Where My Heart Breaks (25 page)

I left the event planning in Millie’s capable hands. Every morning I met with Sam and Millie to go over the day’s itinerary of activities just like Patrice had done with me, and then we went about our days dividing and conquering. I quickly discovered why Patrice seemed to be constantly on the go. There was always something somewhere that needed to be done or required my attention. I buzzed all over the Willoughby grounds inspecting the gardens, checking in the maintenance staff, keeping up with housekeeping, and most importantly, making sure the guests felt loved and cared for during their stay.

That was the part of the job that I found that I liked the best. It took just a little extra time spent with every guest, but I found out all sorts of things about them. And because the guests were almost exclusively honeymooners, I got to watch the sidelong glances and shared secret smiles of people who were obviously deeply in love. It made me happy to hear about how they met, all the details of their weddings, and what they planned for their futures. It made me realize that maybe a wedding in my own future wouldn’t be such a bad thing.

Then there was Reed. I wasn’t sure what to call our relationship yet because he continued to refuse to let me talk about it. Yet he showed up every evening after the dinner service and invited me to sit outside with him on the patio to enjoy the warm summer evenings. Sometimes he brought a piece of Good Day apple pie with him, and that’s how I knew he thought there was something more ahead for us as well.

When Millie wasn’t working on details for the next Willoughby event, I had her on Patrice duty. Millie didn’t care when Patrice snarled at her or tried to get a rise out of her. Millie had the patience of a saint it seemed, so I gratefully let her push and gently chide Patrice into sitting outside or down by the lake instead of bothering me.
 

As Sam predicted, Patrice’s well-oiled machine churned on and I started to feel a bit more settled into my life there. Patrice had been home for a week when Millie came into the foyer and found me there going over the day’s receipts. Summer school had started at the Cheshire community college, so it was one of Reed’s teaching nights. I wasn’t sure if he would to be able to stop by the Willoughby on his way home or not. I hoped so. Seeing him was the best part of my day.

“Patrice requests your presence down by the lake,” Millie said. Her jaw cracked in a wide yawn.
 

“In a minute,” I said, not taking my eyes off the calculator.

“She’s more owly than usual tonight,” Millie advised. “You might want to hustle.”

I sighed and leaned back in my chair and stretched. Then I rubbed my eyes. “I don’t know how she does this all the time. I feel like a zombie.”

“As long as you don’t try eating my brains in the middle of the night, we’ll be fine,” Millie joked.
 

I stood, and we swatted hands as I passed her. I stepped out onto the patio and took a deep breath. The country air was so different than in the city. In such a short time, the Willoughby had more than grown on me. I was starting to think of it as home.

I made my way down the path and saw Patrice sitting on the bench that I sat on my first night at the Willoughby. It seemed like forever ago. The summer was almost half over now. I still had a lot of things to think about and decide before it came to an end.

Patrice saw me coming and waved for me to sit down next to her. I expected her to start drilling me about the upcoming event on Saturday night, or if everything was going as expected with the guests, but she surprised me by saying nothing for a few minutes. I waited for her to start.

“I spoke to your mother this afternoon,” she said, not looking in my direction.

I hadn’t spoken to my mother since my phone call where I told her that I wasn’t going to stop seeing Reed. I figured that I likely wouldn’t speak to her again until I went home to claim the rest of my belongings and clean out my room. I didn’t need a crystal ball to tell me that by defying my mother as I had, I wasn’t going to be welcome in her house anymore. That was all right with me.

I’d forgotten though that I didn’t tell Patrice. I felt a sinking feeling in my stomach. “I was going to tell you about that, but then you got sick.”

“Your mother believes that I should boot you out on your ass and let you figure out how to fend for yourself.”

I felt a wave of anger. That sounded just like something my mother would say, aside from the cursing, but after everything I had done to keep the Willoughby running smoothly during Patrice’s recovery, it felt like a stab in the back.

“Should I start packing my things then?” I said, unable to keep the bitterness out of my voice.

