I tilt my head to the side and shake it back and forth. “You should’ve sent them. You should’ve shared those things with me. All this time, I honestly thought it didn’t bother you being away from me so often and that you didn’t miss me as much as I missed you.”
He cups my face in his hands and stares into my eyes. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I hate that I made you feel that way. I hate that I never let you know how much it killed me to be away from you. I hate that I made you second-guess everything I felt for you.”
Pulling one of his hands away from my face, I kiss his palm before pulling his hand against my chest. “No more secrets, promise me. Whatever you’re feeling, whatever you’re thinking, you have to share it with me. We have to be open and honest with each other about everything.”
He leans forward and kisses my lips. “I love you and I promise.”
I curl into his side and rest my cheek on his shoulder. He continues to whisper words of love to me as my eyes grow heavy and I drift off to sleep. The alarm on his cell phone wakes us both from a sound sleep an hour later.
“What are you doing today?” I ask as he slides out from under the covers and grabs his clothes from the end of the bed.
“Oh, you know, just some running around. What time are you meeting Ellie? Want me to pack you guys a lunch or something?” he asks, quickly changing the subject.
He’s done that a few times lately when I’ve asked him about his plans for the day. I know he’s hiding something, but even when I flat out asked him what he’s up to, he changes the subject. I even caught him digging through the attic a few weeks ago and he looked like a kid caught with his hand in the cookie jar when I went up there to see what he was doing. I can’t really be mad at him when I’ve been keeping a little secret of my own and I instantly feel guilty about making him promise to never keep anything from me. It’s something that will fix all of my problems, but will undoubtedly piss Fisher off, so I’ll leave him to his secrets until I’m ready to divulge my own.
Fisher finishes getting dressed, leaning across the bed to give me a kiss. “I’ll pack a few things in a basket for you guys and leave it on the kitchen counter. Don’t forget your sunscreen and if you wear that hot, red bikini, keep it on until I get home.”
He kisses my nose and I laugh as he pushes himself off the bed and heads out the door.
“I hate you so much right now. Why do you have to look so hot when I look like a whale?” Ellie complains.
I just came in from the water and I’m standing in front of her drying off while she stares up at me in disgust from her beach chair.
I took Fisher’s suggestion and went with the red bikini, even though I’ve secretly hated this thing ever since I bought it on a whim. I don’t think I have the body to pull it off, but when he saw it in my dresser drawer last week, he started drooling and asked me to model it for him. Let’s just say this red bikini didn’t stay on for more than a couple of seconds that day, so it’s starting to grow on me.
“You don’t look like a whale, you’re pregnant and beautiful,” I remind her. “And you’re barely showing, so quit your bitching.”
I spread out my towel next to her and flop down on my back, closing my eyes and letting the sun warm me and dry off the rest of my body.
“Did you tell Fisher about Stanford yet?” Ellie asks.
I squint open one eye and glare up at her. “No. And I thought I told you we weren’t going to discuss this until I made a final decision?”
Ellie shrugs and rests her head back against her chair with her face turned up towards the sun. “I wake up puking every morning, I get up seventeen times to pee at night and my fiancé uses baby talk to speak to my stomach. Please, give me something to live for. This is exciting and we SHOULD be talking about it.”
I sit up on my towel and cross my legs in front of me.
“It is kind of exciting, right? I mean, this isn’t a completely insane idea, is it?” I ask.
“Hell, no! I mean, when you first told me Stanford called you with a proposal, I laughed my ass off and almost got on the ferry to the mainland to kick his ass, but I really do think this is going to work,” she tells me.
The thing I haven’t told Fisher is that I’ve been in contact with Stanford. After I broke up with him and pretty much embarrassed him in front of the whole town, he left the island with his tail between his legs and I didn’t hear from him again until a few weeks ago. I felt a little bad at first about the way things ended, but then I remembered the shit he said to me. Fisher also set about wiping all traces of him from my mind, so pretty soon it was like Stanford never even existed.
Getting a call from him out of the blue was a shock. When he told me that he quit working for Fisher’s father as soon as he got back to the city, it threw me even more. He overheard the things Jefferson said to me that day at the ballpark and there had been some other questionable things Jefferson had said and done in the time that Stanford worked for him that made him uncomfortable and forced him to realize that the man was not to be idolized. He quit and had a job with another, larger corporate bank with locations nationwide within a week.
He felt bad about the way we parted and he still wanted to do whatever he could to help me with the inn. I immediately distrusted him and assumed he was trying once again to buy the place from me, but he had a better idea. His new company specialized in small business loans and he asked if I would consider refinancing the mortgage on the inn with his bank. I politely told him no and tried to explain to him that having to deal with my ex-boyfriend for the duration of my loan would be almost as bad as having to deal with my ex-father-in-law. I ended the call and assumed that would be the end of it. Within an hour, the president of the bank was calling, giving me his assurance that my account would be serviced by another loan officer and that Stanford’s name would only be on the paperwork as the referring party for commission purposes. He went on to explain that they were committed to keeping the small businesses in America afloat, giving them the lowest possible finance rates permitted by law. I really didn’t want to believe that there might be a chance to save Butler House without having to crawl on my hands and knees and beg Fisher’s father, but it was hard NOT to believe it when the bank sent me a draft of the paperwork. The interest rate is almost seventy-five percent less than what I’m paying now with Fisher’s Bank and Trust and it would cut my monthly payments almost in half.
