The Bookshop on Autumn Lane (29 page)

I was closer to thirty than twenty, a grown woman who was beyond acting like a star-crossed teenager. But even so, my heart sped up at the knowledge that Nicholas Conrad was coming toward me. Dozens of my diary entries between the ages of eight and fourteen were devoted to him. I knew everything about him: his favorite candy from the vending machine in the golf shack, his batting average on Harrison County High School's baseball team, and the type of car soap he had used on his royal blue 1995 Grand Prix. I knew every girlfriend he took to homecoming and why they weren't good enough for him.

And Nick? He didn't even know my real name.

“Hi, Bump,” he said.