For Love of a Grump: A Grumpy Soft for Sunshine Collection

Chapter 13

“I don’t know how you did this haul so often in the last year.” Stepping into Maggie’s apartment, Athena dumped her bag and stumbled over to collapse onto the sofa. “How is it that Tennessee feels like a million miles further from L.A. than Chicago does?”

“Well, having to drive hours to the airport in Nashville before even getting on the plane has a lot to do with it. I’m gonna guess by the fact that you’re doing a fine impression of a throw blanket on my couch that you would vote for a nap before going out for dinner?”

Throwing an arm over her eyes, Athena considered just passing out right here and skipping food altogether. Then her stomach growled. “Please, God, don’t make me people anymore. Can’t we just get takeout?”

“Seriously? After months in Eden’s Ridge, you’re back in a city, with access to every kind of food known to man, and you’d rather stay in? What happened to you, girl? I’ve never known you to bail on the chance to try new cuisine.”

“I’m just wiped out. I guess I’ve lost some tolerance to the volume of people in the city since I left Chicago. It’s the longest stretch I’ve been home since I left at eighteen.” How had she not realized that before? She’d expected to be itchy and dying to get the hell back out of Tennessee. Instead she’d slid back into the rhythm of it like a pair of favorite jeans.

“Well, if this whole show pans out, you’ll have plenty of time to try everything you want out here. And there’s a lot.”

Athena waited for the usual buzz of excitement that accompanied the idea of culinary exploration in a new place. But it didn’t come. Maybe she was just too damned tired. She hadn’t slept for shit last night, too anxious about the trip, about how this meeting with network executives would go. Too upset at the fight she’d had with Logan. She didn’t know where they stood. Maybe that was the answer in and of itself. She hadn’t wanted to get in too deep for exactly this reason. A show would mean she’d be moving to Los Angeles, at least for the bulk of the year. Maybe some people could maintain a long distance relationship from three thousand miles away. She wasn’t one of them. And what did that matter, anyway? He wasn’t the guy she’d thought he was.

“Who’s not the guy you thought he was? Logan?”

Athena peeked out from her arm, startled to realize she must’ve spoken aloud. Dammit. Maggie would never let it alone now. “Yeah.”

“You’re gonna have to explain that because every other conversation we’ve had you’ve been your version of giddy about him.”

Insulted, Athena sat up. “I was not giddy.”

“I said your version. And giddy was Ari’s term.”

Athena rolled her eyes. “Of course it was.”

“What happened?”

He’d ruined her high, that’s what happened. When she should’ve been able to bask in the excitement and thrill, instead she’d been sucker punched. Knowing her sister would just wait her out, Athena grabbed up one of the colorful pillows and wrapped her arms around it. “I went out to the farm yesterday to tell him about the show.”

Maggie moved into her kitchen and opened a bottle of wine. “I gather that didn’t go well.”

Athena snorted. “That would be an understatement. This is the first legitimate offer I’ve had that could salvage my career, and he shot the idea right on down. After being so supportive of me this whole time, when push came to shove, he was just paying lip service.” She accepted the glass of wine. “Thanks. And—and—not only was he absolutely against the idea of the show, he’s been shrinking my damned head this whole time!”

Maggie folded herself onto the other end of the couch. “He what?”

“He’s a therapist.”

“I thought he was a farmer.”

“He was a therapist, or almost, before he left the last semester of school to be a farmer.”

“So he never practiced?”

“He’s been practicing on me, apparently. Using his shrinky skills.” Athena scowled, replaying everything he’d ever said to her, wondering what else she’d dismissed as casual conversation.

“Used them to what exactly? Coerce you? Manipulate you?” Maggie’s expression remained neutral, but the steel in her tone said she’d castrate anyone who tried.

Athena wanted to say yes, but couldn’t. Logan hadn’t coerced or manipulated her. Not in any castration-worthy way. No matter how angry she was, she knew he wasn’t a bad guy. It was just— “He acted all blasé about the whole thing, like he left the program, he’s just a farmer, but the whole time he’s taking in everything I say and do and analyzing me.”

