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“What good would that do?”
“You said she has anxiety like me, right? If she did, can you even imagine how hard it must’ve been to tell you how she was feeling like that? Imagine how much she cared about you to do that. And what did you do?”
It finally hit me. When it did, it all came with the force of a fucking freight train straight to my chest. I hung my head, hands balling into fists. “Shit,” I muttered. I thought back to the dressing room–to the emotion and fear in Pearl’s eyes as she told me how she felt right to my face. She’d asked me to be with her and I told her I couldn’t. It must’ve broken everything in her, and the next time I really saw her she was getting plastered to take her mind off it.
Laney leaned forward, tilting her head to get a look at me. “Is he finally realizing the scope of his screw up? Have we gotten through the iron curtain surrounding that peanut you call a brain?”
I suddenly felt like getting up and doing something, but I didn’t know what. “I can’t call her,” I said. “She blocked me.”
“Okay, cool your jets, big guy. Let’s think this through. I’m not sure I completely trust you to have the right plan in mind. What’s our goal, here?”
“To fix this.”
“Fix it how?”
“I want her,” I said simply. “I’ve wanted to be with her since we first met. It took me a little to admit it to myself, but it was there. It still is. So I’m going to apologize. If the right thing is to tell her how I feel, then I’m going to fucking tell her. The rest can sort itself out.”
“What kind of apology do you have in mind?”
“A good one?” I tried.
Laney sighed. “Look. Let me educate you just a little on woman-kind. If you want your apology to really matter, it needs to show us that you fully understand what you did wrong and that you’ve taken steps to change. Got it?”
“Understand my screw-up, ready to change. Yeah. Got it.”
“Good. Can I trust you to handle this, or do you need my supervision?”
I grinned. “You have school to focus on. Go home. I’ll take care of the rest.”
Laney smiled and gave me a little punch. “By the way, I know you’re not stupid. And I think it was really sweet that you did what you did, even if it was bone-headed. So go fix it.”
I gave her a hug, thanked her, and then started working on how I was going to go about making things right.
42
PEARL
The Ashford Inn smelled like pancakes, syrup, and coffee. I took a deep breath and smiled. My view from the window beside our table at The Spot was of ice-capped mountains and rolling hills. It was something I still hadn’t come close to tiring of.
Lizzie was eating a biscuit with gravy and had a big glass of orange juice. Steph had crepes filled with some kind of strawberry reduction and a coffee. I was eating my favorite, french toast drizzled in home-made syrup with apple juice on the side.
My apartment wasn’t big enough for both of my sisters to sleep, so they were staying at the Ashford Inn while they visited me for the week. We’d been meeting at The Spot for most of our meals. Considering the quality of the food, the prices were insanely reasonable. It also beat trying to cook in my tiny little kitchen.
Lizzie was going on for the tenth time about how amazing her honeymoon to Key West with Jonas was. By all accounts, they had become the perfect married couple. Maybe there was still a little jab of jealousy toward Lizzie and her perfect life, but I loved her and was happy for her all the same. Jonas and Maxwell apparently had a falling out with Alec after the wedding. In the days following his blow-up, some nasty things had come out about his feelings toward his brothers.
Ultimately, they decided to go their separate ways. Maxwell still cut ties with Dean because he didn’t trust him anymore, but they also split the Pollard company into two branches. Alec called his wing Spotlight Marketing and was allowed to take some of the staff with him. He’d tried to recruit Marley, but she outright refused and managed to keep her position with Maxwell, who continued to run Pollard Marketing with Jonas.
Lizzie snapped her fingers at me. “You there? You zoned out on me.”
“Sorry.” I shoveled a big bite of french toast into my mouth and smiled around it. “Still waking up, I guess.”
The bell over the door to the lobby gave a little jingle. I looked up and nearly choked on my food. Dean Slater in all of his tall, gorgeous glory was striding into the inn. I stared at him for several long moments and waited for my brain to decide he was real. Dean went straight to the front desk, never looking in the direction of the dining room. Molly and Billy were at the desk this morning, and he was asking them something.