“When are you going to tell Fisher?” Ellie asks.
I shrug and look out at the ocean. “I don’t know. When is it ever a good time to tell the man you love that the guy you were dating is the one who is going to make your dreams come true?”
“Never,” Ellie informs me.
“Awww, keeping secrets already? Tsk, tsk, that’s never a good thing.”
Whipping my head around, I stare up at the one person on this island I hate more than Fisher’s father.
“I think you made a wrong turn. The skank beach is a mile that away, Melanie,” Ellie says, pointing to the left with a sweet smile.
“You’re one to talk, getting knocked up before you’re married,” Melanie sneers.
Ellie continues to smile as she lifts both of her hands in the air and gives Melanie two middle fingers.
I push myself up from the ground, feeling much more comfortable being eye-level with Melanie than having to look up at her, but I quickly realize how bad I look standing next to her and immediately want to wrap a towel around me. The red bikini I’m wearing made me feel sexy until I stood next to Melanie with her long legs, fake boobs and flat, toned stomach. The white string bikini she’s wearing consists only of three triangles precariously concealing her goods and doesn’t help my confidence much, either.
Every time I see this woman around town, all I can think about are Fisher’s hands on her ass and his mouth pressed against hers that night at Barney’s. He swore to me that nothing happened between them, but I still have to swallow a few times to keep my lunch down where it belongs just t
hinking about that night.
“I have no idea how you do it, Lucy,” Melanie says with a shake of her head.
I sigh and take the bait, even though I know better. “How I do what?”
Melanie laughs and brushes her long, perfect, shiny blonde hair off of one shoulder. “How you managed to get the richest, most eligible bachelor on the island to propose to you, kicked him to the curb and then got that hot piece of ass ex-husband following you around like a puppy. I’d say you must be good in bed, but that’s obviously not the case since Fisher practically begged me to fuck him and give him a taste of what he was missing.”
White-hot rage flows through me and I don’t even think about my actions. I raise my arm and smack that smug look right off of her face. She yelps loudly, causing a few vacation stragglers enjoying one of the last nice days at the beach to sit up and take notice.
“Daaaaaamn,” I hear Ellie mutter softly, but I don’t pay any attention to her.
“You are a skanky piece of trash and the only reason Fisher went anywhere near you a year ago is because he was drunk,” I shout, not caring that people can hear me.
“You are a BITCH!” Melanie screams.
“At least I’m not a scheming whore who tried to steal someone else’s husband!” I fire back.
“I didn’t steal anything! He CHOSE me, and you just can’t stand that, can you? You weren’t good enough for him and you couldn’t satisfy him, so he chose someone who could,” she argues.
“Nice try. I happen to know nothing happened between the two of you, so give it a fucking rest already,” I tell her with a roll of my eyes.
She laughs right in my face and leans in closer. “You keep telling yourself that, sweetheart, and maybe one day you’ll believe it. He was so angry and full of rage that night, and you just walked away from him. Don’t worry, sugar. I took care of your man after you left, right in the bathroom at Barney’s. When he fucked me against the wall, he shouted MY name when he came, not yours.”
My heart starts beating frantically in my chest and I bite down on the inside of my cheek, trying my damnedest not to cry. I will not cry in front of this heartless bitch or give her any indication that her words are killing me and making me doubt Fisher in any way.
“Jesus, LOOK at you! Do you honestly think he’d want you when he could have me?”
I start to lunge for her when I feel a pair of arms wrap around me from behind, dragging me away while Ellie jumps up from her chair and starts screaming at Melanie.
“Lucy, calm down, baby,” Fisher tells me.
I jerk out of his arms when he gets me far enough away from Melanie that I won’t be tempted to punch her in the nose with my fist this time.
My pride and my heart have both cracked in half and my head is filled with memories of things I’d rather forget. I hate Fisher for making me look like a fool with Melanie and I hate Melanie for throwing it in my face and for making me doubt everything I thought to be true. I hate myself for being so fucking weak where both of them are concerned, but at least I didn’t keep my mouth shut with Melanie. She can wear my handprint on her face for the rest of the day as a reminder to stop fucking with me.
I let the tears fall while my back is to Melanie and Ellie is still ripping into her.
“Hey, what happened?” Fisher asks softly as he reaches for me.
I step away from him and swipe angrily at my tears.
“Don’t. Please, just don’t right now,” I beg him.
I feel inferior and I feel worthless and I hate that I’m questioning my own worth. I hate that I feel like I’m back in high school all over again, wondering why the king of the jocks and the hottest guy in school wants anything to do with me. I’m a grown fucking woman and I feel pathetic for letting Melanie get to me.
I start walking away from Fisher and he tries to grab onto my arm, but I jerk it out of his grasp. “No! Just please, leave me alone right now!”
