“I doubt I’m any better than Sam. And I certainly don’t know more than he does about running Winslow’s. I do know one thing though. He cares a hell of a lot more about the firm than I do.”

  It was like talking to a brick wall. Joel wasn’t going to give up.

  “Think about it, son.”

  “I’ve already thought about it. I won’t help you hurt my little brother. If you want to stab him in the back, you’ll have to do it on your own.”

  Without waiting for Joel’s reply Zack slapped his drink down on the desk, turned on his heel, and marched out of the house and down the front porch steps. If he’d stayed, he would have had more to say. None of it would be helpful.

  He’d go to the wedding tomorrow, act like he didn’t disapprove, and then get back in that rental car and drive somewhere.

  Anywhere. It didn’t matter the destination.

  He just needed to be far away from Winslow Heights. Maybe he’d find himself somewhere along the way.

  Lucy Gilbert adjusted a stack of books on the front table for the fifth time, still not quite satisfied with how they looked. A bestselling author had written a new mystery, and Lucy was setting up a display in the middle of her bookstore.

  “You’re a perfectionist,” her friend and employee Jane teased. “It looks great. I love the cover, too. I think this one is going to fly off the shelves.”

  “It’s definitely intriguing,” Lucy agreed. “It’s on my to-be-read list. Just as soon as I finish that thriller I started last week.”

  There was a reason Lucy owned a bookstore. All the books she could read and then some.

  “Speaking of intriguing,” Jane giggled, looking over her shoulder to ensure that no one was listening. “Mary told me that the Winslow kids are back in town for the wedding. She saw both Zack and Frankie.”

  Mary ran the most popular hair salon in Winslow Heights. It was also the best place to catch the latest gossip, along with the cafe, and the oil change-slash-tire place on the corner.

  Yes, men gossip just as much as women do. They might even be worse.

  “I’d hardly categorize Zack and Frankie as kids,” Lucy replied. “He’s about thirty-six, and I think she’s thirty or so. And did she see them? Because she’s been open all day and if they just flew in…”

  “Okay, she maybe didn’t see them herself. But there have been sightings.”

  “You make it sound like Bigfoot and the LochNess Monster. Zack and Frankie grew up here. It’s not a shock that they’ve come home for the wedding.”

  Jane’s brows shot up.

  “C’mon, everyone knows that the Winslows are divided about Papa Winslow marrying his late wife’s sister.”

  Sadly, that was true. It was a bit unsavory, to be honest. Lily Winslow had been declared dead a few years back. A decade ago she’d gone to a doctor’s appointment and then the grocery store. She’d never come home.

  No word from her. Nothing from a possible kidnapper. No signs of violence. Her car had been found in the supermarket parking lot. Her purse and phone were gone.

  Lily Winslow had disappeared off the face of the earth somehow.

  There had been “sightings” through the years that only kept up the family’s hopes, but they’d never panned out. Search parties had combed every inch of the county but had found nothing. If Lily Winslow was still alive, she was doing a great job of hiding. In the end, Joel Winslow had his wife legally declared dead. Only a few months later he’d gone public about dating Kim, Lily’s younger sister, although there had been rumors about the couple for a long time.

  “No one truly knows what goes on in another person’s home,” Lucy said. “We don’t know how the family feels about the marriage.”

  “Yes, we do,” Jane declared. “Piper is loud and proud about how she feels about her old man. And everyone also knows that Sam would stand by his daddy. Cooper hates him, and Tate is decidedly neutral.”

  “I guess what I mean is that we don’t know what Zack and Frankie think about this.”

  “You went to school with Zack,” Jane pointed out. “What do you think?”

  “I think that I didn’t know him well enough to have an opinion about it.”

  “You were in the same friend group.”

  “Sort of. We were more acquaintances than anything. We moved in the same friend group, but I was a year behind him. He was a nice guy, but he didn’t pay any attention to me.”

