Chapter Thirty-Four
Jase
Setting foot in Ardena after three nights away was like stepping outside after a seven-hour flight and taking that first breath of fresh air. I even felt a bit jet-lagged. Everything about my world was slightly off, as if my brain hadn’t quite fallen into sync. Especially after spending the past four hours in the time warp that was a hospital waiting room.
Stephanie hadn’t had the baby yet, though she seemed to be doing well. Better than Alec, at least, who was a nervous wreck now that their birthing plan had gone off the rails.
Not gonna lie, I kind of enjoyed seeing him so unraveled for once. It reminded me of when we were kids and how worried he would get about whether Santa could still make it in the snow. He’d stay up as a six-year-old on Christmas Eve watching the Weather Channel until our parents forced us to go to bed.
This time, instead of the Weather Channel, he’d fixated on the nurses’ station. The nurses seemed mostly amused by his constant questions and requests, but I still planned to pick them up some baked goods when I grabbed Alec’s and my takeout. Right after I checked on a delivery here first.
I made my way up to the office, taking comfort in each familiar step. Things had changed last night—with my brother and Dani both, in ways I hadn’t quite figured out yet—but Ardena, at least, was the same. And with each step I climbed, I remembered a little more of how it felt to be proud of something.
This restaurant was an achievement I could claim. Not mine alone, but still mine. Remembering it was like rediscovering a piece of myself, feeling it click back into place the way it first had the moment Frank put a knife in my hand.
I’d fought for those pieces of myself. Endured grunt work and burns, sometimes for no pay, often not knowing where I’d end up the next week. I’d dug deeper with each challenge, with each success, pulling myself together one chunk at a time until I finally felt whole.
Somehow, going back to my parents’ house always made me forget that. Like that version of myself I had created was nothing but an act, a clever disguise I fooled the world with while the real me was the equivalent of three monkeys in a trench coat. A poor imitation of what a son, a brother, a man was supposed to be.
But this place around me I had helped build—it was real. I could reach out and touch it. See the truth of what I had accomplished in every room and during every shift.
Where was the truth in what my parents thought of me? Their words? Their assumptions? Their expectations based on their own beliefs?
Next to the concreteness of this restaurant, those didn’t seem so substantial.
I walked into the office and paused at the sight of Jillian at her desk.
“I didn’t expect to find you here,” I said as I approached the order clipboard hanging on the wall beside her.
Her gaze stayed trained on her computer screen. “Just going over some numbers. Turns out we did very well this weekend.”
“Oh yeah? Talia have good things to say?” I was more ready to hear them than I had been last night. Might even have been willing to believe some of them. Or at least accept that others believed them like Dr. Ohara had said.
“No. Dani came by earlier.”
Her name shot through me like a pinball ricocheting around my chest, and I held my breath in anticipation of where it would land.
When I’d gotten the text from her earlier this morning that Stephanie was in labor, I’d still been reeling from my conversation with Dr. Ohara. It hadn’t even been twenty-four hours since she and I had last spoken, but it felt like it had been weeks. I’d wanted to pick up the phone and call her, hear her voice, ask her to meet me at the hospital so I didn’t have to endure my parents alone.
But it wasn’t her job to shield me from my parents. I didn’t want it to be. Which was why I needed to decide for myself what I wanted my relationship with my family to be before I brought Dani the rest of the way into my life.
So I’d texted her back to thank her for letting me know and headed to the hospital alone to be with my brother. It turned out my parents wouldn’t make it until tomorrow, so I had a bit longer to prepare myself. Which was good because I needed every second.
I cleared my throat. “What’d she say?”
“Apparently, they nearly doubled their funding goal,” Jillian said, still typing. “And then she informed me that not only did you stay within their slated food budget for the entire event but you managed to come in under it.” Now she pinned her focus on me, scrutinizing me over the rim of her reading glasses. “Do you know how many catering inquiries I got last night?”
I shook my head.
“Twenty-three. Ranging from private weddings to corporate events. Am I to understand you impressed them all with food that cost pennies a plate?”
“The budget wasn’t that small?—”
“Did I not make it clear that the budget wasn’t an issue? That I would cover any additional costs?”
I fought to keep my eyes from rolling. “I wasn’t going to spend your money if I didn’t have to, Jillian.”
She closed her laptop and angled her body toward me, one leg crossed over the other, hands clasped in her lap in the picture of ladylike elegance. I knew enough to be terrified.
“This accessible fine-dining restaurant of yours,” she said. “What kind of investment would you need for that?”
