Chapter 19
CHAPTER NINETEEN
WILLOW
I must’ve been out of my mind, thinking my body would settle down after it’d had a taste of Finn Thomas. If anything, our being together had lit an insatiable fire beneath my skin, making me crave him when I had absolutely no business doing so. Like in the middle of a workday. In the middle of every workday.
After our amazing night together, I’d decided to throw caution to the wind and tiptoe my way into this thing between Finn and me for as long as he was in town. It was quite possibly the dumbest decision I’d ever made, but I didn’t care. I was tired of only doing what I was supposed to. Sue me for wanting to do something that felt good…damn good.
Unfortunately, we hadn’t been able to get together since the night I’d snuck out of his and Drew’s apartment sometime in the wee hours of the morning. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d done something like that, tiptoeing into my house like I’d been out doing something wrong. I was a grown woman, for heaven’s sake. Did it really matter what I got up to on my own time and if I got up to it with one Griffin Thomas?
“You want me to make a copy of this paperwork before I get it sent off?”
I jumped at Avery’s question, like I’d been caught with my hand in the cookie jar. Like my best friend could read all the thoughts—the super dirty, completely inappropriate thoughts—going on in my mind.
I cleared my throat. “Yes, please. Thank you.”
“You wanna tell me why your face is bright red?”
I averted my attention to my desk and the suddenly very interesting mound of paper clips there. “Not particularly.”
Avery snorted, but she didn’t push. But, really, if I couldn’t tell my best friend, what did that say? What was the big deal anyway? Maybe I’d pop over to the bar after work, say hi to Finn and see what kind of progress they’d made inside.
King Construction had been in and out of the building all week, hauling all kinds of material into the place, so I was kind of excited to take in the changes. I was… happy for Finn. And I was happy for my hometown.
It’d been my mission to revive the heart of Havenbrook since I’d started working for town hall five years ago, and finally, after all this time, my mission was going to come to fruition. I was proud as hell I’d been the one to incite those changes. Made me feel like I was actually doing something with my life and job, actually bringing something back to this town I loved so much.
I couldn’t wait to see the changes this brought in Havenbrook, because I knew in my heart it was a change for the better. Whether or not my daddy saw it that way.
After our discussion—okay, argument—the day he’d come back into town, I hadn’t attempted to broach the subject again. What was the use? I’d learned long ago to pick my battles, and that was one hill I wasn’t willing to die on. Not since there was nothing my daddy could do about the bar going in. And certainly not since attempting to have a discussion with him was about as fruitful as talking to a brick wall. Except, at least brick walls couldn’t talk back.
“Will?” Avery said, poking her head back in my office. “It’s about that time again…”
I sighed and pushed back from my desk. Mid-afternoon meant it was time to endure another daily meeting with my father. I’d come to dread the afternoons because of them. The meetings did nothing but eat out part of my day…and part of my self-esteem, if I was honest. In all the time I’d been working for him, he’d never once given me a job well done acknowledgment. Nope, all he’d given me was more work and dozens of migraines.
Since Gloria was still out on maternity leave, I went straight to his door and knocked, waiting for his bark of a response telling me to come inside.
“What took you so damn long? You’re just across the hall, for God’s sake.”
My daddy…such a pleasant, soft-spoken man. “Afternoon, Daddy. This shouldn’t take but a minute, and then you can get back to your business.” Which, I knew, was absolutely nothing at all, unless you counted playing solitaire on his computer as something important.
“Let’s get to it, then. I’ve got a lot left on the agenda today.”
It took every bit of willpower I possessed in my body not to roll my eyes. I made his schedule, and there wasn’t a thing on it.
I passed over a stack of papers I’d cleared off his desk yesterday and sorted through to make sure they were taken care of. I found staying three steps ahead of my father saved me a lot of hassles in the end. “We haven’t discussed these yet, but I went ahead and got them taken care of. They just need your signature where I’ve indicated.”
He grunted as he took them from me, barely glancing at the papers as he scrawled his name next to the flags. “Mighty nice of you to do something before I had to ask you to.” Once he’d signed them all, he placed them off to the side and leaned back in his chair, hands folded over his rounded belly. “I'll have to look ’em all over, of course, but good job getting the jump on something. It’s nice to see you workin’ hard finally.”
Well, would wonders never cease? It might’ve been backhanded as hell, but was that an actual compliment coming from my daddy’s lips? Seemed after five years of busting my butt, he was finally paying attention.
“Um…thank you.”
“Now, don’t go lettin’ it go to your head. I’m just pleasantly surprised, is all. I thought for sure with those Thomas boys back in town, your attention might be…diverted.”
I froze, my entire body going ice-cold. My father and I didn’t speak about my relationship—past or present—with Finn. Which meant…had someone seen Finn and me together? Or worse, seen me fleeing his apartment well past midnight, which meant we’d been up to only one thing?
“But you’re smarter than that now, aren’t you?” he continued. “Wouldn’t get mixed up with the likes of him now that you’re not a dumb teenager, rebelling against her parents.”
I breathed out a sigh of relief, realizing it wasn’t based on anything but my father wanting to hold my past mistakes over my head. To him, that was all Finn and I had been—a mistake. An act of teenage rebellion, despite the fact that it had been love, plain and simple. An impassioned love my daddy had swept aside as a crush, or worse, an infatuation.
Had it really been less than an hour ago when I’d thought it wouldn’t be a big deal for me to swing by the bar, maybe go out to dinner with Finn? That was laughable. My daddy would never let me live it down, would make my life even more unbearable if he even caught wind that something was going on between Finn and me.
The two of us hadn’t discussed the details, but if we were going to keep seeing each other, we’d just have to do it on the down-low. Keep it to ourselves and not involve everyone in Havenbrook. That’d be better in the long run anyway. Because no matter how I cut this, he was still leaving. At some point, once the bar was up and running and his job here was done, he’d get on a plane and fly back to California, once again leaving me behind.
This time, I just had to make sure he didn’t break me when he left.