“I was just about to leave.”
Riley turned to Mark. “Didn’t you just get here?”
Mark lifted a shoulder. “I got farther than I thought I would.”
She dropped her eyes and hid a smile. He liked that.
“Now that you mention it,” Dalton said, “it’s been a couple of years since I’ve seen you—well—at anything.” He chuckled. “You’ve become quite the hermit, Rivers. Welcome back.”
Mark saw Riley look at Dalton with what he hoped was annoyance. She turned back to Mark. “What did you want to ask me?”
“It can wait.”
She hesitated, then smiled and nodded before Dalton led her away.
“Don’t be a stranger, Rivers,” Dalton called behind him with a raised hand.
Riley waved.
Mark kept his hands in his pockets. “I might take you up on that, Gainer,” he muttered.
Riley let Dalton guide her up to the house. She’d wanted to keep talking to Mark. Wanted him to keep revealing pieces of himself.
Which was why she let Dalton pull her away.
She’d done what she’d set out to do. She’d apologized to Mark about the other night, and he’d accepted it. The memory of his fingers running across her palm like feathers made her shiver, and she looked back. The truck was gone.
“Are you still cold? Come on, new girl. Let’s get you to the bonfire.” He placed his hand on the small of her back to direct her through the house and outside again. He grabbed drinks along the way and offered her one.
Smooth. She’d heard that much about Dalton. Divorced. Two kids. Competitive. Kind of a player. No matter how exceptional he thought he might be, those were pretty average stats in the adult dating world.
She was counting on those stats to be accurate. Dalton wasn’t looking for anything lasting.
“Hey, Gainer, looks like you found your date.”
One of Mark’s friends from the bakery hailed them from the perimeter of a large bonfire built in a giant tractor wheel rim turned on its side.
“I did. Nate, this is Riley Madigan. Riley, Nate Crandall, our host.”
Nate smiled. “I saw you at the bakery this morning.”
“Teachers love their donuts,” she said.
“We keep Lette Mae in business,” Dalton said, raising his drink.
Nate raised his back. “Pretty sure Lette Mae’s bollens keep her in business.”
“To Lette Mae’s bollens,” Dalton said. “May they always be light and creamy, and never fall flat.”
Riley rolled her eyes, and Nate caught it.
“How many of those have you had, Gainer?”
Dalton chuckled. “My apologies. My feelings for Lette Mae and her confections are pure, I assure you. And, for the record, this is my first.”
Nate raised his brows at Riley. “A word of warning—he’s like this sober.”
She smiled, deciding she liked Nate. “So, you’re a friend of Mark’s?” she asked, despite her silent vow not to think about him for the rest of the evening.
“We’ve been friends since we were kids.” He narrowed his gaze. “How did you meet him? He’s been pretty antisocial.”
“We met after the play on Saturday.” Kind of.
“Oh, right. His niece was one of the Lost Boys.”
That’s where she’d seen the little girl in the bakery before. “It’s too bad he left the party early.”
Nate frowned at her. “He was here?”
“I just talked to him down at the driveway.”
Nate looked behind her as if expecting to see Mark in one of the groups of guests. He took out his phone and started texting. “Excuse me,” he said, glancing up. He nodded to them and walked toward the front of the house.
Dalton chuckled, shaking his head. “Babysitters.”
“What was that?” she asked.
“Oh, nothing. Just Nate and a few other people like to mother our local hero as if he were a stray puppy. I bet you Nate’s calling around to get a location on Rivers to make sure he gets home safe, or you know, doesn’t drive his truck off a cliff.”
Riley gasped quietly.
Dalton shook his head. “I don’t mean to sound cold. Geez. That kid’s been through things beyond imagining. But I saw who he was before, what he’s made of. He’s tough as nails. He tackles a challenge. Thrives on loose reins. Just get him going in the right direction and bam. He’ll knock down whatever wall is in front of him. He’s one of those guys who can carry the world on his shoulders and make it look good. At least he was. All this mothering and quiet corralling and Big Brother watching him—” He took a drink. “It’s gonna undo him sooner than anything.”
Riley considered the turn his words had taken. “It sounds like people care a lot about him.”
He nodded. “Can’t help that, I guess.”
They watched the fire for a time. Riley shrugged off Dalton’s leather jacket.
“Getting warm?” he asked, taking it from her.
She nodded. Too warm. Anger and unease knotted inside her, and though she appreciated Dalton’s take, his callousness unsettled her. He was probably right in some ways. If what he said about Mark’s tenacity was true, then no wonder people corralled him, even if he didn’t want to be. But she didn’t like Dalton’s glib remark about driving off a cliff.
She watched the fire as it snapped and hissed. Tiny explosions popped here and there, and red-hot ashes whirled up into the sky. Heat warmed her skin even from six feet away. “I don’t blame him for not coming up here.”
Dalton took another swallow of his drink. “Neither do I.”
Another guest hailed Dalton and came over. They started up a conversation about retirement plans—401Ks versus the DRS—so Riley excused herself to the house to freshen up. But as she walked, she scanned the crowd. She roamed the open areas of the house and headed out the front door, finding herself on the front lawn again.
A couple of people caught her eye, and she drew closer. Nate was in deep conversation with Mark’s other friend from the bakery.
Nate lifted his head at her approach, and she slowed, not sure she’d be welcome.
“Hey, Riley, right?” He motioned her over. When she
