Chapter 2 #2
Brynn cut her off. “I know you weren’t, but I’m offering.
I am currently free of professional obligations, have been told that I’m a whiz at paperwork, and I would be so thrilled to help.
Please, Reese? Let me do this for you?” Wanting to help had morphed into a need to do this for Reese that she felt in her bones, and she wasn’t going to take no for an answer, regardless of whether Reese had realized it yet.
“Brynn, what about the holidays with us?” Stan asked, his lips turned downward. “Reese needs someone to live on-site and work full days from the day before Christmas Eve to New Year’s Day.”
Brynn stood up straighter. She meant business. “I know it’s not ideal, but I’m in a position to help. Haven’t you always said that lending a hand isn’t just for when it’s easy? Well, I can make a difference now, and I want to do it.”
She could see her father softening at his own words being parroted back to him. They were words she’d taken to heart throughout her life.
Reese’s hesitation was written across her face. “This feels like too much, Brynn. Your dad told me that you were considering applying for a few university positions. I wouldn’t want to take your focus away from that.”
And that’s what she had told her parents a few weeks ago, on one of her phone calls with them.
At the time, she’d even meant it. Maybe she still did.
But… “The reality is, spring semester positions have already been filled, and there aren’t many of those anyway.
Best-case scenario, I’d be looking at summer to lock down a position for the fall.
Really, you’d be doing me a favor,” she pushed, biting her lip when she admitted, “since I’m trying to keep busy. ”
She felt Reese waver then, as a look of recognition flashed across her face at what Brynn was likely trying to keep herself from dwelling on.
A failed engagement. A social scandal. It wasn’t why she’d left Boston to head South, but putting fifteen hundred miles between herself and prying eyes hadn’t been a bad idea.
And even though Grant was from Stoneport, getting out of the city was becoming more attractive to her by the second. “This is really good for both of us,” Brynn added, the idea solidifying in her mind.
“You have such a big heart,” her dad said, still standing near her. “And I know these last few months haven’t been easy.”
Brynn turned to look him squarely in the eyes.
“Then support me in doing this, Dad. I want to help Reese, and I think it would be good to keep my mind off of everything. And you and Mom could probably come visit the inn while I’m working?
” Brynn asked, turning toward Reese. “We could maybe do a holiday dinner or lunch there?”
Reese nodded emphatically, now clearly sold on the idea. “Absolutely. You’d have the run of the kitchen in whatever capacity you’d like.”
And then, the last holdout crumbled. “Baby, if this is important to you, then I’ll support you, and your mom and I will absolutely be there whenever you want. Your happiness is all that matters to me. I hope you know that.”
Brynn clasped her hands together. “Then it’s settled. Reese, when would you like me to start? I assume you’ll want to train me in some capacity?”
She could see Reese thinking about her calendar. “How about Monday? That will give Hallie two weeks to work with you so that you’re comfortable managing things on your own.”
Brynn beamed. “That’s perfect. I’ll have time to spend with my parents this weekend, and then I’m all yours. Or Hallie’s, I guess,” she corrected.
“You’ll love her. There’s no one I’d trust more to train you,” Reese said, the warmth evident in her tone.
“I can’t wait to meet her.” Brynn couldn’t keep the smile off her face. This new challenge beckoned to her, supported by someone who clearly meant a lot to Reese.
A few hours ago, she’d been wondering if she was coming home too soon.
The recovery efforts on the Gulf Coast were nowhere near complete, and she could have easily applied to university jobs from down there while she continued to help out.
There was also nothing waiting for her here except the wreckage of a life she’d left behind.
But she could feel her family missing her, and three months had already felt like too long without seeing them. The word “codependent” flitted through her mind, but her relationship with her parents was intense. She was the only child they had left, and she took that responsibility seriously.
“Does your mom know that you’re home?” Stan asked. He smacked his forehead lightly. “She’s gonna kill us if not.”
Brynn kissed her dad’s cheek. “I stopped by to drop off my suitcases and see her before coming here.”
