Chapter 20
CHAPTER TWENTY
Gabriel
I padded downstairs to the smell of Autumn’s cooking, having just put Bethany to bed. Weekends, when I got to see my daughter from the moment she woke up to the moment she went to bed, were what I lived for.
“I poured you a glass of wine,” Autumn said as I entered the kitchen.
“That rounds off a great day. Thanks.” I took the glass from the counter beside the hob and took a sip. “Bethany passed out before I finished Zog and the Flying Doctors.”
“Best book ever,” Autumn said with a wide grin. “Chicken pasanda tonight, if that’s okay.”
“More than okay. Can I help?”
She shrugged. “Nothing to do for dinner, but you could look at those résumés I left out for you. I’ve arranged interviews for all four this week because there’s only a month before I leave. They look amazing.”
I groaned. I didn’t want to think about another nanny because that meant Autumn was leaving, which didn’t bear thinking about.
There wasn’t going to be anyone like Autumn.
Apart from the fact that I was sleeping with her, she was wonderful with Bethany and I trusted her completely.
Anyone else was going to be a step down.
“Look at that top one.” She nodded to the stack of papers on the island. “She’s a Norland nanny like the royal family always have, and she’s got years of experience. Plus she has a lifeguard qualification.”
Just like Autumn to think of everything. “She’s not you,” I huffed.
“We’ll find someone better than me. Your mail is in that pile of papers as well. It’s building up.”
I pulled the stack of envelopes from underneath the CVs and started to flick through them to see if there was anything other than water bills and bank statements. “There’s one for you here.” I pulled out an envelope and handed it to Autumn.
She set down her wine and grabbed it from the side and set about opening it. “I never get mail.”
After looking at them, I set the envelopes down. There was nothing in my post that I wanted to open. I’d rather chat and pretend to help with cooking dinner.
I glanced up to find Autumn’s face frozen in a grin that even I could tell was forced. “You okay?” I asked.
“Yes,” she said, resolutely. “Absolutely fine.”
She didn’t look fine.
I glanced down at the letter. “Does it say anything interesting?”
She folded the letter and stuffed it back in the envelope, tossing it onto the counter before heading back to the hob and stirring the chicken vigorously. “They’re cancelling my trainee-executive position. Fifty percent of our year has been cut. I’m out.”
“They did what?” I asked, wondering why she was so calm when the role she’d moved across an ocean for had just gone up in smoke.
“It’s fine. Better this way probably. I wouldn’t have had enough money to see much of Europe in August anyway.
I can get a bar job or even stay on with you and Bethany if you like.
” She picked up her wine and took a gulp.
I slid my arm around her waist, and she froze.
“I’m fine. It’s better this way. And it’s not like I really want to be in an international program anyway.
I want a job in London because this is where Hollie is. This is for the best.”
I turned off the hob and took the wooden spoon from her hand. “It’s awful news, Autumn. I’m so sorry.”
“Don’t be,” she said through gritted teeth. “Like I said, it’s fine. If you don’t want me to stay on, that’s fine too I can find something else. I can—” She pulled in a breath. “I can even go back to Oregon for a while. I’ll get to spend some time with my mom and dad.”
How was she just shrugging this off? I knew the last thing she wanted to do was go back to Oregon.
“You’re right. I don’t want you staying on as Bethany’s nanny,” I said, holding her by the shoulders. “I want you to be doing what you’ve had your heart set on for months.”
“Well, that option is no longer on the table. You have to deal with what you’ve got, not what you’d like. Let’s look on the bright side—”
“No, Autumn. Let’s not look at the bright side. Let’s get drunk and send those arseholes who just fired you a letter telling them you’re going to sue them. They can’t just string people along like that.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” she said, picking up the wooden spoon and stirring the cooling curry. “That’s not going to help. I just need a few days to make a plan. Things will work out for the best. They always do.”
“Autumn!” I snapped. “What the hell is the matter with you?”
She turned, shock flashing behind her eyes. “What?”
“You’re being ridiculous. You can’t tell me you’re not upset about this.”
She shrugged. “There’s no point in putting my energy into being upset.” She stopped and winced. “Don’t say anything to Dexter. He’ll tell Hollie and she’ll start freaking out and it will be a mess.”
“Freaking out would be the right response,” I said.
She was behaving like a robot. I loved the fact that she was sunny and positive all the time, but she was taking it to an extreme.
“You don’t need to look on the bright side tonight.
