“I hoped you’d want to leave it.”
“Why?”
“To marry me.”
Her mouth opened, but she seemed too stunned to speak.
“I love you, Laura. I want to be with you all the time, but with you tied to that place, it won’t work. I have to travel, find new business investments, and do the same things I’ve been doing with you at the diner and motel. I want you to come with me, work with me, be with me. I don’t want you here while I’m in Leesburg or Hollywood or Tallahassee or Sarasota or somewhere else. I want you with me. Do you love me, Laura?”
“Yes, of course I do, but what about my business?”
“We’ll hire more people. Judy can manage the diner and your parents can keep an eye on things. I thought we could live here, at the beach house. It’s only forty minutes away, so we’d be close if they need you.”
“I know, but—”
“Florence and Meg can help Judy. They can hire however many people they need.”
She looked stricken. He’d just proposed and her mind was on business. Did she have any idea what that did to a man’s ego?
“You’re not ready to give up on it, are you? You’re more tied to that place than you are to me.”
“It isn’t that, Luke. It’s just... I want to marry you, but I can’t just walk away.”
What made him think she’d give up her business for him? The diner was her baby, her child. She wouldn’t leave her baby for him.
She drifted into his arms. “We can still get married, Luke.”
“A long-distance marriage won’t work. I don’t want us to be separated all the time. Either you’re with me or you’re not.”
She draped her arms around his waist and gazed up into his eyes. “But I love you.”
Sure she did, but she was too obsessed with the diner and with proving her worth to a woman who’d died months ago to leave Kingston. “It’s not enough, Laura.”
Deeply hurt, Luke turned away and walked out to the deck. She had to know what this was doing to him. He’d handed her his heart, but his love couldn’t compete with that damn diner. Without looking back, he opened the gate and walked down to the beach. He slipped his shoes off and waded in the frothy surf and started down the beach. She didn’t love him enough to leave that damned place. He should have known she wouldn’t leave it. She was obsessed with it. Instead of fixing it up, he should have torn it down and started over. They’d changed the name, but to her it would always be Queenie’s Café.
Her home.
He walked for nearly an hour before he found himself back at the beach house. He was hot and itchy and wanted to take a cool shower, but he wouldn’t do it now. Right now, he had to drive Laura back to her precious diner. From now on, their relationship would be strictly business, as it should have been all along. He’d let himself fall in love with a woman who wasn’t free to love him back. She wouldn’t be free to love anyone as long as she was tied to that diner.
He found her on the deck, sitting by the pool in the shade. She didn’t say anything, but her eyes were swollen and red. She’d been crying.
“Maybe we’d better go back,” he said.
“If that’s what you want.”
“You know that’s not what I want.” The words came out harsh. He swallowed his angry pride and lowered his voice. “That’s not why I brought you here.”
“Why should I give up my job? Are you giving up yours?”
“I’m not asking you to come along just for the hell of it. I’m offering you another job, working with me.”
“All I know how to do is run a diner.”
“You know about people and you understand how a business runs. You’re smart. You’ll learn the rest.”
“I want to be with you, but—”
“Pack your things. I’ll take you back to your precious diner.” He heard the bitterness in his voice and knew she heard it, too, but he wouldn’t apologize. He couldn’t.
“I didn’t unpack. I didn’t know if you’d want me to stay.”
“I want you to stay for good, but you don’t love me enough to do that, do you?”
She didn’t answer, and her silence drove the knife in deeper.
Luke locked up and tossed their bags on the backseat. He didn’t know what to say to her, so he said nothing.
Laura wiped tears off her cheeks a couple of times, but she didn’t speak until they were approaching Kingston. “Luke, you don’t understand.”
“No, I don’t. It’s just a place, honey, just a building where you work yourself to death.”
“I can’t leave now.”
“Because you still have something to prove to yourself? You sure as hell don’t have anything to prove to anyone else. Laura, Queenie is dead.”
“Her words still haunt me.”
“I know,” he said softly. Queenie’s power was stronger than Laura’s love for him, and there wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it. He could compete with another man, but how could he compete with a dead woman?
“I’m sorry, Luke.”
“So am I.”
She pulled her suitcase off the backseat, closed the door and walked away.
Luke drove back to the ranch to lick his wounds and wallow in self-pity. He should have expected this kind of response, but he thought she loved him. On some level he knew she did, but it wasn’t enough.
She loved her business more.
He walked in the door at the ranch and Mom asked, “What are you doing here?”
“I asked and she turned me down. End of story.” He walked to his bedroom and threw the suitcase on the bed with such force it nearly bounced off.
She followed him. “Why did she turn you down?”
“Queenie told her she was lazy, and she’s still trying to prove she can run that place better than Queenie. You’d think she’d already proven it.”
“Does she love you?”
“She said she did.”
“Then she’ll come around.”
