DO YOU MEAN, he just left?” Daisy hopped off her stool and ran to the window. Sure enough, there went Squint’s truck, hauling down the drive fast enough to make the truck bed lurch. A little concern jumped inside her, but then she calmed it. No doubt he’d just gone to grab a bite at The Wedding Diner. Or gone to see Madame and Monsieur Matchmaker—though now that they were divorced, perhaps it was fair to say that they were no longer Bridesmaids Creek’s special matchmakers. Daisy gulped. That split could probably be laid square at her and her father’s door, as they’d taken over the establishment where Madame Matchmaker’s Premier Matchmaking Services, and Monsieur Unmatchmaker’s Services, had once been housed. Now her gang had the space, and they’d put in a hopping cigar bar, sort of a pickup meet-and-get-sweet kind of place that doubled as a dating service and hangout.
There was no going back now.
Somehow she’d have to win the townspeople over, make up for a lot of the wrong she’d done. Daisy went back to sit with her gang, looking around at the five men who professed themselves in love with her.
“Listen, fellows. We’ve had a long, good run together.” Daisy took a deep breath. “But things are going to have to change.”
“Change?” Gabriel sat up. “What kind of change?”
There’d have to be lots of change if she was going to convince Bridesmaids Creek that she was a new woman. “Change. As much as possible.”
“I don’t like it.” Red shook his head. “We’ve got a great thing going, the six of us.”
Yes, but they didn’t know that she’d been diving under the sheets with Squint. And the lovemaking was fantastic. Mind-blowing. Once she’d gotten through the smoke and haze of trying to keep Suz and Cisco apart—what had she been thinking?—she’d realized the hunky, tall, saddle-brown-eyed Squint was a really sexy guy. Supersexy, to the point of being mouthwatering. And when he kissed her, she melted. Like a puddle of snow in hot sun. “It can’t be the six of us anymore.”
They looked alarmed. “But we’re so good together,” Carson said.
She shook her head. “Actually, we’re not. We were the misfits and outcasts together. But that’s not what I want to be anymore.”
“Whoa,” Clint said. “It’s Squint, isn’t it? John Lopez Mathison is getting inside your head.”
Daisy jumped. “Of course not!”
“It was Branch Winters,” Dig said darkly. “Every time you go to Montana to his retreat, you change. That was when it started, when you went chasing up there after Cisco. You came home different.”
“Yeah,” Red said. “You came home not mooning after Cisco anymore. And not really wanting to hang out with us, either.”
Daisy got up. They were right, of course. Branch’s place in Montana was a spiritual retreat where warriors of all kinds went to reboot. She’d gone to throw a few wrenches into Cisco’s works—and found a few thrown in hers instead. It was hard to explain Branch. He sort of lived on the metaphysical, and sometimes hippie, edge of life—but he’d helped her see that she was operating out of fear of never belonging in Bridesmaids Creek.
And only she could change that.
“It’s going to be okay, for all of us,” Daisy said softly, going to the door. “But change is in the wind. It has to be.”
She went outside into the cold February chill, knowing this was the right path—if she was ever going to make John Lopez “Squint” Mathison believe that it was him with whom she’d been in love all along.
She didn’t know if there was enough magic in Bridesmaids Creek to convince him, but she had to try.
Daisy felt every eye on her as she walked into The Wedding Diner the next morning. She was aware the town didn’t have a very high opinion of her, even though she’d managed to convince her father to give up pursuing the Hanging H, and even though she’d talked him into giving up on taking over the land where the Best Man’s Fork and Bridesmaids Creek lay in sleepy, small-town fashion. The Hawthorne’s Haunted H amusement park for kiddies was now situated on some land near Bridesmaids Creek, because Daisy had convinced the Hawthorne sisters that no one could take over their home and their business all at once if they weren’t tied together. Now the year-round haunted house was more of a community venture, which helped everyone in BC, because it was more centrally located, and people were assigned regular hours to run it. It was more lucrative for the town now, and with time, Daisy thought that its popularity would only grow.
But memories were long in BC, and she’d done an awful lot of bad. She smiled at everyone who turned to stare at her, and moved into a white vinyl booth that Jane Chatham, who owned The Wedding Diner, showed her to.
“You’re back,” Jane said, and Daisy nodded.
“We came back yesterday, Squint, myself and the boys.”
Jane’s gaze was steady on her. “Squint left town last night.”
Daisy blinked. “Left town?”
The older woman hesitated, then sat across from her. Cosette Lafleur—Madame Matchmaker herself—slid in next to Jane, her pink-frosted hair accentuating her all-knowing eyes.
Daisy’s heart sank. “He couldn’t have left.” He hadn’t said goodbye, hadn’t even mentioned he was planning to make like a stiff breeze and blow away.
The women stared at her with interest.
“Did you want him to stay, Daisy?” Jane asked.
“Well—” Daisy began, not knowing how to say that she’d thought she at least rated a “goodbye” considering she’d gotten quite in the habit of enjoying a nocturnal meeting in his arms. “It would have been nice.”
“Have you finally realized where your heart belongs, Daisy?” Cosette asked, and Daisy started.
“My heart?” How was it that these women always seemed to read everyone’s mind? A girl had to be very careful to keep her secrets tight to her chest. “Squint and I are friends.”
Cosette winked at her, and a spark of hope lit inside Daisy that maybe Cosette wasn’t horribly angry or holding a grudge with her about the whole taking-over-her-shop mistake she’d made.
“We know all about those kinds of friends,” Cosette said, nodding wisely.
“Still,” Jane said, “it does seem rather heartless of John to leave without telling you. Had you quarreled?”
Here it came, the well-meaning BC interference of which many suffered, all secretly cherished and she’d never had the benefit of experiencing. She had to say it was like being under a probing yet somehow friendly microscope. “We didn’t quarrel.”
“But you’re in love with him,” Cosette said.
“That may be putting it a bit—” Her words trailed off.
“Mildly?” Jane asked.
“Lightly?” Cosette said. “You are in fact head over heels in love with him?”
Daisy felt herself blush under all the scrutiny. Sheriff Dennis McAdams slid into the booth next to her, and the ladies wasted no time filling in the sheriff, who turned his curious gaze to her.
“He left last night,” the sheriff said, and Daisy wondered if John Lopez Mathison had stopped by to see every single denizen of this town to say goodbye—except for her.
“Yes, I’ve heard,” Daisy said.
“Not coming back, either,” the sheriff continued. “Jane, can I get some of your delicious double-dipped chicken-fried steak and mashed red potatoes with gravy? Maybe chase it with a slice of your four-layer chocolate cake?”