“To what end?”

She thought about what he’d said. “He said it was about getting to know me and being respectful of who I am.”

“That doesn’t sound so terrible.”

“Then why does everything in me want to reject that?” Athena sipped at the wine, barely registering the bold notes of plum that underscored the grapes.

“You know why.”

She did know why. He was just like those assholes who’d analyzed her without her knowledge or consent and used that to take her away from her father.

“But you’re saying he didn’t get to know you and then use that against you?” Maggie asked into the protracted silence, like she wanted to be sure there was no valid opportunity to mete out violence.

Athena thought about it, and because she was messed up and tired, because Logan’s reaction to her news and that whole conversation had really thrown her, she had to think really hard. But no, Logan hadn’t betrayed her; he wasn’t like the counselors in her past. But there was something. He’d done something, because she’d felt…something.

“Athena?”

“No, he didn’t use it against me. The fact is, he does know me. So well it makes me feel...” She struggled to find the words to explain that feeling of exposure.

“Vulnerable?” Maggie suggested.

“Yes. And I hate that. I hate that so much.”

“You always have. As long as I’ve known you. But I’ve never asked you why that is. What are you so afraid of?”

She’d had a big chunk of sleepless night and hours on a plane to think about it. “Because it means he can hurt me.” Setting her wine aside, Athena drew her knees up and rested her cheek against them. “I didn’t mean to let him so close.”

Maggie studied her over the rim of her glass. “It’s not that he can hurt you. It’s that he has.”

“Yes,” Athena whispered. “In the heat of things he said none of this was about my father. That it’s just about my reputation and ego. I get that I have a titanic ego. It goes with the territory of my profession. But literally everything I have done in my career has been about attaining maximum success so that I could take care of Dad. I chose paths I wouldn’t otherwise have chosen just because it would mean more commercial success.”

You’ll hate it. And you’ll blame everyone but yourself for having made the choice.

On some level he’d been right, damn him. She had hated it. Not all of it, not all the time. But in the end, she had hated it. But he was wrong about the choice. She didn’t have one. Not really.

Maggie sipped her wine, considered. “I think a lot of it has been about that, yeah. But you’re a chef, not an accountant. If it was just about the money, you could’ve gone into a multitude of other more lucrative fields. You chose food because it’s your passion. So there’s a lot of you bound up in it, too. As there should be.”

Athena bristled. “Are you siding with him?”

“I’m not taking sides here. I’m asking questions to clarify. Given your level of pissed off about this, I have to ask if he’s right. If your dad wasn’t part of the equation, would you still make the same decision to come out here, to try this?”

If she didn’t have the financial burden of her father’s care, if she didn’t have a ticking time clock over her head, would she still choose the show? “After everything I’ve been through the past months? Yeah. Yeah, I would. Because I feel like a failure. A disgrace, and I want to reclaim my reputation. You, of all people, get that.”

“Yeah, I do. It’s why I’m way out here instead of home. Because here I can be something other than ‘that girl who got knocked up in high school.’” Maggie tipped back the rest of her wine. “What did Logan say when you explained that?”

I was meant for bigger things than a small town life. I’m not going to hold myself back because of fear—mine or yours.

“I’m…not sure I did explain it. Not very well. The discussion kind of degenerated.”

“I can only imagine. Well, you’re here. You’re going to go to that meeting tomorrow and wow the hell out of them. You’ll see what there is to see about whether this opportunity is what you want it to be. And if it is, know that I will be ecstatic to have you here. I miss family. I miss home. It’s hard being this far from everybody.” She set her glass aside. “You know. It was the same for you in Chicago.”

Yeah, it had been. She’d lived in big cities on her own since she left home at eighteen. Every single one had been an exciting new opportunity. A chance to learn something new. That had been enough to override the inherent homesickness. After a while, she’d forgotten what life had been like before. She’d learned to do without the tight bonds of community and the daily presence of her sisters. But she couldn’t help but think that it would be so much harder now that she’d had a solid reminder of what home actually felt like.