  Zack Winslow had been a decent person, despite his family’s wealth and history with the town. The Winslows had helped found Winslow Heights. Their name was everywhere - even on the local university. But Zack had never seemed stuck up or snotty. But he’d definitely had his share of self-esteem. Even as a teenager, he’d been so gosh darn certain about everything. His belief in what his future entailed was unshakable. In a way, she’d admired him. He seemed to have it all figured out while the rest of them were just making it up as they went along.

  “He dated Angel Barnes, right? Maybe they’ll get back together.”

  Ah yes, Angel Barnes. How could Lucy forget about her? While Zack had been friendly to everyone, never bragging about his connections and wealth, Angel had been the opposite. She gloated constantly about dating the handsomest and richest guy in high school. She’s show off the gifts she’d received from him and make everyone else’s life a misery. She’d be nasty to anyone she didn’t think was on her level, but then acting all sweet and innocent around Zack or adults. The teachers had thought she was some sort of saint, with her big blue eyes and pale blonde hair.

  “She’s dating Deputy Blake,” Lucy reminded her friend. “I hear they’re serious about each other. Shit, now you have me gossiping.”

  Angel and her husband had divorced a few years back. He’d remarried to a local schoolteacher. They had a baby on the way.

  “You’re going to the wedding,” Jane reminded Lucy. “Maybe you’ll see Zack there.”

  “Half the town is going to the wedding, and I probably will since so many people will be there. But it’s a huge wedding. I doubt I’ll even talk to him. He wouldn’t remember me anyway.”

  “I’m not going to the wedding.”

  “You’re invited,” Lucy said. “Everyone in town is invited.”

  Jane hadn’t lived in Winslow Heights all that long. She’d come to town five years ago with her then husband who had proceeded to drink, gamble, and womanize. Eventually, Jane had divorced him, and he’d left Winslow Heights to take a job in a bigger city.

  Jane, on the other hand, decided to go back to school to finish her degree. She was currently working at the bookstore part-time while also attending classes. She was only a semester away from finishing her accounting degree.

  “I know, but it would be weird to go,” Jane replied. “I don’t really know them. I’d feel out of place.”

  Jane didn’t like large crowds with a lot of unfamiliar people. She preferred smaller gatherings. Lucy did, too, but she’d be disowned by her mother if she didn’t go to the wedding.

  “You and I could hang out together. I won’t leave you by yourself.”

  “Naw, I’m good. I’m planning a quiet day studying. Maybe I’ll take a nap.”

  The entire downtown would be deserted so Lucy and Jane were closing the bookstore. They wouldn’t have any customers anyway. The university only had summer term going right now so most of the students were gone, and the rest of the residents would be at the wedding.

  It wouldn’t be so bad to spend an afternoon at a fancy wedding. She could get dressed up, sip some champagne, and enjoy having a day off. She might even slip out of the reception early and go home to read and relax.

  “Who do you think will say it?”

  Lucy had been lost in thought, and she hadn’t heard the first part of what Jane had said.

  “Who will say what?”

  “Who do you think will say it? Zack? Tate? Frankie? Cooper? We know Sam won’t.”

  “I’m completely lost. What are we talking about?”

  “You were off in thought again,” Jane laughed, not at all insulted. “I was asking which of the Winslows are going to object during the ceremony. You know that part where the minister asks if anyone has any objections?”

  “I don’t think any of them will say anything. If they object, they just wouldn’t go to the ceremony.”

  “It would be so Jane Eyre-esque.”

  “You’re reading too many books.”

  “Pot. Kettle.”

  Jane had a valid point.

  “It would be dramatic,” Jane said. “This little town can get kind of boring at times.”

  “Trust me. Winslow Heights has had drama. It’s better this way.”

  There wasn’t anything wrong with a nice, quiet little town.

  Drama was usually accompanied by its sister - Trouble. And when a town had Drama and Trouble at the same time…

  It wasn’t good.

  2

  “Hey, Zack. Long time, no see. Here for your daddy’s wedding?”

