Page 42 of Second Chances

He paused, making her angrier. “They do, I suppose, but they’re not rich.” Reaching for her, he said, “It’ll be all right, Mellie⁠—”

“No, it won’t! What about you becoming a doctor?” What about his dreams of working in a hospital, taking care of people? He was going to give it up to be a mechanic? If she’d wanted a boy with dirt under his fingernails, she’d have stayed in the Redneck Riviera.

“I have other responsibilities now, as my dad told me last night. I can’t ignore them. He said that in a few years I could probably take some classes at the community college over in Beverley, then maybe we’d figure out how I could go to USD.” USD—the University of South Dakota, all Melanie had heard about, practically, for the whole summer. Now he was talking like it didn’t matter if he went there at all. Henry stroked her cheek. “We can make it work, Mellie. I love you. I promise that my family will love you,” he assured her. “They can’t wait to meet you.”

Maybe they could make it work…for a while. What other choice did she have, really? She could see that she wouldn’t be able to talk Henry into moving with her to California, not right now. And while she had some money saved, it wasn’t enough to make it on her own, not with a baby. She could handle it for a few years, with this boy—no, this man—who she knew loved her. She’d have the baby and watch every movie she could…well, the good ones, anyway…and she would hone her craft to become a brilliant actress, ready for Hollywood.

“Okay, I’ll marry you and move to Clover Lake.” What other choice did she have?

“I promise,” he said, raining kisses on her, “you will love my family. And my friends. And Clover Lake. We’ll have the best life.”

Sure they would. Once they got the hell out of South Dakota.

Caitriona Livingston pushed her glasses up her nose, flipping through her mail in her office that was situated just above Mr. Beans. The location couldn’t be more perfect thanks to its Main Street address; the only downside was her inability to ignore the call for coffee every few hours. And pastries. According to her scale, she’d been answering that call too frequently. Her eyes strayed out the window, her uncle Henry’s auto shop in her line of view. Had the time come to admit that she was truly living back here? When she’d come home two years ago, she had seen it as more of an extended stay…much like her cousin Josh had done with his own leave as a surgeon. Until he had chosen to remain in Beverley. But at least he had two good reasons to move back, she thought grudgingly: Effie and his career, whereas she had no reason. Accepting the reality that she wasn’t leaving meant having to find her own place to live. She had been lodging either with her parents or her grandparents, depending on which couple was out of town somewhere. Her family loved vacations, a privilege Cait, a workaholic, rarely afforded herself.

Fourteen years ago, when she left South Dakota to attend Tulane University in New Orleans, she never imagined making her home in the Gulf after graduation. But comfortability settled in, along with the chance to be her own person, far away from the Livingston reach of her dad’s family and the stranglehold of her mom’s family, the Kinsales. Another bonus had been not competing with her gorgeous, magnetic older brother. Thanks to his endless charisma, piercing gray eyes, and chestnut curls, Liam charmed anyone he met. With mousy brown hair that had a tendency to frizz (which her mom insisted on calling Irish curls) and eyes that were neither green nor blue (which didn’t matter because her glasses hid them anyway), people were stunned to learn she was his sister, a resentment she’d harbored since puberty. Over the past year, she had gradually replaced her harsher feelings for him with more generous ones because of his on-and-off heartbreak.

As she sorted through her mail, a letter with no return address caught her attention. Curious why it had no stamp or postmark on it, she wondered if it was junk mail intended for Kinsale Autos, the family business for which Cait was the legal counsel. But then why, she asked herself, was it addressed to her? Using a long, midnight-blue fingernail to open the envelope, Cait gasped as she read what was inside. “What? How dare he?” After all this time, he was making it official, never mind having already crushed her soul.

“Screw him,” Cait said under her breath, picking up her phone to send a nasty text. Although she hadn’t spoken to him since she’d left Alabama, she had thought about him, albeit less frequently with each passing day. And with less cursing each time he crossed her mind. Before she could type his name in, her cousin Josh texted:

Are we still on for this afternoon?