And if it was Logan’s arms and the farm she thought of rather than the inn where she’d spent her teen years, well, she’d learn how to do without them too.

* * *

“Brother, you look like shit.”Xander accompanied that pronouncement by pushing past Logan into the house. Porter and Flynn trailed behind him.

“What the hell are y’all doing here?” But he knew.

Athena had left for L.A. this morning without a word. Logan shouldn’t have been surprised by that. She hadn’t come out when he’d dropped Ari home yesterday, not even to pick up their fight. Maybe in her mind it was done. Maybe they were done.

And he didn’t have anyone to blame for that but himself.

“I brought bourbon,” Xander called from the kitchen.

Logan’s beverage of choice for drowning regrets. Exactly how much had she said to her sisters before she left town?

His old friend had already retrieved glasses from the cabinet and poured two fingers into one. He offered it. “Here.”

Logan eyed it for only a second before accepting the glass. He was done with work for the day. “What did she say?”

“Not a bleedin’ thing,” Flynn said. “She packed up and lit out this mornin’ with barely a word. Not even to say she was excited about the prospect of a job.”

“Our wives are convinced something’s wrong between the two of you, and given your reaction just now, I’m guessing they’re right. What happened?” Xander demanded.

Logan took a hefty swallow of the bourbon, rolling it in his mouth a moment before swallowing down the fire. “I guess you could say we had our first fight.”

Porter reached for the bottle and poured himself a smaller glass. “About this thing in California?”

“Yeah.”

“Ari’s pretty upset about it,” Flynn said.

“Yeah, she was when they came out here yesterday. She doesn’t want Athena to leave. Neither do I.”

Xander kicked back against the counter and crossed his arms. “Did you say that?”

How would she have responded to that tactic? To an honest declaration. Athena, I’m in love with you. Don’t go.

It hadn’t even occurred to him to take that route, and now he wouldn’t get the chance.

“No. I tried to be logical about the whole thing. To point out why it wasn’t the right choice for her.” Logan tossed back the rest of the bourbon and winced. “That’s what I meant to do.”

“But not what you actually did?” Flynn prompted.

“I could have handled it better.” Reaching for the bottle, he poured more bourbon. “I lost my temper and said some stuff I shouldn’t.” He’d hurt her, and that had never been his intention.

Xander studied him with that flat, cop stare. “I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve seen you lose your cool in all the years I’ve known you. What set you off?”

“She’s not being rational about this. And she’s not being honest with herself about what she wants. What she needs. She’s throwing herself at this idea of a show full-force, still reaching for the same world, the same shit that made her miserable in the first place, using bullshit justifications that make it not really about her and her choices. I really thought she’d figured it out, that she’d changed.”

The next shot of bourbon only seemed to inflame that rare temper he thought was banked. “But hell, people don’t change. I know that. That’s the biggest reason I got the fuck out of psychology. Because I knew I’d never be able to sit in session with people, week after week, year after year, and them not take responsibility for their role in their own shit.”

Porter and Xander exchanged a look. “You didn’t actually say that, did you?”

“Not those precise words but something to that effect.” He wished he’d been calmer. Wished he’d been able to frame his thoughts some other way. Athena was a rebel. Tell her not to do a thing, and she’d go ahead and do it to spite everybody, including herself. He knew this about her, knew an ultimatum would go over like a lead balloon. And he’d done it anyway.

I won’t be held back by fear. Mine or yours.

She hadn’t been a hundred percent wrong. Logan was afraid of losing her to her career. But he wasn’t holding her back because of that. Was he?

“You’re an idiot—speaking of people not learning to take responsibility for their role in their own shit. Didn’t you learn anything from what happened with Maisey?” Xander demanded.

Of course he was gonna go there.

“Who’s Maisey?” Flynn asked.

“Are you gonna tell this, or am I?” When Logan just growled, Xander continued. “Maisey Howell was his girlfriend in college and grad school. They were together for, what, three years? Started dating his senior year at UT. Stuck together when he stayed for grad school. She had some…what’d you call it? Adjustment problems, when she graduated and hit the real world.”

