I chuckled.
Mrs. Potts ran a tight ship in housekeeping. She’d been working for Rock Beach for longer than I’d been alive so, more than most of the other employees, I looked at her as family. And, when I was younger, there were a few times I pictured her like my fairy godmother. Back when I had very different ideas about what being a princess meant.
“I was just wondering if my parents were back? I thought they were due in tonight and saw their suitcases in their room, but I can’t seem to find them.”
With over two hundred guest rooms alone in the resort, then tacking on the common areas, drawing rooms, bars, restaurants, and meeting spaces, I’d learned long ago that Mrs. Potts was the fastest way to find out who was where.
“Oh, yes. I think your father was taking a call in his office and your mother went to get a review of everything that happened while they were gone.” She nodded and ushered me to the door. “I would check his office first.”
“Thank you!” I hollered over my shoulder, weaving expertly over the plush navy speckled carpet that lined the hall, perfectly matching the polished silver traditional décor that was complemented with a variety of white blooms for winter.
It may not snow here, but there were enough white petals that could be drawn upon to cover the grounds if necessary.
I’d traded the flats and jeans I’d worn over to Gwen’s earlier in favor of dark gray slacks and black kitten heels—both birthday gifts from my mother. The unwrapped and already hanging in my closet kind. I figured this conversation would go over better if my attire wasn’t one more hurdle to cross.
“Oh, Jules! There you are!”
With practiced ease, I turned with a smile on my face, immediately recognizing the warm, elderly voice. “Good evening, Mrs. McGinley. Mr. McGinley,” I greeted the older couple, both wearing matching white pants and deep green sweaters.
The McGinleys came every year over the holiday and were one of my favorite frequent guests.
“So good to see you, dear. I’m surprised it took all day to find you,” Mrs. McGinley mused, pulling my hand between hers and shaking it.
“Well, I’m here now, and it’s so good to see you both,” I gushed. “How are you? How is Tanner?”
Tanner was their only grandson and their pride and joy.
“He’s good—giving his parents a handful,” Mrs. McGinley replied with a rueful laugh.
I smiled. “Boys will be boys.”
“He’s nothing like Patrick was at his age,” Mr. McGinley remarked about their own son, Tanner’s father.
“And I’m sure Patrick was nothing like you,” his wife teased gently, patting him on the arm in good humor.
“How was Scotland?” I pressed, knowing they went for several months in the fall each year to visit friends and family and to check on their distillery that was just north of Glasgow.
“Oh, just wonderful like always.” She sighed contentedly. “That’s why I was hoping to see you. We have a small gift for you.”
“Oh, you don’t have to do that,” I told her though it wouldn’t change anything.
They brought me a gift each year from Scotland and, each year, it was arguably my favorite gift because it was the only one I got to open. A silly thing, but she always took the time to wrap the gift for me, and that was something special.
“You know we do,” she tutted. “You’re so gracious to us while we’re here.”
“It’s in the room, dear,” Mr. McGinley reminded her.
“Well, there’s no rush. I’m sure I’ll see you both before you get out on the green tomorrow,” I assured them, needing to talk to my parents before I missed the opportunity.
“Oh, yes. Of course.” The older woman nodded. “So good to see you, Jules.”
“I’ll see you soon.” I reached out and squeezed her shoulder, smiling at them both before I continued on my path.
After them, I was still waylaid for a few minutes by the Baileys—another younger couple who got married at the resort and now spent the holidays with us. I noted both in the mental list I’d started running at the beginning of the week of each interaction I had with the guests.
Unlike my parents who, in their defense, were kept busy with meetings and running the business of the resort, I was astonished by how many people I talked to throughout the day without even realizing. Guests, staff, groundskeepers. I chatted about their family, their travels, their work—whatever it was they wanted to talk about. Days that seemed meaningless in the past, I now saw as time I dedicated to creating relationships with the people here who were under my care—so to speak.
And the singular strings supporting my dream began to fill out with concrete confidence that I did have something to offer.
Like Mick swore to me I did.
My heart tripped a little—like it did every time I thought about him and that night.
It had been three days since the night at the Lookout. Three busy days. And three achy nights…
The bad news was that I hadn’t seen Mick at all, which I had a feeling was on purpose because he was the kind of guy who was hard to miss.
My kiss couldn’t have been that bad, could it?
I didn’t have much comparison, to be sure, but I had some pretty bad kisses: Congressman Welling’s son, Todd, and the Honorable Luca DePano came to mind. The first who continued to breathe through his mouth as he attempted to kiss me, turning a display of affection into an attempt at resuscitation, and the second, slobbering so badly I’d had to excuse myself to the ladies’ room to find a hand towel to wipe down my face.
Those were bad. Mine couldn’t have been that bad…
Maybe it was good that I hadn’t seen him, I rationalized.
I was overwhelmed with change—or the possibility of it. On the one hand, it was arguably better if my heart avoided the haywire Mick caused it while my mind sorted through what I wanted for my life.
But on the other, I wanted it all.
