Chapter 1 #3
“My parents sold the inn.” Hallie blurted the words out, her cheeks going bright red.
Relief coursed through Sydney, even as she tried to make sense of everything. In the seconds that Hallie had made her wait, Sydney had considered what felt like every possibility—from a terminal illness to, well, a faster-moving terminal illness.
She sighed deeply before sucking in a much-needed breath. “I mean, that sucks, Hal. Why didn’t you tell me?”
The flush on Hallie’s cheeks softened but didn’t disappear. “I know you’re going through a lot.”
“But that doesn’t mean I don’t want to be here for you.”
Sydney gestured for Hallie to come join her near the window. When she was close enough, Sydney looped her longer arm over Hallie’s shoulders. They stared out at the water, a ritual they’d had since childhood.
“So, tell me about it. What made your parents decide to sell?”
She felt Hallie roll her shoulders against her. “They’ve been spending more and more time in Colorado since Mason and Claire had the twins. They’re going to buy a house near them, but all of their money’s tied up in the inn.”
Sydney nodded. Mason was Hallie’s older brother, who’d moved out to Colorado for college, where he had met his wife, Claire.
The twins, if Sydney remembered correctly, had just turned one.
It made a lot of sense, even if Sydney hated the idea of the Thatcher family no longer owning The Stone’s Throw.
Everything really was changing.
Still, she shoved her disappointment down. “Those kiddos are cute. I’ll give them that.”
“Aren’t they,” Hallie admitted with a glum laugh. “Finicky vacationers and hardcore antiques shoppers were no competition when it came down to it.”
“So, what will you do?” Suddenly, Sydney looked around the room. “Are we even supposed to be here?”
“It’s fine,” Hallie said, though her reassurance didn’t quell the unease building in Sydney’s stomach.
“Wait. How are you doing?” She could feel her adrenaline picking up. “I mean, this is big. Life-changingly big. For your family and for you. What are you going to do? Am I back here so we can do some sort of goodbye tour?”
“Syd.” Hallie laid a gentling hand on her arm. Sydney had always been the one to get keyed up faster. “First of all, it was your idea to come back to Stoneport.”
Sydney acquiesced with a quick nod, the most she could manage at the moment. Tennis had been the only thing her brain worked through quickly. Everything else needed time to marinate and roll around in her mind before it made sense.
While she was toying with what all this new information meant, Hallie spoke again. “I’m staying on for six months to help with the transition. Hence our access to the finest of accommodations.”
“Who are the new owners?” Along with staying in dozens of hotels during her tennis career, Sydney had stayed in even more by virtue of her ex, Grant, whose family was in the hotel business.
Add in that her best friend’s family had up till recently owned an inn, and she knew far more about the hotel business than the average person.
“About that…” Hallie stilled next to her, staring so hard at the water it was like she was looking for a drowning body in the choppy waves.
Sydney’s thoughts immediately went to Grant and his family’s business, which was, coincidentally, a New England–based hotel chain that would absolutely love The Stone’s Throw Inn as one of its coastal properties. Her blood ran cold. “Oh.”
“No, no,” Hallie said after uncomfortable seconds, finally turning to her. “It’s not that bad.”
“But it’s… bad?”
“It’s… um… well, it’s… you know…” Hallie wasn’t usually at a loss for words, having spent the majority of her life defusing scheduling snafus, customer complaints, and guest relations issues.
“Hallie, just say it?—”
“It’s a Devereux, but not Grant. ”
Sydney’s brows lifted. Grant’s father, Tripp, was the head of The Devereux Group, and Grant had worked at his side since graduation.
His mom, Sharon, was a Stoneport socialite who had little to do with the business except, according to Grant, spending the money it made.
And Grant had an older sister, Reese, who had been out on the West Coast since she’d gone to college, but Sydney was sure she’d started some software company.
“Reese does… What does she do again?” Sydney snapped her fingers, trying to remember as she ignored the unsettled feeling in the pit of her stomach.
