Chapter Ten Kelsie
Ididn’t plan to drink much at the bachelorette party last night. I knew it wasn’t a great idea while I was already feeling so emotionally fragile. I’d sent enough ill-advised drunk texts in the past to know better. And those were guys who didn’t mean nearly as much to me as Damien did.
But the party was in full swing when the other women started to speculate about what the men were up to.
Specifically, there was talk about who was most likely to pick up a woman.
There were a lot of women around the resort, and I was sure plenty of them were single.
The thought of Damien taking one of them to his room, making her cry out his name just like I did, felt like a knife between the ribs.
Damien was a catch, and he was single. There was nothing to stop him.
So, I drowned my sorrows in fruity mixed drinks and ended up having a great time at the party.
Now, in the light of day, regret sat heavily on my shoulders. It wasn’t about the headache pounding in my temples or the dryness of my mouth. A hangover was never a good time, but it was my conversation with Damien that made me ready to swear off drinking altogether.
I groaned as I remembered what I said to him in the hallway just outside of my room.
I spoke without thinking, impulsively telling him what I never wanted him to know. I’d bared my real feelings to him, told him that he crushed me.
Oh God, why did I say that?
I felt heat creep up my neck at the memory. Humiliation burrowed under my skin. I knew it’d be like this, and that was why I never intended to tell him the truth. But it was impossible to unring a bell. It was out there now, and Damien would definitely want to talk about it.
At the thought of that, I groaned again, burying my face in my hands. I was sitting on the edge of my bed, fully dressed for the hike that was supposed to take place in twenty minutes.
I’d ordered room service this morning, not up for joining anyone in the restaurant downstairs for breakfast, but it wouldn’t surprise me if others did the same—or skipped eating altogether.
Leanne must not have been thinking about how everyone would feel after a night of partying when she planned this particular excursion for everyone.
But I wasn’t going to skip it. I’d taken some of the headache medicine the doctor in the med room gave me, drank two bottles of water, and eaten a full serving of scrambled eggs. The hydration and protein did wonders for me, and I was eager to see a part of the island that I hadn’t experienced yet.
I’d gone on plenty of hikes in the last couple of years, always with Damien. He loved being outside, walking around nature parks or exploring trails along Lake Michigan. We’d spent many weekends doing that sort of thing back home in Chicago, just the two of us.
I’d thought of those long walks as romantic, something that deepened our connection. That seemed so stupid now.
A knock at my door made me jump, and I knew who it was immediately. I couldn’t say how I knew, if it was something in the rhythm of his knock or just an instinct that told me when he was near, but when Damien’s voice came from the other side of the door, I wasn’t surprised.
“Kelsie? Are you in there?”
I considered staying quiet until he went away, but that wasn’t a solution. I had to face him eventually, and I was never the type to hide from my problems.
When I pulled open the door, Damien stood there in his well-worn jeans and hiking boots, with a simple grey T-shirt stretched across his broad chest. Why did he have to look so effortlessly good?
It just wasn’t fair when I was trying to stop wanting him.
“Hey,” I said, tucking my hands into the back pockets of my shorts, feeling uncomfortable. All I could think about was that we were standing in almost this exact spot last night when I spilled my guts to him.
His eyes trailed over my face for a moment. “How are you this morning?”
Embarrassed. “I’m fine.”
One corner of his mouth tilted up in a grin. “You know, you’ve been saying that a lot lately.”
I sighed. “It’s better than saying things I regret.”
Damien’s face got serious. “We need to talk.”
Before I could object, he slipped by me and into my room. I closed the door and took a deep, fortifying breath before turning to face him.
“Listen…” I started, my stomach twisting uneasily. “I was drunk last night. You shouldn’t take what I said seriously.”
“You want me to just forget about it? Is that what you’re saying?”
He sounded almost angry, and I faltered. I expected guilt or more regret from him. But anger? I couldn’t understand where that was coming from.
“Yes,” I said, my voice wavering. “Can you do that?”
“No, Kels. I can’t. And I think you know that.”
I guess there’s no avoiding this.
“So… you meant it, didn’t you?” he asked. Tension thickened the air until I could almost feel it pressing against my skin. This was the question I dreaded.