  Zack stopped on the sidewalk to speak to another pedestrian that had been going the opposite way. Winslow Heights wasn’t a huge town, but it also wasn’t one where he knew every citizen by name either. She looked familiar with her gray hair, blue eyes, and lined, friendly face. She obviously knew who he was, and he’d barely visited in the last ten years.

  And after speaking with his father earlier, he fully remembered why.

  They didn’t get along very well. It always ended up in a disagreement, and Joel Winslow simply couldn’t fathom that he could be wrong. About anything. He also assumed that he was in charge of everything and everyone around him. Zack wasn’t a kid anymore, and he’d stopped taking orders from his father a long time ago. He wasn’t going to change that any time in the future.

  My family is as dysfunctional as hell.

  “I am,” he replied. “I just flew in this morning. Thought I’d walk around town a bit. It’s changed some since I was here last.”

  The nice lady didn’t need to know about the problems between Zack and his dad. Although the way gossip flew around this town, she might already know. He’d left the house a full twenty minutes ago. That was enough time…

  “The old movie theater shut down a few years ago when Elmer Sykes retired to Florida, and they bulldozed the elementary school and built a new one. Fancy, too.”

  “I drove by it this morning. It does look nice.”

  They seemed to have run out of topics to discuss although he had a gut feeling she wanted to ask him more.

  Like if he was happy his dad was marrying his aunt.

  And how his mother would have felt about it. If she’d been here, that is.

  And maybe how long he planned to stay in town.

  His answers?

  He didn’t have any good answers to those questions, so it was probably best if he ended the conversation quickly. The woman waved to someone else down the block before she told him to have a nice day and enjoy some of the sunshine. Summer had finally come to the little town, and it was a beautiful day. Not that he’d noticed all that much.

  “You have a nice day, too.”

  The woman joined her friend and Zack continued down the sidewalk, taking in the little town he’d been brought up in.

  It was far different than what he’d grown used to. He’d been living in New York City, working a punishingly fast-paced job on Wall Street that barely let him sleep eight hours a night. He hadn’t had more than five days off in a row in six years. Work-life balance had been a joke that he and his co-workers would laugh about as they cashed their outrageous paychecks. He was thirty-six years old and exhausted. There were days he felt like he was seventy. He was sure that it wasn’t supposed to be like this.

  That’s why he’d quit.

  Not a soul knew that he’d done it, although his co-workers had probably learned of his resignation by now. Zack had walked into his boss’s office, slapped down his two week notice, and didn’t regret it for a second. There had been the usual pleas from the management that he could take some time off, think about it, surely, he didn’t want to do this, right? Eventually, they’d realized he was serious.

  For the first time in over a decade, he didn’t have any place to be in the foreseeable future. No responsibilities, no appointments, no ringing phones, no deadlines. He could simply live his life any way that he wanted to.

  And he had no earthly idea how to do that. He’d forgotten what it was like to be human.

  What did people do in the middle of the day when they didn’t have to be anywhere at a specific time? They might stop in the local watering hole to have a drink.

  Conveniently, Zack’s wandering had brought him to the front door of his brother Tate’s bar and grill - Tate’s Tavern. Why not get a drink? He wasn’t driving, and no one was depending on him for anything.

  The air conditioning hit him when he walked in, raising goosebumps on his arm. The place wasn’t even half full, only a few tables occupied and one guy sitting at the bar talking to the bartender.

  His brothers. Tate behind the bar, and Cooper sitting on the other side.

  “I’m not surprised to see you behind the bar,” Zack said, walking up behind Cooper. “But what’s your story, brother? It’s a little early in the day.”

  In seconds, Zack was wrapped up in a hug from his younger brother, and Tate had rounded the bar to take his turn, too. They were slapping each other on the back and grinning. At least for now they were happy to see each other. It might change later.

  “It’s after five in Hong Kong,” Cooper teased. “Or at least, I think it is. Sit the fuck down and have a beer, big brother. Why didn’t you tell me you were flying in this morning? I would have picked you up at the airport.”

