Page 8 of Faking It with my Small Town Billionaire

“Yes and no. I think.” I sound as certain as the weather. “I went to school with Orson Donovan, Jasmine. The people here were awful to him. You know Cindy Caldwell?”

“Who doesn’t?” Jasmine says, rolling her eyes. “The woman’s mouth never closes, and when it’s open, all I hear is ‘blah, blah, blah.’”

I giggle at Jasmine’s perfect description. “Well, she was one of the main perpetrators. She would rile the others up against him, and both the boys and the girls did her bidding to appease the most popular girl in school. She was a real piece of work.”

“I see nothing has changed, then,” Jasmine quips. “She’s still a mouthpiece. Now, she thinks she owns the town instead of the school.”

I couldn’t disagree. The only reason she isn’t on the town council is because she thinks it’s beneath her.

“And that is my point. I mean, how did he do it? How was he able to walk in here last night and speak to everyone so calmly, and—?”

“He’s outgrown this town,” Jasmine says, as if that’s the only logical answer.

But I’m struggling. It’s too simple. It’s hard to believe he’s just gotten over all of that. I know I haven’t, and I wasn’t even the target.

My colleague is still looking at me, and being the perceptive woman she is, she reads my mind. “But you don’t believe that.”

“Not really.” I shake my head. “He arrived here last night and did his best to charm us all. That, in and of itself, could not have been easy for him. But then, he acted like none of it happened. And there were some things he said that alerted me. Like how much he loved this town, and that Willow Creek made him the man he is today.”

“Maybe it did.” Jasmine shrugs.

I shake my head again. “That’s certainly not how I remember it.” I still get shivers down my spine when I think of some of the things they put him through. “They tortured him for years, Jasmine. He suffered constant name-calling. They painted his locker with words that would make your ears bleed. They tripped him up in the cafeteria, sending him and his lunch flying across the room. The humiliation was awful. And that’s not even the bad stuff.”

Talking about this is bringing up memories I’ve purposefully repressed. He was a loner with—if I remember—one friend who was also an outcast. If Jake wasn’t by his side, then Orson was on his own. That went on for all the years of school. When it was over, I never saw Orson Donovan again in this town. And I mean, ever. Which is why I was so surprised last night.

All right, breathless is probably a better description.

“But why?” Jasmine is frowning again. “What dreadful thing did he do to deserve such awful treatment?”

I then explain to her about the Donovans and how the town had treated their whole family. I tell her that Orson didn’t do anything to deserve any of it. He was just born with the wrong name.

Jasmine is gazing at me intently. “So, you think there’s another reason he’s here,” she says.

“I don’t know.” I shrug. “But you heard him last night, spouting all this garbage about the fondness he felt for this town. After school, he was out of here so fast, he left a plume of smoke behind him.”

Jasmine grins at me. Then she inclines her head. “You know, maybe he said what he felt he had to say,” she says wisely. “It’s obvious he had a hard time here, but he’s an accomplished businessman. I mean, my entire wardrobe wouldn’t add up to the cost of that fine suit he was wearing. Maybe he told the town what they needed to hear.”

“Maybe,” I reply.

“Sweetheart,” Jasmine begins, but the sound of the tinkling bell above the bakery door cuts her short, and we both turn to watch Mrs. Ferris walk in.

“Good morning, girls,” the old lady says.

She always calls us girls, but then, she is nearly eighty-two years old. Anyone below the age of sixty probably looks like a girl to her.

“What can I get you, Mrs. Ferris?”

And that made the discussion more or less over. We didn’t return to it after Mrs. Ferris left, and as the hour moved along, we didn’t get much chance between the customers.

But it hasn’t left my mind, even now, as the day has come to an end, and I’m upstairs in my apartment with my laptop open, ready to Zoom call my sisters. It’s a thing we do nearly every couple of weeks.

I’m just not convinced. I couldn’t have imagined anyone from Donovan Enterprises showing their face last night, but even if they had called ahead and booked a chair, I would have expected Orson’s father, not the man who suffered such ill will from these narrow-minded townsfolk.

He lied last night when he recalled fond memories of living here. And if he lied about that, what else was he lying about?

When Martha and Ellie pop up on the screen, I push the thought from my mind and beam a huge grin.

“Hey, you guys.”

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