28. Callum #2
I don’t move at first. Who the hell is even out in this? But the pounding comes again, more urgent this time, and I can hear Margo’s voice shouting my name.
I cross the dining room and unlock the door.
Margo practically falls inside, the wind shoving her forward. Her rain jacket is soaked through, water streaming off her in rivulets. Her hood has blown back, and her gray hair is plastered to her head.
“What are you doing out in this?” I grab her arm to steady her, pulling her farther inside.
“I needed to —” She’s breathing hard, wiping water from her face with shaking hands. “I needed to tell you something, but my power went out, and I couldn’t get through on the phone. I want to tell you in person anyway.”
I pull the door shut behind her, the wind fighting me for it, trying to rip it from my hands. The whole building shudders.
“Margo, you shouldn’t be out in this weather!”
“Sit.” She points at the nearest table with the authority of someone who’s been bossing people around for sixty years and isn’t taking no for an answer. “I have news.”
I don’t want to sit. I want to get in my truck and drive to Vivienne’s cottage right this second. But Margo is already pulling out a chair, shaking water off her jacket, and I know that look. She’s not leaving until she’s said what she came to say.
So, I sit.
She sits across from me, water pooling under her chair, and takes a breath.
“Callum.” She leans forward and grabs my hand across the table forcibly. “Sloane called me yesterday. She said she wanted you to hear this from someone familiar and not from a lawyer.” Margo’s eyes go soft for just a moment. “She asked if I would tell you instead.”
“Tell me what?”
“Okay,” she breathes. “Okay. I’m going to talk fast because this storm is getting worse by the minute and I need to get home before a tree comes down on me on my walk back.
” She wipes more water from her face. “You know how John Castellano kind of owned this section of the beach businesses? Like, the actual land under them?”
I nod slowly, my leg bouncing under the table, my eyes flicking to the window where I can see the ocean trying to tear itself apart.
“Well,” Margo continues, pulling her grasp away and clapping her hands together, “Sloane came into the cafe about a month ago. And apparently, in her dad’s will, there was this whole section about taking care of local businesses.
He wanted to make sure the town stayed local, you know?
Keep it from getting bought out by developers and turned into condos or whatever. ”
“Okay …” I draw out, not sure where this is going. My mind is half on her words and half on the cottage and Vivienne and the storm getting worse with every excruciating second that passes.
“Callum.” She snaps, drawing my attention back to her.
“John was sitting on some serious wealth. Way, way more than anyone knew. I don’t know all the details.
Something about investments, and property, and fishing patents that paid out over decades or something.
I don’t know, but the man was rich. And in his will —” She squeezes my hand hard.
“He paid off the debts of every business on this stretch of beach.”
The words don’t register at first.
They hit my ears, but they don’t make sense. They’re just sounds without meaning.
“What?”
“Your loans, Callum. The ones that have been bleeding you dry.” Her eyes are bright and intense with unshed tears. “John paid them off. All of them.” She gives me a wide smile. “Darling, you’re free.”
I stare at her.
The words are in English. I understand each one individually. But together they don’t make sense.
“That’s not possible.” My voice comes out scratchy. “That’s hundreds of thousands of dollars, Margo. That’s not something you just —”
“It’s done.” She’s still gripping my hand, her fingers tight around mine. “Sloane’s lawyer confirmed it yesterday. The estate processed the payments. Your bank will have the notification by the end of the week, but the debt is already gone. It’s done.”
Gone.
The word echoes in my head.
The debt is gone.
The loans I took out after Sarah cleaned out the accounts — gone.
The fifty percent of my revenue that’s been disappearing every month for two years — gone.
The crushing weight that’s been sitting on my chest since the day I found out what she did — gone.
I pull my hand from Margo’s and stand up, the chair scraping back. My legs feel weak. My hands are shaking.
“I don’t —” I can’t finish the sentence. I can’t even find the words.
For two years, I’ve been drowning. I’ve been working doubles, cutting every corner, and watching every penny. I’ve been staying awake at night doing math that never adds up. Lying in bed, staring at the ceiling, trying to figure out how to make it work for one more month, just one more.
And now it’s just … gone.
“Breathe, Callum,” Margo soothes.
I am breathing. I’m taking these huge gulping breaths that feel like the first real air I’ve had in two years.
