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Her mother sighed on the other end and she knew she’d get her way and have the distraction of talking about something other than her foolishness. “It’s been three years,” her mother said. “You know we are struggling. We’ve got our pensions to live off of. It’s not a big deal. The goal had been to just break even and provide jobs to the area. Have some fun. I don’t know what we were thinking.”
“You were thinking that you were young when you both retired and weren’t ready,” she said. “There isn’t anything wrong with that.”
Her parents wanted to experience life too. Just like she was trying to do with Eddie.
“No,” her mother said. “And if things were still breaking even, I think we’d continue, but the truth is, this last winter was harsh on us. We didn’t have enough put away from the summer to get us through. It’s just a thought, nothing you need to worry about. You’ve got other things on your mind.”
Yeah, and that just added to it. She wasn’t sure how much longer she could stay here with everything looming over her.
She could barely make ends meet right now and the debt from being with Eddie was floating around her like an ominous fog making her want to run for shelter.
Shelter was going to be home with her parents, as much as she didn’t want to feel like she couldn’t handle her own life.
She’d had plans to return home—which meant the island now—and see if she could find a job there. She’d thought she could help out at the restaurant because she knew her parents would need it and it’d give her some spending money to figure out her next move without having so many living expenses on her own.
But if her parents were selling the restaurant, that was going to put a wrinkle in her plans. She’d figure it out on her own like she always did.
“It’s fine,” she said. “I just had no idea you were thinking of selling.”
“Just talks,” her mother said. “Don’t concern yourself with it. We always thought maybe you’d want to take it over, but if it’s not turning a profit, there is no reason to be saddled with it. It’s a lot of work and you don’t want to be here either. We know.”
Hadley let out another sigh. No reason to talk about this now. They said it was just a thought. “Keep me posted if you decide,” she said.
“We will,” her mother said. “And let us know when the services are, please. Your father and I can take the day and come be there for you. It’s not that far.”
She was three hours away in Portland, Maine. She’d come here for college and never left. She wasn’t in love with the area, but she didn’t hate it either.
“Sure,” she said. “I’ll do that.”
She hated to lie but the truth was, she had no idea what was going on with Eddie’s services and she didn’t think she’d find out until after the fact anyway.
She hung up with her mother after that and sat down in her tiny apartment. She was positive she couldn’t stay here much longer unless she could find another job. Or at least a second job. Eddie had a lot of medical bills, and like every other time in her life, when people asked her for something, she did it without thought.
She was the one left with little to no savings and a ton of credit card debt because she’d been giving Eddie money for his expenses. A month ago when she asked if he’d be able to give her some of it back, he started being a jerk. Like a person she’d never seen before. She bit her tongue because it always seemed she did and chalked it up to him being under stress himself.
Once again in her life, she was sitting here wondering what the heck she was going to do and all her options were slowly swirling down the toilet.
She put her head in her hands and started to cry. It’s not like it would solve any problems or even make her feel better, but she didn’t know what else to do.
1
Standing Behind It
Two Months Later
“What are you doing here?”Duke Raymond asked his twin sister, Kelsey, who was walking into his restaurant. “Don’t you have a business to run?”
“I’m working,” Kelsey said. “Just like you are.”
It was nine on a Monday morning in early April. His restaurant, Duke’s, would be opening for business at eleven thirty. He was here going through inventory and placing orders for his specials this week. Or at least trying to.
“Yeah, but you sit in an office, not me.”
Kelsey co-owned and managed a CPA firm with their mother. She was the furthest from the tourist industry on the island.
Their ancestors had founded Amore Island many generations ago. Duke was from Patricia’s side, one of the twin daughters of Malcolm and Elizabeth Bond who’d married well but didn’t get as big of the Bond fortune as their three brothers did.
There was money in his branch, trust funds too, but everything they had they’d worked for and continued to do so.
