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Rachel drew a tremulous breath, and then another. She was angry, so angry. He’d changed everything because he’d changed.
He wanted more from her, but she didn’t have more to give.
She’d enjoyed his attention, and had reveled in the romance, but that was all this was… a romance. It was fantasy. Nothing about this town or her time with Atticus had anything to do with her reality. “I’m not who you want, Atticus. I’m not who you need me to be.”
“I don’t need you to be anything but who you are—”
“This is so awkward, so uncomfortable. I hate that it’s now uncomfortable.”
He caught her chin and turned her face toward him. “I have fallen for you, Rachel. It wasn’t part of my plan, but here we are, and I want to see you succeed. I want your Paradise Books to be the store it could be.”
“And what if I don’t want it—any of this? What if nothing in Marietta is right for me?”
He looked stunned for a moment and then his hand fell away. “Does that include me?” he asked stiffly.
She hated to hurt him, she did, but she had to be honest. “I’m sorry, Atticus, but we’re not on the same page.”
His dark head inclined. “Wow. Okay then. Good to know.”
“So the bookstore—”
“I don’t feel like discussing the store anymore.” He glanced at the big brick building and then back at her. “You’re going to do what you want to do, but it looks like it won’t include me.”
Chapter Nine
Upstairs in the attic apartment, Rachel numbly changed into sweatpants and a soft sweatshirt, doing her best to not think, feeling too confused to think.
She made a cup of tea, and sat facing the window on the foot of her bed, staring out at the jagged mountains. She felt trapped, and sad, disappointed in herself, but also disappointed in Atticus. Why did he have to ruin everything? Why couldn’t things have continued as they were—sweet, lighthearted, fun?
Talking about marriage and children wasn’t fun.
Talking about settling down wasn’t fun.
Talking about building a business together wasn’t fun.
She didn’t need the complications and she didn’t need the confusion. Things were already so hard and he’d made it all worse.
There was no way she could stay here now. There was no way she could open the bookstore tomorrow and pretend that everything was fine. Nothing was fine. She wasn’t fine. And she was an idiot for thinking she could make a bookstore—a bookstore—work.
And yet Atticus…
He was just so much. He was too much… too much handsome, too much wisdom, too much wonderful. He made her feel like a juvenile wreck in comparison.
Her phone pinged with an incoming text.
She leaned across her bed and picked it up from the tiny nightstand. The message was from Atticus. “Let’s talk tomorrow.”
Blinking back tears, she deleted the text, and then immediately regretted it, and then kicked herself for regretting being strong.
She had to be strong now. She had to pull herself together. Everything here, including Atticus, was too much. She needed to go home to the place where everything made sense.
Atticus could have the bookstore. He could give the books to his mother. Rachel didn’t care. She just wanted her life back, the one she understood, the one that felt safe, and familiar. Retrieving her laptop from the kitchen table, she bought her one-way ticket back home.
*
Atticus didn’t sleep well that night aware that the conversation with Rachel had gone badly. He kept checking his phone, hoping she’d reply. She didn’t. He told himself to give her time. He knew he could be intense and overwhelming.
He hadn’t thought she’d react quite so badly though. He’d even imagined she’d be glad—relieved—that he wasn’t pushing for the store anymore. It wasn’t as if she couldn’t sell Paradise Books down the road, but after all she’d done this past week, why should she be in a hurry to get rid of it?
It didn’t make sense.
But the way she’d looked at him when she’d said good night didn’t make sense, either. The smile was gone. There was no light in her eyes. She looked shuttered. Detached. And that worried him.
Atticus went downstairs for breakfast and was on the way back to his suite when the man working the front desk flagged him down. “An item was left for you, Mr. Bowen. Let me get it from the back.”
He returned a moment later with a book. “There’s a letter, too, and I tucked it inside the cover,” the clerk said. “The book and letter were dropped off early this morning.”
Atticus took the book and turned it over and his chest tightened as he read the title on the worn dust jacket, To Kill a Mockingbird.
