“Murphy Cavenaugh, is that you?” I hear when I turn the corner.

I look over to see a familiar face from high school. “Hi, Matt.”

Matthew Jenner was the star quarterback. The homecoming king. The most popular kid in school. Right up until he broke his leg in three places, ruining his chances at a college scholarship and landing him a management position at The Pit Stop—the local high school hangout.

“I didn’t know you were back in town,” he says, blatantly staring at the scar on my face. “Are you here for good?”

I shrug, not wanting to get into it if he hasn’t seen my predicament pasted all over the news and social media. “I haven’t decided yet.”

“Where’s your phone?” he asks. “I’ll give you my number so you can hit me up while you’re back. We can hang out like old times.”

I nod at a friend of my mother’s who walks into a coffee shop. Then I stare at Matt and wonder if he’s lost his mind. “Matt, there were no ‘old times.’ In case you’ve forgotten, you wouldn’t give me or my friends the time of day back in high school. Or even last year.”

“That’s not true,” he lies. “Hey, why don’t you and, what’s your hot friend’s name—Kelly? She still lives here, doesn’t she? Why don’t you and Kelly come over to my place this week? I’ll get Davis to join us. You remember Davis? We can party.”

Davis is another has-been football player who couldn’t make it out of Okoboji.

“You’re kidding, right? You want me to bring my dead friend to your house so we can party?”

He cringes. “Oh, shit. Was she the one who died in the bee attack?”

I shake my head and start walking away. “It wasn’t a bee attack, it was one bee. She was allergic. And how did you not remember that—there’s only eight hundred people in this town?”

Because apparently, even diner managers can be narcissistic pigs.

“Well, you can still come over yourself,” he calls after me.

I wave my hand backwards, ending the conversation.

“You sure looked like a girl who likes to party when you were riding that dude’s cock!” he yells.

My throat tightens as I look around to see who might have heard. A few ladies look at me in sympathy. Some teenagers don’t even try to hide their laughter. Then Matt falls to the pavement after being punched in the face.

“Leave her the hell alone,” Austin Helmsley says to him. “And go back to your grease pit.”

“Douchebag,” Matt says, rubbing his jaw as he walks away.

“Are you okay?” I ask Austin, looking at his injured hand.

“I should be asking you that, Murphy.”

“I’m fine. Uh, thanks for that, I guess. But I can take care of myself.”

I stare at him, trying to reconcile the person before me with the scrawny band geek I sometimes hung out with in high school. I haven’t seen the guy in five years. He’s almost unrecognizable now with his longer hair, his straight teeth and his … wow, all his muscles.

“I’m sure you can, but he was out of line.” He laughs. “Plus, I’ve wanted to do that since middle school when he stuck my head in the toilet. So, I guess you could say that punch was as much for me as it was for you.”

“Okay, well, I’d better go. I have somewhere to be.”

“Murphy?” he calls after me.

I turn around and raise my eyebrows.

He nods to the coffee shop on the corner. “Can we get coffee one day this week? I’m only here until Friday and I’d love to catch up.”

I think about the last few days being holed up in my mom’s house. Then I look at the coffee shop and my mouth waters thinking about the epic pastries they make there. I glance down the street of this sleepy little town before looking back at Austin.

Coffee, Austin, Okoboji—they all seem so … wonderfully normal.

“Sure,” I tell him. “Coffee would be nice. How about tomorrow morning at ten?”

He smiles. “I’ll be here. Nice to see you again, Murphy.”

~ ~ ~

“Hi, Daddy,” I say, placing a rose into the vase attached to his headstone. I sit on the cold earth over his grave. “I’ve made a mess of things, haven’t I?

“I know what you would tell me. You would remind me of the time I was in eighth grade and I tried out for the cheerleading squad. I thought anyone could be a cheerleader. I could do a cartwheel, so why not? I think you and Mom knew what I was in for, but you still didn’t stand in my way. And then at try-outs, when I couldn’t even do the splits or a jump-kick, I became the laughing-stock of the school. Girls mocked me for weeks. Every time I passed one of them in the hallway, they would mimic the kick I tried to do and everyone would laugh. They told me I was developmentally challenged and that I should be in a special class.”

