Chapter 17
CASSANDRA
I strode into the office with my own coffee on Tuesday morning. If how yesterday had ended was any indication, I suspected my days of Blake sweetly bringing me coffee were over.
And I was right. Lila let me know when she came in that they’d shuffled the recreation schedule of the review around, and Blake was going to be with Jude for the rest of the week.
“Okay, that’s great,” I said, smiling. She studied me for a moment, but I’d left her and gone into my office, closing the door behind me.
But even though I spent that day and the next busy with catch-up, I couldn’t help my eyes from going to the empty chair in my office, feeling like I was missing a limb.
Even after the sticky way it had ended.
I kept replaying our day together; all the things we’d done.
And how he’d given me the answer I’d pushed for. That he didn’t want a relationship at all. Not with me, not with anyone. I’m not the marrying type.
But I still couldn’t help the old pain that festered; the self-doubt. Did he mean that? Or was it just me?
And why did I care? It’s not like I wanted him to marry me.
On Thursday, there was a knock on my office door. My heart lifted, and I considered shoveling my coffee in the trash before I called out. Blake.
I didn’t, and it was a good thing because it wasn’t Blake. It was Lila.
“Hi,” I said, surprised and not a little disappointed. Then I was upset with myself for feeling that way. At least I hadn’t binned my coffee.
“Hi,” Lila said.
We exchanged a few stilted pleasantries where, in between talking about the running path and how the town had finally fixed up the area I’d fallen in, I tried and failed to read her face to know what she was thinking—did she know about me and Blake?
Did she know I knew they weren’t married?
Did she think I thought I’d been with a married man?
That last thought made me sick, but I suspected Lila wouldn’t jump to that conclusion first.
Finally, Lila smiled. “I’m on my way down to meet Reese and your sister for food and events. By next week, we’ll have reached the part of the schedule where I’m meant to tour the east wing.”
“Right, the construction zone.”
“Yes. The plan is to get a sense of whether we should recommend continuing the work of the previous contractors, or to scrap and begin again, considering all the income potential of the space.
Suddenly, I understood why she was here. “Griffin’s name was on this part, wasn’t it?” I asked.
“Yes. And unfortunately, I still haven’t been able to get hold of him. I didn’t want to bother you with this, but I’m wondering if you might know when he’ll be back?”
“Lila, I don’t even know where he is,” I sighed, taking a long sip of my coffee. I said a second prayer above I hadn’t tossed it.
Lila looked surprised. Slightly concerned even.
“My brother Griffin is a bit of an enigma,” I said. “As you might have guessed.”
“Yes. Eli explained to me that he’s not on the payroll. He’s got a share of the ownership, but he’s not actually employed here.
“Right.”
“It’s… interesting.”
“It’s weird. But it works. Griffin comes in when we need him and disappears when we don’t. I suspect he’s not back because he doesn’t really care about the potential of the east wing, or profitability. He only cares about the actual nuts and bolts of putting it back together again.”
Lila quirked a brow.
I realized I liked her, but I was angry with her too. Even though Blake’s situation was his own choice, it was because of her. I wondered if she’d fought him on it. If she ever opened windows for him to leave.
But of course they’d talked about it. They were grown adults. Really, I had no reason to be upset with her. I only wanted someone else to blame, because Blake not wanting to change their circumstances was the worst part of it all.
Luckily, she didn’t see all this pass over my face. “Griffin is kind of a savant, isn’t he?”
I smiled, thinking of my brother. He was definitely the oddest one of all of us. Quiet. Withdrawn. But fiercely protective of us all, too. A beast.
“One of the golf club lawnmowers broke down once when we were kids, and before Mom called in the repair guys, Griff asked if he could look at it. He ended up taking apart the engine completely—like right down to screws all lined up neatly on the ground. He was nine years old.”
“Did he fix it?”
“In only a couple of hours. Dad wanted to write the local paper to brag about it, but Griff wouldn’t let him.”
Lila smiled. “I’m sorry I won’t get to work with him. But I was hoping you’d come with me to do the tour next week, seeing as you and Blake—”
I stiffened. If she didn’t know what was going on between me and Blake, she suspected something was up.
“Seeing as you’re not working together anymore,” she finished. “Construction review is our penultimate week; the final week after that is select staff interviews and closeout, then we’re gone.”
I swallowed. I knew the schedule, but I hadn’t looked at it recently. I’d been ignoring it, hoping it might go away.
“You okay?” Lila’s brows slanted.
“Sure,” I said. “Tired, that’s all. Yes, of course I’ll do the east wing with you next week. Happy to.”
“Great,” she said. She moved for the door, then paused. “Cassandra?”
“Yes?” Nerves shot through me.
“Can I ask you something?”
My stomach churned. She was going to ask me about Blake. What was I going to say?
But instead, she came around and sat in the chair in front of me. “You were close to your parents, right?”
It wasn’t anywhere near the question I’d expected. For a moment, I was too surprised to answer. Then I did. “Yes,” I said simply. “I was. Not so much anymore. I mean, my mom’s dead, obviously. And Dad is… away. But when we were younger, yes. We were very close.”
She looked like she wanted to hear more, so I continued.
“I was Dad’s little helper, with the other kids.
I liked being the person he could count on when he was running around looking after us.
