Page 48 of Cash
“What are you doing?” I repeat.
Mollie’s eyebrows snap together. “What does it look like I’m doing? I’m bartending.”
“You got booze back there?”
“No drinking and riding allowed.” Her lips curl into a smirk as she pours lemonade into the glass. “Kids are having a ball.” She holds out the glass. Like me, it’s already sweating in the morning heat.
“Did you poison it?” I eye the lemonade.
“Take a sip and find out.”
“Would that be murder or manslaughter?”
Mollie lifts a shoulder, her eyes on mine. “Neither. I cover my tracks.”
“You’re gonna miss me when I’m gone.” I take the lemonade, the cold pressing into my hand.
“Nice Brooks & Dunn reference. But no, I most certainly willnotmiss you.”
I sip my lemonade. Just the right balance of tart and sweetand cold enough to make me feel a shade short of overheating. “You like Brooks & Dunn?”
“I fu—” She glances at the kids nearby. “I freaking love Brooks & Dunn. They were my first concert. My parents took me.”
I search her eyes over the rim of my glass. “Your dad said it was a thrill, dancing with you to ‘Boot Scootin’ Boogie.’ He got y’all first-row tickets, didn’t he?”
That gives her pause. She blinks, swallowing. “My dad told you about that?”
“He was so proud you liked country music as much as he did. Man had tunes on day and night.”
She blinks again, lips twitching into a tiny smile. My pulse skips. I’m not sure why I’m sharing this with Mollie. I still think Garrett deserved better from his only daughter.
Then again, no one deserves to lose a parent.
No one deserves to see their parents go through a divorce. Can’t imagine how much that must’ve sucked for Mollie. My friends whose parents split, their lives were totally upended. For her to go through that so young?—
“I also brought you this.”
I stare at the foil-wrapped item she holds out. “More poison?”
“Ha. No. It’s a fried chicken sandwich. Found it in the fridge.”
My pulse skips again. “How’d you know I was hungry?”
“Gave you the benefit of the doubt and assumed you were hangry back at the house.”
I take the sandwich. “Thank you?”
“Oh, please.” She rolls her eyes. “If I wanted you dead, you’d be in the ground already. Except for your head. And your hands. I’d toss those in the river.”
Laughing, I unwrap the sandwich and take a giant bite. Dang, that’s good. “Exactly how muchYellowstonehave you watched?”
“Enough to know my way around dismemberment.”
“This sounds fun.” Wyatt appears at my elbow, empty lemonade glass in hand. “He hangry again?”
Mollie eyes me as I go to town on my sandwich. “I’m starting to think he’s always hangry.”
“That’s because I don’t have time to eat,” I reply, mouth full.