He realizes I’m serious and he stops trying to follow me. As I start moving faster and run up the veranda stairs to the inn, I hear him begin to shout.
“What did you do? What the FUCK did you say to her?!”
I race through the sliding door and run up to my room, the tears coming fast and hard until I can barely see.
Chapter 38
Lucy
Present Day
“You’re going to have to talk to him, Lucy. You can’t keep avoiding him,” Ellie tells me a week later while we hang the storm shutters on the front of the inn.
After Fisher got the story from Ellie that day, he ran into the inn and found me curled up in the fetal position on the bed, crying so hard I could barely breathe.
“You know she’s lying, Lucy. Please, God, tell me you know she’s lying. I swear to you, NOTHING happened between us. Baby, please, you have to believe me. I don’t know why she’s doing this.”
I didn’t say a word to him. I couldn’t. I wanted to throw myself into his arms and tell him that yes, I knew it was all a lie and that I loved him and of course I believed him, but I just couldn’t do it. Melanie made me feel like a fool and ugly and worthless and it hurt so deep down in my soul that I couldn’t make the pain go away. Nothing Fisher said could make it go away, either, and he finally listened to me when the only words I could get out through my sobs were the ones telling him to go and that I needed time.
He’s called every day since then and stopped by multiple times, and while I haven’t refused to see him, I haven’t spoken to him, either. I’ve allowed him to do all the talking, listening silently while he begged, pleaded, and apologized. He swore over and over that nothing happened between him and Melanie, but I just can’t get her words out of my head. She talked about his anger and his rage and him fucking her against the wall and it was too much. It was too much like what Fisher and I shared and I don’t know how to get past that. I don’t know how to see past those words and find the truth. I don’t want to be one of those foolish women who automatically believe their man when he says he didn’t cheat, especially when there’s so much evidence to the contrary. I’m not stupid and I refuse to let anyone make me feel that way. It’s bad enough I don’t feel like I’m woman enough or good enough for Fisher, I don’t need to feel like I’m not smart enough, as well.
I was finally forced to talk to him last night when he came storming into the inn, pissed off and more than ready to fight. He’d found out about my phone call with Stanford and he was definitely not happy.
“How in the hell could you keep something like that from me?”
“I wasn’t keeping it from you, I was waiting to see if it panned out before I said anything.”
“Jesus, you’ve been ignoring me for a week for something I didn’t even do when the entire time you’ve been going behind my back with your ex-boyfriend!”
“I wasn’t going behind your back with anyone! I was doing what I needed to do to make sure I didn’t lose the inn. This has NOTHING to do with you!”
“It has EVERYTHING to do with me! I was your fucking HUSBAND and you wouldn’t let me help you with the inn, but you’re going to let THAT schmuck bail you out?”
“That’s exactly why I WOULD let him bail me out, because he isn’t my husband and it’s not something he feels like he HAS to do.”
“I don’t HAVE to do it either, I fucking WANT to. I love this place just as much as you do. Dammit, why can’t you just let me take care of you for once? What’s mine is yours, don’t you see that? I love you and I WANT to do this for you!”
We went round and round for over an hour, neither one of us willing to give in. When he tried bringing up the Melanie situation again as a way to steer the argument away from the inn, I finally stormed out of the living room and locked myself in my room.
“Am I bad person for not believing him when he tells me he didn’t sleep with her?” I ask Ellie softly as I step down from the ladder and stand next to her. “I feel like the worst person in the world. He was going through so much when all of that happe
ned and he’s done so much to get better and be a better person and I can’t let go of this hurt. I can’t let go of this one little thing.”
Ellie wraps her arm around me and I rest my head on her shoulder.
“It wasn’t a little thing, though, it was a big thing. Even if he didn’t fuck her—which, I’m telling you right now and I’ve told you a hundred times before, HE DIDN’T—it was still a big thing. It broke your trust in him and when you break a woman’s trust, it’s hard to get it back,” Ellie tells me. “You aren’t a bad person, Lucy, you’re a woman with a big heart. You loved him more than anything else in the world and he pushed you away no matter how hard you tried to keep him close. I think it’s time for you to decide if you can let all of that go and let him heal your heart once and for all, or if you’re going to let it stay broken.”
I lift my head off of her shoulder and run my palms up and down my face. I feel like shit and I know I look like shit. I’ve cried myself to sleep every night that Fisher hasn’t been here with me. I want to believe him; I don’t want to let Melanie have the last word and get the satisfaction of knowing that she tore us apart, but I don’t know how to do this. I’ve been with one man my entire life and it’s something beautiful to me. Even though Fisher was far from a virgin when we first slept together, I’ve always been confident that he was faithful to me. In the back of my mind, I’ve always had those little worries and doubts that every woman has from time to time that maybe he’d find someone better, someone prettier, but I never let them take over and he always made me feel like I was the only one he would ever want. A few choice words from Melanie and all of that is shot to shit.
I put away the ladder and leave the rest of the storm shutters for another day while Ellie heads over to Bobby’s house and I go inside to do a little work on the website, switching out the summer rates for the winter rates. As soon as I sit down at the computer, I hear the front door open and see an older couple walk inside with a few suitcases.