Chapter 10
TEN
L andyn
By Monday morning, I’d mostly convinced myself that the gala had been a strange, glittery dream.
A wildly unexpected, emotionally loaded, candlelit fever dream.
And then I walked into Cove, and it was all right there—proof that it really had existed.
Crates of glassware waiting to be picked up by the caterer, the slightly slower pace of still-tired employees.
And the ache in my chest like I’d left something unfinished. Which, of course, I had.
Ford hadn’t said another word after our hallway run-in. Just stared at me from across the room like I’d set something on fire. Again.
I step inside my office, leaving the door ajar a few inches, and immediately spot the small, gift-wrapped box sitting on my desk. Brown craft paper, tied with a navy-blue string. No note. No name.
I pull the string to undo the bow and peel the paper back to reveal a hardcover book, one I immediately recognize as the collection of Annie Leibovitz photographs I used to keep on my coffee table in college. The one I’d lost during my rushed move to Alberta. I hadn’t seen it in years.
Tucked between the pages is a card.
June—
We’ve got history. That doesn’t just disappear. This doesn’t fix anything. But maybe it opens a door.
—F.
My throat tightens. He used my old nickname. Just one word, but it’s enough to trigger a rush of emotions. No one else has ever called me that.
“Morning, Landyn!” Becca calls as she pops her head in, followed closely by Marco, both of them clutching their cups like their lives depend on the coffee inside.
Quickly, I slip the book and the card into my bag before they ask any questions.
“You in the mood to be productive, or should we just pretend today doesn’t exist? ”
“Pretending sounds good,” I say, forcing a grin. “But I already answered three emails on the walk from the parking lot, so I think I’m officially past the point of no return.”
Marco groans and drops into the chair across from me. “Ugh, you’re one of those high-functioning morning people.”
“Well, when you have a —,” I clear my throat, catching myself before I tell them about Poppy. “Um, when you have a spare minute, there always seems to be something to fill it. Besides, my mom never let me sleep past seven, so I’m just wired that way.”
Becca chuckles and nudges Marco. Becca is a Black woman in her mid-forties with a trendy bob and thick, tortoise-rimmed glasses.
Marco is her closest friend here, and also her complete opposite.
Beneath her buttoned-up disposition, Becca is a firecracker who never backs down when she knows she’s right—which she usually is.
Marco is in his twenties, he’s an open book with a great sense of humor and a drive to make a difference.
They’ve both welcomed me to Cove with open arms. I already consider them to be friends.
“Speaking of duress, did you see Ford this morning?” Becca asks.
Marco sits up straighter, eyes wide. “Okay but seriously, what is up with him lately? He’s walking around like someone canceled Christmas.”
“Cancelled it, lit the tree on fire, and threw the turkey out the window,” Becca adds. “The man is broody but he’s never this miserable.”
I shrug, keeping my face neutral. “He’s probably just stressed. Running a company tends to do that.”
“Sure,” Marco says, clearly unconvinced. “But this feels different. It’s like…personal. Like someone messed with his color coordinated sock drawer.”
Becca snorts. “I’d pay money to see that sock drawer.”
I bite back a laugh and reach for my coffee, grateful to have friends here. But they don’t know my history with Ford and I’m not about to clue them in. Not yet.
“Or maybe someone stole his protein powder,” Marco mutters, peering dramatically at us over the rim of his coffee cup.
We all laugh, and for a second, the tension lifts. But I can still feel the weight of the gift in my bag beside me, the unspoken history humming like static in the background.
There’s a creak as the door to my office is pushed all the way open and Becca and Marco immediately go silent. I don’t even have to look to know who has just walked in.
“Landyn,” Ford’s voice is calm, clipped .
His hands are shoved into the pockets of his black Cove quarter-zip which seems to be the standard office uniform. His gaze flicks from me to the others and back again. “Can I see you in my office?”
Marco’s mouth actually drops open.
“Sure,” I say quickly, standing and grabbing a notepad I know I don’t need.
Ford gives a short nod before turning and walking away.
“He didn’t even growl once,” Becca whispers once the coast is clear.
Marco leans over the desk, eyes wide. “What the hell was that?”
I shrug, tight-lipped then take one more sip of my coffee. “I guess I’m about to find out.”
“Text us if you’re kidnapped,” Marco says as I pass them.
I walk down the hall towards Ford’s office, my heart already racing. The door is ajar, so I tentatively push it open and step inside, shutting it gently behind me.
Ford stands at the window, posture perfect, shoulders broad. The sunlight slants through the glass, catching on the sharp line of his jaw, the slight furrow between his brows. He looks steady from the outside, but I know him well enough to see the current roiling just beneath.
He must know I’m there, but for a long moment, he doesn’t turn around. When he finally does, his eyes meet mine, and just like that, everything feels too quiet. Too close. Like the room has closed in on us.
“Hi,” he says, his voice softer than I expect.
“Hey,” I reply, the word catching slightly in my throat.
He gestures toward the chair across from his desk. “Have a seat.”
I nod, crossing the office slowly and lowering myself into the seat. My fingers find the hem of my shirt, smoothing the fabric with a kind of nervous energy I haven’t felt in years. Not with anyone else.
The silence that stretches between us is thick with memory. His pristine, polished office makes me think back to the makeshift workspaces and late-night, coffee-stained plans we used to piece together when Cove was still just an idea.
“I hope it’s okay,” he begins, before trailing off, leaving the sentence unfinished.
I meet his gaze. “The gift?”
His expression shifts, but not enough to read. He nods. “Did you open it?”
“I did,” I say softly. “I remember. The handwriting. The name.”
His jaw flexes, just barely. “You always hated nicknames.”
“I didn’t hate that one,” I answer. “You gave it to me when we met. It was June.”
