Chapter 29 Christina #2
“Of pretending.” The words came slowly, pulled from somewhere she usually kept locked.
“I pretend I’m fine. Pretend the divorce didn’t nearly destroy me.
Pretend I know exactly what I’m doing, all the time, with complete confidence.
” She looked down at her hands, at the perfect manicure that suddenly felt like another layer of facade.
“I’m exhausted by the perfection. By the armor. ”
James was quiet for a long moment. A breeze stirred the rosemary, releasing its sharp fragrance into the air.
“I was engaged once,” he said. “Victoria. She was a literary critic, brilliant, the first person who made me feel seen in years.” His voice was flat, controlled.
“She was writing a book about me the entire time. Using our conversations, our private moments, everything I’d trusted her with. Published it without telling me.”
Sophia’s breath caught. “James—”
“I came here to hide. Built my cabin, wrote my books, convinced myself that isolation was the same as peace.” He turned to look at her, and something in his expression had shifted—still guarded, but cracked open, just slightly. “It’s not. It’s just a different kind of exhaustion.”
“So what’s the alternative?”
“I’m still figuring that out.” He reached over, took her hand. His palm was rough, callused from work, so different from the soft hands of men she’d known in Milan. “But I think it might involve taking off the armor. Letting someone see the real person underneath.”
Sophia looked at their joined hands, at the contrast between his weathered skin and her polished nails.
She thought about all the men who’d wanted the Castellano name, the connections and status.
None of them had wanted to know about the nights she cried in her apartment, or the fear that she’d never be good enough, or the secret dreams she’d buried under duty.
“The real person underneath is kind of a mess,” she said.
“The real person underneath is human.” James squeezed her hand. “That’s all any of us are.”
From inside the inn, a burst of laughter erupted. Sophia found herself wanting to go back inside, wanting to be part of it, wanting to let herself belong somewhere that didn’t require perfection.
“I’m not leaving yet,” she said. “I know I said I’d only stay a few weeks, but—”
“Good.”
“I still have to go back, eventually. The company needs me, and there’s a spring collection that won’t design itself.”
“I know.”
“But I could come back. For visits. Longer ones.” She met his eyes, letting him see the uncertainty she usually hid. “If you wanted.”
James didn’t smile—he rarely smiled—but something warmed in his expression. “I’d like that.” He touched her cheek. “I’ll come visit, if you’ll have me.”
“I will.”
They sat together in the fading light, hands still linked, the garden peaceful around them. Inside, the celebration continued. Outside, the first evening star appeared above the mountains.
“We should go back in,” Sophia said. “Before they send a search party.”
“Probably.” But neither of them moved.
* * *
The bouquet toss was Ally’s idea. “It’s not a wedding, sweetheart,” Tara had said that morning. “It’s a christening.”
“It’s a celebration,” Ally had countered, already arranging the leftover flowers from the ceremony into a tossable bundle. “And we have approximately seventeen single women in that room.”
So here Tara stood, watching her daughter hurl a bouquet of bronze and gold chrysanthemums over her shoulder toward a laughing crowd.
Francesca caught it. The bookshop owner looked down at the flowers in her hands, her cheeks flushing pink, and across the room Bo Cooper’s face transformed.
The sheriff—usually so composed, so professionally neutral—was grinning like a teenager.
He pushed through the crowd toward Francesca, took her hands, and said something that made her laugh and duck her head.
“Twenty bucks says he proposes by Christmas,” Will murmured in her ear.
“That’s a sucker bet.”
“Fine. Ten bucks says he proposes by Thanksgiving.”
Tara elbowed him, but she was smiling. This was what she’d wanted when she’d imagined the inn—not just guests in beds and breakfast on tables, but moments like this. Connections forming and strengthening.
She scanned the room. Ryan and his gaming friends had commandeered the parlor, their cards and dice spread across the coffee table.
Dora had gathered an audience near the fireplace, regaling them with stories about moonshine runners and the old days in the mountains.
Sam drifted through the crowd with her camera, capturing candid moments for the portfolio she was building—art school applications due in January, her future stretching bright ahead of her.
Near the windows, Evan was bouncing baby Grace on his hip, talking to Marco. Tara caught fragments—community college curriculum, business fundamentals, local job market—and watched Marco nod with what looked like genuine interest.
“Your son is trying to recruit a billionaire to teach a fashion class,” Will observed.
“My son is passionate about education. It’s not his fault Marco keeps asking questions.”
“I like him. Marco, I mean.” Will’s arm settled around her waist. “He’s not what I expected.”
“No,” Tara agreed. “He’s not.”
She watched Christina emerge from the side porch. Her daughter’s expression had lost some of its tension—not all, but enough. Something had shifted between them.
Christina caught her mother’s eye across the room and gave a small nod.
Tara excused herself from Will and made her way through the crowd. Up close, she could see the traces of tears Christina had hastily wiped away, the slight tremble in her hands as she held Violet.
“Mom,” Christina started.
“You don’t have to explain.” Tara reached out, smoothed a strand of hair behind Christina’s ear—the same gesture she’d been doing since Christina was small. “Whatever you two decided, I’m here. Whatever you need.”
“We’re going to try. Half here, half there. See how it goes.”
“That sounds reasonable.”
“It sounds terrifying.”
