Hooked on You by Kathleen Fuller (hot novels to read .txt) 📕

when she was little and visited Mimi. She’d evenswung on it a few times after she moved in as a teen. She sat on the raggedy tire and pushed her toes in the dirt, swingingback and forth as she ate her sandwich.

How many times as a child had she sat on this swing while her mother and grandmother were in the house, having a talk thatusually ended in an argument with Tracey storming out and dragging Riley with her? She had no idea, but she clearly rememberedwishing she could live here instead of with Tracey. Mimi’s house was always nice, always comfortable, and always filled withfood and love. Mimi read her bedtime stories and fixed her cookies and milk, but only if Riley had eaten her vegetables atsupper. She would let Riley take bubble baths and play dress-up, and she always told funny tales about her life with Poppy.Tracey had never done any of those things. Living with Mimi would solve all her problems. Riley had been sure of that.

Then she moved in with her grandmother, and while her life had been different and better, it hadn’t been the paradise she’dimagined. She hadn’t felt any more connected to Maple Falls than she had to all the transient cities she’d lived in with Tracey.Whose fault was that?

She popped up from the tire, shoving the past out of her mind. She should have gone with Mimi to The Orange Bluebird. At leastthere she would be distracted by the food and company. Here her only companions were memories she didn’t want to relive.

As usual when she was out of sorts, she thought about her art. She went back inside and put her partially eaten sandwich andglass of water on the kitchen table, then climbed upstairs to her bedroom. She searched the small dresser in the corner ofthe room, and in the bottom drawer she found a small stack of cheap sketch pads, exactly where she’d kept them when she livedthere, along with a pack of charcoal pencils.

Riley took one of the pads and one of the pencils and went back to the backyard, this time sitting in a white plastic chairon the pitted and peeling deck. She put her feet up on the short deck railing and began to sketch the elm tree in front ofher. She was halfway through with it when she looked at it and frowned. The sketch was uninspired and two dimensional. Sheglanced at the tree again, disappointed that her drawing hadn’t done it justice. Working in mixed media for most of a decadehad eroded her drawing skills. She turned the page over to a fresh white sheet.

Closing her eyes, she let her creativity take over, as she often did when she felt blocked or off her game. She allowed thepencil in her hand to take the lead, giving control to the art instead of forcing it. After a few minutes of sketching, sheopened her eyes, eager to see what was on the page.

She groaned. An outline of Hayden’s face stared back at her.

Riley started to turn the page again, then paused. She studied the light pencil strokes, thinking of how she could flesh outthe image. Maybe she could get him out of her mind by getting him on the page. At this point she was willing to try anything.

She continued drawing, sketching out his facial structure, which of course was perfect. Then she started on his hair, makingsure to add the way the ends touched the collar of his shirt at church this morning, and the one cowlick at the crown thatshe’d noticed the first time she saw him in high school. Soon she was engrossed, focusing on her craft as much as she wasthe subject of it.

The sound of a car door slamming brought her out of her zone. She folded over the sketchbook and set it on the rusty whitewrought iron table next to her chair, then went inside, put on her shoes, and opened the door to help Peg with Mimi.

When she stepped on the front porch, she was stunned to see Olivia, Anita, and Harper coming up the steps, holding bags oftakeout.

“You left before we could invite you to lunch,” Anita said, smiling as she stopped in front of Riley.

“So we decided to bring a late lunch to you.” Harper held up a plastic bag from a restaurant Riley had never heard of. “Weplanned to get here earlier, but Mother asked me to run an errand.” She rolled her eyes. “Sometimes she refuses to take nofor an answer.”

“I hope you like Mediterranean food,” Olivia said. “The spanakopita is amazing.”

“So is the hummus.” Anita chuckled. “I hope you aren’t planning to kiss anyone this afternoon, though. They put tons of garlicin it.”

Hayden’s face appeared in her mind, and Riley’s cheeks flushed. Then again, she had been drawing him for twenty minutes, sothinking of him didn’t necessarily mean she was thinking about kissing him. Liar.

She scratched at her forearm. “You didn’t have to do this,” she said as Harper opened the front door.

“I don’t know about y’all, but I’m starving.” Harper walked inside like she owned the place.

“We better eat before it gets cold.” Olivia smiled at Riley. “It’s nice that you came back to be with Erma. She’s a firecracker,but everyone needs help sometimes.” She followed Harper inside.

“Is it okay that we did this?” Anita asked, her eyes darting to the table and back to Riley. “We saw Erma leaving with Pegand Bea, and then you left by yourself . . . Well, we didn’t want you to eat lunch alone.”

A lump formed in Riley’s throat. She couldn’t remember the last time someone had been this hospitable to her. Melody, of course,but she and Melody were roommates and good friends. She barely knew these women.

“Yes,” she said, her voice sounding thick. “It’s okay.”

“Good, because Harper ordered enough to feed six people.”

Riley motioned for Anita to go inside, and then followed. Harper and Olivia were in the kitchen, talking as they unpackedthe bags. The spicy scent of the Mediterranean