But maybe it would be best to just get everything out in the open. Maybe that was what we finally needed to move on.
“Yes, I meant it.” I couldn’t look at him, so I focused my eyes on my window. I could see the beach, where that clear blue water lapped at the sand. It was peaceful in a way that this moment wasn’t. “The truth is that I had no regrets until you said it was a mistake.”
Silence met my words, and I couldn’t resist glancing his way. The color had drained from Damien’s cheeks, and his mouth parted slightly, as if he wanted to speak but didn’t know what to say. But he’d already said enough that terrible morning.
“Don’t worry,” I hastened to add. “I get it. You just want to maintain the friendship. I’m totally fine with that.”
And if my voice went up an octave, that didn’t mean anything. Nothing at all.
The mild surprise he’d shown before deepened. Confusion flickered through his eyes, and he went rigid.
“Are you?” he asked after a moment, his voice tight. He was hard to read right now, and I wasn’t sure if that was a good or bad thing. I didn’t want to see relief on his face as he realized he was getting what he wanted. “Are you really fine with just being friends?”
I forced myself to smile, and it was more painful than ever.
“Of course.” The lie tasted bitter. “Let’s act like that night never happened.”
Damien took a step toward me, his hand stretched out as if he were going to touch me, and I went rigid. Before he could get too close, there was once again a sudden knock on my door. We both jolted, and my breath left me in a rush as Damien lowered his hand to his side.
Whipping the door open, I found Jess standing there with her husband, Cody. They were both dressed for the hike, and Cody was even wearing a backpack.
Jess’s eyes shifted from me to Damien, but she didn’t look surprised to see him there. “You guys ready for the hike?”
“Actually, we were in the middle of-”
“Yeah, we’re ready,” I cut Damien off without looking his way. But I could somehow sense his irritation.
Still, he didn’t argue as we left my room, heading downstairs with Jess and Cody. It was easy to put distance between us when we met the rest of the group in front of the resort, where we were waiting for everyone to arrive so that we could leave.
I made small talk with Ryan’s sister, Zoey. As we chatted, I kept seeing Ford in my peripheral vision, obviously hovering near Zoey, even though she purposefully avoided looking his way.
I didn’t ask what that was about. I was doing my own avoiding that I didn’t want to discuss, so I wasn’t going to butt into her business.
“I don’t know how you do it,” I said after listening to her talk about working in the emergency department as a nurse. “It must be so stressful.”
She nodded, but she was smiling. “It is, but I love it. The intensity of it is exciting, and the stress makes me feel alive. I’ve been working at the hospital for three years in various departments, and none of them suit me quite as well as the ER.”
“It’s important to do what makes you happy,” I said, thinking about my own job. I’d always known that I wanted to work with children, and I once thought I’d teach elementary school, but working with underprivileged kids ended up being my calling.
Until recently, I never even considered a different job. But there was a new option that had been weighing on my mind for a while. It would be a huge change and take me away from everything I knew, but that idea wasn’t quite as unappealing as it had been only a few days ago.
“I’ve always thought so,” Zoey said. “My dad thinks I’m crazy for working such long hours on my feet when I could just live off my trust fund. He doesn’t get it.”
This was something that I couldn’t relate to, so I just nodded with what I hoped was an understanding look on my face.
“Okay, is everyone here?” A man I’d never seen before called out.
He was wearing a powder-blue polo shirt with the resort’s logo on the front breast pocket and a matching visor that cast a shadow on his face.
“Great! Let’s go over a few rules before we head on our guided hike through the rainforest.”
As he droned on about not feeding wildlife and leaving no trash behind, I glanced around at the group.
There were many more people on the island for the wedding than before.
In the first few days, it was only close family members and the wedding party, but guests had started to arrive.
There were old friends and distant relatives here now, and as we set off on the hike, it was overwhelming to be surrounded by so many people, most of whom were chattering.
“Not quite the peaceful hikes we’re used to, is it?” Damien asked, appearing at my side just as we entered the rainforest. A path had been carved through the thick trees, and our guide made sure to tell us not to step off it because it was easy to get lost here.