  “I rented a car. I wanted to have wheels while I was here.”

  “You could have used one of the cars at the house,” Tate said. “You didn’t have to rent one. Hell, I would have lent you mine if you needed it.”

  “I didn’t want to make a big deal of it. I enjoyed the drive into town.”

  Winslow Heights was about an hour from a major airport, although it had its own executive airfield for private planes.

  “It looks exactly the same,” Cooper groaned, sitting back down on a barstool. “Nothing ever changes around here.”

  “You being here is a big change,” Zack pointed out. “Are you here for good? Or is this just a pit stop along the way? Are you here for the wedding?”

  “The wedding?” Cooper laughed. “I am not attending that event. Dad knows how I feel about it all. But yes, I am back in town. For good? Who knows the future? I’m here for now.”

  Cooper had been born with an insatiable curiosity about other places on the globe, and as soon as he’d been old enough to travel, he’d gone off on far-away adventures in places Zack had barely even heard of. He’d come home every now and then, drop off a few souvenirs he’d picked up, and then be back on the road again.

  As far as Zack knew, Cooper had never held a job. Not a real one, anyway. He might have picked up odd jobs here and there, but for over ten years he’d had no discernible income stream that anyone knew about. Cooper might be a drug dealer or a pirate for all they knew. Yet he never seemed to lack money, and he had all that he needed.

  To be fair, Cooper wasn’t the type to spend money, even if he had it. He’d lived out of a backpack most of the time, slept on couches and floors, and hung out with the locals wherever he was. He liked the simple life, and his father’s conspicuous consumption had always turned him off.

  “That’s good,” Zack said. “Are you staying at the house?”

  “Oh, hell no,” Cooper laughed. “I have an apartment over the shutdown movie theater. It’s decent, and everything is close by.”

  “He means this place is close by,” Tate said, rolling his eyes. “He eats pretty much all his meals here. We don’t even hand him a menu anymore. He’s memorized it. Are you hungry? The kitchen is open.”

  Zack was about to deny that he needed to eat but his stomach spoke up first, growling for food. The muffin he’d had in the airport this morning seemed a long time ago.

  “I could eat,” he conceded, sliding onto the barstool next to Cooper. “And I will take that beer, please.”

  Zack reached for his wallet, but Tate shook his head.

  “Your money isn’t any good here,” Tate said. “But Cooper’s is. I’ll put it on his tab.”

  Zack made a mental note to ask about that tab before he left town. He could pay it off without saying anything and then slip away before Cooper found out. He didn’t know Cooper’s financial situation, but he knew his own. He could afford to help a brother.

  “I don’t mind buying my older brother a beer,” Cooper said. “And how about we share a pizza? I’m getting hungry, too.”

  The Winslow boys loved pizza. Zack wasn’t turning down that offer.

  When the pizza came out of the kitchen, piping hot and smelling delicious, the three of them sat down in an unoccupied booth away from the other patrons. Tate had another employee watch the bar, although the young man looked incredibly bored and uninterested in his job.

  “Is it tough to get good help?” Zack asked, nodding to the bartender who was now scrolling on his phone.

  “The worst,” Tate groaned. “I sound like an old fart when I say this, but man, kids these days only care about their phones. When I was twenty-one, all I cared about was girls and beer. And football. That’s it.”

  “Kids aren’t so bad. Every generation complains about the next one,” Cooper said, biting into his pizza.

  “Says the man that doesn’t have any kids, and never spends any time with them,” Tate replied. “When are you going to get married and have kids, anyway? Doesn’t Dad bother you about that? Because he’s driving me crazy. I swear it’s the only topic he has these days.”

  “He’s worried about his legacy,” Cooper said. “None of his children have given him grandchildren and he doesn’t want the Winslow name to die out. Or some bullshit like that. We’re not fucking royalty. Who cares if the Winslow line dies out? Maybe it should.”