He knew immediately who’d left the book but waited until he was in the elevator on the way to his room to open the letter.
Atticus,
I thought your mom might like this for Christmas. I believe it’s a first edition, but an 8th printing, so not the most valuable of first editions.
Thank you for your kindness and friendship, as well as your support. It meant a great deal to me.
I’m heading back to California now. If you want the bookstore, we can work out the details after the holidays. If you don’t, perhaps you can pass the key to a reputable commercial Realtor and the Realtor can help me with the next steps.
All best, and happiest of holidays,
Rachel
Southern California was in the middle of a heat wave when Rachel arrived back in Orange County Monday afternoon. She peeled off her sweater as she retrieved her suitcase and waited for her ride, amazed at the difference between frigid Montana and blistering California. Standing at the curb with her suitcase she felt her phone vibrate. She glanced at her messages, expecting a text from Atticus.
Instead it was a message from her father, checking in with her.
She sent him a text that she was back and on her way to her place. She’d just hit send when her phone rang from an Orange County area code but she didn’t recognize the number and let it go to voice mail. She played the voice mail once she could. It was Jared Helm calling, her immediate supervisor at Novak & Bartley. She was being offered the promotion.
She replayed Jared’s message a second time.
Jay Shields had been fired—Jared didn’t say why—but Jay was gone and the firm was offering her the promotion, if she wanted it.
If she wanted it.
Rachel hung up and clutched the phone in her fist. Why wouldn’t she want it? This was what she’d worked so hard for. This was why she’d sacrificed so much. Of course she wanted it.
Part of her felt vindicated. Jay had not deserved the promotion. He’d barely pulled his weight. But now they were offering her the title, the raise, the recognition she’d craved.
And they’d offered her the promotion before she returned. They’d think she was coming back early from her holiday because of the raise, instead of her returning because she’d fallen in love, and that was beyond terrifying because falling in love would require change, and risk, and pain.
Falling in love meant she could lose Atticus. He could walk away from her at any point, or he could get sick and die. Far safer to not love, and not be hurt. Far safer to be obsessive about work rather than a person.
So she didn’t have Atticus, but she had the promotion. She didn’t have love, but she would soon earn substantially more money.
That was something, wasn’t it?
*
Rach
el had never found it hard to concentrate before, but since returning from Marietta, her attention wandered constantly.
She was struggling being in the office, struggling at her computer, struggling to stay focused during meetings.
Fortunately, no one knew her well enough to know she wasn’t on her game. Fortunately, she could hide her exhaustion behind her calm, professional mask.
But she hated the mask. It was just that—a fake persona she’d created so people would respect her, and not know how sensitive she really was.
She didn’t let herself think about Atticus, though. And she didn’t let herself think about Marietta or the bookstore, either.
She did find herself returning to her last morning there, and how she hadn’t said goodbye to anyone when she left. She’d simply tidied up the store, emptied the refrigerator of perishables, unplugged the lights on the Christmas tree and yes, she’d agonized over the note she would be leaving for Atticus, because she didn’t know how to say goodbye to him.
It was unthinkable that she was saying goodbye, but it was also unthinkable remaining, and feeling such strong feelings. She liked him far too much. She was becoming dependent on him and that wasn’t healthy. And so, she’d stood, pen in hand, for the longest time, staring out at the sea of books, and remembered the moment he’d entered the store and introduced himself, extending a hand to her.
“Atticus Bowen,” he’d said.
“Atticus?” she’d answered.
“My mother loved To Kill a Mockingbird.”
Rachel had raced upstairs and searched the L section and there she’d found a lone copy of To Kill a Mockingbird, and inside a tiny slip of paper read, first edition, 8th printing, average wear and tear.
Rachel hoped the book would be a suitable parting gift, and maybe it’d help smooth things over. After dropping the book and letter off at the hotel, Rachel drove her rental to Bozeman never intending to return to Montana again.
She’d done the right thing, she told herself, as she dragged herself into her second week back at the accounting firm. She’d worked too hard for too many years to not return. She’d earned the promotion. She deserved it.
