Accidental Sweetheart

by Elana Johnson

  “Something just came up.” Her eyes left her device for less than a second, and he couldn’t decide if she was snubbing him or nervous or what.

  “Well, I’m not going to eat it without you,” he said.

  “It’s fine,” she said.

  “No,” Chet said forcefully enough to get her to finally look at him. “It’s not fine. We’re not fine.” He couldn’t get a decent breath. “What do you want to do? Are you breaking up with me?”

  That terrified look crossed her face again. “I think we probably should.”

  “Why? Because I worked for a rival hotel long before coming here?”

  “Because…of me,” she said. “I thought I was ready to date, and I’m just…you’re great. I’m just….”

  “Olympia, you’re great,” he said, taking a step toward her.

  She backed up, letting her door slam closed. “I just need a little more time.”

  Three years seemed like plenty of time to Chet, but he couldn’t say that. If she wasn’t over her ex-boyfriend, married or not, by now…she was never going to get over him.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Olympia watched Chet walk back into his penthouse, the door closing between them. At least she didn’t have to run off again when all she wanted to do was get out of her heels. She had nowhere to go, and nothing had come up—besides Chet standing outside her door.

  Which was stupid, as she’d been waiting for three nights now for him to show up outside her door.

  “You’re a mess,” she muttered to herself as she went into the penthouse. She was secretly glad he hadn’t come in and seen just how much of the ice cream she’d consumed. She ate it for breakfast and dinner, supplementing her diet with a salad for lunch.

  She stood in front of the freezer, dangerously close to tears as she reached for a container of cookie mint. It wasn’t her favorite, but ice cream could solve almost any problem.

  It hadn’t helped her much the past few days, but she had a feeling she’d need a professional for her problems. She’d done nothing about that, either, and now she’d lost Chet.

  She stilled, the realization of what had just happened in the hallway hitting her hard. A moan started somewhere in the back of her throat, and the tears streamed down her face. Grabbing a spoon, she headed down the hall to her bedroom, because the only thing better than eating ice cream was eating ice cream in bed.

  The clock had barely ticked to ten-thirty when someone knocked on her door. It wasn’t Chet, that much was obvious. So Olympia got off the couch, fully expecting to see one of her sisters on the other side of the door.

  Gwen, maybe, as one of Olympia’s first stops in the morning was the kitchen. Or Sheryl, who often saw Olympia and kept her up-to-date on the grounds. With the surfing competition over, the beach should be cleaned up and raked by now—a huge job Sheryl had been overseeing almost singlehandedly.

  But it was Celeste on the other side of the door, and she wore a look of concern on her face and a professional skirt suit in a shade of blue that made her complexion look downright porcelain.

  “You’re sick?” she demanded, looking over Olympia’s shoulder as if the germs would be visible in the penthouse.

  “I don’t feel well,” she said—not a lie. Technically, she wasn’t sick. But she definitely didn’t feel like working today. The inn would survive without her for one blasted day.

  Celeste muscled her way into the apartment, and Olympia realized too late that she hadn’t taken the trash out in days. “Oh, honey,” she said, lifting up one of the empty ice cream pints. “What’s going on here?”

  “Nothing.” Olympia grabbed for the empty pumpkin pie carton. “I just haven’t cleaned up in a few days.”

  “Or eaten anything but ice cream.” Celeste opened her fridge and peered inside. “This has to do with the hot man across the hall, doesn’t it?”

  “He’s not that hot.”

  Celeste scoffed. “Honey, he’s one degree away from the sun.” She faced Olympia. “And word in the lobby is you two broke up.”

  A pinch started beneath her ribs. “Who said that?”

  “Oh, just Gwen,” Celeste said with a smile. “She said there’s been some trouble in paradise lately.”

  “It’s fine,” Olympia said, crawling back onto the couch. “I’m fine.”

  “O, you’re wearing a robe, but you haven’t showered or brushed your hair or teeth. You’re not fine.”

