Page 30 of Forever To Me

I follow her and do the same. After I dry my hands, she hands me an apron with a cup of coffee on it, and I slip it over my head, tying it around my waist.

“Do your mom and brother live here, too?” I ask as I look at the recipe sheet she hands me.

“No, my mom moved to town a few months ago, and Ollie is living above Poppy’s dad’s shop in town.”

“So, it’s just you out here?” I ask as I start grabbing ingredients from the shelf.

“I have my dog, her name is Love. She’s a blue heeler,” she says as she nods to the back porch where a dog sleeps in the sun.She gets up and stretches and trots toward me when she sees me.

“Oh,” I say as I look at her and realize how much she looks like my dog. Well, my dog I don’t have anymore.

“What?” she asks, searching my face.

“I had a blue heeler, too. Mine was named Rip Heeler,” I tell her.

She chuckles, “That’s cute. I lovedYellowstone.”

“Me, too,” I admit, as I measure out the dry ingredients.

A hollow ache settles deep in my chest, one I’ve tried to ignore for weeks. I swallow hard, blinking at the ceiling, willing away the sting of tears in my eyes.

I miss him. He wasn’t just a dog, he was my best friend. And now I’m trying to pretend it doesn’t hurt as much as it does.

Rip should be with me. And I hate that he isn’t. I don’t even know if he’s okay.

“What happened to him?” she asks, looking up.

I open my mouth to form the words and honestly don’t know where to begin. I exhale a deep breath. “My ex still has him. He wouldn’t let me have him. But he was my heart dog. You know? That once-in-a-lifetime dog that you bond with. He was my best friend.”

She asks me, “Why didn’t he let you take him?”

I shake my head. “He was being spiteful. If I’d taken him, he’d have ruined me even more than he did.”

“Where’s he at now? Just so you know, I’m not above dog napping.” She shakes her head, looking mad. “And ruin you? What did he do?”

“He’s back in Nashville. My ex has the apartment we shared and, to be honest, he never even liked Rip. He knows he belonged with me,” I say. “I’d steal him back in a heartbeat if I could.”

“Wait, what happened? Why did he ruin you?” she asks again as she mixes up her ingredients, pausing to heat up the ovens.

I want to tell her. I want to open up to someone and have a friend. But the last time I did that, it blew up in my face. I don’t know what to say, so I just settle on partial truth. “He cheated on me and messed up my career. I had to take off and get out of Nashville. I don’t really like talking about it.”

She nods. “That’s fair. But if you want to talk about it, Violet, I’m here. Poppy, too.”

I bite my lip and smile. “Thanks.”

We work in silence for a while, the music playing softly on the radio, both of us singing along to it and mixing up scone ingredients, and by the time we slide our first batch in the oven,I feel better.

“Okay, you might just be a better baker than me,” she laughs. “Where did you learn all this?”

“I grew up on a farm. My mom makes nearly everything from scratch, and I grew up helping out in the kitchen,” I tell her as I get the next pan ready to switch out.

“I’m impressed. You have so much talent. You can sing, bake, and cook. Is there anything you can’t do?” she asks, shaking her head in amazement.

I laugh. “I’m sure I can think of a lot of things.”

We take a break, and she pours us big glasses of sweet tea, and we have scones. After all, we have to test the products.

“So good,” she says as she bites into mine.

---