I’d been living in a world of complacency—of black and white. And now I was seeing in every color of possibility. And I wanted every color. Especially the vibrant ones that burned so brightly in his kiss.
Reaching my father’s office, I shoved all thoughts of Mick aside and refocused on my task—a task that made my hand tremble as I knocked on the cracked-open door.
“Papa?” I called, pushing against the solid wood, and let myself inside.
The scent of cigars and old-world tradition lingered like a fine film in the air. Heavy brocaded curtains closed off the windows and the bookshelves lining the walls were filled with uncracked spines of leather-bound books which stood like soldiers along the shelves; but they were just for show—a lesson I’d learned the hard way.
A quick glance around the large study confirmed he wasn’t inside but he hadn’t been gone long.
I walked over to the imposing oak desk that sat along the far wall, leaving a giant hole in the center of the room, large leather chairs circling it from the sides. My father didn’t like any chance of someone looking over his shoulder while he was working. He preferred all those who entered his office to be front and center, as though they were approaching a king.
My small heels sunk into the carpet as I reached for the mug sitting on wide desk; my father’s nightly Hot Toddy. It was still hot and I took a whiff, the not-so-subtle mix of whiskey, hot water, lemon, and honey warming my nose; he never left it unfinished, so I knew it was safe to wait for him to return.
Setting the cup down, the papers on his desk caught my eye. It was a ledger of sorts with dates and numbers—large numbers—written down. I peered down at the top sheet to look closer. Normally, my mother and the accountant for the resort, Henry, were in charge of things like this; my father preferred to know the big picture rather than the minutiae.
But none of the notations made sense.
There were names only next to half of them, and not even full names at that. Some initials. Some only first names. My first instinct was that this couldn’t b
e for Rock Beach; my parents would’ve never stood for something so inefficient, insecure, and fallible.
Except it said R.B. at the top in the same handwriting.
“Julia.”
I jumped with a small gasp, looking up to see my father paused in the doorway with a look I’d never seen before—one of indecision. My mother could be swayed depending on the circumstances, however, once my father decided on something, that was the end of it.
“Hi, Papa,” I greeted him a little breathlessly, taking a small step away from the desk and toward him as heat flooded my cheeks. Nothing had even been off limits for me but still, it felt like I’d just seen something I shouldn’t have. “Mrs. Potts said you both just got back, so I wanted to see you and see how your trip went.”
Calm and collected under pressure, just like he’d raised me.
He nodded a few times and walked around me, not speaking until his hands were on the papers I’d been looking at, straightening them and then tucking them into his desk drawer. It only took a few seconds, but each felt longer than the last, and I couldn’t tell if we were getting closer to an explosion or to a subtle deflation.
“Good,” he finally said, raising a pensive stare to mine. “It will be good. The gentlemen we met with will be coming to stay at the end of this week for some time, so we’ll have to do something special.”
“Oh. Of course.” I nodded. “Where’s Mama?”
“She… went to unpack.” He sunk down into his chair. “What have you been up to while we were gone?”
I squeezed my hands tighter in front of me to fight off the urge to look down or away or any direction that gave away just how much I’d been up to.
“Not too much, really.” I didn’t want to have this discussion without my mother present. “Actually, I was wondering—”
“Tony said that you borrowed the maintenance truck several times this last week,” he interjected, arching his eyebrow to turn the statement into a question.
Even though Tony was the head of security on the resort, I didn’t realize he’d been watching my every move. Then again, I was just in the hospital, so if they were concerned, it was understandable that they’d asked him to keep an eye on me.
They wanted to make sure I was okay. I hated how that notion felt so foreign to me.
I nodded. “I went… Laurel reopened Roasters. So, I went into town a few days to see her and see how everything turned out.” My palms were sweating. I shouldn’t be skirting the truth. I should be confessing my change of heart—and change of life.
But the truth—and my dream—was the first thing that was wholly mine, and I wasn’t ready to give it up.
“I hadn’t seen her since the hospital, and I felt bad. I wanted to thank her; she saved my life,” I ended with that gentle reminder.
“That’s good.” He took a sip of his nightcap, his head bobbing with disinterested distraction.
My jaw dropped in an unladylike way. “It is?”
My gaze narrowed slightly on the man in front of me. Rich Vandelsen was beyond predictable, both in good ways and bad. But the way he was acting now, I couldn’t make heads or tails of it. All I could say for certain was that a week ago, I would’ve received a very different response to admitting that I’d been spending time in town with my cousin.
“There is nothing for you in town. Your life is here. At Rock Beach. With everything at your fingertips. What more could you possibly want?”
My father nodded definitively, tapping on the leather insert of his desk with the pen in his hand, and repeated, “Of course. You should go see her.”
I had to be imagining things. Had I fallen and hit my head again? Was I already knocked out and dreaming?
“Isn’t that right, dear?”
I turned to see my mother standing in the doorway, still in her clothes from traveling. She always showered and changed as soon as she got home, wanting to wash the recycled plane air off of her. But they’d been home for almost two hours now and she looked like she hadn’t done anything.
