Chapter Twenty-Six
Zane
The busy chatter of The Summit was an annoying buzz in my brain, and I wished it would just go away. We’d been nonstop go from the minute my shift had started. I hadn’t even had time for a piss.
Normally, it wouldn’t bother me. Hell, normally I’d love it. But tonight, all I wanted was to leave the upbeat party atmosphere and go hang out with Melina. In private.
I missed her, body and soul, and it hadn’t even been a whole day.
“I wish your girlfriend’s office wasn’t so close to mine,” Nate complained as he propped himself up against the side of the bar.
Despite the drink order I was in the middle of preparing, I came to a dead stop. “Tell me.”
“Not sure I can give you much. I only caught the tail end, but Wyatt left her office looking tense, and your woman looked like she’d been run over.”
“Fucking hell.” I scanned the busy room.
Caleb was in the back on a break and Larissa was alone on the floor. I’d feel like shit leaving them to handle this place, yet there was really no other choice.
“Go,” Nate urged. “I know how to mix a drink.”
I didn’t deserve friends like him. Like any of them, really. But I’d spent my whole life trying to earn it anyway—showing up, being the life of every party, making myself indispensable—because that was easier than sitting still long enough to feel the hole my parents had left behind.
Fuck, I was still messed up in so many ways.
But with Melina by my side, it all felt manageable. I was a different person with her. I just hoped she knew it. Even though I still hadn’t told her.
“I owe you one,” I told Nate, handing him my apron.
He frowned as he came around the bar. “I’m not helping you so I can get something in return. That’s not how this friendship works. Besides, I’m not really doing it for you at all. I’m doing it for Melina. She needs you.”
A sense of urgency hit as I launched myself from behind the bar and raced toward the lobby. People turned with looks of curiosity, but I ignored them all.
The door to the guest services office was closed, but I ignored that too. Without knocking, I plowed straight in, my heart still trying to catch up with me.
Her head snapped in my direction, but her face was blank. Not a hint of emotion. Like she’d decided I wasn’t worth the energy.
“Hey,” I said through the lump in my throat. “Are you okay?”
She shrugged, her gaze filled with nothing but dull, lifeless apathy. “Why wouldn’t I be okay?”
Fuck. No spark, no drive, not even a smile. Whatever had happened had put her on the defensive. Melina was going to freeze me out.
“I don’t know,” I croaked, finding it harder to breathe by the second. “Nate said you were upset. He thought maybe you needed my help.”
Her eyes flashed bright with sudden animosity. “Your help? Don’t you think you’ve done enough?”
There’s the fire. But fuck, it was aimed at me.
“I’d do anything for you.”
With a shake of her head, she turned her attention back to her desk as she started packing her work into a drawer. “That’s the problem, Zane. I didn’t want you to do anything. But you did anyway.”
I stood in frozen silence, my mind a black hole and my heart dying in my chest.
She shut the drawer with force, the sound echoing in the tiny room and shattering my hope.
Then, standing to grab her coat from the hook, she turned to me with a scowl. “I’m worth more than your fucking pity.”
My body and brain finally started working, just as she pushed past me, out of the room. “Melina,” I called, icy dread still gripped around me. “Melina!”
But she didn’t bother to look back.
“I love you,” I muttered into the empty room.
There was no echo. No answer. Nothing but the hollow thud of my heart in my ears—still beating, even though it was completely shattered.
I stood there longer than I should have. Long enough for the silence to consume me and the walls of the tiny office to feel like they were closing in.
Then I went back to the bar and pretended I was fine. Because that’s what I did. That’s what I’d always done.
The rest of the night was a blur of activity. Drinks were served. Guests made small talk. My coworkers did their best to engage me. But even though I was physically present, I was a vacant fucking mess.
Nate stuck around until after last call, sneaking glances of concern my way every so often. Once the room had cleared and the lights turned out, he followed me to my truck.
“What happened?” he asked.
What the hell had happened? I wasn’t even sure I knew. Maybe she’d found out about the car? Or my plans to help cover Vic’s therapy?
“She might be mad that I spent some money on her without asking.”
“Really?” Nate’s brow wrinkled. “Obviously I don’t know her as well as you, but it seemed a little bigger than that. It looked like someone had ripped her heart out of her throat. And Wyatt said something about her promotion.”
All at once it hit me.
