We’ll be hosting atournew house but…
Natalia smiles. “Okay. That saves me the trouble of guilting you into hosting.”
Lana rolls her eyes and I chuckle. “You left the kitchen for this?”
Natalia’s eyes pinch, shooting daggers right at me. “I was baking the special cupcakes and I was reminded.”
I stick my tongue out at her and she returns the gesture.
“Get back to work,” Lana grumbles, attempting to hide her amusement. “Both of you.”
I knock on the door of her office and from the other side, I hear her say, “Come in.”
As I open the door, I say, “Hey, boss.”
She smiles, her teeth digging into her bottom lip, from behind a desk. “Hey.”
“We’re closing up.”
“Already?” Her eyes wide, she checks the time. “Oh my god. I was— I was so stuck doing this?—”
“It’s okay,” I tell her.
Lana releases an exhausted sigh and pushes away from her desk. “Okay, let’s go clean up.”
“Ryan and Michelle closed up the registers,” I tell her and her shoulders relax. “They’re cleaning up.”
She walks around and kisses my cheek. “I’ll go send them home. Want to help me finish up?”
I check my watch quickly. The meeting is going to start soon. “Yeah,” I rasp. “Okay.”
Ihaveto go to this meeting today. There is a new chipwaiting for me to be put into our old jar. And I’ll show them to her tonight.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing, let’s go clean before we head out.”
I follow her out of the office and toward the café. “Hey, Michelle,” Lana says. “You’re good to go. We’ll finish up. Thank you for today. You too, Ryan.”
Her two most trusted employees thank her before they grab their belongings and find their way out. I lock the doors behind them.
I take a deep breath when I face Lana. She’s wiping off one of the tables, vigorously scrubbing at what looks like sticky residue. I promised we’d talk about it after work. I promised myself I’d tell her tonight—and I will, even if I don’t know how and even if it’s word vomit.
I’ll just take Julian’s advice and talk toLana.
Talk to her like she’sLana.The girl who loves you unconditionally. She won’t hate you, she’ll just worry.
But how do I tell her all of my mistakes and where they led me? I know about her life while I was gone, and it was…calm in comparison. She missed me and she was sad often—as was I—but she didn’t make the same bad decisions. Instead, she made decisions that would take her somewheregood.
I made decisions that led me to my near-death.
I swallow the knot in my throat. “Lana?”
“Yeah,” she breathes, blowing the grown-out curtain out of her face with a smile.
“I…I have to go,” I say carefully. “But I’ll meet you at the house?”
She frowns. I hate those frowns. And she stops wiping, freezing. “Where are you going?”
