Page 73 of Breaking the Ice

When she left.

With everything that had happened in the last little while she’d forgotten that her job was only temporary.

“Not a morning person?”

Samantha pulled her thoughts back from the brink. “Not a dawn person.”

Nick grinned. “Best time of the day.”

“Ugh,” she repeated.

“I rang Kelly,” he said, wrapping his hands around his mug. “She said their numbers have been swelling through the night.”

The news perked Samantha up. “That’s great.”

“Apparently some professional protestors have showed up so I hope things don’t get ugly.”

She rolled her eyes. “It’s hardly an anti-war demonstration.”

“These things can get out of hand quickly. We don’t want to have the purpose of this march lost because a few hotheads couldn’t keep a lid on it. As long as they’re on their best behavior and leave their super glue and joints behind, I suppose it’ll be okay.”

Samantha almost choked on her tea. “There’s going to be marijuana?”

“Maybe.”

“Cool. I’ve never done that.” And it was legal now. “Do you think I’m too old to smoke pot?”

“No. I think you’re too smart. You seriously didn’t smoke a joint at school?”

“No. We lived in the middle of nowhere. There weren’t any drugs.”

Nick rolled his eyes. “Of course there were. People in the middle of nowhere need them the most.”

“How come I never got offered any?”

“You probably didn’t hang around in those circles. Where’d you spend your lunchbreaks?”

“At the library.”

“I rest my case. Library geeks aren’t generally known for their substance abuse.”

Samantha sighed. Yep, that was what she’d been. A library geek. One look at Nick told her he’d been one of the in crowd. Theitcrowd. He would have hung with the cool kids.

Hell, hewasthe cool kid.

And everyone knew the cool boydid notlook twice at the geeky girl…

Fifteen minutes later, Samantha was showered and dressed in an A-line corduroy skirt and T-shirt withSave Martha’sstamped across the front. She had her hair in a ponytail and Keds on her feet. Nick shoved another hot drink in a takeout cup at her as he met her outside the bookshop and, with the sky a soft dawn-blue they walked the ten minutes to the picket line outside the heavy wooden doors of Tetworth’s oldest teahouse.

She tried really hard not to think about how nice it had been waking up to Nick as they walked. Or how her eggs had sighed happily at the sound of his voice. Or how there’d been a strange warm feeling in the center of her chest. Waking up at Nick’s had only felt so right because it reminded her of Birdie.

That was all.

The group gathered outside Martha’s was heartening but it wasn’t until they’d marched through the city and arrived at city square that the full impact of their protest efforts was realized. It was packed with supporters and Samantha’s heart did a little happy dance.

She looked around at the eclectic bunch that had swelled their ranks all morning. There were a lot of Hawkeye fans – a lot of Crabbers jerseys and hats and foam fingers – but there was also a lot of older people as well as a strong representation of Gen Zs. Also, as Nick had said, there was a professional protestor element ready to march for anything anti-establishment.

After they’d milled around for forty-five minutes and different people took to the stairs that formed the entrance to the beautiful old sandstone building that was city hall, revving up the crowd through a megaphone, it was Nick’s turn. He’d been posing for selfies and signing autographs pretty much non-stop, but he made his way to the stairs just as the clock in the tower that dominated the building’s roofline clicked over to midday.

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