1. Chapter 1 #2
With a triumphant smirk, she faces forward again and slips her hand into Mason’s. I watch Mason play with the bold-colored bracelet on Dani’s wrist in between holding her hand for the next twenty-five minutes as we drive to the Salt Lake airport, hating the jealousy that bubbles up.
I’m happy for her. I really am. But three of our cousins also started dating guys this summer—heck, Chloe went and got married —and when they’re all younger than me, it’s hard not to feel bitter.
I was so close to my happily ever after, only for it to just…
fizzle out. It wasn’t some epic tragedy or heartbreak, and there are moments when I’m relieved that Eric and I didn’t go through with the wedding.
But that doesn’t make the envy hurt any less.
When we hit the airport, Mason drops me off at the terminal. Their flight is an hour after mine, so they have some time to park and check Hercules onto the plane. I, on the other hand, do not have time, so my goodbye to Dani is rushed.
We hug each other tight, like we always do, but there’s more to Dani’s embrace this time. “Please try to have some fun,” she tells me with a squeeze. “Don’t think about work or my book or Sir Lost Cause. Just enjoy Italy, okay?”
Enjoy Italy. Those words are on repeat all through security, where I forget to take a hair tie out of my pocket and am rewarded with a pat down. The words repeat when I stop at the first bathroom I find, and then the next because I have a nervous bladder.
And they’re still on repeat when I pass the shop called The Wandering Reader and barely register my name being called before I’m practically tackled. Thank goodness for my neck pillow protecting me from being strangled. “Avery!”
Struggling to stay upright, I force a smile. “Poppy.”
Somehow I managed to forget my youngest cousin would have made sure she was working during my flight.
I should have prepared myself better, or maybe avoided her entirely.
At twenty-one, Poppy is unerringly sweet, but with nine years between us, I’ve never been able to fully figure out what her deal is.
“Avery!” Poppy says again, way too loud for a crowded airport as it pulls a dozen glances our way. She presses her hands to my cheeks and seems to stare into my soul for a moment. Her eyes squint and her lip trembles, like she might burst into tears. “Oh, Avery. You’re hurting so much!”
“I’m fine,” I say, and I’m sure she would have believed me if my voice didn’t crack. I try to salvage my credibility by adding, “Really.”
She clucks her tongue and grabs hold of my hand, dragging me to the store where she works. “You’re not fine, but you will be.”
“That sounds…ominous.”
Laughing, she reaches for her display of handmade jewelry and grabs a necklace with a transparent, yellowish crystal swinging at the base, holding it out in front of my face like she might start trying to hypnotize me.
I don’t know if hypnotism is something she’s into, but I wouldn’t be surprised.
She’s the sort of person who reads the horoscopes every day and thinks a rock can heal your aura.
“Avery, your luck is about to change. I can feel it!”
As long as that change of fortune doesn’t affect Rose & Quill, unless it’s for the better, I’m okay with that. “Great,” I mutter. “I have a flight to catch, so—”
“I also made you this!” Poppy holds out a bracelet to match the necklace, only the rock on this one is a light pink encased in a braided leather band.
Compared to the bold colors on the bracelet she gave Dani last month, this one is quite tame.
It’s pretty. At least, I think it’s pretty until she says, “This one will help you find love.”
“I don’t want it.” The words are out of my mouth before I can stop them, but they’re true. “That’s the last thing I need right now.”
Poppy deflates, looking like she did when she was three and following me around anytime the family got together.
I was too grown up—a whole twelve years old—to want to spend time with a little girl, but for some reason she would never leave me alone.
I once got mad at her for bothering me and made her cry, and I’m getting sudden flashbacks of her nonstop tears that day.
Before her sad eyes can make me feel worse, I cave.
“Okay! Fine. I’ll take the love bracelet.
” I snatch it from her fingers and stuff it into my purse along with the necklace.
She really is sweet to look out for all of us the way she does, but if she thinks love is going to be good for me, she clearly has no idea how stressful my life is right now.
That’s not her fault. It’s not like I’ve been big on sharing with my cousins lately.
By some miracle, a woman over the loudspeaker announces they’re boarding my flight, giving me the perfect excuse to duck out of the store before I’m overrun by guilt and start telling Poppy all my woes.