He shot Brynn a loving look before glancing down at his watch. “Reese, I think we’re good here—unless you need anything else? I’m going to take an early Friday and spend the afternoon with my two favorite women.”
“Fine by me. I also have a favorite woman who would probably be thrilled to see me home early.” Reese beamed.
Stan wrapped his arm around Brynn’s shoulder, and she leaned into his frame.
“Tell Sydney I said hello,” he said, breaking his hug to go to his desk and pack up his laptop.
“Me too,” Brynn added, meaning it.
Sydney King was the woman Grant had been in a serious relationship with when Brynn had unknowingly become a partner in his affair. She hoped that maybe one day they’d get to talk, to clear the air now that Brynn had also broken free from Grant.
And now that she’d be spending more time in Stoneport, she realized that opportunity may just present itself.
“I cannot keep up with your comings and goings these days.” Gregory Atwell, her best friend and—for an ill-advised period in his closeted life—former boyfriend, sat across the table at the diner where they were having lunch.
It was a restaurant that Brynn and her dad had frequented when she was younger, though they still stopped in for an occasional meal.
It still smelled the same, even after all these years.
Honestly, it had been a tough sell to get her dad to stay home when she’d mentioned where she and Gregory were meeting, but he’d relented.
Thankfully. She just needed some time to talk to someone who didn’t think she could do no wrong.
And over the past thirty-six hours, her parents' loving and, well, slightly overbearing adoration of her now that she was home made her all the more certain that offering to help in Stoneport was the right choice.
She’d have lunch with Gregory, go home and pack, and then she’d be on her way to the charming coastal town where she could put herself to work so that her mind was too tired to even think.
Still, though, she smiled. No one would ever expect her to be the “bouncing between places” type of person. She didn’t hate it. At least for right now. “I texted you every week from Louisiana.”
Gregory peered at her through his glasses, his bright eyes shining.
He was a gorgeous man who would one day look dashing in the arms of another, also gorgeous man.
“Brynn. You created a freaking PowerPoint presentation about your cheating fiancé, which you then showed to everyone at your rehearsal dinner. And then, mere days later, you absconded to the South, where the only photos that I got from you were you doing manual labor. For three months.” He held his fingers up, like that somehow drove his point home.
Brynn frowned. “I was really upset by the hurricane.”
His groomed eyebrows rose dubiously high on his forehead. “Really? That’s the line we’re going with?”
“Two things can be true.” And really, it wasn’t a lie.
The hurricane had whipped through Louisiana and a few of the surrounding states a few days before her wedding weekend was set to kick off, and for as much as she’d tried to focus on what was in front of her—namely, said PowerPoint that she was preparing to give to a room of two hundred people—she hadn’t been able to shake the destruction.
Somehow, having it as an anchor in her mind, reminding her what true devastation looked like, had made what she was about to do to her own personal life a lot easier to manage.
“Have you, like, ever even tried to apply any of the philosophical principles that you study to yourself?” he asked before picking up a piece of the turkey club that their waiter had dropped off moments ago.
In response, Brynn pushed her scrambled eggs around on her plate. There was never a wrong time for breakfast as far as she was concerned, but right now, she felt a little queasy. If Gregory wanted her other truth, though, then she’d give it to him.
“Grant was a serial cheater. That’s on him.
I’m not sure what else you want me to suss out of the situation.
Do you want me to beat myself up about it?
Spend sleepless nights wondering how I couldn’t have known?
Doubt every single decision that I’ve ever made and break myself down into so many tiny little pieces that I’ll barely be able to function?
” Even though that’s exactly what she’d been doing—and trying to avoid doing—over the last few months.
So much sympathy was written across Gregory’s face that it made her want to cry.
All anyone in her life ever wanted was for her to be happy.
It should have been every person’s dream.
Instead, she was paralyzed by the constant fear of disappointing those closest to her.
Like if she was unhappy, it would have been caused by some failure on their parts.
Especially when it came to her parents. She didn’t want to keep thinking about this.
She rolled her shoulders and took a bite of her still slightly warm eggs.