  No, she wasn’t, but she didn’t know what to do about it. “I think I’m broken inside,” she whispered. She felt like part of herself had cracked off three years ago, and she’d never be whole again.

  Celeste joined her on the couch, and Olympia laid her head in her sister’s lap. “I vowed I’d never fall as hard for someone as I fell for Hunter.”

  “He doesn’t deserve any more of your time,” Celeste said kindly. “O, I know I’m not the fun sister. Or the one you share everything with, but you’ve been so happy these past few weeks.”

  “I did it again,” she said. “I fell too hard, and now I’m all cracked again.”

  “And what did this guy do?”

  Before Olympia could answer, another knock came at her door. Celeste got up to answer it, and both Gwen and Sheryl entered. “Oh, it’s bad,” Gwen said, looking at Sheryl.

  Olympia sat up so there would be room for everyone. “I’m fine, guys,” she said.

  “Uh, you didn’t come to work.” Gwen perched on the edge of the armchair. “I can’t remember the last time you didn’t come to work.”

  “I can,” Sheryl said. “And that was only because the National Weather Service had issued a mandatory evacuation of the island for Hurricane Peter.”

  “That doesn’t count,” Gwen said. “No one came to work that day. I meant a normal day of work.”

  “Oh, well, Olympia’s not normal.”

  Sheryl had never spoken truer words, and Olympia felt herself splintering again. The love of her sisters helped, and she finally lifted her eyes to look at all of them.

  “I think I need to see a counselor. A therapist. Something. I mean, Chet’s a great guy, and I freaked out over him working for The Grand America.”

  “He works for The Grand America?” Sheryl asked at the same time Gwent said, “Was he spying on us?”

  So at least she wasn’t the only one shocked by that news—and had immediately jumped to the spying prospect.

  “He used to,” she amended. “And no, he’s not spying on us.”

  “Then why have you made yourself ‘sick’ with all this ice cream?” Celeste asked.

  “Because I feel duped,” she said. “Again. Why can’t I find a nice, honest, upright man who looks like he could win a bodybuilding contest? Is that too much to ask?”

  “Ew, yes,” Gwen said. “You don’t want a bodybuilder. They oil themselves up.”

  “So do surfers, and you like them,” Sheryl pointed out, earning herself a glare from Gwen.

  “I’m just saying. And they shave everywhere, O.” Gwen shook her head. “Nope. No bodybuilders.”

  “This conversation is so irrelevant,” Celeste said, lifting one hand.

  Olympia was starting to feel better though, the easy bickering her sisters had always been so good at comforting her.

  “We’re here to show Olympia that she’s not sick, and that she needs to march across the hall and kiss that man.”

  “Oh, he’s not there,” Sheryl said.

  Olympia whipped her attention to her. “What?”

  “He got off the elevator when we got on,” she said, looking at Gwen. “And Alissa just texted to say she’s on her way up, but she saw him get in a cab with a bag.”

  He was gone, and Olympia went hollow inside. Her sisters continued to talk, and someone let Alissa in at some point. She wasn’t sure what was said. She may have nodded a few times, and then Gwen ordered room service for lunch, and Alissa passed out bowls of chocolate-covered crispy rice cereal ice cream.

  While playing hooky the
next day, Olympia sat on her parents’ front porch for about twenty minutes before she heard anyone moving around inside the house. She’d been up for hours, and she’d answered email and made a few phone calls from the safety of her penthouse.

  Then she realized Chet wasn’t there anymore, and she could leave her house. Go to work. Do whatever she normally did.

  The problem was, her definition of normal had shifted. Changed. In fact, it was so far off the axis of where she’d put her focus for the past few years, that she didn’t know what to think.

  “Morning,” she said as she entered the house. Coffee scented the air, and if she was lucky, her grandmother would make bacon and eggs.

  “Oh, Olympia.” Her mother looked up from the counter where she stirred sugar into her brew. “What brings you by?”

  “Nothing,” she said, but that was so far from the truth, she couldn’t even mask it.

