You got me? I’ll be damned if you’re going to be the one making a scene in this little fucking—”

I didn’t wait to hear more. I was gonna kill him.

I shoved my binder into Paul’s hands. “Attentive, my ass.”

I stalked toward them and grabbed Mal by the back of his T-shirt.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”

“What the hell?” he yelled as I dragged him down the sidewalk to the front of the original Susie Dupree’s Deluxe Barbecue, which fortunately hadn’t opened for the day yet, and hauled him up against the brick wall. I heard Ava squawk in protest, but Paul murmured something in response. I honestly didn’t care. I was too busy trying to figure out how to get this asshole to show her some respect.