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“I’m sorry to have to be so blunt, Brady. You know I’d help if I could.”
“No need to apologize,” I said, regretting that I’d bothered Will just to confirm what I had already suspected—that I was completely and totally fucked. “I’m sorry for bothering you… and about Jamie. You’re a good guy and a good friend, and you don’t deserve that shit.”
“You’re right. I don’t. Thanks, Brady. I’ll talk to you later.”
I hung up the phone and closed my eyes as I leaned back in the creaky chair. That conversation hadn’t gone nearly as well as I had hoped.
There really was just one option—one sensible thing to do. I hated it, but… what fucking choice did I have?
I opened my eyes and dialed the number that was on the top of the paper in front of him, grimacing when that too-nice, too-eager voice answered on the first ring.
“Brady? I didn’t think I’d hear from you so soon. I hope you’ve got good news for me.”
I grimaced. Yeah, it would be good news for Mike, but forme? It was ripping my heart out.
Joanne had already ended what we had, though, and I was out of options. Ten years in the NFL had taught me how to take on the opposition—but fighting for love?
I’d tried, and I’d failed. I just didn’t know how.
Maybe it would hurt less after it was done. Then I could walk—no,run—away as quickly as possible. Just like I had the last time Castle Falls had broken my heart.
I took a deep breath, then said the words I’d been fighting since the moment I’d arrived in Castle Falls… the ones that hadn’t felt right since the moment I’d met Joanne.
But, unfortunately, the only words I had left.
“I’m ready to sell, Mike. Now.”
Chapter Thirty-Six - Brady
I had barely eaten, had barely slept in the twenty-four hours since Joanne had stormed out of the office, since I’d spoken with Will, and then with Mike.
Since I’d tried and failed to find an alternative to selling the shop.
I’d spent the whole afternoon, then the whole night trying to convince myself that it was the right decision, that it was for the best. That it was what I had to do.
But now, as I sat behind the counter of the flower shop for maybe the last time, waiting for Mike to walk through the door with the paperwork that would seal my fate and give me one more reason to run—away from Castle Falls and the thought of what could have been with Joanne—I couldn’t help but wonder if I was about to fuck things up even worse.
If that was even possible.
I reached for the candy dish, absently unwrapping the chewy little square and popping it into my mouth.
“Gross candy,” I muttered to myself, grimacing as I tried to chew it as quickly as possible.
I’d never liked those candies, but they’d been my dad’s favorite for as long as I could remember. They were always sitting around in a dish in our house growing up, just like the dish that was always there at the shop. Hell, it was probably the same dish.
I felt a pang of… regret? Sadness? I wasn’t sure, but my stomach clenched as the memory took me back to a time when everything had been so much easier. Much more black and white. Back when both of my parents had been alive and the three of us had been mostly happy, or at least mostly content.
Mostly afamily.
That flower shop, that candy dish, and the memories they held for me were really the only things I had left to remind me of that time in my life, of my parents as I wanted to remember them.
The shop suddenly felt too small, too full of those memories that I wanted to hold onto and run away from all at the same time. Notjustof my parents anymore. Now, the memories of Joanne were here, too.
Wonderful.
Painful.
I couldn’t stand it.
