“Are you okay?” he asked.
His handsome face showed a hint of concern. I hadn’t thought he’d been paying attention. Now that I looked at him, really looked at him, I could see what a catch he was. Handsome, successful … here. Vincent had completely intimidated me at first but now we had become not friends exactly … but peers? The idea made me happy. I’d spent so long feeling like I needed to prove myself to him but he didn’t care. He was never judging me. To be fair, he probably never thought about me at all. That’s the secret I would pass on to all graduating classes from here out:Hey, it’s depressing but also majorly freeing once you realize nobody actually cares about you. Everybody is too busy worrying about themselves.
I frowned. “I’m okay. How are you, Vincent? It’s been a crazy last few months.”
“It’s been nuts. I tried my best to keep my side of the Lodge running smoothly, but I need to go back to the city.”
“Oh,” I said. I had grown to like working with Vincent.
“You’ve been doing a great job here. You earned that events coordinator title. But don’t let it be your whole life. It’s just work.”
I gave him a look.
“I’m just saying that I recognize the sign of early-onset workaholism.”
He had no idea. What else was there for me? Sanders had said I was worth more than what I did for other people but I still couldn’t help but think if I had just done more, then I wouldn’t be alone right now. If I had just …
But I was the one who pushed everyone away, determined to prove something.
“I’ll have my doctor run some tests,” I said.
He grinned at me.
“And I appreciate you allowing me time to get to know you more,” he said. “When I read that initial recommendation email for your hire, I had some concerns. But I figured, if you could handle a biker bar—”
“I can handle pretty much anything,” I finished. I didn’t flush worrying what he thought. That was forever ago. It wasn’t who I was now.
“It’s a shame I never got to meet this Bethany Winston. It sounds like she was a major matriarch of this town.”
I blinked at the random reference of Jet’s mama, who I’d never met. “Bethany Winston?”
“She was the one who emailed Diane recommending you for hire. It was way down in the emails but I got the impression when Bethany suggested something, people listened.”
I nodded dumbly. How had Gretchen convinced Bethany Winston to email Diane Donner about me back in the day? I didn’t even know Jet’s mom. None of this made any sense.
He went on but I was still focused on his last comment. “I’ve enjoyed working with you.” He swallowed and I watched his Adam’s apple move up and down. “I had hoped maybe we could get to know each other more.”
I blinked in surprise.Wait, what?All these months of thinking he was judging me for being small-town trash and he’d actually been looking at me like I was a woman he was interested in? I replayed all our interactions in a new light. But there was nothing there. There were no zips and fizzes. He was a good guy but he wasn’t mine.
When I didn’t say anything fast enough, he sighed. “But I suspect that you’re interested in getting to know Mr. Olsson better?”
I made a sound that came out like a groan and a growl.
Vincent scratched at his eyebrow under his glasses. “Yeah, I had a feeling. Had I known I was pushing you two together …” He shook his head and cleared his throat. “I lost my wife a few years back.”
“I’m so sorry. I had no idea.” I watched his face closely.
“I don’t like to talk about it but I’m just bringing it up because well, if you have strong feelings for someone, you should give yourself a chance to explore them.”
“Oh—okay.” I straightened my bangs, wondering where he was going with this.
“I know it’s weird for me to say this to you. I’m not trying to be unprofessional. But since I’m leaving anyway.” He shrugged. “I witnessed the way you two looked at each other when you thought nobody was looking and … it made me think of my wife.”
Emotion tightened my throat. I had no idea what to say. This was by far the longest and weirdest conversation the two of us had in all our months working together. Not that it was his fault, I didn’t exactly scream “people person.”
He cleared his throat and went on, “Also, I was organizing some files and found these mail slots in the back office.” He reached into the breast pocket of his jacket. “The mail cubbies look like they’ve been long forgotten but I found these. Addressed to you.”
He handed me a stack of letters.
