Brogan forced a smile as the deal was sealed, but she didn’t actually feel anything close to settled.
£ £ £
Emma rested her head against the cool glass of the passenger-side window and stared up at the dark sky lit with the pinpricks of a thousand stars. She hadn’t noticed before how much better she could see them out here. She’d never lived in a place dark enough to appreciate their multitudes. She smiled at the thought. In order to see so many lights, she had to step more fully into the darkness.
“It’s beautiful here,” she said, with a contented sigh, “the sea, the stars, the rolling pastures, the castle. How is everything so picturesque all the time?”
“They say it’s God’s country up here, but I suppose people everywhere think that about where they live.”
Emma closed her eyes and relished the low hum of Brogan’s steady path around gentle curves. The emotional rollercoaster and social engagement of the last few hours had taken a lot of energy, but not in the soul-sucking way she’d come to associate with public appearances. The people she’d interacted with were much more subdued with a lot less bravado than the aspiring artists and investors she’d known in Manhattan. Aside from the donation she’d willingly made to the local arts initiatives, no one had wanted much from her. Victoria had set a relaxed tone, and her social graces had put Emma at ease at every turn.
“I did not hate tonight,” she mused aloud as she sat up.
Brogan smiled over at her for a second, her eyes seeming as sleepy as Emma felt. “That’s a ringing endorsement.”
“It is!” she laughed. “For me anyway. That was the biggest event I’ve attended in ages, and with a different set of people than I’m used to. And in a castle that looked like someone dropped it out of a medieval fairy tale. That might be old news to you, but I can’t believe humans still live in places like that.”
“No, I’m with you there,” Brogan said dryly.
“Well, I could’ve felt in over my head. I expected to, but I wasn’t nearly as intimidated as I feared.” She reached out and put her hand atop Brogan’s on the gear shift. “I owe a lot of my comfort level to you.”
“I didn’t do anything special.”
“You did. You stayed by my side, you smiled at me when I got nervous, you were beyond attentive. I never even had to ask for a drink. I would merely think it, and you’d appear with a glass in hand.”
“Old habits of a good bartender,” Brogan quipped.
“It’s more than that.”
Brogan laughed, but the sound was strained in a way it hadn’t been earlier, even in the moments after the kiss when their bodies had burned and emotions had cracked in her voice.
“Did you have a good time?” Emma asked.
“Yes.”
“Really?” Emma’s stomach tightened at the feeling she’d had this conversation after other events, in another place, with another woman.
“Of course,” Brogan said with a smile that barely reached her cheeks, much less her eyes.
“Would you tell me if you didn’t?”
“Emma, I enjoyed being with you tonight.”
The words were right, but something else wasn’t, and she couldn’t quite place what. The set of Brogan’s shoulders? The way she kept her eyes on the road at all times? The tiniest tinge of something distant in her tone?
Emma’s chest tightened with the urge to ask more. She wanted to understand. She wanted to know Brogan, her wants, her needs, her moods, the same way Brogan intuited those things about her. At the same time, not enough time had passed since their last serious conversation for her to forget how that one had ended. A little shiver raced up her spine at the memory of the kiss and the realization that she wouldn’t hate a similar result.
Which was why she couldn’t put herself in that position again. Despite her body’s urging to the contrary, she wasn’t ready to feel those kinds of emotions again. She wasn’t strong enough, and it wasn’t fair to Brogan to keep reeling her in, then pushing her away, but that fact wasn’t enough to make Emma ache for her any less.
She used her thumb to swirl little circles on the back of Brogan’s hand before she even realized what she was doing. Even as she’d been musing on Brogan’s ability to hurt her, she’d still reached out for her. Wasn’t that evidence enough that she couldn’t trust her own instincts? The last time had nearly destroyed her. She couldn’t face that kind of devastation again, not yet. Actually, hopefully, not ever.
