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started madly dabbing at the mess. But it was too late. She’d greedily poured herself a huge cup of Quixie, and now everything on the tabletop was soaked.
    “Damn,” she wailed, mopping and breathing hard, and trying not to look up at her best friend’s big brother. When she realized that she’d cursed out loud, she blushed harder and mopped faster.
    Mason Bayless was sunburned, which made his blue eyes look bluer, and his dark blond hair needed cutting because it brushed down his high forehead and across his thick dark eyebrows. His prominent nose had a bump across the bridge, but he had perfect white teeth, except for one chipped incisor. He was dressed in faded blue jeans and well-worn high-top leather work boots and a green Quixie Beverage Company uniform shirt with red pinstripes and an embroidered patch over his breast that said MASON .
    Not that he needed a name patch. Not much. Every one of the three hundred employees at Quixie Beverage Company knew Mr. Glenn Bayless’s oldest boy, as did just about everybody in the community. Passcoe was a company town, and Quixie and Passcoe had been inextricably linked for more than seventy years.
    Mason’s uniform shirt was untucked and the top three buttons unfastened. After a moment, he grabbed another envelope and began sweeping the ruined papers into the trash.
    “Sorry,” he drawled. “Didn’t mean to scare you like that. I was looking for my sister.”
    “Oh, wait,” Annajane said, grabbing for the trash can. “I can’t, I mean, those are contest entries. And I’ve got to type them into the computer. Maybe I can get them dried out…”
    “Forget it,” Mason said. “Those are toast.”
    “But I’m supposed to type them all in. It’s a contest, and the winner gets a cooler, and it’s not fair…” she sighed. “I’ll have to tell Voncile, I guess. I don’t know what she’ll say.”
    “Voncile won’t give a rat’s ass,” Mason said. He smiled. “I’ll just tell her I did it. Which is kinda true. It was my fault.”
    He cocked his head and considered her. “Hey. You’ve got stuff on your dress.” He reached out and his fingertip brushed the sleeve.
    She jumped several inches.
    He laughed. “Sorry. You’re kinda jumpy, aren’t you?” He held out her hand. “I’m Mason Bayless. I don’t think I’ve seen you around the plant before. Are you new?”
    “I know,” Annajane said, “I mean, I know you’re Mason.” Idiot! He’d think she was stalking him. She blushed and tried to start over. “Well, I mean, we’ve met, but it’s been a long time. I’m Pokey’s friend, Annajane Hudgens.” She smiled nervously, glancing down at the large red stain blossoming across the front of her new dress.
    “Pokey’s friend,” he said. “The one who disappears every August. Hell yeah. So you’re working here?”
    “Just for the summer,” Annajane said. “Your dad gave us jobs. It’s my first day.”
    “And where’s my bratty sister?” Mason asked. “Did she bail on you already?”
    “Um,” Annajane stalled, not wanting to rat out her best friend.
    Mason rolled his eyes. “That’s what I thought. She never even showed today, did she?”
    “She might have had summer school this morning,” Annajane lied. “She’s trying to get her Spanish grade up to a B.”
    “Riiight,” Mason said. “What do you wanna bet her lazy behind is lying right beside the pool at the club, while you’re stuck here at the plant, counting bottle caps?”
    “Summer school could have run late,” Annajane said, loyal to the end.
    “If you do see Pokey, tell her I came by,” Mason said. “I’ll stop by Voncile’s desk and let her know I kinda messed things up in here.”
    “Thanks,” Annajane breathed.
    “And don’t worry,” he added. “I won’t blow Pokey’s cover story. Not this time, anyway.”

 
     
    4
     
    Annajane never told Mason she’d fallen in love with him that first day at the plant. She’d never told anybody. Not even