Chapter 18
eighteen
WHITNEY WAS GOING to tell Aretha the truth. She didn’t know how or when. But after ruining another pie crust, she couldn’t afford not to.
And then she would tell Daniel. She just needed to find a moment with him. Alone. A moment where Aretha wasn’t still pushing him and Ruby together. The two business gurus had been busy finalizing agreements with the quilters, and Aretha had hovered over them like a mother hen.
But the moment she could get Aretha by herself, the lies had to end. And with them, hopefully her sleepless nights would too.
Her hand brushed over the sharp corner of the envelope sticking out of her apron pocket. Ignoring the twist of her stomach at the reminder, she rubbed her eyes with the heels of her hands and focused on the fresh peaches swimming before her. If she messed up now, she was liable to lose a finger, not just have a soggy pie crust. She cut through the fruit’s flesh with slow, steady movements. Then she turned the peach half and sliced it at a ninety-degree angle.
She had only one farmers’ market of the season left, and only a handful of pies yet to bake.
Not that it mattered. She wasn’t going to culinary school. She couldn’t take Aretha’s money—even if by some miracle Aretha still offered it. And she couldn’t make the tuition without it.
At this point—after she broke Aretha’s heart and then Daniel’s—she didn’t think she’d have much desire to attend anyway. Mostly, she wanted to disappear. Before she had to come clean with them all if possible.
But that wasn’t how these things worked. She’d much prefer to bail as soon as it got hard. Like soccer. Like fiddle. Like swimming.
Yet these were people’s lives she was dealing with. This wasn’t a flying ball to the face without any feelings of its own. These were people who deserved the truth—even if it hurt her to say it.
She needed the Lord’s strength because she was about to set her whole Christmas season on fire.
“There you are!”
Whitney spun at Daniel’s voice, facing him down, knife outstretched before her.
“Whoa!” He chuckled, hands held up in surrender.
“Sorry.” She dropped the knife to the cutting board and scooped her peach bites into a mixing bowl.
“Hey, are you all right?”
“Fine.”
Uncertainty was clearly spelled out across the pinched line of his eyebrows, and she knew it wasn’t fair to make him doubt his interpretation of her response. Not when he was right.
“I’m just up in my own head today. I’m sorry. It’s not you.” It’s me.
His warm hand slipped across the small of her back, a little bit possessive, completely sweet. It said she belonged with him. And he with her. She couldn’t help the way her head fell back and into his shoulder. Just for a second she closed her eyes, and the voice that had been screaming at her for days drew silent.
He pressed his lips to the side of her forehead, and the ache that had been her constant companion eased.
“You look pretty today.”
“Don’t say that. I look like a mess.” No mirror was required to know that her hair had turned frizzy and her cheeks were dusted with flour from the remade crust.
He brushed her hair from her forehead, dragged a finger down to her chin, then pressed his thumb ever so gently to her lips. “I don’t see any mess at all.”
Great. Now she was going to turn into a puddle. “You can’t just say things like that.”
“Says who?”
What if someone heard? What if he knew the truth? He would hate himself for believing even for a minute that she was something she wasn’t.
Like a snap of her fingers, the voice was back, and she pushed away from Daniel’s warmth. “I have to get these pies done before the market on the twenty-second.”
“Great. I’ll help you—and maybe you can help me?”
She sprinkled sugar over the cut peaches. “What do you need help with?”
“A ride to Georgetown.”
“You’re not cheating on my pies with the goodies at the Maroon Pig, are you?” The little bakery along the southeastern coastline was island famous for their rhubarb cinnamon rolls, but to her, their butterscotch brownies were as close to a taste of heaven as she’d find this side of eternity.
He chuckled, that shallow dimple teasing her. “Never. But we have one quilter who doesn’t do computers. Or the internet. She asked us to fax her the agreement.”
Whitney cringed. “Does anyone actually own a fax machine anymore?”
“Poppy Donaldson in Georgetown, apparently.”
She snorted. “No, she doesn’t.”
“Probably not personally, but maybe. The problem is we don’t have a fax machine on this side to send it from. And the back and forth on a fax machine will just drag it out. Ruby and I agreed that a trip to see Poppy in person is a much better idea. Otherwise, we’ll never get this wrapped up before Christmas.” He nudged her shoulder with his. “What do you say? Up for a road trip?”
“Just the two of us?” She didn’t know if she sounded hopeful or not. She wasn’t even sure if she was. Uninterrupted time alone with him meant she’d have to make good on the promise she’d made to herself.
“Um, and Ruby.”
She sighed louder than she’d expected. Relieved that she wouldn’t have to tell him the truth just yet.
Because she was a coward.
“Yeah. I can do that.” It wasn’t like she had to bake pies anyway. It didn’t really matter how many she took to the market.
“Great!” He pressed a quick kiss to her lips. “Now, put me to work.”
“You’re sure?”
“Everything for Aunt Aretha is done—except for Poppy’s signature. The sale is going to be completed right after the New Year, and I just want to spend the afternoon with my favorite girl.”
“You still can’t say things like that.” But she knew her smile took the legs out from under her argument. “Come on, let’s get you cleaned up.” When she lifted her apron to wipe her hands, the white envelope it had been storing flopped to the floor.
“What’s this?” Daniel stooped and picked it up, studying the return address. “From the culinary institute? Why haven’t you opened it?”
She studied the floral pattern of the fabric between her fingers for a long moment. “It’s a last call to pay the tuition or lose my spot.”