She removed her hand from Brogan’s and sat up a little straighter as they turned back into the village, the streetlights of Amberwick illumining their way right to Emma’s cottage.
“Thank you for going with me.”
“It was my pleasure,” Brogan said, in a way that felt neither completely forced nor completely genuine. The mix set off another round of warning bells in Emma’s gut, and this time the impulse to understand came with an almost equal desire to protect herself from getting too involved.
Maybe Brogan was tired, maybe she had something else on her mind, or maybe she’d hated the event the same way Emma had used to, or even the way Amalie had. The thought left a bitter taste in her mouth, which she supposed she should be grateful for, in that at least it killed any worries about ending the night with another kiss.
Still, after saying a quick goodbye and walking up to her front door, she did turn around to wave one more time, and maybe wish for something she shouldn’t.
Chapter Twelve
“It’s been almost a week,” Charlie said.
“What part of ‘I don’t want to talk about it’ implied I’d want to talk about it in a week?”
“I don’t know. I mean, I thought maybe you were tired, or processing something.”
Both statements had been true when she’d got home from her evening with Emma, and the week since then had done little to help on either count. She’d worked nearly nonstop between the boat and the bar and the post office. The arrival of her newest nephew two days earlier had been cause for both excitement and a lot of schedule-juggling to provide key drop-offs and check-ins at a variety of Edmond’s rental properties. She hadn’t got more than five hours of sleep any night all week, and yet, when she did get a down moment, instead of crashing, her mind ran laps around the inside of her skull.
“If I went on a date with a woman like Emma, I’d make sure everyone knew all about it,” Charlie continued. “I’d be like, ‘Oh, what’s that? You’d like a pale ale? That’s like the one time I went on a date with a beautiful millionaire.’”
“I don’t doubt it, Charles, but maybe that’s why you’ve never been on a date with a beautiful millionaire.”
“Ouch.” He laughed and rubbed his jaw like she’d actually delivered a blow. Then he slid his pint glass across the bar to her. “Fill me up, will ya?”
“On your tab?”
“Yeah, but no worries. I’ll pay the whole thing before closing time. Nora paid me for a few of the shifts I picked while you were helping Ed.”
She pulled the tap and watched the yellow liquid fall into the glass. Then, closing her eyes for a second, she had a little trouble prying them back open again until Charlie said, “Whoa there. Don’t waste the beer.”
She jerked her head up as something wet hit her hand.
“Sorry,” she mumbled, setting the glass in front of him so a little sloshed over.
“Hey, I’m happy for a heavy pour, but if you’re falling asleep standing up, maybe I better take over at the tap.”
She shook her head and glanced around the bar. The place wasn’t packed, but with four tables still occupied at nearly eleven o’clock on a Thursday, she couldn’t deny any longer that tourist season was upon them.
Any other time the thought would’ve injected a little energy into her step, especially with the group of young women getting an early start on their weekend at the corner booth. “We’ve got too many customers at the inn for me to turn in early.”
“Yeah, ya do,” Charlie said, following he
r gaze to the four in the corner. “They all staying upstairs?”
She nodded, aware that meant they’d likely shut the place down.
“And that fact not bringing a little grin to your frowny face brings me right back to Emma Volant,” he said. “What gives?”
“Nothing,” she shot back, sad to mean it. She hadn’t heard from Emma all week, and while that was probably for the best, given all the hard truths she’d had to face last Friday, she didn’t have to love it.
“Are you grumpy because the date was terrible, or because it was awesome and she hasn’t called you?”
“Neither. Both. It wasn’t a date.”
“There’s three valid options.” He smirked. “Must’ve been a busy night.”
She opened her mouth, but before she could even formulate a response, one of the women from the corner table stepped up to the bar.
“Hi,” she said, her smile both a little sweet and shy. “Is it too late to get another round for me and my friends?”
“Not at all,” Brogan said quickly, even though the clock to her right said ten minutes to closing time. “Two pinot grigios, a cider, and a Bacardi and Coke, right?”
