BooksBarbecue
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Chapters (57)
  1. Cover
  2. Title Page
  3. Copyright
  4. Dedication
  5. Chapter One
  6. Chapter Two
  7. Chapter Three
  8. Chapter Four
  9. Chapter Five
  10. Chapter Six
  11. Chapter Seven
  12. Chapter Eight
  13. Chapter Nine
  14. Chapter Ten
  15. Chapter Eleven
  16. Chapter Twelve
  17. Chapter Thirteen
  18. Chapter Fourteen
  19. Chapter Fifteen
  20. Chapter Sixteen
  21. Chapter Seventeen
  22. Chapter Eighteen
  23. Chapter Nineteen
  24. Chapter Twenty
  25. Chapter Twenty-One
  26. Chapter Twenty-Two
  27. Chapter Twenty-Three
  28. Chapter Twenty-Four
  29. Chapter Twenty-Five
  30. Chapter Twenty-Six
  31. Chapter Twenty-Seven
  32. Chapter Twenty-Eight
  33. Chapter Twenty-Nine
  34. Chapter Thirty
  35. Chapter Thirty-One
  36. Chapter Thirty-Two
  37. Chapter Thirty-Three
  38. Chapter Thirty-Four
  39. Chapter Thirty-Five
  40. Chapter Thirty-Six
  41. Chapter Thirty-Seven
  42. Chapter Thirty-Eight
  43. Chapter Thirty-Nine
  44. Chapter Forty
  45. Chapter Forty-One
  46. Chapter Forty-Two
  47. Chapter Forty-Three
  48. Chapter Forty-Four
  49. Chapter Forty-Five
  50. Chapter Forty-Six
  51. Chapter Forty-Seven
  52. Chapter Forty-Eight
  53. Chapter Forty-Nine
  54. Chapter Fifty
  55. Acknowledgments
  56. Discover More
  57. About the Author

I pressed a finger to my lips. “Your mayor is a poet? How romantic!”

Jennifer snorted. “You’d have to ask his wife.”

He was married. Huh. They were always single in the movies. “What’s the town doctor’s name?”

Monica frowned. “Do we have a town doctor?”

I sighed. I could have kept going—bookstore owner, sheriff, town lawyer—but I was tired, and the beer wasn’t sitting too well. Besides, this line of questioning was getting me zero intel on Finn and no useful material for my story. It was supposed to be about an idyllic quiet town under attack by an outsider. So far, Pleasant Hollow was proving to be less than idyllic, and all the answers I was getting about the new condos suggested folks were either all for it or didn’t care either way. It wouldn’t do if I was going to advance my career and help my mom financially.

I thanked Jennifer and Monica for their friendliness and said I hoped to see them again, waved goodbye to Cousins One and Two—next time I’d determine which was Greg and which was Aaron—and headed back to the B&B.

It was time to recalibrate. Before I spoke to anyone else in town, I’d go to The Man himself—Andrew Hanes.

Chapter Eight

Chapter Eight

I woke up the next morning momentarily confused about where I was and how I’d gotten there. In my twenty-five years, I could count on my fingers and toes how many times, outside of the years in college, I’d slept anywhere besides the apartment I called home. But the walls were a vibrant cobalt blue instead of the subtle pale pink of my bedroom in Manhattan, and I had to turn to the left instead of the right to see if the sun was shining outside my window.

Once my mind cleared, I vaulted out of bed ready to start the official day one of my project. First stop: the site for the new development. According to my research, it was in the earlier stages of construction. My goal was to learn what Hanes planned to do with the building from the mouth of the Big Bad Wolf himself. It would earn me quotes from Hanes for the story and legitimate intel I could pass along to the townspeople to hopefully elicit the genuine and consistent reaction I needed. I didn’t have an appointment scheduled—I could only listen to Christopher Cross and Kenny Loggins while on hold with corporate for so long—but hoped Hanes would give me a few minutes of his time anyway.