No more debt payments eating half my profit.
No more investors looking over my shoulder.
No more Brad and Jim and Cameron questioning every decision, threatening to pull funding if I don’t meet their metrics, talking about rebrands and name changes. Flirting with Vivienne!
The restaurant is mine. Actually, fully, completely mine.
I sit back down heavily, my hands coming up to cover my face. And I laugh. It comes out a strangled, half-sob, but it’s a laugh.
“Oh my God,” I murmur into my palms.
“Yeah.” I can hear the smile in Margo’s voice.
I drop my hands, looking at her, still not quite believing it. “Why didn’t anyone tell me sooner?”
“Because it took weeks to process through the estate. And because Sloane wanted to make sure it was real and legal before she got anyone’s hopes up. She is as careful as her dad, that one. A real badass, honestly.” Margo stands, pulling her soaked jacket back on. “But it’s real, Cal. You’re free.”
Free.
The word settles into my chest, and I feel something I haven’t felt in five years.
Relief.
Pure, overwhelming, bone-deep relief.
I can breathe again. I can actually breathe.
“Vivienne,” I say, standing abruptly. “I have to tell Vivienne.”
Margo searches the empty restaurant before understanding crosses her face. “Callum. No. Look at that storm.”
As if on cue, the wind slams into the building hard enough to rattle every window. The rain is coming down sideways so hard it sounds like gravel hitting the glass.
“She needs to know.” I’m already moving toward the door.
“She will know tomorrow when this passes.”
“She’s in that cottage, Margo.” I grab my jacket from where I left it draped over the bar. “Your old cottage right on the water with the windows that don’t seal and the roof that’s half rotted and that tree that’s been leaning toward it for a hundred years!”
“Then call her.”
“She won’t answer my calls!” I’m pulling on the jacket now, checking my pockets for my keys. “She’s been avoiding me for three days, and I’ve been giving her space, but that storm is right on top of us, and she’s alone in that cottage, and I —”
I stop.
This isn’t just about the good news I need to share.
It’s that I can’t stand the thought of her being alone in that cottage when the storm hits. I can’t stand the thought of her being scared or in danger or needing help and me not being there.
Again.
We already lost five years. Five years I could have been with her.
Loving her. Being there for her. And I know she needs space.
I’ll give her all the space she needs to process what happened with Stellan and to figure out what she wants and needs to heal.
And I’ll move heaven and earth to make sure she gets exactly that.
But I won’t let her face this storm alone.
Because I love her.
I’ve been in love with her since Paris, and I never really stopped. Not when she left me. Not when I convinced myself I was over it. Not even when I was with Sarah, pretending I’d moved on, trying to force myself to feel something that came remotely close.
It’s always been her.
It will always be her.
“I have to go,” I say.
“Callum, this is so dangerous!”
“I know.”
“The roads are going to flood!”
“I know.”
“You could get hurt!”
“I know! I don’t care.” I look at her, begging her to see the desperation I feel. “I have to make sure she’s okay.”
Margo stares at me for a long moment. Then she sighs, shaking her head. “You Reid men are all the same. Stubborn as hell and stupid in love.”
“Yeah, well. Dad raised us right.” I’m already at the door, my hand on the handle.
“Be careful,” she calls after me. “Go get your girl, Callum.”
I nod, not trusting my voice, and push out into the storm.
The wind hits me, nearly knocking me back against the door. Rain is coming down in sheets so thick I can barely see my truck parked twenty feet away. The temperature has dropped at least ten degrees since this morning, and the rain is ice-cold, soaking through my jacket in seconds.
I put my head down and run for the truck.
The door fights me when I try to open it, the wind trying to rip it from my hands. I have to use both hands to pull it shut once I’m inside, and even then it takes two tries and all my weight against it.
The windshield is instantly covered in water. I turn on the wipers but they’re nearly useless, barely keeping up with the deluge, just smearing water back and forth.
I can’t see more than ten feet in front of me.
I start the engine anyway.
Vivienne is in that cottage, all alone, and I promised myself I’d give her space. But I never promised I’d let her face this storm by herself.
The truck pulls out of the parking lot, headlights cutting through the rain and doing almost nothing, just reflecting back at me off the wall of water.
I press down on the gas and drive straight into the storm.