SABRINA RYAN HAD NEVER planned to return home.
Not that Wheaton, British Columbia, the small town where she’d grown up—population: 4500, number of ATVs: 600, movie theater: 1—was home anymore. Not for the past nine years, at least. So finding herself there, for more than just a quick weekend visit, was a real kick in the teeth.
“What can I get you?” she asked the teenager at the front counter of her parents’ coffeehouse. Yes, that’s right. After living on her own and making her way in the world as a Vancouver newspaper columnist, becoming semi-well-known for her celebrity interviews in the process, she’d been reduced to working as a barista. In Wheaton.
She got irritated just thinking about it.
The teenager requested a latte and Sabrina set to work steaming the milk. At least he didn’t try to strike up a conversation, ask her what had brought her back and try to share all of his own life’s little details with her. Not like the previous ten people she’d served. And the ten people before them. And the ten people before them. And, really, everyone who’d made their way into the cozy coffee shop in the two weeks since her return.
So different than Vancouver, where a person could lose herself in the masses. Where a sudden appearance after years away brought no more than a single raised eyebrow, if anyone noticed at all. Sabrina sighed and watched as the milk began to froth. But anonymity was an anathema to small-town residents. Something she’d cheerfully forgotten in her years away because she hadn’t planned to come back. Ever.
She turned her attention to pulling the espresso shot, ignoring the pinch of her high-heeled boots around her right pinky toe. Considering she was going to be on her feet for the next seven hours, heels might not have been the most sensible choice, but it was bad enough that she’d had to leave her fabulous city life, amazing job and cultured friends behind. She wasn’t giving up her style, as well.
She rolled the milk to create a smooth, glossy surface and then poured it into the coffee with a couple of added wrist flicks and shakes to create a perfectly presented leaf. A latte that any Vancouverite would be proud to sip. Or take a photo of to share online.
Sabrina handed over the beverage, smiling through the pain in her foot and reminding herself that her visit was only that. A visit. A way station in her journey of life. Just as soon as she was able, she’d be on her way back to the city and Wheaton would be nothing more than a speck in her rearview mirror.
She made three more lattes, two espressos, eight plain black coffees and one hot chocolate in the next thirty minutes. She was asked about her return seven times during the same period, but though her answer remained the same—“Why am I back? My newspaper wants me to write a book about the celebrity interviews I’ve done over the years”—her smile began to feel strained. She might not have visited Wheaton since she was eighteen, but it still felt wrong lying to people. Even her parents didn’t know the real reason for her return. It was simply too embarrassing to admit she’d been fired. Too embarrassing to admit that she’d blown through her savings in less than six months and, with no cash to pay for food or rent or any other necessity, had been forced back here.
Sabrina inhaled slowly and concentrated on masking the shame with a cheerful smile. As far as she was concerned, no one would ever know. One day soon, she was sure her former boss and editor would greet her regular phone check-in with the news that she’d been forgiven her little gaffe and was needed back at the office immediately.
So far, no one had questioned her story. Not even Trish Mason, the editor of the Wheaton Digest, who’d agreed to hire her on part-time while she was in town. It felt like the first bit of good luck she’d had in ages.
Well, it had felt that way until Trish handed over her first assignment: interview the two candidates running for mayor this November.
The assignment itself wasn’t the problem. Although it was only May and the election wouldn’t take place until the third week in November, the fact that there was an actual race had caused big interest in Wheaton. Sabrina had already scheduled an interview with the challenger, Pete Peters, who’d been only too happy to agree to a sit-down interview, photo session and whatever else would get him into the local paper.
But the incumbent was a slippery sort. She’d tried calling and had even popped into his office last Friday to try to talk to him in person, but so far Noah Barnes had evaded her.
And Sabrina knew why.
Too bad for him, she wasn’t so easily dissuaded. Even though writing articles on a pair of small-town politicians angling for the mayor title was far below her usual celebrity subject matter and though the paper had a circulation in the thousands as opposed to over a million, she’d write to the best of her ability. Not just because the editor of the paper was a close family friend, but to prove to herself that she was still an excellent reporter.
Excellent enough to recognize the mayor when he walked into the coffee shop with the jangle of an overhead bell.
Noah
