Shelby shut the back door softly and leaned up against it, closing her eyes. As hard as she tried to be cool, to be normal and graceful, she was just an unrefined country girl who talked too much for her own good. Definitely not the kind of girl a handsome man from Chicago would be interested in. She sighed.

It felt like God had sent a big tease to her front door: a tall, gorgeous guy who didn’t just like reading, but could talk about it. Who made her laugh and didn’t run away screaming when he saw Daddy’s prosthetic leg. Shelby had always loved red hair too, maybe because no one in Lucky had it. The fact that he wasn’t from Lucky was the biggest part of the tease. Shelby didn’t want to settle with someone local, but because of her daddy, she also couldn’t leave.

And of course he had money. She’d already heard about his fancy car from Gracie, who heard it from her mother, who heard it from someone at the Market Basket. Knowing that he was wealthy made Shelby unable to trust herself. Because while she wasn’t a superficial kind of girl, she was also hard-up for cash.

The thought of money made her hairline start to sweat and her hands get shaky. She’d been fighting off the bank for almost two years now as they kept trying to foreclose on their property. The pressure of trying to stay afloat was tearing her apart. She hated how she was always plotting for a way out of debt. Whether it was renting out the Airstream, selling cupcakes, tying balloon animals and face-painting at kids’ birthday parties, or just picking up extra shifts at the diner, her whole life felt like it had a singular purpose: Don’t let the bank foreclose on the house.

It was so bad that each new time Rhett McClure, the mayor’s son, asked to marry her, she came closer to saying yes. Despite his slimy grin and pompous attitude. Even despite his sister Daisy and his father, Mayor McClure, both of whom Shelby hated even more than Rhett.

Knowing that Rhett could snap his fingers—or open his wallet—and make her problems disappear made her think about saying yes. Because this last letter from the bank made it sound like she might have finally hit the end of the runway they gave her.

Now there was a tall, handsome, wealthy redhead staying in her trailer. One who knew nothing about her money troubles or the whispers about her crazy mama. He liked books and was funny and smart. But he’d be leaving in a day or two, whenever his car was fixed.

“Shel? You back, girl?”

“Yes, Daddy.”

Shelby set about the nightly routine. She fixed Daddy a glass of water, lukewarm from the tap the way he liked, and shook out two of his pills into her palm.

“Is that boy in love with you yet? Let me know if I need to do a little gun cleaning tomorrow. Just to put him in his place.”

She walked into the living room, where he was still reclining in his chair, the TV on mute now. His leg sat on the wobbly metal television tray table, right on top of the TV guide. She set down a glass of water next to him and held out the pills.

“You’ll do no such thing,” she said. “Now sit up and take your multivitamins.”

He didn’t fight her as he sometimes did. He knew full well that they weren’t vitamins, but he happily pretended along with her. Just one more thing they didn’t talk about: Mama running off, his PTSD, and whatever was wrong with his brain.

When he came back from his third tour in Afghanistan, it was after stepping on an IED. The loss of his leg was the easy part. Sure, he didn’t want to wear the prosthetic. But he would, when he needed to get around. The big issue was the undiagnosed brain injury. As in, they knew he had a brain injury, but they couldn’t diagnose it. Or fix it. He was lucky to be alive after the shrapnel to the skull. And he wasn’t a vegetable.

They sent Shelby home with his prescription for Keppra—some drug that was supposed to keep him from having seizures and reduce the risk of stroke. And though she loved him, her daddy just didn’t live fully in reality. Not that he was crazy. Not like her mama. But he suffered brain trauma, which caused seizures and other issues if he didn’t stay on a steady regimen of Keppra and a few other things. Another cost. The Army paid some, but not enough.

He couldn’t be trusted to take them himself. Both because he might not remember and also because he didn’t want to take them. The doctor said he either needed to be in a facility or have full-time paid care at home. Without the money for either and knowing she wouldn’t have done either anyway, it all fell on Shelby once her mama left. Which was ten years ago, right after he came home. Perfect timing.

Shelby put the glass of water in his hand and he drank, his eyes sleepy and only half-opened. When he lay back in the recliner, she covered his legs with a crocheted blanket. It was getting threadbare. Her mother had made it when she was pregnant with Shelby. Almost every night for the last ten years he’d slept here in this recliner with that blanket. Shelby hated it and wanted to throw it away, but knew he’d have her hide. She knew what he was doing: sleeping in a recliner where he could see the front door in case she came home, wrapped up in something she’d made for him. It broke Shelby’s heart a little bit every day and made her equal parts furious with her mama.

“Did you kiss him?”

“Daddy!” Her cheeks flamed and she smacked him on the shoulder. His eyes were fully closed now and she thought he’d drifted off. He had a huge grin on his face.

Shelby left the TV on but turned off the lamps and locked the front door. As she headed down the hall, she called out, “But if I did, I’d never kiss and tell!”

“Girl, get me my shotgun!”

“Night, Daddy!”

Despite all his bark, she knew that he wanted her to find someone and settle down. Which, ironically, she couldn’t do precisely because of him. Who would take care of him if she was gone? To an outsider he would just seem like a burden. No one wants to start a marriage when your wife comes with someone like Daddy, needing care and ornery about it.

Of course, the other problem was the lack of men. Daddy hated Rhett maybe even more than she did. He loved Matt, but knew Shelby didn’t feel that way about him. Every so often, Daddy listed out why she should like him, but that didn’t change her mind. There were other guys in town who had pursued her, even a few men closer to her daddy’s age, which made her feel sick.

Not one the guys she’d ever met had made anything in her come alive. Not the way Jake did in the hour she had known him. It was probably just that he was new. And unattainable. You always want the shiny, new toy you can’t have.

Shelby was too keyed up to sleep and stopped in her library, running her hands over the spines of the books, thinking of how Jake looked at these shelves the same way she did. He got it. She wondered what it would be like to have him sit in the chair next to hers, reading. He’d need a bigger chair—the two armchairs weren’t nearly big enough for someone so tall.

No more Jake thoughts! Ugh. They were swirling around, adding to the uneasy feelings she had about her meeting with the bank tomorrow. Until that was over, her stomach felt like it was filled with slithering snakes. She had money saved up, but not enough to cover what was due—or rather, overdue. She was well-loved in Lucky, but that only got you so far.

Shelby needed a book that would get both Jake and the bank out of her head.

Her mood was very Winter of Our Discontent, which meant she needed the opposite end of the spectrum. She pulled down The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants. This was the perfect place to lose herself for the night. Matt was picking her up early for the breakfast shift at the diner, but coffee could keep her going through the day if she stayed up late reading.

Tomorrow she could worry about the bank and Daddy and why she couldn’t stop smiling as she pictured Jake’s face. For tonight, she would dive into someone else’s fictional problems, which would all be resolved neatly by the time she got to the end.