Page 11 of Second Chance for the Grump

A sense of calm settled deep in my bones, almost as if time had righted itself. We were right back where we started. Maybe this time our story would have a different ending.

“Elephant ear?” the man behind a window in a small white building screamed as we reached him.

I shook my head and laughed. The engines of the generators kicked to life, adding another layer to the carnival noise. An orange bulb, a different color than the rest, hung over the elephant ear booth, setting him apart from his peers.

“Are you sure you don’t want one?” Rowan asked as he threw away the paper plate from his seasoned fries we purchased from the food trucks on the other side of the town square.

I held my stomach. “No, I couldn’t eat another bite.”

Somewhere behind us—closer to the center of the activities—a country song crackled through an old speaker. A child with plastic vampire teeth half hanging out of his mouth and a melting caramel apple in his hand ran past us.

Rowan stepped out of his way and then watched. “None of these kids are sleeping tonight.”

“That’s part of the fun.” I laughed when a superhero quickly followed as if in pursuit of the vampire.

Then a cloud fell over my emotions without warning. The bit of peace evaporated into something else. It happened often. Grief had a way of sneaking up on me. I should have been excited to be here again with Rowan, and I had been a minute earlier, but reality came too quickly.

It made my chest ache.

Sure, he was here with me now, but he’d been here with me two years ago as well. It didn’t mean he planned to stay.

How long would I have him this time? And would we get Charlie back before he left?

“Did the Ferris wheel piss you off?” he asked.

I whipped my head and attention to him. “What? No.”

“You were glaring at it pretty hard.”

I blinked nice and slow. “Was not.”

“Baby girl, you gave that thing so much stink eye, it lost confidence.” As if on cue, the Ferris wheel came to a jolting stop.

I laughed.

Rowan’s upper lip twitched as if he’d gotten exactly what he wanted.

My chest hurt more. Fuck, why did his smile hit me in all the feels?

It wasn’t fair. Rowan looked unnaturally good tonight. His dark flannel stretched across his shoulders, and he made his worn jeans look supermodel-ready. He was also bigger than I remembered him to be. Which was shocking, since his bigness was one of the things I remembered most about him.

Alaska treated him well.

I wondered if it would have done the same for me? Would the fresh air, quiet, and wilderness have reduced my stress lines or made them worse? Something seemed magical about all that rugged wilderness and alone time, but also terrifying. What if I couldn’t hack it on America’s frontier?

A small child with her hair pulled back into pigtails ran by, clutching a giant stuffed ghost almost as long as she was tall. Rowan watched her for a second before turning his glance toward me.

“Are you sure you don’t want an emotional support funnel cake?” he asked as we passed the stand.

I snorted at his joke and the way it made my tummy tumble with happiness. “No.”

“Liar,” he said with a headshake, but his gaze softened as he stared at me.

If only I could be in his head to know what he was thinking because it seemed like his gaze was saying he felt very much the same as me.

In love.

And that worried me. I was definitely not still in love with Rowan. That would be crazy. Right?