Until Drew Ryan.
Which was still so weird, she couldn’t think about it.
And now Roger knew she was living in Autre, and about the Christmas party and Santa’s Village and, while he may not know everything Rory had to do with it, it was clear he knew enough. There was something about his expression and the tone in his voice that made it clear he knew this was the way to get to her.
“What are you saying, Roger?”
“I'm saying that these game controllers could be sold for huge money.”
And there it was. Her dad's new con. Hell, it wasn’t even a con. He wanted to steal these toys and resell them. For huge money.
“Those are donated. For kids. For Christmas.”
Though she wasn't sure why she was even trying. Roger hadn’t even cared about Christmas for her, his own kid, so the chances of him caring about Christmas for a stranger was pretty much zero. Especially if the alternative was money for himself.
“And that's pretty important to you?” Roger asked.
Rory knew that admitting that would be giving him power over her. But he already knew the answer. He wouldn't be here if not. He would have just taken the controllers and gotten the hell out of Autre if he didn’t want to involve her somehow.
She probably wouldn't have even put two and two together right away. Oh eventually, she would've put together the fact that Roger had breathed air in Autre and that something bad had happened and so of course the two things are connected, but it would've given him time to get away. The fact that he was explaining all of this to her meant that he wanted to hurt her somehow.
“What do you want?”
“Three thousand dollars.”
“You think these controllers are worth three thousand?”
Roger laughed. “Oh, they're worth far more than that. But that's what I need. I'm such a good guy, that I will return these controllers to you when you give me three thousand dollars and I won't even think about the fact that I could be selling these for five times that.”
“You're going to hold them for ransom?”
“Think of it as my backup plan. I'm asking my daughter for three thousand dollars. If she can't or won't help me out with that, the controllers are my plan B.”
“I really have no way of getting three thousand dollars, Roger.”
Rory felt her throat start tightening and the back of her eyes began stinging. She didn't want to give Roger money. But in the past, she had because it was easier than anything else. When he showed up, she wanted back out of her life as quickly as possible and she had very few resources to truly fight him with.
“You’ve got this whole amazing community now. And a new guy. You’ll come up with something.”
Oh, fantastic. Now Drew was a part of this in Roger’s eyes. “He's not my new guy. I just met him.”
Roger gave her a sleazy smile. “Well, turn that new guy into your piggy bank. Women have been doing that for decades.”
More like centuries, actually. But that was certainly not Rory's plan for any guy, particularly Drew Ryan.
Her heart gave a little thump in her chest. Because now thinking about not getting involved with Drew was not about the fact that he lived so far away. Or that he wasn't sticking around for long. Or because he didn't check the very first box on her checklist.
It was because she couldn't.
For a brief moment while they’d been flirting and teasing and talking about reindeer, she'd thought that maybe a week-long fling with him while he was in town was better than nothing.
He was a great guy and she felt more sparks with him than she had with a guy in almost forever. She'd been very, very tempted. Of course, then he’d turned on his heel and practically run out of the barnyard, so there was that.
But now Roger was here and just reinforcing all of the ways he made her life complicated and terrible and chaotic and that she had actually tricked herself into thinking that she could have this sweet, calm, small-town life in Autre and could get away from all that.
This was Roger's first trip to Autre, but she should have known he’d eventually come. And he wasn't here just to harass her. He was going to ruin the Christmas party. Of course he was. Everything important to her that was sweet and good and just nice was ruined by Roger Robins. Autre would definitely be one of those things. And if she got involved with Drew or, hell, anyone else in this town, Roger would somehow ruin that too.
“I have no way of doing this, Roger. And if you take the controllers, they’re going to figure out someone stole them and they’re going to come after you.”
He laughed. Just flat-out laughed in her face. And she had to admit that he had a reason. It wasn’t like the petting zoo had security cameras. It wasn’t like the storage area in the barn was being monitored by law enforcement. The only way they would find out that Roger was the one who'd stolen the controllers was if she turned him in. And that would lead to one very terrible thing.
She’d have to admit how she knew him.
She'd really hoped to keep Roger Robins out of her life in Autre and now, not only was he here and ruining everything, but she was going to have to confess who he was, that he was here because of her, he’d stolen the gifts because she wouldn’t give him money, and that he’d probably be back to do something similar in the future.
This was all her fault. She never should have gotten involved with this project. If she’d just let someone else take care of Santa’s Village, Roger wouldn’t have come to the petting zoo to find her, found out about the controllers, and realized this was the perfect way to manipulate her.
Roger tossed the box with the controller up in the air and caught in one hand. “Well, I’ve got forty-nine others of these in my truck right now. I don't have to pay this debt off until this weekend. That gives you a few days to think about what you’re gonna do about this. You'll find the phone number to my burner phone on the sticky note in the storage unit where these controllers used to be.”
And for the second time that night, a man turned on his heel and walked away from her.
Yeah, this was her fault. So she needed to take care of this. That was one thing she’d learned from the Landrys—you owned your shit and you cleaned up your messes.
Now she just needed to figure out how to do that.
5
It only took Drew about five minutes inside Ellie's bar to realize that he was not going to meet his hot, sexy, up-for-a-good-time bayou girl in here tonight.
And that Rory had known that.
He grinned. Maybe she had felt just a flicker of I-don’t-want-him-hooking-up-with-anyone-else after all.
Oh, the place was full of gorgeous, funny, sassy women. It only took about five minutes to realize that as well.
But they were all taken. Very taken.
And not just obviously in love. But were in love with men who had the last name Landry. Or the women had the last name Landry themselves.
In other words, the sexy, funny women who were thrilled he was at Ellie’s tonight were all completely off limits.
At least the ones his age. The sweetest of the bunch was Cora, who had pretty blue eyes, a bright smile, and immediately brought him a tall glass of sweet tea and a big bowl of sausage and shrimp gumbo. But Cora was old enough to be his grandmother. Literally.