But here’s where it gets wild.
Griffin Callahan isn’t just back to cry into his sweet tea. He’s here because Coach Andrews gave him a Hail Mary, fix that knee or clean out his locker.
And who runs the most elite sports rehabilitation program in the Southeast?
Jessica. Freaking. Hartwell.
I literally screamed when I found this out. I scared my cat Loretta right off the balcony.
Twelve weeks of him looking at her with those blue eyes while she decides whether to heal him or accidentally make the injury worse. I’m not saying she would. I’m just saying I’d understand.
That heartbroken barista turned her pain into an empire. Now he needs her help, and I am LIVING for it.
Either way, I’m obsessed. To whoever filmed that video in portrait mode: you understood the assignment. Like, share, follow, and subscribe.
CHAPTER 5
JESS
It’s only beenthirty minutes and my phone won’t stop buzzing. Every friend I have needs to know if I saw the video. What really happened and whether or not it's AI as if it were some bunnies jumping on a trampoline. It’s real, people! Griffin is back.
He’s fucking back after all this time.
The words circle in my head like vultures as I storm down Main Street with my empty coffee cup crushed in my fist. Five years. I spent five years building a life, building a career, building walls so high and thick that nothing could get through.
And he just strolls into my favorite coffee shop like he has every right to be there.
Griffin Callahan. The sweetheart of Magnolia Landing turned out to be a real jackass if you ask me. The man held my heart in his hands and crushed it like tissue paper.
I’d known he was coming back, of course. Charleston’s gossip mill is more efficient than the Associated Press. The old ladies at First Presbyterian have been whispering about hisfall from gracefor weeks.
I tried to ignore it, but I got all the highlights anyway. His manager embezzled millions. His knee is destroyed. His career iscircling the drain. Good. Great. Fantastic. I don’t care. I refuse to care for a single minute.
My phone buzzes again and this time it’s Grandma Dot. She’s the one person I can’t ignore.
Grandma: Heard you threw coffee at the Callahan boy. Good girl. Come for dinner and tell me everything.
I almost smile. Grandma Dot has been my rock since my parents split when I was fifteen. She took me in, raised me, taught me that pie crust and prayer could solve almost anything. She also taught me that heartbreakers don’t deserve second chances.
Me: Athletes leave, heartbreakers return, but pie crust is forever. Someone taught me that.
Grandma: In my day, we didn’t give our hearts to men with exit strategies.
Too late Gram, that ship sailed back when I was twenty-two.
Me: :)
By the time I reach my practice, I’ve almost gotten my breathing under control. Hartwell Sports Medicine occupies the ground floor of a historic building on Peach Street. It’s all exposed brick and state-of-the-art equipment. It’s just the way I wanted it.
I couldn’t be more proud of the way this place ended up. I built from nothing and had my hands in every step of its creation. It wasn’t always pretty either. I scraped together loans, worked fifteen-hour days, begged and borrowed until I had something worth being proud of.
It’s mine. He can’t touch it.
“There you are.” My receptionist, Macy, looks up from her desk with knowing eyes. “Dr.Thompson wants to see you. He’s in his office.”
Beside her, Vivi, our new physical therapy assistant, looks up from a stack of intake forms. She moved here from Colorado sixmonths ago, and we became fast friends. She's the only person at the clinic who knows the full story of Griffin and me. The sympathy in her eyes tells me she's already seen the video.
My stomach drops.
