Hold On

Why couldn’t I just have an excellent day?

A day where I woke up in Merry’s arms, my kid safe and snug and warm under his roof in his new awesome lake house that had new double-paned windows and a new furnace.

A day where Merry made us pancakes and teamed up with my kid to give me shit, which I would for eternity (if I had the shot) make them think annoyed me when I secretly loved every second of it.

A day where Merry said he wanted Christmas and he wanted us to move in with him.

A day where I could buy a bunch of Christmas crap that (best case) Merry was going to think was hilariously me or (worst case) Merry was going to hate. For the former, he’d just tease me, and if it was the latter, he’d still let me have what I want.

Why, from the parking lot of Bobbie’s Garden Shoppe, couldn’t I go to the grocery store, buy a tube of premade Christmas cookie dough (cookie dough was not candy, so it didn’t count) and some Pringles (because we were low), go home, make Christmas cookies for my boys, and decorate a tree my man (and maybe my kid) were gonna hate?

Why?

Why couldn’t all that just be without anything fucking with it?

“Mia, really, today’s been a good day and I’m not—” I started.

She got closer to me (something I liked even less than her being there at all) and cut me off. “Today’s been a good day? Has it, Cher? Has it been a good day for you? Well, how lucky you are. Because today and yesterday and the last three months have been shit for me…” Her face twisted before she finished, “Because of you.”

No wonder Merry scraped her off. She was a pain in the ass.

“If you think I’m lucky, babe, then—” I tried again.

I didn’t get far.

“Do I think you’re lucky?” she sniped. Her gaze cut inside my car and back to me, and her voice degenerated significantly when she asked, “Merry needs Christmas decorations for his new house?”

Okay, right.

I was done. I didn’t need this and I wasn’t going to have it.

So I was going to end it.

“If you’ve deluded yourself into thinking I’m the cause of all your problems, that’s your gig, Mia. It has nothing to do with me. Take it elsewhere,” I stated.

“Deluded?” she asked, coming even closer. “Isn’t it you who’s fucking my husband?”

“No. It’s me who’s fucking Garrett Merrick, who isn’t your husband. Now, step back,” I demanded.

She didn’t step back.

“He’ll come back to me,” she declared.

“Whatever,” I muttered, grabbed the handles of the last bag in the cart and put it into my car.

“He will. He’ll come back. It’s him and me and everyone knows it,” she pushed.

“Really? Are you that deep in the fantasy? How sad.”

I didn’t say that.

My head turned at the new voice.

And when I saw who was behind it, I stopped dead.

I did this because, joining our tableau, was Susie Shepherd.

And her catty, bitch-from-hell eyes were aimed at Mia.

I didn’t know Susie. Not at all. She never came into the bar partly because she was Colt’s ex, partly because she was kidnapped by Denny Lowe and shot by him during her time as a hostage, and partly because everyone in town knew she’d sold her story, which made the residue of Lowe’s journey of lunacy last a lot longer.

She was also known ’burg-wide as a soulless, selfish, spoiled bitch.