His eyes soften for a split second like he’s somewhere other than here in his office with me. “You saw me staring at you, and you looked at me like you already knew I was gone for you.”
The words hang between us, painful in their precision. I look away, the memory so vivid, threading itself through my ribs like a breath I hadn’t realized I was holding.
He shifts, leaning back against his desk, arms crossed but not closed off.
“I’m not trying to make things harder. I just…
” He exhales, gaze dropping briefly to the floor before finding mine again.
“I didn’t leave that gift to mess with your head.
I just hung onto it. I thought maybe…maybe you’d want it back. ”
“I…,” I whisper. “I do.”
He nods. “I meant what I wrote. The gift doesn’t fix anything.
But it’s a peace offering. We’re going to be in the same place five days a week, and I’m not interested in wasting time pretending we don’t exist to each other.
” He pauses, holding my gaze just a beat longer. “ And I didn’t forget about us.”
Neither have I.
And that is the hardest part.
“I’m not expecting this to be easy,” I offer after a beat. “But I want to be here. For Cove. For you.”
His eyes search mine, something unspoken swimming in the gray. “Cove was supposed to be ours,” he says.
My breath catches and I blink back the tears that suddenly sting my eyes. “I know,” I whisper. “I really do hate that I wasn’t strong enough to stay.”
His eyes narrow, but he doesn’t move. Doesn’t speak. Another beat. Another stretch of silence. “You’re here now,” he says, his voice low.
I smile faintly, thankful that he didn’t ask the question that must be running through his head: Why?
“I am.”
He smiles too, the barest twitch of his mouth. “Welcome back, June.”
The sound of it cracks something open in me.
I am here and I won’t run this time.
“Landyn?” My mom’s voice calls from the hallway, followed by the familiar sound of the faint jingling of her keychain. She pokes her head into the kitchen, a glass mason jar in her hand. “Just dropping off soup I made today. Thought I’d check in and see how your first real week’s going.”
I flip the card shut from Ford closed too fast, shoving it under the stack of mail on the kitchen table.
Her eyes land on the package. “What’s that?”
“Just…something from an old friend,” I say, hating how my voice wobbles.
She gives me a knowing look. “Friend, huh?”
I don’t respond because what am I supposed to say? That the man whose heart I broke had somehow found the exact crack in the armor I’d been building for the past seven years? That he remembers me better than I remember myself? And that I hate how good it feels to be remembered?
“Mom, it’s nothing. It’s no big deal,” I mutter, bringing P’s dinner dish to the sink to distract myself.
She doesn’t let it go. “I don’t know, Landyn. You’ve been awfully tight-lipped about things lately. Since when do you hide things from me?”
“Fine, it’s from Ford, but I really don’t want to talk about it right now. I want to talk about you and what you’re doing here this late when you should be on the couch with your feet up.”
“I’m fine, Landyn. You don’t need to worry about me. Besides, your dad drove me here, he’s waiting outside,” she says, putting the soup in my fridge. “Make sure P knows it’s here—it’s chicken noodle, her favorite.”
“Thanks, Mom. I love you,” I say wrapping her in a tight hug. “I should get Poppy ready for bed.”
“Okay, go on. But just remember, I’m here when you’re ready to talk. I’ll see you tomorrow.” She smiles, tossing one last look at the package on the table before heading to the door .
I sit on the edge of Poppy’s twin bed, running a brush gently through her damp, honey-brown curls. She’s in her favorite pajamas, the ones covered in tiny golden retrievers wearing tiaras. She yawns dramatically every few seconds like she deserves a medal for surviving a day of grade one.
“You’re going to pull my hair out,” she mumbles, her voice heavy with sleep.
I smile, brushing slower. “You have about four strands tangled. You’ll live.”
She tilts her head to look up at me, those wide gray eyes blinking. “Mommy?”
“Yeah, bug?”
“Can we get a dog? Like, a real one? One that sleeps in my bed and eats pancakes?”
I laugh softly, pulling the brush through the last section of her hair. “Why would it eat pancakes?”
“Because its name is gonna be Pancake.” She sounds exasperated that I even have to ask. “Duh.”
I press a kiss to the top of her head, heart tugging hard. “We’ll see, okay? Maybe after we get settled.”
She frowns. “We already are.”
I pause. “I know. I just mean… more settled.”
She scrunches her nose at me but seems too tired for any more questions. Instead, she wriggles under the blankets, pulling her stuffed bunny tight against her chest, and I smooth my hand over her curls again.
“You know,” I whisper, more to myself than to her, “when you were born, you had this little wrinkle between your eyebrows. Just like now, when you’re tired. You looked so serious for such a tiny baby.”
She grins sleepily. “I was thinking about important things. ”
I laugh, blinking back the burn behind my eyes. “I bet you were.”
My mind drifts, uninvited, to when I lived in Alberta at my aunt’s.
Poppy was a newborn, and we shared a bedroom with barely enough room for her crib.
I was terrified. But then I would look at her little face and everything else just fell away.
She looked just like him. Still does. Same sharp jaw, same fierce eyes.
The same stubbornness that lives in her bones.
She’s breathing heavier now, almost asleep, one arm still looped around Cinnamon the stuffed bunny.
“Night, Poppyseed,” I whisper, brushing one last kiss to her cheek.
Downstairs, I flick off the lights and head to the kitchen. The gift from Ford is still on the table. I pick it up now, fingertips grazing the sleek, familiar cover. My thumb brushes over the edge of the note tucked underneath.
June .
Just that. A word. A memory. A version of me I’m not sure I can be again.
I don’t open it. I don’t throw it away either. Instead, I carry it upstairs and tuck it into the drawer of my nightstand.
Out of sight.
But not out of mind.