5. Chapter 4 #2
“Hope Berkley, I’m so sorry about your daddy.
” Mrs. Annabelle Harper had to be in her seventies by now, but still moved in that same agile way Hope remembered as she rounded one of the industrial metal countertops.
At one time she’d run the local hardware store with her husband, but Hope wasn’t sure if that was still the case.
“Thank you, Mrs. Harper. ”
“You can call me Anna, hon.” She pulled Hope into a hug, then eyed Bradford as she stepped back. “Who is this handsome man?”
“Ah—”
“I’m her husband.” Bradford’s voice was deep and smooth and she swore Mrs. Harper’s cheeks flushed pink when he held out his hand. Yeah, he had that effect.
“Well, good for you darlin’,” she said, glancing back at Hope. Then she gently patted her arm. “We’ll be bringing the food out there in just a minute, but let me know if you need anything. Today and for however long you’re in town.”
Nodding, Hope smiled at some of the other women who looked vaguely familiar (probably from the church she’d been forced to attend as a teen), then headed through the swinging doors into the large cafeteria.
There was a gaming area on one side of it that wasn’t in use at the moment, and clusters of people walking in the main doors.
The AA group had been serious about setting up because there were a bunch of round tables, all covered in tablecloths with nice centerpieces, and a memorial with her dad’s picture set up in one corner of the room.
“I feel like a fraud being here,” she muttered.
“You were his daughter.” Bradford’s voice was low, steady. “Sounds like he turned his life around and would have wanted you here.”
“Yeah, maybe.” He’d left her a letter—one she still hadn’t opened.
She wasn’t sure if she ever would. She could only imagine it was an apology, but what if it wasn’t?
Would that make it worse? Ugh. “Also, husband?” She glanced up at him to find him looking down at her with an expression she couldn’t read.
“It’s true, isn’t it?” Now there was a challenging look in his gaze.
It was true only on paper. She’d never found the courage to divorce him. “ Bradford—”
“Hope.”
She turned at the sound of the sheriff’s voice.
Jeez, she hadn’t even heard him approach.
“Sheriff,” she said with a polite nod. He nodded back, then looked at Bradford with clear curiosity so she said, “Sheriff Crow, this is my husband, Bradford.” Felt weird to say the word husband , but he’d already told a roomful of white-haired church ladies.
Everyone in town would know by the end of the day.
And a small (large) part of her liked saying the word.
He blinked. “Oh, hadn’t realized you’d gotten married.”
She simply nodded and kept her polite smile in place.
It wasn’t like she’d told her father, they hadn’t had that kind of relationship.
“Any news on the guys from Wednesday night?” Hope knew she should have checked in with the sheriff sooner, but she’d been going through some of her father’s things.
Some of her mother’s belongings as well, stuff she hadn’t even realized he’d kept.
She’d also been working on a story, but for the most part she felt like she was simply trying to tread water in her childhood home.
It wasn’t like she’d expected her dad to live forever, or that they’d even had a good relationship, but everything was upside down now. She felt a little lost, untethered to everything. Her last blood relative was gone.
“I spoke to both of them. Jed says he and your dad had some handshake type of deal about a boat. I called bullshit and directed him to talk to your lawyer if he has an issue. If he bothers you again, just call me.”
“I will,” she murmured, glad when someone called for his attention.
“Someone bothering you?” Bradford asked, a bite to his tone.
“Not really. Just some guy showed up Wednesday night saying Hank owed him money.” She rolled her eyes. “I scared him off with Hank’s old shotgun.” She couldn’t call him Dad , hadn’t for a long time.
Bradford’s frown deepened, and he looked like he was going to say something, but his old unit approached then .
To her surprise, Tiago, then Rowan, then Hailey, and Ezra all hugged her one by one, murmuring condolences. She couldn’t fight the tears that rolled down her face as they embraced her.
She hadn’t expected to have anyone here, and to have all these kind faces from her past show up to support her was almost too much. She wasn’t a crier by nature, but today was the exception to the rule of her life.
“Thank you all so much for coming,” she said when she stepped back. “I can’t tell you what it means that you showed up.”
“Of course. Come on, I got us a big table.” Rowan, a giant teddy bear of a man, had his arm around a gorgeous redhead he’d introduced as his wife, Adalyn, who Hope vaguely recognized from one of her assignments in Afghanistan.
She sat with them, grateful when a plate of food appeared in front of her courtesy of Bradford, who’d been mostly silent, but a rock-solid presence.
She never should have walked out of that hotel room on him. A thought she’d had so many times when it was just her all alone in her sad little condo. She’d never even slept with anyone after him, which was probably ridiculous.
But she’d never been big into sex anyway. For her it was all about trust and there weren’t many people she could or would trust with her body. There was too much intimacy in that. Bradford had been different, had made her feel like she could be the best version of herself.
So of course she’d run, because that shit couldn’t last. He would have left her eventually, would have gotten sick of how often they were separated—would have realized she wasn’t really that great.
She mostly sat and listened as the others talked, leaning into Bradford as if she had every right in the world until Mrs. Harper (it felt too weird to call her Anna!) approached and asked for her help in the kitchen.
“I’ll be back,” she murmured, squeezing his knee and wishing he would stay for longer than today, but knowing she would never ask him to.
He had his own life and friends and that didn’t include her, no matter how much she might wish otherwise.