Nantucket Romance 3-in-1 Bundle (81 page)

“I’ll get your bike.”

She followed him around to the back of the car, and he set the bike at her feet.

“Well, regardless of how this turns out, I’ve enjoyed getting to know you.”

He was sounding as if this project was winding down. He must be buying her Ohio theory. “There goes my mysterious air.”

“Oh, you got plenty of mystery left, don’t you worry.”

“Who’s worried?” She reached for the bike’s handles.

He laughed, deep and throaty. “Goodnight, Mystery Woman.”

“Goodnight,” she called, wheeling the bike toward the garage. Even as she scurried through the drizzle, she couldn’t stop the smile that formed on her lips.

Tucker pulled from the drive, still smiling. So she hadn’t admitted who she was . . . But she was still coming over every night.

Ohio. He shook his head. Well, at least he was spending time with her. She was opening up a little. Okay, so it was a minute amount, but it was something. Ten more years and she’d be an open book.

He breathed a laugh. He had time. He still had a few tricks up his sleeve, and she had four months of letters to wade through. Plus, the list of messages was getting longer every day as they continued to write. In fact, he’d write her when he got home. After all, the more they wrote, the longer she’d be around.

Harbormaster: After my sister’s accident, I took her to physical therapy for months and tried to distract her from the pain. Once I got really stupid and stuck a Tic Tac up my nose. An ER tech had to remove it. Good news: It did get a laugh from my sister. What’s the stupidest thing you’ve ever done?

Sweetpea: Go on my honeymoon alone.

Chapter Fifteen

“I’m going for a jog,” Sabrina called to Arielle the next evening.

“Run a mile for me.” Arielle changed the channel to a house-flipping program and settled into the sofa.

Sabrina trotted down the steps and walked down the lane at a brisk pace, warming her muscles. She couldn’t stay home tonight. The emails she’d read earlier brought back too much, and it would drive her crazy to sit around dwelling on it.

When she reached the street, she turned toward town and settled into a slow jog. She felt guilty leaving Arielle home alone, but she needed to run tonight like she needed oxygen.

The heat of the day hadn’t yet given way to the evening coolness, and the warm air burned her lungs as it came and went. When she reached town, she set a punishing pace, turning down Pleasant Street, hoping to avoid the worst of the traffic.

Daylight was fading, and the summer people were exiting rented homes, clicking down sidewalks in their heels toward their supper reservations. She navigated around such a couple as she crossed Main Street. The woman wore a filmy ivory dress, and the man matched her in his linen suit. They looked like they belonged in a Nantucket ad.

Sabrina hitched her sleeves up her shoulders, thankful for the breeze that whispered across her skin, even if it was warm. She wondered what Tucker was doing right now. Was he on his deck, enjoying the same breeze? Enjoying the way the evening light danced on the surface of the water?

She couldn’t get out of there fast enough tonight. It had been disturbing to read that email, the message that had sealed her fate. The message that ensured Sabrina and Tucker could never be more than online friends. Even now, it replayed in her mind, words committed to heart, not by will, but by sheer repetition.

Tracey called today. She wasn’t this despondent even after her accident, and I feel helpless to do anything about it. She’s divorcing Sebastian.

Her mind flashed back to the first time she’d read the email, her heart skipping in response to the memory. It was the first time he’d mentioned his brother-in-law’s name. The first time she’d realized that the terrible mistake she’d made had consequences that reached further than she imagined.

Her thoughts washed back farther in time to the night she’d arrived on Nantucket. To the night she’d met Sebastian.

She’d never felt more alone than she had upon entering the cavernous honeymoon suite at the White Elephant. The room featured a giant bed with puffy pillows, a fireplace, and an ocean view. On the table by the door, a bottle of champagne chilled in a bucket. Everything about the suite said “romance.”

Her suitcase hit the floor with a thud, and she sank into the first chair she reached. She should’ve called ahead and told the hotel she was alone. Even with her aunt’s help, there’d been so many things to do in the six days since she’d found Jaylee and Jared. Cancellations, phone calls, gifts to return. She hadn’t realized how drained she was, how utterly empty, until this moment, sitting in the darkness in her honeymoon suite.

The amount of money her aunt and uncle had lost was mind-boggling. Sabrina tried not to feel guilty. It was Jaylee and Jared’s fault, not hers. Both of them had tried repeatedly to contact her, but after one phone call with Jared, she was done with them both. What could they say to change things now?

Sabrina curled in the recliner, tucking her feet under her. The big bed loomed across the room. The big, empty bed. She and Jared were supposed to be here together. They should be celebrating the beginning of their life together, yet here she was. Alone. How could everything have changed so drastically in a week?

She wanted to curl up in that bed, draw the covers over her, and never come out. She shed her shoes and crawled under the covers, clothes and all. It wasn’t quite dark out, she hadn’t washed her face, hadn’t brushed her teeth, but she didn’t care.

Maybe she could spend the next seven days under the blankets. She could hang up a Do Not Disturb sign and disconnect the phone.

But regardless of how she spent the coming week, eventually it would end. And then what? She’d have to return to Macon and face them again. Her family, her friends. Jaylee. Jared.

Sabrina pulled the duvet over her head. She hadn’t felt so alone since her father killed himself. Like it was yesterday, she could see his lifeless body on his bedroom floor the way she’d found it after school that day. She’d been nine then, in the third grade. She’d thought he was playing a game.

If her aunt and uncle hadn’t taken her in, she would’ve spent the remainder of her childhood in a foster home. They’d made her feel like a sister and daughter. But the past week had shown her clearly who their daughter was. Blood was thicker than water, and Jaylee had more of their blood than Sabrina did.

