CHAPTER ONE Hunter

" M ore coffee, Sheriff Copeland?"

I looked up from my paper. "Enough of that shit, Jill. I still expect you to call me Hunter." In my mind, I was still a kid. Still embarrassed that people elected me to be the Sheriff, even though I'd tossed my hat into the ring after Sheriff Hansen left town with the banker's wife.

Townsfolk made me feel important, a need I hated to reveal about myself. Sure, I was quiet, downright sullen sometimes, but I wanted to be needed. Especially now that I didn't have someone to take care of. Any shrink worth their money knew I was filling an empty life with a different responsibility.

"Can't do that, sheriff," she teased. "Big man on campus is now big man around town."

I rolled my eyes and held my cup out to her. Jill Hayes was a former classmate in school. My senior-year prom date, actually, and now one of my best friends. Almost a sister. She inherited an institution in our small town, Jill's , her mom's café. Her mother was named Jill as well.

"Just buzz off today, please," I said, tearing open three sugar packets and dumping them in my coffee. "Not a good day for me, and you know it." She looked at me like that statement hadn't passed her ears a thousand times already.

"What's new?" she wisecracked. I swiped at my eyes and I think she saw something different about today's complaint. Jill pulled her phone out of her back pocket and checked the date. "Shit!" she hissed, looking away before she teared up. "June 1 st already? Again? So soon? I'm sorry, Hunter."

"Me too," I replied, accepting her hand.

I was about to say something nice, possibly recognize her grief, but my throat was clenched shut. Her brother, my husband, had died two years ago. On this date. How she'd forgotten was beyond me. Maybe she could share the secret of how she did it.

"He loved you, Hunt," she said, sitting across from me and holding my hand. "I mean it, honey. You were his world."

"He was mine," I croaked, swallowing more heartache.

Mark had dropped dead from an undiagnosed heart condition on my thirtieth birthday. Surprise! So now I had the pain of his death, and the ruin of any future birthdays, all wrapped into one pathetic day of the year. One day, every year, for the rest of my life.

Jill squeezed my hand. "Happy birthday," she whispered.

Despite my best efforts, a single tear slid down the side of my nose, splashing on the stained, wooden tabletop, leaving evidence of the worst day of my life.

"Thanks," I said, looking at her through a wall of water, noticing how much she resembled Mark. They both had the same nose and green eyes. Eyes that haunted my soul to this very day. "I just miss him, Jill. So goddamned much."

She got up and came to stand behind me, leaning forward and embracing me from behind. "You've gotta start living again, honey. Mark would hate this for you."

My hand held the forearm she'd wrapped around my neck, trying to feel something, anything, for a change. Maybe a part of Mark was within her and I could sense him. Like I said, I was desperate for any evidence of Mark I could find.

"You're right. I can't do this anymore," I admitted. "Maybe I need to move. Perhaps a change of scenery would help."

Jill straightened up and massaged my shoulders. "You can move to Pluto, Hunt, but the hurt will still be there. Best you stay put with people who know and love you."

The bell at the front door chimed and Agnes Brewster came walking in, heading directly for us. "Shit," I muttered, leaning back. Just when I thought the day couldn't get any worse.

"Hunter Copeland. There you are," she prattled, making herself right at home and pulling a chair out and plopping her ancient ass on it. "Them Olson boys are terrorizing Miss Chow again. She's stuck in a tree outside Hawthorne House."

Miss Chow was her Siamese cat. The Olson boys were a set of nine-year-old identical triplets that Jenny Fulbright, who married Kevin Olson, gave birth to. She was in the town's paper and everything.

"Which Olson boy chased her up a tree?" I asked.

"And how the fuck would I know that?" she spat. "I can't tell them little fuckers apart."

"Agnes!" Jill spoke. "Your language."

"What about it?" she threw back at Jill. "I'm seventy-… something, so sue me, girly."

Agnes Brewster was the longtime nurse at Hawthorne House, the local medical facility that was inside a fantastic Victorian mansion a block away from where we sat. Of course, everything was a block away in this town, no matter where you sat.

"So, what can I do for you, Agnes?" I asked, taking a sip of my coffee and warily eyeing her over the top edge of the cup. I didn't need Agnes, the town gripe, ruining my plans of being pathetic all day. "I'm from the Sheriff's office, dear. Paul, over at the fire department, is who you need."

"Screw him," she stated. "He's too fat to climb a tree." She stood and gave me one of her death glares. "I'll expect you at two PM sharp," she said. "Besides retrieving Miss Chow, I want you at Hawthorne House when the new doctor arrives." She directed her gaze at Jill. "May as well join him, young lady. You two are attached at the hip as it is." She gave us one her looks of disdain, her eyes moving between us. "Damn strange thing, you two, considering Hunter here is a fruit."

"I don't think you're supposed to say that, Ms. Brewster," Jill claimed.

Agnes was halfway to the door when she turned around. "I wiped that boy's ass when he was born. Yours too, Jilly girl, so I'll say whatever the fuck I want." She opened the door, delivering one more death glare. "Two PM sharp, Hunter." And with that, she walked out.

Jill and I exchanged glances, both of us left shaking our heads. "Whattaya know about the new doc?" I asked Jill.

"Rumor has it, he's an actual Hawthorne," she stated, locking eyes with me. "As in Hawthorne, Hawthorne."

"What the hell does that mean?"

" Hawthorne , as in his ancestors built that mansion. Their money has supported the medical center ever since," she said. "Apparently, if you're not someone fancy in that family, they disown you."

Plentywood had been without a doctor since Doc Hughes retired three months ago. Agnes was keeping all of us going while we waited. She was a witch, but as an older and experienced RN, she was basically the entire medical team in our small town.

"Explain to me why a Hawthorne would move to our town?" I requested.

"Beats me, but I'm going over there with you this afternoon," she replied, picking my breakfast plate up. Jill looked wistful as she stared out the front window. "God, I hope he's single."

"That ain't happening," I said, throwing ten bucks on the table. "I'll pick you up later, sis."

"Don't forget. Two PM," she yelled after me.

I confirmed I'd heard her with a wave over my shoulder. "Two fucking years already," I mumbled, making my way to my SUV, a familiar pain pressing on my heart. Sometimes the pain pressed so hard I held out hope it might snuff me out one of these days. It'd taken all my strength not to fall apart in front of Jill today, even if she'd somehow managed to forget the date.

After turning the key, I rested my chin on the steering wheel while the engine idled. I spaced out, staring straight ahead. Sometimes, when I'd find myself stuck in moments like this, I found myself losing track of time, oblivious to the world around me. A world that had kept on going after mine had stopped. Leaning back, I glanced at the rearview mirror, eyes filling to the brim. "I miss you so goddamned much," I muttered.

Voicing my pain tore another piece of my heart away. How many more levels of scars would I have to peel away before I could wake one day and not have me wanting this one to be my last? Something had to give for me. If this was my life from now on, I wasn't sure I could do it.