Maybe not ever. Maybe this is just a shit thing that’s going to happen and you can be pissed off and angry and sad and—”
She shoved the wooden spoon into the curry and pushed past me.
“Worse things have happened to me, Gabriel,” she said, her voice lifting slightly as if she were on the verge of actually expressing how she felt.
“I can’t break down when I have a setback.
If I did, I’d never pull myself together.
And I’d certainly never be able to help Hollie if I was constantly getting angry and pissed off about how life was unfair. These things happen.”
“Just because worse things have happened—just because bad things happen—doesn’t mean you can’t feel things. It doesn’t mean you have to put on a smile and pretend everything’s okay. You can shout and cry and stamp your feet.”
“That’s not what I do,” she said, her eyes beginning to water. “If I give in to it and collapse, I don’t know if I can get back up.”
My heart squeezed. Here she was, trying to keep her chin up, when anyone else would have given in to devastation.
“Of course, you will. You’re strong and capable and independent. But you don’t have to be all those things all the time. And I’m here to give you a hand up, if you need it.” I pulled her into my arms, and she sank into me, boneless.
“I don’t know how to give in to it. I just . . . want to be happy.”
I wanted that for her too. “Even the sun brings shadows,” I said. “Nothing is all good, all the time. It’s in the shades of grey that we learn who we are.”
“I’ve always been the happy one. The one who pulls Hollie and me up and makes us believe we can get through.”
I’d always loved how sunny and positive Autumn was. How she always saw the silver lining in every cloud. I hadn’t realized until tonight that she’d cultivated that disposition because she’d faced so many impossible situations. It was a coping mechanism as much as it was a personality trait.
“Not all the time,” I said. “You can take turns.”
Her sobs were almost unnoticeable, but I held her tightly as she let out everything she’d been holding on to.
I wanted to make it better for her—perhaps that was the example she set me—but there was nothing that could make it better.
Not tonight. This evening was just going to be terrible. All I could do was hold her.
“I need wine,” she said eventually.
“That I can do,” I said, not letting her go as I shuffled us both toward her glass.
“I don’t know what to do,” she said, her voice wobbling. “Hollie is going to be so disappointed in me.”
“No,” I said, pulling her tighter. “She’s going to be disappointed for you. Not in you. You don’t need to concern yourself about that.”
“She’s going to worry.”
“She knows you better than that. There’s no need to worry.”
“There are always a thousand reasons to worry, Gabriel. And I don’t need to be one more.”
Thoughts started to slot into my brain and make sense, like the final pieces of a jigsaw. She was always so happy and upbeat because she didn’t want to be a burden. She didn’t want to be another item on anyone’s list of worries, especially not Hollie’s.
“Your sister loves you. She’s bound to worry sometimes. That’s natural and it’s okay. But that doesn’t mean you’re a burden.”
“She was the reason I had food in my belly and a roof over my head growing up.”
“But not anymore. You got your executive training position yourself. You’ll get another.
And you know what? You are a capable, independent, creative woman.
I would bet money that you took a chunk of the burden growing up.
I’ve seen the way you organize this house.
And Bethany—you saved her life, for goodness’ sake.
And you even organize me.” I nodded to the candidates for the new nanny she’d shortlisted.
“I can’t imagine you ever being a burden.
You might have been younger, and you might have supported each other in different ways, but you were both in a very difficult situation. You both fought hard to survive.
“It’s okay for things not to be okay sometimes,” I said. “It’s okay to need help and it’s okay for people to give you help.” I kissed the top of her head. “I’m here to help where I can. Even if it’s to pour your wine. You will figure this out. I have no doubt.”
Her bottom lip wobbled, and she rested her head on my chest. “How do you know exactly the right thing to say?”
“Believe me, I learned what it is to need help and what it is to get it from five of the best friends a man can have.”
“Even Tristan?” she asked.
“Even him. There’s nothing he wouldn’t do for any one of us. And vice versa. You have that with Hollie. It’s a two-way street.”
“Thank you,” she said as she looked up at me. “I’m so disappointed. I thought I was about to make this final move away from my past. And without that job . . . I just don’t know where to go from here.”
I nodded. “I understand. But you don’t need to know where to go right away. You have time to figure it out.”
As I held her, I realized that the more I knew about Autumn, the more I liked her.
Yes, I loved that she was sunny and positive and always looked for the silver lining.
But I liked her even more as I understood why she was built like that.
Most of all, I felt honored to be the man who got to pour her wine and hold her when the sky clouded over, not a sliver of sunshine in sight.