Of all the Devereuxs, she’d spent the least time with Reese by a wide mile.
Sydney had stayed in Florida with her parents for holidays while Grant had come home to Stoneport.
She and Reese’s paths had crossed maybe once in the last six years.
“She created a hotel management software for smaller properties. We use it here. Though, now that it’s been sold, I’m not sure if it’ll be phased out.”
Sydney was still trying to make sense of things as the words started clicking. Her spine snapped up straight. Hotel management. Small properties. Reese had sold her company.
“Your parents sold the inn to Reese Devereux? But—she’s not working with her family?”
Hallie quickly held her hands up, eyes wide. “She’s not associated with them, best I could tell. She seems to have very little to do with her family, actually.”
Sydney waved her finger in the air, feeling like she was finally getting up to speed. “So… my ex-boyfriend’s sister bought your family’s inn?”
“Small towns?” Sydney started to laugh at Hallie’s weak shrug, but the laughter died on her lips when Hallie added, “So, anyway, she’ll be arriving tomorrow. To officially start working with me on the transition.”
Cool, cool, cool.
It didn’t matter . That’s what Sydney repeated to herself, even as her stomach churned .
She didn’t even know Reese. And Reese and Grant had never been close. Returning to Stoneport or, at the very least, shacking up with Hallie, wasn’t a permanent life plan anyway. Reese would be so busy taking over operations, their paths would probably never cross.
“I mean, that’s fine,” Sydney said, unable to come up with a better word for the situation. Only, it didn’t feel fine. It felt like another slap in the face; a continuation of the last year, as she’d been scrambling—and failing—to find solid footing underneath her.
Clearly, that fight wasn’t over yet.
“It’s weird,” Hallie said.
Relief at Hallie’s willingness to have an honest conversation about the absurdity of this situation flowed through Sydney. “It is weird! I’m glad you said it first!”
Hallie warmed to her theme. “My parents started this process a while ago, and there was significant interest from The Devereux Group.”
That perked Sydney up. She never pretended she was a great person. “Which means that Grant and his dad didn’t get the property?”
“No. My parents have never liked Tripp. I mean, what adult man goes by Tripp after twenty?”
Sydney finally laughed, a genuine sound that broke the tension. “Well, with a family name, there are only so many variations to tell them apart.”
As far as Sydney was concerned, Grant Devereux IV had lucked out.
His grandfather, who Sydney hadn’t met before his death, went by Junior.
Grant’s dad went by Tripp. She didn’t know if she could have stomached calling someone she was in a relationship with Junior or Tripp, even just to other people.
God, one generation earlier, and maybe this could have all been avoided.
“So this isn’t that bad,” Sydney said, psyching herself up for some slight awkwardness in the coming weeks, now that Reese would be around more. And it sounded like Reese wouldn’t be having her family over for Sunday lunches. “Grant doesn’t even live in Stoneport, so at least that’s a consolation.”
“Eh…”
Her head snapped toward Hallie, and she mimicked her friend’s shrinking shoulders. “What do you mean, ‘Eh’?”
“That’s the other thing.”
“There’s another thing?” Sydney felt her relaxing summer, the one she was finally settling into for a reset and recalibration, quickly evaporating before her eyes.
Hallie began talking so quickly the words would have been unintelligible to Sydney if not for their twenty years of friendship.
“I really think Stoneport will be good for you, but I knew that if the situation was complicated, you wouldn’t want to come.
But, so, anyway, Grant is back.” She made a manic, frazzled noise in the back of her throat.
“He’s getting married this summer and the town is acting like the prodigal son has returned and I’m so sorry I didn’t tell you sooner, but, well, like I said, I really think Stoneport will be good for you,” Hallie said, starting to repeat herself like she was stuck on a loop.
The words struck Sydney, the sentences falling into place at the same time she pressed her head against the cool glass of the suite’s patio door. “Well, shit.”