Patrice turned to me then. “I never wanted kids. John and I were perfectly suited that way. We had our careers, and we got to travel the world and do whatever we wanted whenever we wanted. I felt sorry for those people who were tied down with crawling, whining, nagging little people.”

I wasn’t sure where Patrice was going with her train of thought. I was too busy trying not to lose my cool and stomp away. I didn’t know where I was going to go.
 

“My point is that after this past week, I kind of get it,” Patrice said. Her face softened. “You’ve done a good job here, Kate. You’ve managed to handle the Willoughby and a tired, cranky old woman to boot. I’ve talked to every single guest, and they all can’t stop talking about how fantastic you’ve been to them and how impressed they are with your ability to cater to their every whim despite your obvious youthful age. I’ve talked to some of the staff too. They might not have liked me bringing you in at first, but they respect you. They see how hard you’re working. Those are all good things.”

My mouth fell open. I blinked hard.
 

“On top of that, I’ve watched Reed Black come and go every day this week doing everything in his power to make you smile and make sure that you are happy despite the madness around you. I’ve never seen him act like that for a woman before, and I’ve lived in Bleckerville for eight years.”

Of everything she had said so far, those words affected me the most. Somebody else saw a glimmer of what I saw in Reed.
 

“So knowing all of that, I told your mother she’s a damn fool. You can stay here with me at the Willoughby as long as you like. After losing John, and then getting sick the way I’ve been, I can see why having close family can be important. You’re my family, Kate, and I appreciate what you’ve done for me.”

I clapped my hands together and then I swooped across the bench to give Patrice a massive hug. I could hear her protesting the whole time about still being weak and fragile, but I didn’t care. She had paid me one of the highest compliments anyone in my family had ever given to me. I finally felt like I was able to do something right.

“So I take it you’ll stay on for the summer then?” Patrice asked when I finally let her go.

“I love it here,” I said honestly. “There’s nowhere else I’d rather be.”

Patrice smiled. “I have a feeling that has to do as much with a particular young man as anything else, but it’s a nice sentiment. Go on back to work. I’m sure he’ll be around soon, and you’ll want to get tidied up.”

I gave her another quick hug and then I practically skipped back up to the house. When I breezed through the doorway, I found Sam leaning over the registration desk murmuring something to Millie. He straightened with a guilty look on his face when he saw me.
 

“I’m staying!” I burst out. “Patrice said I could stay the summer.”

“That’s great news!” Millie said.
 

“Was there any doubt?” Sam said with a confused look on his face.

“Why don’t you go make us some coffee?” Millie said. “Let me chat for a few minutes with Kate.”

Sam nodded with a small smile and then disappeared toward the kitchen.

I raised an eyebrow at my friend. “What is that about?”

“I’m breaking down those walls,” she said with a small smile.
 

“I still don’t get it,” I said. “You’ve got some rich, gorgeous guy back in Manhattan who has been after you for over a year. Even if you didn’t want him, there are a million guys out there. What’s your attraction to Sam?”

Millie shook her head. “You should have spent some more time getting to know him before you chucked him to the side. Your loss, my gain.”

I knew by her wink that she was kidding. She pulled out her phone, and I watched her type something into the Google search field. Then she handed the phone to me. It was a close up picture of Sam, but he looked different in it. He was positively hunky in his plain white t-shirt and jeans. Then I saw the picture was attached to a Wiki article on an actor named Carter Samuel Groveson.

I thought about the first day that I met him and how he looked so familiar, but I couldn’t place him. I burst out laughing.
 

“Horror Night on Frat Row!” I exclaimed. Millie shushed me, and I lowered my voice. “You probably watched that movie a million times last year.”

“I know!” Millie said. “I recognized him right away. He’s super shy about talking about it. It was a gig that he did to earn some extra cash between his freshman and sophomore year, and I think it embarrasses him even though I told him how much I loved that movie. He said that he’s considering auditioning for a theater company in New York in the fall instead of going back to UNC.”