She turned over and stared at the lit face of the clock. Were Jared and Jaylee together right now? Were they lying together in each other’s arms? Were they glad she was gone so they could be together without having to hide their feelings?

The betrayal had carved an aching hollow spot in the middle of her stomach. She was tired of the ache. Tired of the pain. She wanted it to go away. But the truth was, the betrayal was only now hitting her fully. The busyness of wedding cancellations, she realized, had distracted her. And while all she’d wanted the last six days was to escape, she hadn’t realized that being here, that being idle for seven days, would allow her full exposure to the pain.

Why did she lose everyone she loved? Her mom, her dad, now Jared. Was she unlovable? Was there something about her that was so terribly flawed?

The ache grew, spreading, swelling, devouring her. Is this how her dad had felt before he killed himself? Had he suffered some heartbreak or had her mother’s death been too hard to recover from? Still, he’d had Sabrina. Why hadn’t that been enough?

You’re not enough, Sabrina. You weren’t enough for your dad, and you weren’t enough for Jared.

Maybe thoughts such as these had driven her dad to that ultimate act of selfishness. Maybe she wasn’t so very different from him. Maybe things like suicide were hereditary.

She rolled over and clutched her hands to her chest, feeling the bracelet Jared had given her all those months ago. It had been Valentine’s Day and the bracelet had only held a single heart. Every special occasion after that, he’d given her another charm. A pearl birthstone pendant for her birthday, a key charm for their anniversary, a book charm, an
S
charm, and a ring for when they got engaged. Sabrina wrapped her hand around the bracelet, holding it close to her skin as if by grasping it she could keep a tiny piece of her life with Jared.

She closed her eyes against the throbbing ache. She was so tired. Tired of thinking, tired of hurting, tired of breathing.
Don’t think.Don’t think about anything except the sound of the water outside. The sound of it lapping the shoreline.

Eventually she fell asleep, but when she awoke, she wished for sleep again, for oblivion. She spent the next day in her room, telling the maids she didn’t need her room serviced. She ordered food only when her gnawing stomach became unbearable, took a long bath, watched TV without seeing it. When the phone rang, she disconnected it.

The next day, when the maids came to the door, she went outside and walked down the beach, listening to the lonely cries of seagulls and the shushing of water lapping the shoreline. When the maids finished, she was relieved to return to the cocoon of her room. The maids had replaced the tepid water in the champagne bucket with fresh ice.

Day three was a duplication of day two. The loneliness was getting to her, and the realization that she’d lost not only her fiancé, but her best friend and family, was weighing hard on her. She missed feeling wanted, feeling needed. She missed feeling normal. She’d never felt so unwanted. Not even in high school when she hadn’t exactly shone like a star next to her beautiful cousins. Not even in the beauty pageant her Aunt Bev had entered her in.

Near the end of the week, when evening arrived, she felt suffocated by loneliness. The air in the room seemed thick and impossible to pull into her lungs. Two more days and she would face Jared and Jaylee. She didn’t want to go home, dreaded the thought. Visions of her dad lying on the floor haunted her.

Her eyes fell on the champagne still nestled in the bucket. She picked up the bottle and went to work. The cork popped off. She poured the liquid into a fluted glass and made a toast.

“To life alone. May I never be so stupid as to love again.” She drained the first glass. Then, feeling somewhat better, Sabrina poured another.

She wondered why she hadn’t drunk the champagne earlier. To think she’d suffered needlessly when a reprieve had been nearby all along.

This was better than lying around depressed. Better than contemplating the similarities between herself and her dad. She wasn’t like him. Would never do something so horridly selfish and destructive.

Again, that vision of him on the floor, his denim-clad legs crumpled, his oval glasses askew on his ashen face.

She sprang to her feet.

She needed to leave this depressing place. Go someplace fun and lively. She’d stared at these four walls too long.

The only dress she’d brought slipped easily over her head. The waist hung loosely, so she tightened the belt, then went to run a brush through her hair. By the time she was ready, she almost looked like she fit in with the elite summer crowd.

The Nantucket air was mild at night, a warm breeze blowing in off the harbor. She walked toward town, her sandals clicking on the sidewalk. Main Street was lively. People on their way to supper, dressed in fine linen and suit jackets. There were a lot of couples, she noticed suddenly.

She looked around, from the cars on the cobblestone streets to the tourists milling on the sidewalks. She didn’t see anyone alone. Only her. And where was she going to go? Supper reservations were necessary here, especially on a weekend, and she couldn’t see herself dining in some exclusive restaurant anyway, certainly not alone.

Music and chatter poured from a doorway as she neared it. A shingled sign beside the canopied entrance read “Cap’n Tully’s Tavern.” She wouldn’t feel out of place there. The sound of laugh ter pulled her inside. She could count on one hand the times she’d entered a bar. Her feet crunched over peanut shells as she made her way to a darkened corner and took an empty table, a low one with two stools.

The effects of the champagne were wearing off, and the idea of losing herself again held some appeal. She took in her surroundings. A pool table crowded the opposite corner, surrounded by four college-aged men. A few singles sat at the bar, nursing drinks, but even in here, there were couples. She felt like a wallflower, stuffed into the corner of the room, invisible, wilting.

I used to be half of a couple
, she reminded herself. What a fool she’d been to think it might last forever. She’d never had Jared, not really. She wondered again what was inherently wrong with her. There had to be something.

Enough, Sabrina.
These thoughts were only digging her deeper into the hole of despondency. Keep going and she would end up at the very bottom, where her dad had no doubt landed just before he took his life.

She was not like that. She was not.

When a young male server stopped at her table, she ordered a snakebite. She’d never had one, but there was no time like the present. Now that she’d found her drug of choice, why not take the shortcut to oblivion? It was better than sitting around, writhing in her pain. At least she was
doing
something. It felt good to have a little control back.