  Her mom stopped stirring, only glancing toward the hall when Grandma came padding down it. “Morning, Mom. Here’s your coffee.” She passed the mug to Olympia’s grandma and went about making another cup.

  She gave it to Olympia as Grandma opened the fridge. “How does bacon and eggs sound?” she asked in her gravelly voice.

  “Heavenly,” Olympia sighed into her mug.

  “How are things at the inn?” Her mom sat down at the table, her own coffee finally in her hand.

  “About the same,” Olympia said, realizing for the first time that her whole life did not need to be about the inn. She’d ignored her job for a full twenty-four hours and nothing had crashed. Nothing had burned. Everything ran just fine without her.

  “Mom,” she said, glancing around for her father. She didn’t see him, and she deduced he’d probably gone fishing. “How did you know you loved Dad?”

  “Oh.” Surprise crossed her mother’s face. “I don’t know, sweetie. I just did.”

  So not helpful. Olympia sighed again as the perfect, salty scent of bacon filled the air.

  “He’s the better one to ask about this,” her mom said.

  “Yeah? Why?”

  “We dated for a while,” her mom said. “And then he broke up with me.”

  Olympia abandoned her mug. “What? I’ve never heard this story.”

  Her mom smiled and nodded, sipping so slowly. Painfully slow. “Yeah, he eventually came back, and he said he was just scared. He was the oldest son, you know, and he had to have someone who would inherit and run the whole inn with him. For generations. It was a big deal to him.”

  Olympia could relate, because she was the oldest, but she hadn’t once worried about Chet not being able to be at her side as she ran the inn.

  Not once.

  In fact, she’d never worried about anything with Chet.

  “What did he do?” she asked.

  “He talked to me,” Grandma said, entering the conversation. “And I told him he better not lose the best thing God had put in his life.” She beamed at Olympia’s mother and went right back to the stove.

  Her mom watched her mother-in-law for a few minutes, pure love on her face. When she looked at Olympia again, she asked, “What’s going on, sweetie?”

  “I met a guy,” she said, her voice low and weak. Exactly how she hated it. Exactly the opposite of who she was and how she acted around the inn. She paused, thinking. No, she could be weak too. She wanted to be—with Chet. She wanted to be able to come home to him each night and shed off her tough-guy skin. Be real.

  She cleared her throat. “I met a guy,” she said again. “And it was kind of an accident how we started dating. But he’s great, and wonderful, and we didn’t get along so great at first, but then we did. And he’s smart, and handsome…and then I found out he worked for The Grand America and didn’t tell me.”

  The familiar pain and doubt zoomed right back into her mind. She shook her head, wishing those feelings would go as easily. “And I just feel…like, how can I trust myself? The whole thing with Hunter, and now Chet….”

  She looked at her mother to find that unadulterated love still shining on her face as she listened to Olympia.

  “I just feel like I need a booklet of questions to ask men before I start falling for them,” Olympia said. “Then it’ll be safe. I won’t get hurt.”

  “Oh, sweetie.” Her mom cradled her face with one warm hand. “Falling isn’t safe. Nothing about it is. Just ask Grandma and her hip.”

  Olympia smiled, but her heart still thrashed in her chest.

  “You’re a smart woman, Olympia. Don’t get too far inside your own head. You know how you feel about this man, and you know it’s right.”

  Grandma set a plate of bacon on the table, shuffling back into the kitchen to get the eggs.

  “Don’t doubt yourself,” her mom finished. “Right, Evona?”

  “That’s right,” she said. “You run an inn with hundreds of employees. You know exactly what you’re doing. Your relationship with him was no accident.” She nodded once like that was that, and then she reached for the bacon. “Now, eat up. Eggs aren’t good cold.”

  Olympia chuckled as she filled her plate with bacon and eggs. Her heart tapped out a normal rhythm, and as she laughed with her mom and grandma, the truth of their words started to sink in.

  Once back at her penthouse, she bypassed the ice cream in favor of her phone. Your relationship with him was no accident.

  Maybe Chet wasn’t her accidental sweetheart. Maybe she was supposed to be with him.