I opened my mouth to defend myself, then froze as her words registered. “What?”
“Dani seems to think I should take the money I’d been prepared to spend on food costs for the symposium and use it to fund your new restaurant idea. She said that the overwhelmingly positive response to the event’s food was proof of concept, and I have to say, I don’t disagree.”
“Dani pitched you my restaurant idea?” I stood a little straighter as the pinball machine in my chest went off like the jackpot, sending my heart flying against my ribs as a new kind of pride seeped through me.
“She did. Did a convincing job of it too. To the point that I spent the last three hours looking over spreadsheets, considering it.”
“You’re serious?”
We’d talked about it before, but the plan had always been to wait at least a year after Ardena’s opening to fully discuss it. And until hearing her say just now that she was seriously considering it, I don’t think all of me had accepted she actually would.
“I am,” she confirmed. “If you are.”
Was I serious about accessible fine dining? Without question. Catering the symposium only reinforced for me that not only could it be done, but it could be celebrated. Hearing Jillian say she believed in it—in me —enough to back it with her money…it was the opposite of how my parents made me feel.
This was what Dr. Ohara had meant. Dani and Jillian—they were the ones who knew the real me, who saw what I was capable of, who made me feel good.
But it wasn’t just that.
What I was doing here with Ardena felt good too. This thing Jillian and I were building wasn’t finished yet, and what else the symposium helped me see was how much further it could grow. I wanted to be a part of that growth. Even if it looked different from what I’d originally envisioned.
Clarity settled over me, another piece of myself clicking into place. I crossed my arms and leaned back against the wall. “Here’s what I propose.”
“He’s so little,” my brother said softly, gazing at the bundle of blankets in his arms that held his newborn son.
Oliver Lawrence Beauford, six pounds, fourteen ounces, born at 11:07 p.m. after nearly twelve hours of labor. No wonder Stephanie was passed out.
It was nearly two in the morning, and Alec and I each sat in one of the two reclining chairs beside her hospital bed. Alec rocked his chair as he cradled his son, happier than I’d ever seen him. I welcomed the warmth it brought to my chest, grateful and relieved to find no jealousy there beside it.
He glanced at me. “Thanks, by the way. For being here.”
My chest constricted. “Of course.”
He looked down shyly, his eyes returning to his son. “I wasn’t sure if you’d be too busy. Or…want to be here. With what happened at the shower and then after last night…”
I blew out a breath. “Look, about last night. I know I need to explain?—”
“No, it’s not that,” he said. “I’m not mad that you’re dating her. I mean, sure, I was surprised. But mostly I wish you’d felt comfortable talking to me about it. About anything in your life. I feel like I hardly know you anymore, you know?”
He wasn’t wrong. Truthfully I’d grown to assume over the years that he didn’t care whether I was around or not. He and my parents seemed to make this perfect family unit, and I’d figured he didn’t need me. That he probably thought I was making an endless stream of bad decisions, slowly wasting my life.
“You always had everything so together,” I said. “It didn’t really seem like you needed a big brother. And then when you were older, I didn’t want to get in the way.”
“You wouldn’t have.”
I shrugged. “Felt like it sometimes.” Though, to be fair, that came more from my parents than it ever had Alec. I’d just assumed he agreed with them.
“If anything, I felt like it was the other way around,” he said. “You were off on these great adventures in different countries, following your dream, and it seemed like you didn’t want anything to do with me anymore.”
“I didn’t realize you saw it that way.” Now that I thought about it, I could see why he would. In trying to avoid my parents, I had shut out pretty much all of my life from back home. There were a few times I’d remembered to send Alec a postcard from abroad for his birthday or graduation, but I’d never called. Rarely texted or emailed. I hadn’t thought he noticed.
“Why do you think I was so excited to surprise you at the gala?” he asked. “I was finally going to get to taste your food.”
“You could have just come to the restaurant. I’d have set up a chef’s table, done a tasting menu. I would have loved that.”
He lifted a shoulder. “You never invited me.”
“You never asked.”
His mouth tipped up. “I guess we both have room for improvement, huh?”
I chuckled. “Yeah, I guess.”
Oliver kicked in his swaddle, the little lumps of his arms and feet moving beneath the blanket before stilling again.
“So, Dani,” Alec said, tugging Oliver’s cap down where an earlobe had peeked out. “That serious?”
I shifted in my seat and took a deep breath. I guess we were doing this now.
