Page 67 of Sweet Trouble
“Yes,” Jillian agreed, not bothering to tell her that she hadn’t attended as a student.
On the drive home, she replayed her text conversation with Tripp in her mind, feeling excited about the formal instead of nervous.
Maybe things are working out just as they should…
She had some time, so she decided to swing by the country store on the way home and grab a few things. It was clear that adding herself plus two growing girls to the household meant the fridge got emptied quicker than her grandparents could possibly be used to. And with Tripp around, even Jillian was finding it hard to anticipate how much food they needed.
She parked and hopped out, waving to the trio of old-timers who were chatting outside. The country store was sort of a clubhouse for some of the older folks in town. If her parents hadn’t moved to Florida, she wondered if her dad would have wound up passing time here one day. Grampy sometimes liked to come by and talk with his friends, though he still spent most of his days following Gram around the house like a besotted puppy.
She headed inside, enjoying the Christmas music playing on the radio, and grabbed a basket and got to work filling it with fruit, veggies, cheese, bread, and eggs.
“Hey, Jillian,” a woman she’d gone to high school with said. “How’s it going?”
“Hi,” Jillian said, racking her brain for the woman’s name. “I’m happy to be back. How are you?”
“Heard you were going out with Tripp Lawrence,” the other woman said with a funny smile.
“Oh, um, yes,” Jillian admitted, feeling her cheeks heat, though she wasn’t sure why. Maybe it felt a little like bragging to say she was dating a boy who had been so popular.
“Well, watch your back,” the woman said quietly. “He’s a heartbreaker.”
“What do you mean?” Jillian asked, her stomach twisting.
“He took my best friend out a couple of times,” the woman said. “But then out of nowhere, he dumped her cold, just when she was really starting to like him. It’s kind of his MO.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” Jillian said.
“It is what it is,” the woman said, shrugging. “Not like she didn’t know who she was dating, right?”
Jillian blinked at her, feeling lost.
“Have fun though,” the woman said, patting Jillian’s arm. “Really, he knows how to show a woman a good time. Just don’t fall for him. And if you do, definitely don’t let him know it.”
“Thanks for the advice,” Jillian managed.
“Hey, Max,” the woman whose name Jillian still couldn’t remember called out to the owner of the shop as she turned and headed to the counter. “Hey, do you have any of that reallygood cheese?”
It doesn’t mean anything,Jillian told herself.Just because he hasn’t had a serious relationship before, doesn’t mean he doesn’t want one now. He said he was serious about me and the girls.
But in the back of her mind, she couldn’t help thinking about the conversation she’d had with Jess Dansen the other day, and what he’d said about Tripp and how he ran whenever things got serious.
It was one thing to hear a warning once and ignore it, but at this point, Jillian was starting to wonder if she might be making a big mistake.
18
JILLIAN
Jillian made her way through the next school day grateful for any distractions as her mind spun out about Tripp.
She patched up a boy who skinned his knee in gym, helped a student who needed to pick up meds from her refrigerator, another who needed a blood sugar stick, and handled a few more kids who came in with aching heads and bellies—some telling the truth, some who just needed a break.
At the end of her day, Jillian was filling out the usual mountain of daily forms, still preoccupied with Tripp Lawrence and his troubling reputation.
It seemed that all she had to do was appear to be publicly dating him and folks were coming out of the woodwork to warn her off. It was one thing for Jess Dansen to mention it—he was a colleague and they talked every day. But the lady at the store hadn’t said a word to her since high school.
It’s no big deal,she told herself.The only person I need to talk to about it is Tripp.
When she was finished, she grabbed her phone and saw that she had a message.