  Now she just needed to be brave enough to dial Chet’s number.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chet woke in a strange place, the stale smell in the air disorienting him for a moment. He had a flashback of those three weeks on the road after he’d lost his job. He’d woken up like this every morning during that time, and he hated not knowing where he was.

  “The plantation,” he sighed as everything came rushing back to him.

  Olympia had broken up with him. He’d packed a small bag, so he couldn’t stay forever, and gotten his car out of storage the next morning. The drive had been long, but only because Chet went fifteen under the speed limit the whole time, arriving at the plantation near nightfall.

  That hadn’t stopped his mother from crying into his shoulder, and Chet had been up half the night wandering the mansion and standing in the gardens as the night bugs sang.

  Now, the sunshine streamed through the window, and he wondered what time it was. Almost noon, and no one had bothered him.

  “Probably because they can’t use the stairs,” he muttered. His mother and grandmother both lived on the main floor now, and yes, they had old bones that didn’t use the stairs much. Two live-in servants still worked here, and Chet actually found that he was relieved his aging family members had someone to look out for them should something happen.

  Of course, Lynn only lived twenty minutes away, but she was extraordinarily busy for a woman who didn’t have a paying job.

  He hadn’t wanted to come to the plantation, but he’d found he couldn’t stay at The Heartwood Inn with Olympia right across the hall but so far out of his reach.

  Everything and everyone felt out of Chet’s reach. His mother, his siblings, his future. He knew he could stay at the plantation indefinitely, but he also knew boredom would consume him by tomorrow morning.

  And if that didn’t do the job, irritation surely would.

  Despite both of those, he showered, dressed, and went downstairs. Nobody stirred in the kitchen, though someone had been there. Old coffee sat dormant in the pot, long cold. Lunch wasn’t on yet, and he stepped out the huge back doors to the wide spread of land behind the mansion.

  Everything was pruned and clipped to exact perfection. He had loved these gardens as a boy, but now, they just represented a lot of hours of work.

  “There you are, dear,” his mother said, and he turned to his left to find her with his grandmother, sipping tea. A plate of cookies sat in the middle of the table, and he grabbed one as he sat down with them.

>   “Sorry to sleep so long,” he said, though he wasn’t really sorry.

  “You’ve had a rough few weeks,” his mother said knowingly. Chet should’ve known that when Lynn had said Charles had heard about what happened at The Grand America that meant everyone in the family would know too.

  His mother had questioned him about it almost instantly upon his arrival last night, and he’d told her the whole story. At least she seemed to believe him.

  It had been just over six weeks since he’d lost his job, and the last few had actually been pretty great. Everything that had happened since he’d stepped foot on the island of Carter’s Cove had been great.

  His lungs pinched, but they kept breathing. He knew it would take more than a little crack in his heart to stop them. Still hurt, though.

  “Did you want breakfast, dear?” she asked, her hand already going up. A man appeared almost instantly, and Chet wanted to wave him back.

  “I’m fine, Mother.”

  “He wants coffee,” she said, and Chet met the man’s eyes.

  He hoped they said I’m sorry, at the same time his mouth said, “Black, please.”

  “Right away, sir.” The butler left, and Chet looked out at the huge pecan trees in the yard.

  “You seem sad,” his grandmother said, her words shaking. It must take her an hour to get up and get into her gown for the day. Chet watched her for a moment, thinking she must be bored out of her mind.

  Of course, she’d never known any different. She’d lived on this plantation too, before Chet’s father was born. She probably knew nothing else.

  “I’m okay,” he said, giving her a smile.

  “Okay?” his mother repeated. “You have no job, and you’re living in a hotel on an island.”

  “It’s an inn, Mother,” he said. “Not a hotel.”

  “What’s the difference, honestly?”

  Chet pressed his lips together and squinted out into the meadow. The Heartwood Inn was different, and Chet struggled to put his finger on why. He thought of his time at The Grand America, and how it compared, and suddenly everything made sense.