Chapter 30 The Grand Gesture
Chapter 30
the grand gesture
Summer hadn’t had many lonely days recently, not since Wes had come into her life. But last night had been hell. He’d come and collected his things, which she’d boxed up and put on the porch so she wouldn’t have to see him. In fact, she’d been dodging him since the breakup. Avoiding his calls, texts, visits to the store, flower deliveries. He’d even sent a hundred heart balloons to her shop which had been Guide -worthy but too little too late. They were over, a fact that had spread like wildfire through the town.
Summer rolled over in her tiny bed, which seemed gigantic now that she was sleeping alone again. It was cold too. And a reminder of what she’d lost.
Her store had seen more customers than she knew what to do with, but they’d sold very few books. They were there to check in on her. Which was sweet and very embarrassing. A good chunk of them had also come to cancel their orders for Sloan’s new book.
It was the first sign of the new normal. The second sign was when the property tax bill came in and was double last year’s because of the appreciation due to the new behemoth store next door. The third sign was when a real-estate agent—Mable’s niece—had approached her to say that if she ever decided to sell, to please give her a call.
Even her most loyal customers knew it was game over.
Autumn and Cleo hadn’t left her alone, hovering around her like she was a fragile snowflake falling in the dead of summer. Even her parents and auntie and uncle had flown out from Florida. But instead of being there for her big event, they were there for moral support.
Wes had been right when he’d told her that love was fiction, because if it were the amazing, magical thing she’d thought it would be, it wouldn’t hurt this much. Right?
The rest of her family had made it work, so maybe she was defunct. She was a mirror twin, meaning her heart was on the wrong side of her body. Maybe she had been destined to be loveless from birth. Not that she wasn’t loved by her friends and family, but she wanted the everlasting, romantic kind of love. And she’d found it, then lost it.
Maybe love wasn’t enough. At least not for everyone. Because she’d put everything into Wes, and he’d chosen a piece of paper over her. Then again, he’d always been honest with her that when it came to his life it was all about the bottom line. Which meant her worth was beneath a signature on a piece of paper.
And the last sign was when the music started thumping next door at BookLand’s version of Burning Man. She had avoided looking out the window, but curiosity won out and she nearly yelped at what she saw. When she woke up at six, there were people sitting in lawn chairs at the entrance to BookLand. By noon the line had grown around the block. And by four the line had nearly doubled around and ran the length of both sides of the streets.
That was when Cleo sent her up to her room for the day. When she’d looked around the shop and spotted not a single customer, she’d obliged. Her dad tried to teach her to knit. Her, her auntie, and her mom made lasagna from scratch, and Autumn took her shopping to buy a new dress for the signing and podcast because apparently, they were still happening.
Autumn had told Randy that she would not host the event and that her loyalties lay with her sister, and she even went on a sex ban in support of Summer. By the time her family was done distracting her she was exhausted, so she turned in early just so she could breathe.
That night there was a tap on her bedroom door. She rolled back over to check her phone. It was nearly midnight so she decided to ignore it. But the tapper wouldn’t stop tapping.
“Ugh! Come in,” she grumbled. It wasn’t like she was sleeping. Even her ear plugs couldn’t keep out the thumping bass from BookLand’s Mardi Gras.
“Did I wake you?” her dad asked quietly, as if he hadn’t just tapped himself onto her shit list.
“How can anyone sleep through this?”
“Your mom. This doesn’t even match my snoring.”
“If you’re coming in to check on me, I’m fine. Fine. Fine. Fine.”
“Well, now that I know you’re fine, I came to tell you a story.”
Frank crossed the room and Summer sat up against the headboard, leaving room for him to sit on the side of the bed. “Did you know that your mother left me?”
“What?” Not only was this shocking, it was clearly fiction. Her parents were so in love with each other that sometimes it was hard to look at them without feeling like you were interrupting an intimate moment.
“When you girls were little.”
“I don’t believe you.”
He chortled. “Trust me. It was the worst week of my life.”
“Oh, Dad.” She took his hand in hers. “What happened?”
“I wanted to grow my company to keep up with the competition.”
“I know.”
“What you didn’t know was that I didn’t have the money, so I put the house on the market without even asking her. She came home to find a FOR SALE sign on her front lawn. She tried to talk me out of it, but I wouldn’t listen. I wanted to provide everything for my family, not just be an average man. For my family, I wanted to be Superman.”
“Did you sell it?”
“Yup, and in less than a year we’d lost the company. Your mom took you girls and moved back into this apartment, and I stayed in a motel. Nine days we were apart. Nine days I thought I’d lost the best thing in my life. All because I was trying to be a big man, taking on all the responsibility. I forgot that love goes both ways, and if I had just listened to her fears and concerns she probably would have let me chase my dream, but I made a unilateral decision that tore my family apart.”
“Dad, I had no idea,” Summer said, raw and tentative grief overwhelming her.
“But it wasn’t just your dad,” Blanche said from the doorway. “I was to blame too.”
“How?” Summer wanted to know. Her mom hadn’t sold the house out from under her family and put business over love.
“Because I ran. When your dad needed me the most I was a coward and ran.” Blanche sat next to Frank and took his hand in a loving and tender way. “Worst of all, I took his babies away from him.”
That’s when Summer realized she was shedding silent tears. Her parents’ story didn’t follow the traditional romance novel plot. Or did it? They’d reached their darkest moment, and instead of working it out together Blanche had fled. And Frank hadn’t gone after her.
It was just like how Summer had fled. At the first sign of trouble, she’d broken things off and run, even though she loved him. So no, love wasn’t enough; you had to have the courage to make it work.
