Page 44 of All Mine

“Yeah, leave us alone,” shrieked a woman with a sleeping infant strapped to her chest. The infant’s face turned to the side and smashed against its mothers’ chest, a line of drool seeping into her shirt.

“Preserve Hart Valley,” someone else called, waiving a large wooden walking stick at me.

Perhaps walking out into the middle of a mob was not the safest thing I could do.

When I finally made it in front of the megaphone-wielding maniac trying to ruin my livelihood, I stopped, hands on hips.

She smiled, lowering the megaphone. “Oh hi, Cam,” she said, sweet as pie.

“You’re protesting me,” I shouted. “Have you lost your damn mind?”

“I assume that’s a rhetorical question.”

“Why?”

“Oh, you know,” she spat.

“We need to talk.”

“No, we don’t.”

“Come inside so we can speak privately.”

“You can just kiss my—”

I snatched the megaphone from her hand before she could react. “Attention,” I said into it, dodging her attempts to grab it. “I am not the person buying the land. It will sell regardless of me. This protest is a waste of your time. Please return to your daily lives.”

“Give me that back,” she complained. Lauren stretched up, trying to retrieve her megaphone from me, but I held it above my head. She clawed at my chest and shoulders, practically climbing me. I dipped, wrapped my arm around her thighs, and lifted her over my shoulder in a fireman’s carry.

“What the hell are you doing?” she yelled. “Someone stop him.”

The crowd stood in stunned silence as I carried Lauren back to my office, closed, and locked the door behind us. I continued toward my office, tossing the megaphone onto a chair along the way.

“I opened my business here, and this is how you thank me,” I muttered, dropping her onto my desk. With my hands on either side of her hips pinning her in place, I kicked the office door closed behind me even though I was sure that both Lewis and Stephen were long gone.

“Thank you?” she sputtered, arms crossed over her chest. “Just what am I supposed to thank you for? For putting me out of business, is that it?”

“It’s not putting you out of business, you incorrigible woman. You said that you didn’t want some outsider telling you what’s best for the town. So I moved here, and I’m learning. And despite your impressive mob gathering skills, protesting me will not change a thing…”

“We have the right to gather and express our opinion as to what’s going on.”

“And I have the right to conduct business here, especially since I’ve done nothing wrong.”

“How about don’t buy the land and leave us in peace.”

“Honey, my client is motivated, and he’ll do this regardless of my involvement.”

“Don’t honey me… Then I’ll take him on too. I’m not scared of some rich dude.”

“Clearly, you aren’t. But, with me involved, I’ll build you the bakery you want.”

“I want my old Victorian house.”

I threaded my hands through my hair and pulled. This woman was about to make me rip my hair out.

“Is this some kind of sick joke?”

“You don’t understand.” Lauren’s arms tightened around her chest. I stepped back and study the lines on her pretty face. Not only exhaustion from a long day but something else too—something she held back.

---