Family Trees by Kerstin March

along with a stadium of cheering Badger fans. Jeff had put his cap on her head and kissed her cold nose that October night, as they huddled under the stadium lights, wrapped in a bleacher blanket, waving college pennants. She had never felt happier.
    â€œI’m sorry,” she heard Ryan finally say. “I can see you don’t want to talk about this.”
    The memory of Jeff’s face faded as she turned her attention back to the man standing before her. “You seem like a nice guy, but I hardly know you and I really do need to finish up here.”
    He insisted on helping her load the ladder into her truck. “I know I’m keeping you, but here’s the thing. And I know it’s going to sound crazy,” he said with a pause.
    â€œYes?” she asked, shifting her weight to the other leg as she waited.
    â€œIt simply comes down to this—I’d love your company, I mean, I’d like to spend a little time with you,” he finally said, grimacing a bit at the awkwardness of his own words.
    Shelby slammed the tailgate shut, brushed off her hands, and faced him squarely. The soft blush in her cheeks was replaced with a flush of rising irritation. “Listen, Ryan. That’s nice, and, like I said before, I’m sure there are plenty of girls who would love to keep you company while you’re in town. But I’m not—”
    â€œYou’re not one of them. I get that,” he said gently while resting his arm on the tailgate. “I don’t know what kind of men you’ve spent time with in the past, but I think you’re getting the wrong impression. I mean, you have to admit it’s unusual that we have literally run into each other several times in the short time that I’ve been in Bayfield.”
    â€œIt’s a small town.”
    â€œOkay, maybe it’s something. Or nothing at all,” he continued. “But if you were Cinderella and I came to you with the glass slipper, would you tell me to take off? Or would you agree to another dance?”
    He’s charming, and those dimples are irresistible, but he’s exactly the kind of guy Mom would go for, she thought, standing firmly with a clenched jaw.
    â€œI’m going to The Inn’s rooftop for a drink tonight at around eight, and your grandmother said she’d like you to call it a day. Something about needing that truck of yours,” he suggested. “So what do you say—join me?”
    Before walking away from him and climbing into the driver’s seat to head back to the barn, Shelby put on a polite Midwestern smile and said simply, “Sorry, but I’m no Cinderella.”

C HAPTER 8
    WATER
    A t 8:45 that evening, The Inn’s rooftop bar was busier than Ryan had anticipated for a weekday. People congregated around plastic tables and chairs, drinking from bottles and disposable cups as the sun set over the waterfront park and marina below. Even at this hour, the day’s heat had only dropped by a few degrees. Men wiped perspiration from their brows and necks while women pulled at their blouses and fanned themselves with laminated bar menus. Ryan knew Brad and Pete were keeping cool back at the cottage with beers in hand and their feet in the water. Now, looking down at the ice melting in his second gin and tonic, certain she wouldn’t come, he regretted abandoning his friends.
    â€œWhat do you mean, you’re going into town for drinks?” Pete had asked earlier that evening while manning a black Weber grill in the backyard of the cottage, a plume of gray smoke billowing up around him as he flipped steaks over a mound of ashen charcoal briquets that gave off a slight red glow.
    â€œI’m meeting someone,” Ryan had answered nonchalantly from where he sat on the back porch steps, a safe distance away from Pete and the smoke. “Actually, to be honest, I’m not sure if she’ll show. I could be back