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“Yeah, but you also have to know when to accept reality.” Like there was any actual hope of her ending up with a movie star. Even if she hadn’t messed everything up by posting about how Carter was on the cruise, she was a wannabe writer working at her gran’s bakery in a small town. It would have never worked out and so maybe it was for the best that he’d found out. Still, she couldn’t even think his name without having to purse her lips together to keep from crying. “That’s what I did when I came back here,” she continued, her voice trembling. “I shelved my book proposal, set my alarm for o’dark thirty, and did what needed to be done.”
Ruby Sue huffed at her. “At first maybe, but then you got comfortable and a bit lazy.” She pointed a liver-spotted finger at Aubrey. “I’ve known you since you were a Daisy Scout and you walked in here during the lunch rush and sold me ten boxes of overpriced cookies despite the fact that I was trying to run the cash register, s
eat people, and eavesdrop on the latest town gossip. Growing up, there wasn’t a single day when you sat back and just accepted things. You have too much spark to you to give that up now. It’s still there, you just have to find it.”
That’s what Aubrey had thought she’d done on the cruise. She’d thought it was being with her friends and Carter, but that wasn’t it. The cruise had forced her to take herself out of the rut she’d fallen into. The new perspective the cruise had given her was like having electricity running through her veins like she was in college again. She’d been inspired. She’d been happy. She’d been open enough to fall for Carter despite knowing in the long term there was no way to make it work.
Ruby Sue made an mmm-hmmm noise as she shot Aubrey an I-told-you-so-look that sent her gray eyebrows into the stratosphere. “I can practically see the lightbulb turning on above your head.”
That’s pretty much what it felt like, as if someone had flipped a switch. She didn’t want to go back to feeling like she was just going through life by the motions again. She couldn’t fix things with Carter but that didn’t mean she couldn’t keep that cruise perspective when it came to the rest of her life. It wasn’t too late to still be that person she’d been before, the fun one who took chances and just went for it.
Mind whirling, she glanced over at Otis with his crossword. He was gnawing on his pencil just like she did when she was in the middle of research. Her heartbeat sped up.
“I know what I need to do.” She hustled off the chair and toward the door. “I just have to figure out how.”
“I’ve found pie always helps with that,” Ruby Sue said, handing her a full pecan pie already wrapped up. “I’ve had this set aside, figuring you’d be over soon enough.”
She gave the older woman a kiss on her papery-thin cheek. “You are the best.”
“You think I don’t know that?” Ruby Sue said with a chuckle.
Then Aubrey was off, striding down Main Street with purpose for the first time since she came home from college. She knew exactly what she was going to do next.
Carter couldn’t stop fidgeting with the linen napkin as he sat in front of the indie film world’s favorite director Allyson Hernandez. She wore head-to-toe black including a non-ironic beret that she somehow managed to carry off. He fiddled with the corner of the cream material as their waiter took Allyson’s very specific order.
“And for you, sir?” the waiter asked, turning to Carter.
“The hot fudge sundae, please.”
The waiter’s eyebrow may have gone up a millimeter or two but otherwise he didn’t have any outward reaction. “Very well.”
“Interesting choice for brunch,” Allyson said. “Gotta sweet tooth?”
“It’s become a new favorite.” Okay, so he’d had at least one hot fudge sundae each day since he’d returned because like a sap it reminded him of Aubrey and he couldn’t help but poke that open wound that still hurt like hell. In fact, he’d spent most of the four days since he flew out of Nassau trying to distract himself from thinking about her by deep diving into the movie script. “It reminds me of...” A friend? A lover? The woman who got away because he was a dumbass? “It reminds me of someone.”
The director made a non-committal huh and took a sip of her water. “You know you weren’t my first choice for this part.”
“Probably not even the tenth,” he said, practically on autopilot after spotting a woman across the restaurant that sent his pulse into overdrive.
He leaned forward in his chair, still facing the director but watching the woman just over Allyson’s shoulder. Blonde hair. The right height. She was facing away from him and it took nearly everything he had not to bound out of his seat and rush over to her.
Allyson chuckled and gave a whatcha-gonna-do shrug. “No, but I have to admit you got me curious with the cruise challenge. It went off nearly without a hitch.”
The woman turned around and Carter sank back against the plush back of his seat, his pulse returning to normal, and the ache in his chest that had been building since he walked out of the hotel bathroom and found Aubrey gone returned in full force that made him wince.
“You know what got me though?” Allyson continued, “It was the fact that you were willing to work for it, you didn’t expect it to be handed to you. That’s not always the case in our world. So tell me about the sundae.”
The change in subject came so swiftly that he answered without thinking. “I met someone on the cruise.”
“And she didn’t know who you were?”
“She did.” Hell, by the end she probably knew him better than anyone else but Byron. “She was the one who posted that I was on board, but I didn’t know that until Nassau.”
That gut punch still had him waking up in a cold sweat in the middle of the night with her name on his lips. God, he’d fucked it up. If he’d taken the time to think instead of just react he would have realized all of the times she’d tried to tell him.
“When did you find out?” Allyson asked.
“Not until it was too late and I was already neck deep with her.” So basically from the moment she’d shoved those pants up his shirt and told him to play along.