“’Cause it looked serious,” he said, sounding way too amused by my discomfort. “Steph and I were standing in the hallway for a good ten seconds before I said anything, and you had no clue.”
My eyes fell shut. “Great.”
“We could have twerked circles around you, and I still don’t think you would have noticed.”
I rested my elbows on the arms of the chair and pressed my fingers against my temples. “Point made, thank you.”
He gave a quiet laugh. “So? What’s the deal?”
I dropped my hands and picked at my thumb. “We haven’t really talked about it yet. I don’t think either of us knew how to navigate the fact that she’s your ex.”
His brows pulled together. “What does that matter? It was years ago. I’m married with a kid now.”
I shot him a look. “It’s awkward, and you know it. Just because you’re apparently a saint who has no qualms with it doesn’t mean that’s how most people would react. Plus, Mom’s all protective of you…it seemed like it could get messy.”
He tilted his head. “I guess.”
“And to be honest,” I said, studying my palm so I didn’t have to look at him while I said it, “I’ve always been a little insecure when it came to you. And knowing she’d been with you…a part of me worried I wouldn’t be enough to live up to what you two had.”
I locked my fingers together, pressing my thumb to the center of my hand, bracing for his response. There came a strange sound, and when I swung my head his way, the tension in my muscles dissolved into confusion.
He was laughing.
Head thrown back, eyes squeezed shut, lips rolled together to keep quiet, full-on laughing.
He lifted his head to catch his breath and caught my perplexed stare. “Sorry, I’m not laughing at you, it’s just—” He gave another soft chuckle. “She dumped me. I wasn’t enough for her. I don’t even think she knew why at the time, but as much as it hurt when it happened, she was right. We weren’t right for each other long term. And her gut told her that. I would have married her, been oblivious, and never had the life I have now with Steph, and it would have been all wrong, because you can’t convince me this isn’t where I’m supposed to be.”
Affection flooded his eyes as he cast his gaze to where Stephanie slept, then down to his son. It struck me then: this life he’d carved out for himself that so perfectly aligned with my parents’ vision—it was the one he genuinely wanted. Not one he’d forced himself into to make them happy, like a part of me had always wondered. A part of me that felt like a failure for not being able to force myself to do the same. And if I couldn’t, then I must be a worse son. The one not trying hard enough or not willing to sacrifice as much.
But that wasn’t it. It was what he said—this was where he was supposed to be. And all I could feel was relief that his happiness was truly his.
“So as far as I’m concerned,” he continued. “If Dani’s gut is telling her she should be with you? I don’t see any reason you shouldn’t trust it too. Unless it’s your gut telling you it’s wrong.”
“No,” I said right away. For all my doubts and fears, my gut had only ever told me one thing when it came to Dani: not to let her go. Even in the beginning, being with her had felt like waking up and coming alive. Finally.
And what Alec said…I hadn’t thought of it that way before. That our differences might mean I could give her something he lacked, something she needed but he wasn’t able to give. That, like Dr. Ohara had said, my being different from Alec didn’t have to mean I was less .
I met his gaze. “It’s serious.”
He grinned. “Glad to hear it. I really didn’t want Gabby coming to Christmas.”
My stomach dropped. “Mom wouldn’t.”
“She was already talking about it the day after the shower.”
I let my head fall against the recliner. “I don’t know what I’m going to do about her.”
“It’s them, right?” Alec asked.
I raised a brow.
“Mom and Dad are the reason you felt insecure around me?”
“It’s not always past tense,” I admitted.
He glanced at Oliver and resumed rocking. “Sorry.”
“It’s not your fault.”
“I saw how they treated you differently. I just didn’t think you cared.”
“I tried not to. It’s why I left, though. Why I never really came back. I shouldn’t have left you behind, though. That’s what I’m sorry for.”
He watched his son for a minute, thinking. Then he nodded and raised his arms out to me. “Want to hold him?”
My pulse sped up. “What?”
“You haven’t yet, right?”
“I…are you sure?”
He laughed. “Yeah, I’m sure. You’re his uncle.”
I swallowed. “Okay.”
He stood carefully and walked over to where I sat, then placed the bundle that was my nephew in my arms.
He weighed almost nothing. A squished little forehead and cheeks stuck out from the blankets, all red and splotchy. His face reminded me of a potato, to be honest, but I kept that to myself. Potato or not, he was still the greatest thing I’d ever seen.
“Hey, Oliver,” I whispered, pulling him in close. “I’m your Uncle Jase.”