“It’s such a small world,” I said. “So you like him?”

“I’m fascinated by him,” Millie corrected. “Plus he’s a nice guy. I like that.”

I understood what she meant. After all the jerks we met over the years, it was decidedly refreshing to meet a guy who was simply a nice guy. And as if I called him up with my mind, my own nice guy walked through the door.
 

I heard Millie chuckle. “Hey, Reed. I’ll see you later, Kate.”

I didn’t even turn to tell her goodbye. I only had eyes for Reed.
 

Just like that day under the bridge, he opened his arms to me. I ran to him and jumped up into them. He whirled me around, and I laughed. All the stress and anxiety of the day bled away. I couldn’t remember ever being so happy.

EPILOGUE

The summer slipped through my fingers like sand after that, and soon it was time for Millie to leave and head back to school. Like her father, I couldn’t believe that she stayed the whole summer at the Willoughby, but I had a feeling a certain up and coming young actor had something to do with it.

Patrice continued to surprise me. She offered to help me pay the tuition for school with a little bit of money she had set aside. While I appreciated her offer, I told her that it was important for me to stand on my own two feet. I signed up to take bookkeeping classes at Cheshire Community College. I still liked numbers, and I knew that I could save Patrice some time and money if I took over that side of the business for her. I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do with the rest of my life yet. I was going to take some time off and figure it out, and I was determined not to stress out about it. Now that I was the one making the decisions about my life, I found I wasn’t in any hurry to rush into any career choices just yet.

Patrice offered to let me stay at the Willoughby after the summer ended too, but by then it was pretty obvious to everyone that Reed and I were inseparable. For the time being, he didn’t want to be too far away from his mother, and I understood. After Patrice’s health scare, I didn’t want to stray to far either. In a letter she sent mid-summer when my parents returned from Europe,
 
She and I had grown close since my mother made it clear that if I didn’t come home immediately she was going to disown me. I didn’t bother responding.

I felt like my heart was going to burst the day that Reed asked me if I’d consider moving in with him.

“I thought we weren’t going to talk about the future,” I said. Even after Patrice was fully recovered, Reed kept mum on any topic that touched on our relationship status. I wasn’t even sure that I was allowed to call him my boyfriend yet.

“I have a lot of superstition around saying things out loud before it’s time,” Reed said. We were standing by the lakeshore at Grossler’s Point. We hadn’t been back to that spot since that afternoon he first made love to me. He held me in his arms as we watched several boats pass by. “I don’t want to jinx anything.”

I turned in his arms and put my hands around his neck. I decided I would never get tired of the way that he looked at me with such heat in his eyes. It was as if his insides burned for me. I felt the same way.

“Well, I don’t move in with any random guy who asks me,” I said, deliberately being mischievous.

Reed smiled and brushed his lips across my forehead. That simple gesture made my knees weak. “I will kill any random guy who would try to ask you because you are mine, Kate.”

He kissed me then so boldly that I was sure he was staking his claim to my soul as well as my body. I didn’t mind that either. I was head over heels in love with Reed Black.

When he finally released my lips, I asked breathlessly, “ So what does that mean?”

“That means that I love you,” he said softly. “If you want me to yell it to the next damn boat that goes by I will. I want you to move in with me. I want you in my life. I want you in my bed, and I never intend to let you go. You’ve shown me that for the last ten years, I’ve been courting a memory. I will always love Izzy, but she’s my past. You’re my future.”

His words shook me to my core. I looked up at him and knew without a doubt that he was the man for me. Forever. I stood on my tiptoes and brushed my lips against his. “I love you too, Reed Black.”

He reached down and, hooking his arm under my legs, lifted me up into his arms. I squealed and threw back my head laughing.

“What are you doing?”
 

“I’m not letting any slippery damn rocks steal you away from me,” he said.

I looked back over his shoulder and into the setting sun. In my mind, I could almost picture Jackson and Camilla standing there with their arms around each other, watching us leave.