Free Nolan: Return to Signal Bend by Susan Fanetti

situations out of his control, and Badger and Adrienne had decided that John, their youngest, a toddler, was too young for the occasion. So Bo and John were spending the night with Lori Mortensen, who had been Bo’s babysitter all his life.
     
    But Iris had charge of all the other kids: Isaac & Lilli’s Gia; Bart’s Lexi, Ian, and Deck; Nolan’s little brother, Loki; Badger and Adrienne’s three oldest, Henry, Megan, and Caroline; and, of course, Millie and Joey. Ten kids in all.
     
    She was excited. It would be a party, and probably more fun than getting stupid drunk and doing something stupid, then spending the next day hung over and miserable.
     
    “I’m very sure. Gia’s fourteen. She can help. And Millie, you’ll be my helper, right? You’ll keep the little ones entertained, too?”
     
    “Yeah! We can do art!”
     
    “We can. We can do lots of stuff.”
     
    Millie jumped down from the bed. “I’m going to get my art stuff! Can we make an art station like at the museum?”
     
    “Sure. Why don’t you set that up in the dining room. I’ll help in a few minutes.”
     
    “Okay! We need to make sure everything’s safe for little hands!” Millie had run most of the way down the hall before her sentence was complete.
     
    When Iris turned back, Shannon was standing there in her black leather pants and pretty black lace bra, her silk robe open. Her expression was wisely amused. “You dispatched her handily. There something on your mind?”
     
    “I have a question.”
     
    “About Nolan.”
     
    Iris sat down on the end of the bed. “Is it that obvious?”
     
    Shannon sat next to her. “Honey, I won’t say everybody knows that something is going on between you two, but I will say that it is known. Your dad knows, too. We’ve talked about it.”
     
    Great. People were talking about her and Nolan, and Iris didn’t even think there was a her and Nolan. “But that’s just it—nothing is going on. Except…I don’t know. It’s strange. I think we’re just friends, though. Pretty sure.”
     
    “Then what did you want to ask?”
     
    Now, Iris was shy and ashamed to ask. “I think it’s stupid.”
     
    “Ask, Iris. No harm in that.”
     
    “I was going to ask you to let me know if he was…with anybody tonight. I know that’s creepy and awful, but things are weird between us, and it would help me know what’s going on.”
     
    “Weird how?”
     
    There was a protective edge to Shannon’s tone, so Iris smiled and shook her head. “Nothing bad. It’s more that I don’t think he knows what he wants, and I don’t know how to be around him.”
     
    “Be you. Always be you, no matter what.” Shannon sighed and stared at the floor for a few seconds. “You know, Nolan’s…he’s gone through some hard things.”
     
    So had Iris, but she didn’t say that. “I know.”
     
    “You know about the girl in California?”
     
    “Yeah, I know. I saw her video. That was a long time ago, though.” The girl had made a video of her doing all the things on her bucket list before she died. Her family had put it online a few months after her death, and it had gone viral. Everyone Iris knew had seen it.
     
    It was a happy, funny video, and a devastatingly sad one, too.
     
    Nolan had been in a lot of the footage. Seeing him with that girl had made Iris see him as more than just another club kid. She’d fallen for him a little, watching him love that girl.
     
    “I don’t think it was so long ago for Nolan. He’s been alone ever since, and I know you know he doesn’t need to be.”
     
    That was true. Every girl within about a hundred miles of Signal Bend, and probably many thousands of girls across the globe who’d seen him in that video, being all hot and sweet and perfect, wanted to get with Nolan Mariano.
     
    Iris had watched the video over and over, and though she couldn’t remember the girl’s name, she could still remember, almost verbatim, the words she’d said to Nolan at