Effie and I are downstairs.

“Damn!” She’d forgotten about her lunch date with them to discuss their wedding and hurriedly replied:

Sorry, be right down!

Josh

What about Liam?

Cait

I haven’t heard from him…

That bastard’s letter had thrown her off, and now she was late. With the wedding just a couple of months away, the couple had asked Cait to officiate the ceremony. Ruth, also joining them, had appointed herself their wedding planner, despite also being the matron of honor and having three daughters under three. Despite Ruth’s occasionally overbearing manner, Cait had become friends with her since she’d been working in Beverley. They had known each other vaguely as teenagers, but back then Cait was a full-blown introvert who rarely hung out with her cousins or their friends. Unlike now, when she was an extroverted party animal, she noted wryly to herself.

After shoving the offensive letter into her purse, she pushed it out of her mind and flew down the creaky wooden stairs in the historic building, one of the oldest in Beverley. She appreciated all the woodwork, but not the way it seemed to announce every movement. Entering the coffee shop through its back door, she found the besotted couple at a front table with Ruth. Cait beckoned to a barista and ordered an iced S’mores latte before taking a seat at the table. “Would you like your usual chocolate croissant with that, Cait?” Sadie called across the cafe. Curse her. Cait had ignorantly believed that if she visited Mr. Beans at different times that perhaps no one would notice her repeat customer status.

“No,” Cait gritted her teeth. “Just the coffee.”

“Did you want the milk replaced with half and half, also, like you usually do?” Was it her imagination, or was Sadie yelling deliberately? She slithered away from her party to the counter. Goddamn, was Cait’s every move recorded into a little notebook, or what? She’d never had these issues when living in Mobile.

“No, Sadie, milk is just fine.” Mouth like a megaphone on her, she thought, studying what used to be her favorite barista. Not after this fiasco. “But I would like whipped cream,” she whispered.

Returning to the table, she found everyone staring at her. “So, is your brother coming, too?” Ruth was breastfeeding her newborn daughter, sipping an iced coffee, and scribbling on a pad in front of her. The woman was a master at multi-tasking, that was for sure; meanwhile, Cait tended to hyper-focus on one thing, most often to the detriment of everything else around her. Which was how she got into her mess in Mobile.

Cait shrugged. “No idea. I haven’t talked to or seen Liam in a while. To be honest, I’m concerned about him. I mean, this Lana person is dragging his heart around like it’s an accessory. Josh,” she looked to Josh, “does he even go out anymore?” He responded by shaking his head. “That’s what I was afraid of. The only thing he does for ‘fun’ is go to the gym or run.” And only her brother would consider those enjoyable pastimes. “She’s your friend.” She glared at Effie, annoyed that she had to defend her brother, and she considered how he’d changed in the last two years, becoming sullen, dejected, and serious. Sure, he was more career-driven, especially now that he taught math classes at Beverley Community College, but all at the expense of his formerly sunny self. His optimism used to drive her mad, but she missed it. “Does she think she’s better than my brother?” Since puberty, maybe before, Liam had always had females prancing around in front of him, eager to be next on his string of broken hearts. If he weren’t so devastated, there would be a certain irony that he was now hung up on the one woman seemingly immune to his many gifts.

Effie frowned. “It’s not that simple, Cait. Lana cares for Liam. She’s just…”

“Cautious,” Josh supplied. “Imagine finding out that the person you started to fall in love with isn’t who you thought.”

Ruth commented, “Well, I haven’t met Lana yet, but my sister adores her. They’ve become close, and Tess said she can’t imagine anyone else renting the apartment in their house.” Gag me, Cait thought. Was everyone a fan except her?

“Put yourself in Lana’s shoes, discovering that her love interest was none other than the playboy cousin I’d told her stories about,” Josh defended Lana while taking a bite of his cinnamon bun. “It shocked her, to say the least.”