I pick at the grass that is just now starting to turn green. “You told me it was character-building. You said I could let it break me or make me stronger.” I sigh, looking up at the cloudless sky. “But this is different, Daddy. Back then, I only had to deal with a few dozen middle-school students. Everyone has seen this.” I shake my head and look back towards town. “Even people here know about it. Here, in nowhere, Iowa, where I was sure I’d be able to hide from it. The whole world knows about it, Daddy.

“Okay, fine. I know you would tell me that when I was thirteen, this town was my world and what happened to me back then seemed as horrible to me as this does now.”

I look over at an older woman visiting her late-husband’s grave. “Mom misses you,” I tell him. “She told me this morning that she’d do anything for one more day with you.” I rub my hand across the base of his headstone. “Would you be mad if she found someone else? I don’t think you should be mad. The guy she’s been seeing is nice, Daddy. But maybe you already know that. Do you know that? Do you know everything? Do you know what’s going to happen to me?”

I kiss my fingers and touch them to his grave. Then I stand up and brush off the seat of my pants. “Bye, Daddy. I’ll come back soon.”

I walk to the other side of the cemetery and put my other rose into another headstone vase. “I could really use you right now, Kel. I need my best friend.”

He’s your best friend, Cavenaugh. Tears trickle down my cheek when I hear Kelly’s words in my head.

“Is he?” I ask her. “Wouldn’t a best friend have told me everything? Wouldn’t a best friend have given me the choice of how to handle things?”

Johnny Davidson, I hear in my head.

“What? No, that’s different. Johnny was a short little turd who dug your stained underwear out of the trash at school that day you got your first period. He was going to humiliate you, Kel. I couldn’t let that happen. So, I offered to give him my lunch money for a month if he’d give them to me. So not the same thing. Wait—did you even know about that? I don’t think I ever told you. I didn’t even want you to think about what could have happened if he’d shown the entire school.”

I look at her headstone and roll my eyes.

“Oh, shut up.”

I spend the next half hour telling her about my run-in with Matt and Austin. I tell her about my job—the one I’m not sure I’m going back to. I tell her about my mom’s new boyfriend. I tell her about everything except the one thing I really want to talk to her about. Caden.

Because I can’t talk about him. I can’t think about him. Not without hating him as much as I love him.

Chapter Forty-nine

Caden

Brady calls time and motions for me to come to the mound. “You might as well have been suspended, because you’re not even in this damn game. Get it together, Kess.”

I berate myself as I look down at the dirt. He’s right. For days now, I haven’t been able to concentrate. My mind has been anywhere but on this field. It’s been at the police station, wondering how much progress they are making in the case against Tony. It’s been at Ethan’s agency, hoping they’ve tracked down every single video that made it to the internet. It’s been in Okoboji, Iowa, praying the woman I love is finding what she needs so she can come back to me.

“You want me to pull myself out of the game?” I ask.

“No, Caden. I don’t. But I do want you to get over your shit and help me out. You’re making me look bad up here. It’s not all about you. You’re like my brother, man, but when you’re out here, make it about us, not everything else going on in your life. This is your team. Your family. We’re counting on you.”

“You’re right. I’m sorry, I know I’ve been distracted. I’ll do better.”

On my way back behind the plate, I find myself once again glancing up at the stands. I look behind the net over by the dugout to where she usually sits. Then I promise myself I’m not going to look over there for the rest of the game. If I already fucked up one part of my life, I sure as hell better not fuck up the other.

~ ~ ~

“I’m glad we were able to pull that one out,” Brady says, patting me on the back after the game.

“Yeah, no thanks to me.” I throw my batting helmet into my locker.

“You need a drink. Let’s go out. Mills, you up for it?”

“Not tonight. I’ve got this thing with my cousin,” Sawyer says.

“Another setup?” I ask.

He shrugs. “What can I say? He’s good at finding chicks who don’t care to be called the next day.”

“I think they’re called hookers,” I joke.

Sawyer throws his shirt at me as those around us get a good laugh. “You two love-birds go have your drink. I’ll have some girl shouting out my name by midnight.”

“Don’t forget your penicillin,” I say, handing him back his shirt.

“Dude, I double wrap just like you do.”