“Thanks, Poppy,” I mumble on my way out. “Have fun at work.”
“Have fun in Italia! I’ll see you when you get back!”
At the moment, she and I are the only ones still single unless she ends up with some guy she met here at the airport a few weeks ago.
I didn’t fully pay attention to that whole thing when she told us about it in our cousin chat, but apparently she practically tackled the guy and still managed to get a date out of it.
And if that doesn’t work out, she’s got some rando texting her cute but questionable things.
It must be all these love bracelets she keeps around.
Since neither of those men sound like viable dating options, most likely she’ll stay single along with me, and I don’t like what that might mean for future cousin get-togethers.
Am I about to become Poppy’s favorite again?
Maybe I need to find her a man she could actually end up with so she can be as distracted as Dani.
Then I can have some peace.
Right as I reach my gate, my phone starts ringing, and I reluctantly pull it from my pocket to find Eric’s name on the screen.
Well, technically it reads “Colonel Buzzkill” because Dani got her hands on my phone at some point after the breakup, and I haven’t had the energy to change it back.
It’s not like he ever calls me anymore, so it hasn’t mattered.
Given my mostly silent interactions with Eric lately, I figure if it’s worth an awkward phone call, it must be important. Sighing, I swipe the answer button. “Hey, I’m about to board, so—”
“Don’t go.”
My heart in my chest turns to lead at the sound of his desperation. “What?” Is he really doing this? Now?
“I need you, Avie. Don’t go to Italy.”
He’s really doing this. My chest grows tight, and I can’t decide if I love this declaration or hate it. It’s been almost two months since we officially decided to split, and I gave up hope on him showing any signs of regret. Do I want this change of heart? I don’t know. No. Maybe?
“Eric,” I say, pressing myself against a pillar so I’m out of the way of the people lining up to board. Why do they do that when they’re not in the current boarding group?
“I need you,” Eric says again, but then he adds a line that instantly turns my hope into irritation. “There’s so much we need to get done on the marketing plan before Sonny gets here.”
Rolling my eyes, I consider hanging up on him.
But that feels petty, and I’ll leave that part to him.
“Sonny isn’t coming to Utah until next week, and I thought the whole point of hiring him was so he can do all that work for us.
” Why else would we hire a consultant? I was skeptical about bringing in a guy from out of state, but Eric and Sonny were college buddies, and Eric thinks his friend can work some kind of miracle for Rose & Quill.
We need a miracle after Dani’s book went viral and put our little company on the map. We’re barely keeping up with demand, drowning in the giant ocean we were plunged into at the start of the year, and if we don’t find a way to grow with Dani’s fame, we’re going to flounder.
“I want him to think we know what we’re doing,” Eric says.
“But we don’t know what we’re doing,” I argue. “Neither of us expected Dani to hit the New York Times list like that.”
“Even so, we have too much to do. Don’t go to Italy, Avery. Please.”
“I’m already eating the cost of your half.” Plus, I splurged last night in a rare moment of impulsivity and upgraded my longest flight to business class. That would be a lot of money wasted if I stay home.
“I told you I can pay for it.” He can’t.
He just finished paying off his MBA a few months ago, and he signed a two-year lease on a townhouse that was going to be ours.
Not to mention the business loan we’re both on the hook for.
“Besides,” he continues, “the only reason you paid for the trip was because your card had the better rewards.”
I sigh, my eyes on the dwindling line to board.
This flight is going to JFK, where I’ll have a few hours before my connecting flight to Rome, and then to Florence.
In less than twenty-four hours, I could be in the city I’ve dreamed of visiting ever since Sandra Bullock fell in love with Bill Pullman in While You Were Sleeping .
Or I could stay in Utah and pretend it isn’t totally awkward working across the hall from a man I used to make out with on a regular basis and now barely talk to.
Enjoy Italy .
I stand up straight and pull my shoulders back. I plan to.
“If there are any emergencies,” I tell Eric, “send me an email. Otherwise, I’ll see you in a week.”
I hang up before he can argue, and I hold my head high as I march to the gate. My breakup may have sucked, but I’m going to go to Italy and have the time of my life because I am totally, completely fine .