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Chapter 16
Brynne
Jack’s little Karmann Ghia is super fun to drive. I like it way better than the Porsche. Even though Volkswagen’s parent company owns both brands, it doesn’t seem so pretentious.
He let me do the honors and drive us back to the inn after we were done sailing. I suspect it wasn’t just for the fun of driving it - it was to give me something to do to distract me from thinking about the inn and its pending demise. He must feel me. The more times I come back home to the inn, the closer to the inevitable we are.
I drive us down closer to the shore. The path down to the beach could use some repair, but that’s moot now. Jack exits the car and follows me to the remnants of an old patio surface with edges that disappear into the sand.
“Wow. This is a cool spot. What’s it used for?”
“I do yoga here or sometimes on the sand, right in the surf,” I say. “And, of course, this is all underwater when the tide comes in.”
I point to the large picture windows we looked out of the first time I showed him around.
“Wait?” he panics. “Should I back the car up?”
I laugh.
“No, you’re fine,” I say. “I’ve lived here for years. Parking in just the right places has become second nature.”
I squint. I think I see a shadow flit across the picture windows on the second floor. But that makes no sense. No one is in the inn. It must have been a bird crossing the sky captured in the reflection.
We stroll around the grounds. It hits me after a couple of strides that we each automatically sought the hand of the other to hold. I love touching him, but the moment is bittersweet.
“Wouldn’t it be so romantic,” I say. “If I kept the inn and you came down to visit me. Think of how we could spend our days and nights.”
We pause and look longingly into one another’s eyes.
“We can still do that,” he whispers, stroking my hair away from my face. “It’s us that makes the moment, not the place.”
“Says the guy who took me to breakfast on his yacht,” I argue gently.
He nods in agreement.
“You’re telling me the moment we shared would have been just as special if we were in the parking lot of a fast-food joint?” I ask.
Jack presses his lips to my forehead.
“You’re saying you care,” I translate. “I get it. I told Todd I have accepted my fate.”
That’s when I wondered if that shadow I saw wasn’t Todd or Gretchen after all.
“You know I did say they could crash here,” I say, mid-thought. “But if they are, where’s your car?”
“I think they went to Gretchen’s,” Jack tells me, gazing into my eyes softly. “I got texts. I think they planned to come here, but stuff happened.”
I tiptoe to kiss him.
“You don’t have to go, you know,” I say so quietly I almost whisper. “You can nap. You can do work. You can be in this building; I wouldn’t even know it.”
“I am not sure I like the idea of you being out here all by yourself,” he says.
“We both know that’s about to end,” I laugh half-heartedly. “I’m going to have to relocate.”
He strums my arm tenderly.
“You find a place, and Gretchen will do all the heavy lifting,” he says. “We’ll cover it.”