“Perfect.” Her smile grew. “We’re up all weekend from York. I’ve only been here five hours, and I don’t know how I’m going to leave on Sunday.”
Brogan nodded. “Amberwick’s not hard on the eyes.”
“Understatement. I’m not sure I’ve ever had a prettier stroll than the walk along the estuary toward the sea.”
Brogan smiled and set two glasses of wine on the bar before turning to pour the cider.
“And did I see you coming in on a sailboat earlier?”
She turned back around in time to see Charlie smother a grin behind his pint glass.
“I do sail with the puffin cruises out of the harbor.”
“So, you’re multitalented,” the woman said, leaning on the bar. “Sounds like you’re kind of a good woman to know around here.”
The exchange couldn’t have been easier to peg. She’d had it with many women over the years. Short stay, the need to get away, an outgoing woman, not so subtle compliments, all the pieces were there, and she was pretty. Her long, black hair fell over the shoulders of her white T-shirt and across her bare arms. Her smile was easy and unassuming. All Brogan would have to do is lean in, and she wouldn’t have to sleep alone for a few nights.
“I’m Brogan.” She tried to sound friendly.
“Caroline,” the woman said, accepting the cider Brogan placed before her. “Do you work all weekend?”
“Pretty much,” Brogan admitted, as she poured the Coke over a glass of rum. “I’ll sail every day, and work the bar tomorrow and Saturday, too.”
“Then I’m sure we’ll see each other again.”
Brogan managed a smile she hoped wasn’t completely crinkled with the exhaustion weighing on every other part of her body. “I hope so.”
Caroline continued to grin and held eye contact a few seconds longer than social graces would require, then backed away from the bar toward her friends, who immediately fell into whispered giggles.
“Any day now,” Charlie muttered when Caroline was out of earshot.
“What?”
“You can tell me how you get women you aren’t even interested in to throw themselves at you.”
She rolled her eyes. “She didn’t throw herself at me. She showed mild interest, and how do you know I didn’t return it?”
Now he rolled his eyes in a way that made her feel as if she might be looking into a time-delayed mirror. “You barely said two words to her. You didn’t offer to take her out on the boat, or to dinner, or show her around town.”
She pursed her lips as she considered the fact she’d done everything on his list with Emma. She didn’t think that was a coincidence. “I see what you did there.”
“Just trying to start a conversation with my older sister.”
“You have four older sisters. I don’t see you bugging the rest of them.”
“The rest of them don’t have a wide and varied group of women coming on to them.”
“One woman, Caroline is one woman.”
“What about Emma?”
“What about her?” Brogan snapped. “What do you want me to tell you? That we had another mind-melting kiss in the car?”
“That’s a start.” He seemed pleased with himself, as if he had anything to do with it. “Mind-melting is a good start.”
“Yeah, a good start to getting my heart broken, because as soon as we got to the castle, it became clear Lady Victoria orchestrated the entire event to win Emma’s affection.”
“What?”
“She set the whole thing up in the library and had Emma’s books in a prominent place.”
“That doesn’t mean—”
“It gets better. She kissed her on both cheeks and kept touching her bare arm.”
“What did you do?”
“I stood there as long as I could while she tried to place where she recognized me from. I waited patiently while she ran through the list of every prep school and royal social event of the last few years before I finally admitted I had, in fact, been at several of her parties, but as the hired help.”
He winced.
“Yeah, is that the story you wanted to hear? Or how about the one where Vic— that’s what she wants us to call her now— invited Emma for a private tour of the castle grounds, and the two of them are going on a day-date up there tomorrow afternoon.”
His shoulders sagged, and the dejection on his face probably matched exactly how she’d felt for days, or rather for nights. Because, when she’d been working, she’d been able to keep her mind busy, but she’d lain awake night after night replaying the memories of Victoria and Emma together. No matter how much she built up the kiss to epic proportions, she couldn’t replay the evening in any way that didn’t end up with Emma making a date with the daughter of a fecking duke.