Wes was the most courageous man she knew. And he hadn’t let her run, he’d tried and tried to reach her, but she’d turned him away time and time again. Just like his family.
Oh god, what had she done? She’d done exactly what Wes had done—she’d let the bottom line define their love.
She threw the covers back and kissed each parent on the cheek. “Thank you for sharing your story and for having the courage to put love first.”
She hopped out of bed and put on her robe.
“Where are you going?” her dad asked.
“I need to see Wes.”
“At least let’s put on some foundation and a smidge of mascara,” Blanche said, but Summer was already sprinting down the hallway. “Lip gloss?”
Wes didn’t need makeup or a pampered princess, he needed her. She was sure of it. She burst through the front door and ran down the back steps, the concrete cold on her heels, little bits of gravel digging into her toes.
She rounded the corner to the alley and came to a dead stop. In front of her doorway was a red carpet with gold ropes zigzagging back and forth. Between them were hundreds and hundreds of people who had made it to the front of the line. And standing next to the door was Sloan Chase herself, surrounded by a team of security that could rival the secret service.
“Thank god you’re here. I’m getting mobbed.”
“Sloan?”
“Summer.” She shook hands. “Nice to meet you. Now can we get this party started.”
“Shouldn’t you be next door?”
“Yes, but the owner informed me that they no longer carry romance and that Romance Central is All Things Cupid.”
Her heart did a little flip of disbelief while a flutter of butterflies took flight in her belly. “He said that?”
Had he really put her, put love and emotions, before his work? Was there a small bead of hope for them?
“Then he moved the party over here. Now that you’re up to date, would you mind opening up shop so I can be ready to sign the first book at 12:01 a.m.?”
“Of course.” She reached into her robe pocket and came up empty. “My keys are back in the—”
“They’re right here,” Cleo said, looking like she’d just gotten off her motorcycle and hadn’t had time to remove her helmet. Behind her were twenty-plus Harleys rumbling and creating a spectacle, which only drove the crowd crazier.
Cleo unlocked the door and led Sloan to a table that was already set up, with a pink chair, books ready to sign, and decorations surrounding the store. There was a tablet at the front of the store, right at the door, where people could sign up for their newsletter, and to Summer’s surprise nearly everyone was.
From there the line went up and down the aisles and, just like they’d hoped, customers were picking up stacks of books to buy.
“We’ll never get them all rung up,” Summer whispered to Cleo. “We don’t have enough staff.”
“Already taken care of.” Cleo pointed to three men, each built like a beast, each with a handlebar mustache, each probably carrying a warrant to appear in court, and each running their own tablet with a credit-card slide.
Thank god biker romances were the thing, because the ladies were eating it up. Their winks, their flirting, even the permanent frown on the third one.
She turned to Cleo. “You knew. All day you knew, and that’s why you wanted me out of the shop.”
“It was all Wes’s idea. He showed up at six a.m. on my porch. Lucky I didn’t shoot the bastard. Then he told me his plan.”
“But he’ll get sued.”
“I’m willing to take the risk,” a familiar voice said from behind her.
Summer turned around and felt her heart ping through her chest like it was a pinball machine. Wes was dressed in low-slung jeans, an ALL THINGS CUPID shirt that said STAFF across the back, and sneakers. He looked like a harbor in the storm that had been building the past few days.
She pushed her way through the crowd as he started walking toward her, people automatically moving to the side for him. When they were close enough that she could smell the fog machine vapor on his skin, she released the first full breath since she’d walked away.
“I’m sorry,” they both said at the same time, and a smile touched each of their faces.
“What are you sorry for?” Confusion collapsed his forehead.
“That I walked away. You told me you loved me, you showed me you loved me, and at the first sign of trouble I ran. I ran because I let my insecurities and prejudice get the best of me,” Summer said. “I never should have left. I should have stayed and worked it out. I know that people have walked out on you your whole life, but I refuse to be one of them. I love you, Weston Kingston.”
“How? I put my needs over yours, hung you out to dry, and wasn’t even open to other solutions. I chose pride. I hurt you and I hate myself for that.”
She looked at the shop full of customers who were going to get her back in the black. “You came up with a solution. Look at this place.” She went serious. “You aren’t going to get sued, are you?
“Nope, I sold them on the idea of a local bookshop with generations of romance and smut. I explained that as a romance author, how could she stand in the way of love, and she agreed.” He cupped her hips. “But I would have done it even if they’d threatened to sue.”
Her heart bubbled up like a bottle of champagne ready to explode. “You would?”
“I have a team of lawyers who can get me out of anything, remember? Plus, the board knows I’m the best man for the job. And they’re scared of me. Just somewhere along the way I forgot that the power of love is stronger than the power of fear.”
“I’m not scared of you.”
“I know, and that’s part of the reason I love you. You call me on my shit, are honest to a fault, and know how to argue like it’s dirty foreplay. Plus, we’ve had more perfect meet-cutes than you have in this store. And I hope those outweigh the darkest moment.”
“Every romance has its darkest moment,” the biker with resting kill face said, and the crowd voiced their agreement.
“They’re right. And it’s what the couple decides to do that matters.”
“What are you going to do, love?”
She cupped his cheek. “How can you ask that after giving me the best grand gesture a girl could dream of?”
“I love you, Summer. Today, tomorrow, and in fifty years I’ll still choose you. The question is, do you still love me?”
She threw herself into his arms. “I will love you until my heart takes its last beat. You’re mine, remember, babe?”
“And you’re mine, and I look forward to reminding you about that tonight.”
“My parents are staying with me.”
“Then we get a hotel. For them. I just want to come home.
She tightened her arms. “Then hold me tighter.”
“As you wish.”