My conversation with Wyatt…
She knew. She fucking knew. And it made me feel like an even bigger asshole because she’d asked me not to intervene, but I’d done it anyway.
Sure, I’d only given Wyatt my opinion on how unfair I thought the whole thing was. And I’d approached it as a concerned co-worker—the same way I’d have done it for anyone else. But she wouldn’t see it that way.
She’d think I was pulling strings to secure it for her. Like it was charity.
Like it was fucking pity.
“I think I fucked up,” I admitted, my hands balling into tight fists. “No. Shit, I know I fucked up. I really am a fucking asshole.”
Nate sighed. “You ignored my advice, didn’t you?”
I hadn’t just ignored it. I’d stomped all over it. I hadn’t trusted Wyatt or the process, or Melina’s ability to earn the promotion all on her own. But most of all, I hadn’t trusted that what we had was strong enough to survive without me trying to fix everything.
“She thinks I went to Wyatt to make her promotion happen.” The words tasted like poison.
“Did you?”
“No. I just asked him why it was being held up when she’d worked so hard to earn it. But it doesn’t matter, does it? My last name did the rest.”
“So what are you going to do?”
The answer forming in the back of my mind wasn’t simple. And it sure as hell wasn’t fucking fun.
As long as I was here and my last name was Alexander, I’d always be in her way. My name would always cast a shadow over everything she accomplished. Every promotion, every success, every achievement would face skepticism and whispers.
I couldn’t do that to her. I wouldn’t.
“I’m going to quit,” I said.
Nate’s head snapped toward me. “Quit?”
“The bar. The resort. I’m going to walk away.” My voice sounded steadier than I felt. Inside, everything was crumbling. “I can’t be an Alexander here and be with her. One of those things has to go, and it’s not going to be her.”
“Zane, think about this. The resort is your whole life.”
“No. She’s my whole life. The resort is just the place I’ve been hiding.” The words hit hard. Because they were true.
The resort had been my sanctuary, my constant, the one place that always felt like mine. But without Melina, it was just property. The hotel was a beautiful building full of people who loved the version of me I’d been performing for years.
She was the only one who’d ever seen the real me. And I’d rather lose everything than lose her.
Nate nodded. Not with enthusiasm or approval but with understanding. “What do you need from me?”
“A favor. A big one.” I swallowed hard. “When I’m gone, the staff are going to need someone. The ones who come to me when shit goes sideways, when they need a shift covered or a problem solved or just someone to listen. That’s not going to be me anymore. I need it to be you.”
Nate stared at me. “You’re serious about this.”
“Dead serious.” I swallowed hard. “Which is why I’m calling my father and accepting his offer. I’m going to New York.”
“Zane…” Nate’s expression didn’t change, but something shifted behind his eyes. “You sure that’s the right move?”
No. I wasn’t sure about a damn fucking thing, except the fact that I loved her and I was the thing standing in her way.
“I’m sure,” I lied.
He clapped a hand on my shoulder and squeezed. “Then go do what you need to do. I’m here. I’ve got it covered.”
I nodded, not trusting my voice.
“And Zane?” He didn’t let go of my shoulder. “When this is over, however it plays out, you better come back. Even if it’s just to visit. This place isn’t the same without you. And neither am I.”
Somehow, I held my shit together long enough to get in my truck and close the door.
I sat in the dark for a while, watching the snow pile up on the windshield, Green Mountain looming behind me in the rearview mirror.
The dream my great-grandfather had built.
The property my grandfather had invested not only his life savings but all his time and energy into making great.
The place that had raised me when my own parents couldn’t be bothered.
And now I was walking away from it.
For her.
I picked up my phone and stared at the screen. Then, with hands that wouldn’t stop shaking, I pulled up my father’s number and hit call.
It rang twice.
“Zane.” His cold, professional tone was laced with a hint of smug satisfaction. “This is unexpected.”
“I need to see you. I’m coming to New York.”
He paused before asking, “When?”
“Tomorrow.”
He paused again, longer this time, like it gave him a thrill to keep me waiting.
“I’ll clear my schedule,” he said, finally. And hung up.
Snow now covered my windshield completely. The resort hotel had disappeared behind a curtain of white.
I hit the ignition and turned on the wipers. The snow cleared, and there it was, lit up and glowing against the dark sky like it was daring me to leave.
The gear felt sticky when I put the truck in drive, but I pulled out of the lot anyway.
And I didn’t look back.