“I didn’t hear you, Rich,” she stated and walked into the room, dropping a half-kiss on the side of my head while she kept her eyes trained on my father.
“I said that it’s a good thing for Jules to spend some time with her cousin.”
My mother tensed beside me, a foreshock that foretold a quake was about to happen. “Is it?” she asked tightly.
My father didn’t even respond, taking another drink while their stare down continued.
They rarely fought in front of me. The most I ever saw was this: the tense passive-aggressive standoff between them that inevitably resulted in my mother caving to whatever it was my father wanted. No matter how far she thought she’d risen in this world, it would always be a step below the man who brought her there.
“Of course,” she barely acknowledged before focusing on me. “How are you feeling, dear? How have your headaches been?”
“Better.” She began to pull me from the room, and I glanced at my father to see him already buried back in his work now that his final decision had been agreed upon. “How was your trip?”
She dragged in a breath as we turned down the hall. “Enlightening.”
It seemed like a strange response coming from my mother, not that she typically liked to involve me in business discussions, but I usually heard something about the city or the shopping.
“I picked up a few things for you while we were gone. They’re already hanging in your closet.”
Now, this was starting to feel familiar.
“Is everything okay with Papa?” I turned and asked as she opened the door to my room.
“Oh, yes. He’s just got a lot on his mind with business negotiations.”
“Negotiations for what?” Maybe if they had just let me in a little, I would’ve wanted to be a part of this place more than I did.
She halted and her head snapped up. “Oh, nothing for you to worry about,” she tutted and then laughed it off, ushering me over to my closet to see what she’d brought me. “Just what we were away for. Boring business things. Anyway, I don’t know if he mentioned that some of the men we met with will be coming up within the week. Your father wants to host something special, but I reminded him we already have the annual Snow Ball scheduled in two weeks, and I’d hate for one event to detract from another, so we’ll see what he decides to do.”
Unzipping the garment bag, she pulled out a pale blue chiffon gown and my eyes bugged.
“Wow, Mama.” I reached out and felt the fabric. “It’s beautiful.”
“Whether it’s for the ball or something else, I thought you could use something new and elegant for the season,” she declared, staring at the purchase she was so proud of.
“Thank you.” My smile dimmed when I saw it hung next to an arm’s length of similar designer dresses from Dior to Dolce & Gabbana that stretched farther down the rack.
It was beautiful, and I was grateful.
It was also one more reminder that to them, I was just a showpiece.
My hand dropped to my side. “Mama, I have to tell you something.”
Horrified eyes turned to meet mine. “What? What’s wrong? What happened while we were gone?”
“Mama,” I huffed. “What if I want to go back to school?”
I’d taken a few steps into the middle of my room and finally turned back when she remained unresponsive.
“Why would you want to do that?” she asked with a weak voice. “Do you not have enough here? Is your life not good enough here? Have we not given you everything—”
“Mama!” I exclaimed with a groan, my unladylike frustration getting the better of me. “Of course not. It’s none of those things. It has nothing to do with you or what you’ve given me. I want to do this for me. Not because I don’t have a good life here. I just want to give this to myself. To better myself.”
She stared at me like I’d grown two extra heads—and all of them were intent on betraying her.
My mother had
a strange sense of loyalty. On the one hand, she thought something like this or my going to visit Laurel was a betrayal, but on the other, she’d completely abandoned her family because they weren’t wealthy enough to blend smoothly with her shiny new world.
“I… I just don’t understand why you would need that.” Her hand rose to cover her mouth like my statement made her sick, and she shook her head back and forth, not even looking at me. “I don’t understand why you would even want that when you have the world at your fingertips here, Julia.”
My shoulders slumped as I fought back tears.
“I’m sorry, Mama. It’s just who I am… it’s what I want to do. Please, don’t be upset. I’m not saying this to hurt you.”
My words fell on determined deaf ears.
Her chin notched up and she walked to the door, her expression now covered with a hard mask of indifference.
“We’ll have to see what your father says,” she said curtly. “And he has a lot on his plate right now. It would be considerate of you to wait until everything with his new business partners is finalized.”
My mouth gaped as she let herself out.
She treated me like this was a decision they could still play a role in—like she could tell me no. Anger bloomed in my chest for the first time. Not having the courage to ask in the past was my problem; believing they had the power over me to the final call, though, was theirs.
I didn’t blame them. I blamed myself. I blamed myself for not speaking up for all the little things I wanted, for letting them believe I had no voice except for what they told me.
I did have a voice.
It might be weak from nonuse and hoarse from lack of practice, but I had one.
I pulled my cell off the nightstand and dialed my cousin.
“Laurel?” I said as soon as she picked up her phone. “It’s Jules.”
“Hey! What’s up?”
“I… thought about what you said the other night, and you’re right,” I informed her with a breathless voice. I was going to be brave and I could only hope that one day my mother would see that being true to myself wasn’t the same as betraying her. “I need to start making some of my own money if I’m going to go back to school and, if the position is still open, I’d really like to come work at Roasters.”
Bespoken: An Opposites-Attract Standalone Romance (Carmel Cove Book 2) Page 11