“She wants to get married, but she won’t leave that damn place. I told her that won’t work for me. I can’t compete with a dead woman, Mom. I won’t beg her to marry me.”
Lily peered around the door. Since Luke yelled at her, she’d been afraid to come into his room.
“Hi, squirt,” he said. “You can come in. It’s okay.”
“I’ll marry you,” offered Lily.
“Don’t you want to marry someone your own age?”
“No.”
Luke looked at his mother, silently pleading for help.
“Don’t look at me,” she said.
Luke pulled Lily onto his lap. “I want to marry Laura, squirt. Someday, when you’re all grown up, you’ll find a nice guy and fall in love. Then you’ll get married. I’m way too old for you.”
“You don’t like me?”
“I like you more like a sister than a girlfriend.”
“Oh, okay,” said the little girl, sliding off his lap. She scampered off to play, leaving him and his mother smiling at each other.
Mom said, “Her mother hasn’t called or written or contacted either one of the girls. She can legally ask for them back at any time, but I haven’t heard a thing. She knows where they are and how to contact them, and Ivy’s baby is due any time now. You’d think she’d want to know how she’s doing.”
“Did Ivy decide what to do with the baby?”
“I don’t know. I’ve tried to talk to her about it, but she doesn’t want to give her baby to a stranger.”
“So take it yourself. Adopt the squirt, too. You wouldn’t mind keeping her, would you?”
Mom smiled. “She’s grown on me.”
“I noticed. Jay likes her, too.”
“Don’t push us together, Luke. If he’s interested, he’ll ask. If not, that’s okay. I’ve been on my own for a lot of years.”
The way things were going, Mom and Jay would be married long before Laura left that blasted diner.
<>
Laura stayed in her apartment for two days. Florence tried to coax her to come out, but she wouldn’t. The morning of the third day, Laura forced herself to go into the diner, back to work. She knew she looked terrible. She hadn’t eaten or slept in two days, and her eyes were swollen from crying so much.
Meg said, “You look like something the cat dragged in. Are you all right?”
“I don’t feel like seeing anyone today. I’ll cook this morning if you’ll take care of the front.”
“Maybe you should call Judy and take the day off, Laura.”
“No, I’ll be all right. I need to work.”
Laura avoided everyone that day. She felt drained, as if all the life had gone out of her. Luke didn’t love her or he wouldn’t ask her to give up her business. He knew she couldn’t walk away from Queenie’s now. She’d already lost him, and she couldn’t lose her business, too. It was all she had. Didn’t he understand that? Didn’t he care about all the work she’d done here?
Meg called to her just after ten. “Laura, they’re putting the new sign in.”
She peered through the sunroom window. Luke stood with the sign man as the crane lifted the new sign off the truck and slid it into place in the sleeves they’d installed in the ground last week, when they removed the old sign. It was beautiful. Black letters on a light blue background, with a crown at the top corner, as if it was sliding off, just like she pictured. The crown was outlined with tiny white lights, with bigger blue lights at the points.
Luke glanced her way and she quickly stepped back from the window. She didn’t want to see him or talk to him. Not now. She had no idea what to say. He didn’t really love her or he’d understand.
<>
Luke was quite pleased with the new sign. It was beautiful, thanks to Laura’s design. That silly crown at the top would catch the eye of any motorist, especially after dark. She had a good eye. Too bad she wasn’t willing to work for the corporation.
Too bad she didn’t love him enough to marry him.
A heaviness settled in his chest, an overwhelming sadness for what might have been. She didn’t want him. She valued this place more than she valued him. Nothing in his life had ever hurt like this.
<>
Laura went back to work, but her heart wasn’t in it. Luke didn’t come in for lunch, and she was too busy to check on the sign again until around three that afternoon, when her father poked his head in the kitchen.
“Laura, come look at the new sign.”
She shook her head.
“Luke left two hours ago. Come on. Take a break.”
“Get outta here,” said Judy, shooing her out the door.
Her father took Laura’s hand and they walked out to the street together. They walked a little way down the street and looked back at the diner and apartments, at the new roof and asphalt, the fresh paint, the planter with the tinted glass rising above it. And the new sign.
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THE DUCHESS DINER
ALL-YOU-CAN-EAT
~ B U F F E T ~
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THE DUKE’S DIGS
~ APARTMENTS ~
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“Laura, look at what you’ve done. Look at this place. Does it look like Queenie’s now?”
“No.”
“You did this, Laura.”
She shook her head. She couldn’t have done it without Luke’s money, without his vision and encouragement. Sure, she could have made the café profitable, but just barely. It was their combined effort, their partnership, that made this possible.
“Queenie is dead. Her business is dead. This is yours. You built the business from scratch, from nothing. You did it. Not Luke. Not Queenie. Not me.
You.
You’re the one who fought the odds, who coaxed the customers to come in, who built this business. It took your sweat and your vision, and you should be damn proud of yourself.”