“How do you know?”
“Because the previous three emails said I’d get a final written notice.”
The line of his jaw worked back and forth. “So, pay the tuition.”
He made it sound so easy, so black-and-white. She wished it could be. “I’m not going to go.”
Jerking back as though she’d slapped him, he said, “I don’t understand. This was your plan.”
“But not my dream. Haven’t you been reminding me of that for weeks?” She tried for a smile, but it fell flat.
“Have you figured out your dream?”
“No.” She shrugged. “I was never going to make it to culinary school. I can’t commit to anything, right?”
“Whitney? Talk to me. What’s going on?”
The words were on the tip of her tongue, ready to spill out. The truth of what she never should have agreed to.
But instead, a different truth poured out.
“It’s what I do. It’s what I’ve always done. I give up when things get difficult.”
He shook his head, and she wasn’t sure if it was because he didn’t understand or because he didn’t agree. If the latter, she could prove it to him.
“The only dream I’ve ever had was to be a dolphin trainer.”
“A lot of call for that on the island?”
She shoved his shoulder. “I’m serious. I was seven, and I’d seen a show about a dolphin, and someone told me it was someone’s job to train that dolphin. And I wanted to do it. They seemed so smart and were so sleek in the water. The kids in my class told me it was a stupid dream. No one from little North Rustico would ever work with dolphins.”
“What do kids know?”
“That’s what I said. So I kept at it, reading all about dolphins, learning how they’re trained.”
He nodded thoughtfully. “Sounds smart. And then you studied marine biology?”
“No. I didn’t get that far. I got to the pool and nearly drowned on my first day of swimming lessons. Like, the lifeguard had to rescue me. And they took me to the hospital in an ambulance.”
He grabbed her hand, pressing his fingers to her wrist as though to confirm that blood still pumped through her veins and she had survived the ordeal.
“I lived.” She did a little jig to prove it—like her chattering wasn’t evidence enough.
His grin was worth it.
“When my mom came to get me at the hospital, she was ... well, I think she was relieved. But she was furious. I wanted to get back in the water and learn to swim. I couldn’t swim with dolphins if I couldn’t swim , if I was afraid of the water. But she forbade me from setting foot on a pool deck again. And forget the beach. When my best friend had her birthday party at the Greenwich beach, I wasn’t allowed to go.”
And how she’d wanted to. All the other kids in her class had buzzed about what fun they’d had the next Monday.
“What did you do with that dream?”
“There were still dolphins that needed trainers, so I snuck back to the pool and tried to teach myself how to swim.”
“Which ended with . . .”
The sight of the water closing over her head and the bubbles rising uselessly to the surface flashed to her mind. The feeling of her lungs begging for oxygen, the burning as she swallowed the chlorinated water. Then everything had gone black. “Another ride to the hospital.”
He cupped her cheek, running his thumb around the edge of her ear and tucking her hair back. “I’m glad there was someone there to save you.”
“Me too.” She managed a mirthless laugh. “But it scared me. It was...” She inhaled deeply.
“You thought dreams were dangerous.”
She nodded. “They are. If I don’t care, I won’t get hurt.”
“But you do care.”
She looked down, but he nudged her chin up with his thumb until she met his gaze.
“You do. I’ve seen the way you care about those kids, all that you’ve done to give them a joy-filled Christmas season. I see the way you honor Aretha and help Marie.” He glanced over his shoulder toward the dining room. “Even the way you serve me and Ruby breakfast every morning.”
“It was a trade-off—it was so I could use the inn’s oven.”
“But you could have done the bare minimum. You could have served us leftovers. Eggs every day. You could have put frozen waffles in the toaster.”
She snorted. “I couldn’t do that to you—not to anyone.”
“Because you don’t give up on people. You may give up on stringed instruments and life-threatening sports. But you don’t give up on people. You love and care for them better than anyone I’ve ever met.”
His words made her eyes burn. If he only knew the truth. But she could barely shake her head and insist he understand how wrong he was. “I don’t. Not really.”
“Yes. Really. How long have you known Marie?”
“Um, almost ten years. Since she moved here. But that was just in passing at church and around town. It wasn’t until Caden opened the inn’s kitchen to a bunch of high school students to teach us how to cook that I really got to know her. And then when Caden came back for the summer seasons, I would stop by and help.”
“Because you like cooking?”
She thought about it for a long moment. “Because I like Caden and Marie, and I wanted to be like them when I grew up. They’re the best people I know.” She stood up a little straighter, and his hands dropped to her shoulders, then slid down to her wrists until he twined their fingers together. “I didn’t care what we were cooking or how we were cooking it. I just wanted to sit on one of those stools and listen to them talk about their lives. I wanted to hear their stories and pretend that I would be brave like them when I was older. And here I am, a fully grown adult and barely a shadow of the women they are.”
“That’s not true. You’re wise and kind and—”
“I’m really not.”
Leaning his forehead against hers, he lifted her hands to his mouth, where his patchy five o’clock shadow bristled against her knuckles. “I haven’t misunderstood you.”
Her stomach swooped, and her head spun. She’d waited a lifetime to hear everything he was saying. Yet he didn’t really know her.
Whitney opened her mouth to tell him the whole terrible truth, but before she could speak, the bell on the swinging door jingled. Daniel pressed her knuckles briefly to his lips, then quickly stepped away as Ruby sashayed into the kitchen, her mouth already running a mile a minute.