Whoever says starting over is easy never faced real danger.

Running the Mad Vine, a small-town restaurant where I traded dirty money and even dirtier people for apple pies, is supposed to be my escape to a safer, more wholesome and boring life.

Or so I thought, until Zeva Dixon, a woman high on Christmas cheer, writes a scathing holiday article that makes front page news in the South Carolina Harrold. Her smiles disrespect my boundaries and her voice taunts me with dreams I thought I’d given up when my wife died.

Now a local organization not only knows where I am, they want me to work for them and will do anything to make me say yes. They don’t know the extent of my past or what I’ve done, but they’ll learn when they make Zeva part of the negotiations.

Because despite her habit of showing up everywhere she doesn’t belong, Zeva Dixon is the only person worth all my yeses.