Gregory cleared his throat. “I’m sorry, B.
I’m sure that this whole thing is a mindfuck and that you’re just trying to push through it in whatever way makes sense.
I’m not here to judge you for how you choose to grieve.
Honestly, I should just be happy that your coping skills are encouraging you to help others and not get shit-faced drunk most nights and make reckless life decisions. ”
Brynn pursed her lips. “I’m not grieving. It’s not like anyone died.” She didn’t appreciate Gregory using that word in relation to something as insignificant as Grant and his philandering. She knew what real grief felt like, and this wasn’t it.
“I’m just saying…” God. He wasn’t going to let this go. “Grieving is about emotional and life adjustments after a loss.”
“I wouldn’t call Grant a loss,” she argued, feeling the truth of her words in her bones. “He was net neutral on a good day. Net negative, if we’re being honest.”
Gregory blanched. “And you were going to marry this man?”
“It made a lot of sense at the time. He pursued me. Wooed me. We dated for a year, and then he proposed. Our fathers were in business together, and we come from the same world. I was graduating from my PhD program and ready to begin the next chapter of my life.”
Now it was Gregory’s turn to frown. “Ahh… the ‘analytical’ part of analytical philosophy. How romantic.”
Gregory was one of the few people who got to see behind the curtain.
He knew that Brynn could be stubborn as all hell when she didn’t want to emotionally delve into something.
Mostly, she just went along with everything to keep the peace.
“I understand how our relationship happened, and now, I’m moving past it. ”
“By taking a job as an innkeeper in the town where your ex grew up? Which is owned by his sister, if I’m remembering correctly, which I know that I am.
” God, she really shouldn’t have mentioned where she was heading later.
Clearly, they were not on the same page about how Brynn should be handling herself in this situation.
The word feelings almost sprang to mind, but again, she wouldn’t give Grant the satisfaction of acknowledging that there was a small part of her that he’d made to feel stupid.
And feeling that way hurt.
Still, he earned himself a snort for calling her an innkeeper, even as Brynn tried to hold it in. “I’m pretty sure I’m going to be some type of assistant manager. I’m not one hundred percent clear on the details.”
“Just flying blind on this one? Seeing where the wind takes you?” He smirked. “Think they’ll give you a name tag and everything?”
“It’s the right decision,” she affirmed, the words important for both of them to hear. “At least for now.”
She couldn’t stay in Boston. She’d given up her apartment in Cambridge somewhere after her almost sister-in-law, Reese, telling Brynn that she’d unknowingly been a party to an affair and before she’d plucked up the gumption to put Grant’s philandering on blast in a very public way.
Once they were married, the plan had been for Brynn to move into Grant’s apartment, but that had obviously never materialized.
She’d been living with her parents ahead of the wedding, and now, the idea of spending winter with her two biggest fans made her feel itchy.
Which she hated to even think about. So, the sooner she could distract her mind with something else, the better.
Gregory pushed his empty plate toward the edge of the table. “So, what’s the plan in Stoneport? For real.”
“I’m not sure. I’m going to help out at least through the holidays.
” She schooled Gregory with a judgmental stare.
“I’d like to repay Reese for being the only person in my life to tell me what a hound dog Grant actually was, and this is the perfect way to do it.
She needs help at the inn, and I’m flush with time these days. ”
He held his hands up. “I didn’t know he was that bad. I just thought that he was some alpha male wannabe who could never keep up with your intelligence, kindness, or winsome personality.”
And that was the rub, wasn’t it? Everyone in her life seemed to know, at least on some level, that Grant was bad news.
Even her parents, she’d come to realize, had been constantly giving her outs throughout this past summer.
But she’d been so focused on looking at everything logically that she’d missed a completely central part of the whole getting married thing.
Which was actually falling in love with the person that she’d been planning to spend the rest of her life with.
It was another in a long line of things that she didn’t want to think about.
But she was heading to Stoneport in a few hours, and with that knowledge driving her, she staved off all the flurrying thoughts that she wasn’t ready to deal with.