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But she had no idea what she was going to do to support herself until then if her mom didn’t get on board with giving her the inheritance she was supposed to get from her aunt. Finally.
She didn’t burden Eleanor with all of her financial issues, but they just dreamed together about what a beautiful place the inn could be, if she was able to do everything she wanted to.
When did that ever happen?
She was going to try to make it happen, she thought to herself as she bid Eleanor goodbye, the food in her stomach feeling warm and happy. Despite the tight ball in her chest when she thought about calling her mom.
She might as well do it now. Deciding that she would walk along the beach and talk to her mom with the sound of Lake Michigan soothing her as she did so, she headed in that direction, pulling her phone out of her pocket and dialing her mom’s number.
“Hello, darling.” Her mother’s cultured voice came on the line.
“Mom. Hey. How are you?”
“I’m fine. Both of your daughters are here. Why don’t you come as well? Then we can all be together.”
She didn’t know her girls were visiting their grandma. Even though she’d just talked to both of them the day before yesterday. She hadn’t mentioned that she’d quit her job though. There were just some things that were hard to say.
“Tell them I said hi. I’ll call them tonight.”
She tried to call them every other day or at least three times a week. She didn’t want to overwhelm them, and usually her calls didn’t last super long. Her girls loved her, they just...needed to spread their wings. At least that’s what she told herself. She couldn’t imagine leaving Strawberry Sands, although she’d done it once herself.
But she’d thought she was in love. She left the town that she loved because she loved a man, and she thought he loved her.
Turned out she was wrong, on both counts, leaving and loving.
So she’d come back.
There was a lot of pain involved in all of that, and she cringed as she thought about her girls going through the same thing.
That was life. Pain and experience being great teachers, and eventually wisdom came out of all that. She wouldn’t want her girls to not be wise, and sometimes there were hard lessons to learn first.
She did a little bit of small talk with her mom, discussing her mom’s latest charity and the things that she and the girls were going to do that day.
Apparently they were spending the weekend. Which was nice. At least Pam told herself that. It had been months since either one of them had come to spend a weekend with her. She tried not to let it bother her and just be happy that they were spending time with their gram.
“Well, I suppose I’ll get back with the girls. We have a lot of things planned for today,” her mom said. She didn’t really expect her mom to be able to read her mood and know that she called for something more than just catching up.
She took a breath and plunged in. “I actually wanted to know about my inheritance.”
“My sister left me in charge of it. I know it’s yours, and I’m not spending it. But I have to tell you that the same thing applies from the last time we talked. You get married, you get it. You don’t get a cent before.”
“But you know it’s mine; you just said it was. I don’t want to get married again.”
Her mom had been in charge of dispersing the inheritance, since her sister had given her that role. Her mom was straight as an arrow and very honest. There was no doubt in Pam’s mind that she would eventually get the money. It was just that her mom didn’t see any problem with putting stipulations on it first.
“You cannot possibly be happy up there in that duplex by yourself,” her mom said, saying “duplex” like it was a dirty word. “I’m only doing this for your happiness. And because I love you. You know that, sweetie.”
“I understand that you think that’s going to make me happy, but you don’t understand that I don’t want to get married again. I have—” She stopped in the middle of the sentence, suddenly, for some odd reason, thinking that if she convinced her mom that she didn’t want to get married, and her mom wouldn’t change her mind about giving her her inheritance before she was married, it was going to be very difficult to convince her mom that she was married, if the opportunity presented itself, oh, like tomorrow.
Which was ridiculous. Of course she wasn’t getting married tomorrow. There was no way. Except... She’d heard of someone else getting married... It was called a...marriage of convenience. The person that she heard about had actually fallen in love.
But who could she have a marriage of convenience with...
Mark. Mark would do it with her. He knew how much her inheritance and fixing up the inn meant to her.
“Pam, are you okay?”
“Yes. I just... I just realized that I probably should never say never, because there is this guy.”
