Free Rising from the Ashes by Jessica Prince Page B

than every damn woman in Cloverleaf combined. If Savvy found out that people knew about us, she would shut herself off tighter than she’d ever been. Nope, no way I was risking it.
    “What are you talkin’ about? I’m always in a good mood.”
    He eyed me skeptically. “Yeah, but not like this,” he said, waving his hand at me. “You were whistling when I walked up. You’re downright chipper this morning. What’s going on?”
    I turned back to the car and began working again. I needed him to get of here before I found myself spouting shit about Savvy that would undo all the work I’d already put in. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, man. Nothing’s going on. Just a good day, I guess.”
    Like an answer to my prayers, the radio on his shoulder screeched and pulled his concentration away from harassing me. He mumbled a few words into the radio and stood. “Gotta go. Got a drunk and disorderly.”
    I looked at my watch and glanced back up at him. “At nine thirty in the morning?”
    Luke chuckled as he called out over his shoulder, “Yeah. Apparently, Forrest Hendrix had a hard night of partyin’. Barb got pissed and locked him out of the house…naked.”
    The image of a naked Forrest Hendrix sent a chill down my spine. “Wear gloves,” I hollered after him.

    I was sitting at work later that morning, trying to concentrate on my job and not that smokin’ hot kiss Jeremy gave me before walking off again, when my cell phone rang on my desk. I looked down to see Emmy’s gray eyes smiling back at me, and slid my finger across the screen to answer. “Hello?”
    “OMG!” she exclaimed before I ever got the full word out.
    “Emmy, we’ve discussed this. I will hang up on you if you insist on text-talking. You’re better than that.”
    Her tinkling laughter rang through the speaker. “IDK what you’re talking about BFF, Savvy.”
    “Hanging up now,” I said with a chuckle. “I’m kind of busy right now, Em.” Trying not to spontaneously combust from thinking about Jeremy.
    “So, you’re telling me that you don’t want to hear the latest in the Cloverleaf grapevine?”
    That instantly piqued my curiosity. “You’re telling me you got gossip?” I asked, sitting up straighter in my chair.
    “Jeez, you’re such a gossip whore,” Emmy replied with a laugh.
    “Guilty as charged. Now, spill it, sister.”
    As Emmy spoke through the phone, my thoughts trailed back to Jeremy—how the muscles on his back had flexed while he’d been making breakfast this morning, how his chest and stomach felt when I ran my hands down them, how the kisses he’d given me were enough to crack the foundation I’d built over seven years of regret and self-denial. I was so wrapped up in everything Jeremy that I hadn’t listened to a single word Emmy had been saying.
    “Are you listening?”
    Emmy’s annoyed tone broke through my lusty haze and pulled my attention back. “Sorry…what?” I asked.
    “Ugh! You didn’t listen to a damn word I just said.”
    I rolled my eyes before responding, “Oh, untwist your panties, you big baby. You enjoy telling gossip as much as I like hearing it, so just start again from the beginning.”
    “Okay, well”—she took a breath for dramatic emphasis—“this is coming straight from the source, so you’re the first to find out.”
    The anticipation was killing me. I really was a gossip whore.
    “So,” Emmy continued, “I’d just opened up Virgie May’s, and I was setting up the pastry case when Charlotte came bursting through like her ass was on fire. And she just up and quit. Can you believe it?”
    My back went stiff at the mention of her name. “What? Did she tell you why she quit?” I asked, completely shocked.
    With everything that had happened between me and Jeremy since last night, I never stopped to think about how Charlotte might have handled the breakup. Clearly, she hadn’t handled it well.
    “She was totally hysterical,” Emmy said dramatically.