And Mom, well, Mom was always busy with the hotel, but at night she’d come home and come to me for the rundown of how everything went.
She treated me like… her source, if that makes sense.
She knew Dad would gloss over the hard stuff, or the little details about what each of the kids had done that day.
So we had a special relationship that way. ”
Lila nodded. It seemed like she wanted to say something, but was holding back. Then she blurted out, “Did you ever have to hide anything from them? Something they’d be incredibly upset about?”
She was trying to play it cool, like this was a casual question, but I could see the way her lip did a quick quiver before she pinched it against the other.
My chest suddenly hurt. I knew what she was asking. I’d been so cavalier about the arrangement she and Blake had made, but I thought about what it would be like if I had a secret so big, and so devastating for my parents, that they’d have severed ties with me.
They wouldn’t have, I realized. I knew that in my bones. They would never have told me there was something about me that made me unlovable.
When I looked at Lila, I didn’t see the person standing between me and Blake.
I saw a person trapped in her own pain, so damaged by a painful truth—the threat of losing the love of the people who were supposed to love her unconditionally.
And I saw how her business with Blake was the one thing she could count on.
Blake had promised he would stick with her. How could he possibly let her down?
I swallowed down the lump that was threatening to form in my throat.
He’s not yours to have.
“Can I tell you something about Blake?” I asked. “It’s related, I promise.”
Lila blinked, but recovered quickly. “Of course.”
“I’ve really appreciated getting to know him during our time together. He respects what my mom was trying to do here. I mean, at first he kept talking about high-end luxury; clean lines and marble porticos. But he’s adapted.”
“He suggested we propose a few iterations of how the hotel could look in our final report,” she said.
“Right. And you know what shifted his viewpoint?”
She twisted her hands in her lap. “We haven’t had a chance to discuss it.”
I suspected they weren’t talking about a lot of things right now. Because of me.
“It was after we had that staff lunch a couple of weeks ago.”
That meeting where our legs had met under the table and we’d both just kept still, in a tacit connection so ridiculous and so completely innocent compared to what we’d done earlier this week.
But it had been special, and symbolic somehow.
Like we decided to be close to each other because it felt better than moving away.
“Remember how I talked about how my parents found the hotel after that other family lost control of it?”
“I remember,” she said softly.
“I think the story really affected him. He pulled up photos of older hotels in the United Kingdom and on the east coast, and talked about how we could embrace our historical roots instead of cutting them off. I hadn’t thought I’d cared about whether the place was modern or classic; I’d just wanted the business not to fail.
I’d wanted my mom to have been proud of me. ”
Just like Blake had said he thought she would be at that same lunch.
I swallowed that lump down again.
“He thought it was important I honor my parents,” I said. “He was going to suggest scrapping the modern proposal altogether.”
I paused. “But I asked him to keep it.”
Lila looked surprised. “I thought he’d convinced you to keep it. He loves the avant-garde modern stuff.”
“Right. But the thing is, I told him I knew my parents would be happy with whatever the five of us kids wanted to do together. Yes, they had their own preferences—my dad lives and breathes the history, and would probably be devastated if we erased every last trace of it. But I know he wouldn’t disown me even if I tore the place right down and opened a…
shopping mall.” I held up a hand. “Actually, Dad would blow his top if that happened, but he’d forgive me.
At a certain point, love is more important than any dogged attachment to the past, or to what someone else thinks is right, you know? ”
Lila was nodding, but blinking rapidly, like she was trying to hold back tears.
“But I’m not na?ve. I know not everyone can just get over stuff that’s important to them, no matter how wrong it is.
I know I’m lucky I had that. If my situation had been different—if I’d had a secret or something that would actually affect our relationship—I honestly don’t know if I’d tell them.
Not to save them the hurt, but… because sometimes you have to make those hard decisions. And you only get one set of parents.”
The next part was the hardest, but it had to be said. “But no matter what, you have Blake. He told me…”
He told me a lot of things, things that hurt, but things that made me proud to know him.
“He told me he would never let you down. And I believe him. Blake cares about you without condition. I was with someone who didn’t, and I know the difference.”
Now my eyes were wet. “I’m sorry,” I said. “This isn’t about me.”
“Love is hard, isn’t it, Cassandra?”
“It’s hard, but it’s everything. And even if we don’t get the kind of unconditional love we want, just know we deserve it. We’re worthy whether we get it or not.”
Lila looked away then, and I knew she was crying too. But she briskly brushed the tears away and stood up.
“Cassandra,” she said. “I’ve seen the way he looks at you.”
My heart felt as if it had stopped. She knew. Or was she guessing and my response would confirm it either way?
I swallowed, but she only smiled, her eyes going wet once more.
“He gets this look when you’re not around, too. When we just mention your name. It’s like… it’s like he’s truly happy, where he never was quite before. We like you too, Cassandra. Me and Brynn. You made this work feel… worthwhile. So, thank you.”
Before I could react, Lila said a mumbled goodbye, and when the door clicked shut behind her, I let out the sob that had been lodged in my chest.
I knew I’d sealed my fate with Blake. He already told me he never saw himself being with anyone, but this stubborn part of me had known he could change that if he really wanted to. But now I snuffed out my last selfish hope for that.
Blake wasn’t mine to keep. Even though my heart was ripped straight through, I knew it was the right thing to do.
I’d have to be okay with losing him.