Because Logan knew the specifics far better, he picked up the tale. “Graduating with honors in the middle of a recession and not being able to find a decent job did a number on her. Lot of frustration, lot of anxiety problems. She talked to me about it a lot. Of course she did. I was her boyfriend. But I was also a therapist in training, and the stuff she was saying, the dark place she was headed into, concerned me. Enough that I spoke to her parents, just to find out if they’d seen anything that worried them, too.”

“That doesn’t sound so unreasonable,” Flynn said.

“Yeah, well, turns out she had a history of depressive episodes, so what I said, the things I shared about my own concerns, were giant red flags for them. They had her hospitalized for evaluation. It was only a week, and I thought, given where her head was, that it was a good move. But when she got out, she was livid. Convinced I’d totally broken her confidence. It had taken her all of college to get out from under her parents’ thumbs, and what I’d done put her right back under the microscope. She didn’t care that I’d done it out of love because I was worried about her. For her, that was it. She couldn’t trust me anymore, and we were done.” He rolled the empty glass in his hand. “But that’s not what happened with Athena.”

“Isn’t it?” Xander challenged. “You tried to use your clinical judgment on somebody you’re in a relationship with. With good intentions, I’m sure, but you still did it. So maybe you’re just like everybody else and aren’t changing either. Because here’s a thing: with Maisey, you didn’t know all the history. You didn’t know how her parents would react by taking away all her control. But this time, you knew the history. You knew Athena’s experience with counselors resulted in them yanking her out of her home, and that she’s been something of a control freak ever since.”

“To put it mildly,” Porter muttered.

Fuck me. Logan scowled. “So I’m a hypocrite?”

“I’d say you’re human and in love with a prickly, stubborn woman who challenges you at every turn. One whose choices might be taking her far away from you.” Flynn lifted his glass. “I’d say fucking up and saying the wrong thing under those circumstances is pretty understandable.”

“Maybe,” Logan conceded.

Xander tipped the bottle against Logan’s glass. “For the record, did she actually tell you what she thinks this is going to be?”

“Her shot at redemption. She was clear enough about that.”

Xander and Flynn exchanged a knowing look.

Logan slapped his glass down on the counter. “What? What is it you know?”

“Well, it’s just that she talked all this over with her sisters before she even came out here yesterday. They went through all of this,” Flynn explained.

“She flat out said that even if it worked out, she didn’t think she wanted to do this forever,” Xander added. “But she wanted to give it a try, see what doors it might open. And if she does decide to walk away from it, she gets to do it on her own terms.”

Logan closed his eyes as the full measure of his screwup hit home. He’d accused her of pursuing all this out of sheer ego. But it hadn’t been that simple. It hadn’t been about keeping up appearances in her professional circles. It had been about going out on her own terms, when she had the final say, the ultimate control. That was her ego. That was what he should have understood when she came to him, because he knew her. But he’d let his own upset, his own panic at the idea of losing her get in the way. And now that he’d pissed her off, driven her away, he’d probably killed any chance of being in her “Stay” column after all was said and done.

“I am a dumbass,” Logan announced.

Flynn raised his glass again. “It’s a wise man can admit it.”

“But I’m not completely wrong. Every instinct I’ve got says this show is a mistake. That it’s not gonna be what she thinks it will be.”

“Maybe it won’t be. But it’s on her to figure that out,” Porter said.

Miserable, Logan eyed the last quarter of the bottle. “I just wanted to protect her from more pain and disappointment.”

“No matter how well-intentioned you are, she won’t thank you for it. Athena’s always been one who has to learn things the hard way. We’ve had to let her,” Xander said.

“How the hell do you stand it? Watching somebody you care about walk into a mistake?”

“You accept that it’s their mistake to make,” Porter pronounced. “And you’re around to help with the fallout. No judgment. No matter how much you have to swallow your tongue.”

“And in the meantime, you drown your urge to act in your favorite form of spirits. More bourbon?” Flynn suggested.