Tara looked at her daughter—this fierce, stubborn, loving girl who’d been so afraid of losing her baby that she’d carried the weight of a secret for months—and felt a wave of pride so strong it nearly buckled her knees.
“Everything good is a little terrifying,” she said. “That’s how you know it matters.”
Marco appeared at Christina’s shoulder, Violet reaching for him with tiny grasping hands.
He took her easily, naturally, like he’d been doing it for years instead of weeks.
The baby settled against his chest, one fist tangled in his shirt collar, those unmistakable green-gold eyes already drooping toward sleep.
“Mrs. Dixon,” Marco said. “Thank you for hosting this. For all of it.”
“It’s Tara. And this is what the inn is for.” She gestured at the room around them—the chaos and warmth and imperfect beauty of it all. “Family. Whatever shape that takes.”
Marco’s expression softened. “My mother is flying in next week. She wanted me to ask if she could see the garden. She lost her best friend to dementia as well, years ago. She thinks she’d like to sit there for a while.”
Tara thought of Patty, of all the moments they’d never get to share, of the garden she’d built from grief and love. “She’s welcome anytime. Everyone is.”
Christina reached for her mother’s hand, squeezed it once. No words needed.
The afternoon light was fading, the great room growing golden with sunset. Outside, the mountains blazed with the last fierce colors of autumn. Inside, the fire crackled, conversations hummed, and the smell of cider and and fresh-baked bread filled every corner.
In the parlor, Ryan threw down a card with a triumphant shout. Dora cackled at her own joke. Bo led Francesca onto the impromptu dance floor, and they swayed together to music only they could hear. Sam snapped a photo, then another, her artist’s eye finding beauty in ordinary moments.
Evan handed Grace to Emily and headed for the cider station. Ally and Colton stood by the window, her head on his shoulder, watching the sunset. Sophia emerged from the back with James, their fingers loosely linked, both looking slightly dazed and entirely present.
This, Tara thought. This is what we built.
Will found her again, pressed a kiss to her temple. “You okay?”
“Better than okay.”
“Want to escape for five minutes? The porch is empty.”
Tara took one last look at the room—her children, her grandchildren, the extended family that had grown and shifted and surprised her at every turn—and nodded.
* * *
The party wound down slowly, the way good celebrations did.
Christina stood at the window as guests trickled out, their cars crunching down the gravel drive, their taillights disappearing into the dusk.
Violet had been passed among so many arms today—Marco’s, Tara’s, Evan’s, even Sophia’s tentative hold—but now she was back where she belonged, sleeping against Christina’s chest.
“Long day.”
Marco joined her at the window. He’d found his jacket somewhere, but it was slung over his arm, and his shirt was thoroughly wrinkled. He looked exhausted and content in equal measure.
“The longest.” Christina leaned into him slightly. “But good.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
Outside, the last car pulled away—Sam’s grandmother, probably, the old blue sedan distinctive in the twilight. The inn fell quiet, or as quiet as a building full of family could be. From somewhere in the back, Tara’s voice called instructions to Will. Ryan’s laughter echoed from the parlor.
“So what now?” Christina asked.
“Now we go home.” Marco’s arm came around her shoulders. “Get Violet into bed. Sleep for approximately fourteen years.”
“And tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow we start figuring out the rest of it.” He pressed a kiss to her hair. “But tonight, we just get to be tired together.”
Christina smiled against his shoulder. Tired together. It wasn’t poetry, but it was real.
“Come on,” she said. “I’ll let you carry the diaper bag.”
“Such generosity.”
“I’m a giver.”
They gathered their things—the bag, the carrier, the gifts that well-wishers had pressed into their hands all afternoon—and said their goodnights. Tara hugged them both, holding on a beat too long. Evan clapped Marco on the shoulder.
The October air hit Christina like a cold cloth when they stepped outside, bracing and clean after the warmth of the inn. Above them, stars were emerging in the darkening sky, more stars than she’d ever seen in Miami.
Marco loaded the car while she settled Violet into her car seat. The baby stirred, fussed, then settled again when Christina tucked the blanket tighter. Those green-gold eyes fluttered open for a moment, found Christina’s face, and drifted closed.
“Ready?” Marco asked from the driver’s seat.
Christina looked back at the inn one last time—the warm glow of windows, the silhouette of her mother waving from the porch, Patty’s Garden a dark shape against the darker trees.
“Ready,” she said.
The car pulled away, gravel crunching, headlights cutting through the dark as they drove around the lake to the cottage. Home.
Christina reached across the console and took Marco’s hand. Tomorrow they’d start making calls—lawyers, logistics, the complicated machinery of two lives becoming something new. But that was tomorrow.
Tonight, the road was quiet, and Violet was sleeping, and the mountains rose dark and steady on either side of them.
“I’m glad you kept her,” he said. “I know that sounds—I don’t have the right to say that, maybe. But I’m glad you did.”
“So am I.”
They sat in silence for a moment, the engine idling, the heater pushing warm air through the vents. Then Violet made a small sound from the backseat—not a cry, just a murmur—and Christina turned to check on her.
“We should get her inside,” she said.
“Yeah.” Marco turned the car off. “Home.”
The word sounded different when he said it. Fuller, somehow. Like it meant more than just a place.
They had time. That was the thing she was finally starting to believe. They had time to figure this out, to make mistakes and course-correct, to build something that neither of them had expected.