I couldn’t deny the truth of that. I’d spent our entire friendship knowing she was caring and compassionate, loyal and protective. But seeing it come out of her and be showered on my niece and nephew—my only remaining family—was something I hadn’t been expecting.
“Yeah, she is.”
“You really are a love-sick fool for her.” Gran shook her head and smiled at me fondly.
I bit my tongue, hating that we had to lie to her. That she thought this was something more than it was—just one friend helping out another. Never mind that the help had seeped into other areas, blurring all boundaries. Never mind that I wasn’t so sure I minded all that much.
“So, what’s in the future for y’all?” Gran asked.
I shook my head and punctured the ground with the garden spade. “We’re just holdin’ on till this guardianship comes through. Hopefully.”
“Not a doubt in my mind, sugar,” she said. “And what comes after that’s taken care of?”
Well, what came after that was Nat leaving Havenbrook—as well as me and the kids—behind. As soon as the final decision came through, she’d be on the next plane out of Memphis. I couldn’t say that, though. Couldn’t even tell Gran that the thought had my stomach all tied up in knots. Had been keeping me up every night since our wedding.
“To be perfectly honest, I’m not sure.”
Gran hummed. “Nat told me you had a meetin’ set up with a label…”
One that had been scheduled for the day after my sister had passed away. It’d been weeks since Aubrey’s and Nathan’s deaths, and though the pain of that loss still weighed on me, it had eased just a bit.
Now, instead of a fist squeezing my heart at the mere mention of her name, I only felt a lingering sadness knowing she was gone. Knowing I’d never talk to or see her again. Knowing the only thing I had left of her were these kids Nat and I were fighting so hard for.
I cleared my throat, my gaze focused on the ground as I dug another hole. “I obviously canceled that.”
Gran reached out and squeezed my hand. “Of course, sugar. No one would’ve expected otherwise. You got another one lined up yet?”
“No.” I blew out a heavy breath, the call earlier from my manager sitting at the forefront of my mind.
Carla was understanding of my situation and was giving me time to figure out what I wanted. But that was the problem, wasn’t it? I didn’t know what that was.
“I had a call this mornin’ with my manager, and she’s wantin’ to know what I wanna do. What direction I wanna take.”
“And what direction is that?”
I shook my head, squinting in the sun as I glanced at her. “I have absolutely no idea.”
“Well, you’ve been through a lot of changes these past few weeks. A lot more still to come.”
“That’s true, but it doesn’t change the fact that I’m gonna have to figure something out. There’s a publishing house that wants to discuss bringin’ me into their stable of songwriters, but Carla didn’t wanna pursue it if I was still gonna try for something with the label. But then I wonder if either job is good enough. They’re both crazy.”
“Crazy how?”
“Unpredictable. Havin’ a steady income is something Judge Seville is gonna take into account for his decision. I’ve got some money stashed away in savings but not enough to last more than a couple months. I need a job, which means I need to figure out what I wanna do, and fast.”
Gran hummed. “That’s a question for the times, isn’t it? What about Nat?”
“I don’t think she’s gonna swap out photography for singin’ with me,” I said on a laugh.
“No, I don’t suppose she would. What’s she plannin’ to do with her career? Havenbrook’s not exactly teeming with the kinds of jobs she’d take.”
“Not exactly,” I agreed.
And that was the sticking point, wasn’t it? I had asked her to stay, to play her part in this lie, but when I’d asked her to do that, I hadn’t expected things to change so drastically between us. Mixing in sex had played a part in that, of course, but it was more.
I’d never realized just how easy it could be between us. We had the best of both worlds—the kind of friendship both of us had always been able to count on, paired with the kind of rawsexual chemistry books were written about. And I wasn’t so sure I wanted to give that up.
I’d had a brief flicker of hesitation the night when Nat and I had first slept together, not wanting to jeopardize what we had. That’d been why I’d forgotten all about my crush on her when we’d been teens, because I’d seen firsthand how things had shaken out between her and Nash after one kiss.