“I’m sorry,” he finally said. “I didn’t know.”
Brogan snorted. “I did. I saw it coming a mile away.”
“You know it’s not too late, though, right?”
“Of course it’s too late. The clock struck midnight, and I’m not even a footman. I’m a kitchen mouse.”
“Come on, you’re at least a footman.”
“If you’d seen the way the actual footman at the castle had looked at me, you’d know for sure I rank below him on the social ladder.”
“So, what?” he asked. “It’s over?”
“Yeah, it’s so over it never really began.”
“Except for the best kiss of your life.”
She sighed. She couldn’t deny that point. She didn’t even want to. As much as she tried not to wish for more, she also didn’t regret the little bit she’d had. “Yeah, except for that.”
“Which is why you’re still forsaking the other women flirting with you. You’ve still got it for Emma. You’re still waiting on her.”
The comment set her teeth on edge. “I’m not waiting on Emma.”
That would be pathetic. Emma had made it abundantly clear she wasn’t ready to move on . . . yet. Brogan knew what that “yet” meant. Brogan was fine for now. She was always the now for women like Emma, but Lady Victoria was the yet. She’d seen a full-color picture of where Emma was headed. When she did get back into the dating game, she wouldn’t play in Brogan’s league.
Try as she might to bank her entire future on one passionate kiss, Brogan couldn’t see any scenario where Emma settled for a barkeep in a cottage when she could have a title and a castle to call her own. What kind of person sat around, falling deeper and deeper while waiting to get the brush-off?
She’d never been that person before, and all the details of her life remained exactly the same as they’d been three months ago— same home, same jobs, same prospects for weekend entertainment. Sure, she might not be a millionaire, but she had a good life. She loved her family, and she loved living in a place so beauti
ful, people from other places vacationed there. Plus, with tourist season hitting full swing, she had plenty of prospects who didn’t need anything more from her than she had to offer.
All of those things had felt glorious last summer. Why should they stop being good enough now?
She was still pondering the question when the group of women at the corner booth all rose and carried their glasses back to the bar.
“Thanks.”
“Cheers.”
“See you tomorrow,” they called on their way up the stairs, but Caroline lagged a couple of seconds, and as she swept past the bar she slipped her palm across the polished wood. Then with a smile and a little wink at Brogan, she lifted it once more, and there in its place sat her receipt folded neatly in two.
Brogan stared at the paper for a long second before turning back to Charlie. He arched his eyebrows in that mix of curiosity and dare only a younger brother could muster. The conflicting thoughts and emotions assaulting her core didn’t offer any helpful advice on the choice in front of her now. And yet, as the thoughts swirled through her mind, every loop whispered a similar refrain, something along the lines of, “Emma has a date tomorrow.”
With a heavy sigh, she grabbed the receipt and slipped it quickly into her pocket. The move didn’t make her feel any better, and it certainly didn’t clarify what she wanted to do. Then again, what she wanted and what she could get had become two different things over the last few weeks. Maybe it was time to try to pull them back together again.
£ £ £
The town car wound up past the gate where Brogan had dropped her car with the valet last weekend. This time there wasn’t even a valet at the gate. The driver merely used a remote built into the dash to open the entrance. Emma smiled at the glorified garage-door opener, unsure if it made the approach to the castle more or less formal. She didn’t have a chance to ponder the question for long before they crossed what she assumed must have originally been a drawbridge and drove into an inner courtyard.
Victoria stood on the front steps waiting for them, in decidedly dressed-down attire. Still, even her jeans and her cream-colored sweater appeared tailor-made for her, which Emma realized they probably were. And yet, the olive canvas jacket she wore open added a rakish element. She’d pulled her honey-blond hair back into a loose ponytail, giving her a more relaxed and youthful appeal, even within the doorway of an ancient castle.
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