Maggie nodded as I pushed away from the table where we had been enjoying some cold beers and good company. The second I walked away, I felt the emptiness crawling into my soul again.
“Janelle, what the hell are you doing? Your fan club is all over my Instagram, looking for answers. Someone just commented ‘Fess up, douchebag.’ Girl, what are you up to?”?
Janelle let out a frustrated breath on the other end, and I heard her step out of her loud studio where she self-shot all of her digital content and into her quieter living room.?
“Lee, you’ve been gone for over a week. I have barely heard from you, and when I do, you’re rushed. Then, I see this post from some dive bar in Savannahthat you’re playing there on Saturday. News to me, you were supposed to be back by then.”?
I ripped off my baseball cap and tossed it on the sink in front of me, running my hands through my hair. “I’m sorry, you’re right. I should have called.”?
“You should have done more than called Lee. You made me look like a fool.” She paused, letting the words linger like a storm cloud hanging over us. “Which isn’t shocking since I’m certainly not the first person you’ve done this to. After all, this was a setup, wasn’t it? Besides, I can spin this. I have a new athleisure line coming out that will coincide well with the breakup weight loss.”
Everything was a business opportunity for her. But standing in the bathroom of a bar I was about to invest in, with the woman I still wanted more than anything in the world just outside the door, I guess I was guilty of the same shit. Except, for me, it was justone“like,”one“heart,” I was trying to gain.?
“I’m sorry, Janelle,” I offered again.?
“It’s whatever, Lee. I’ll send my breakup NDA over to your label.”?
She hung up quickly, leaving me alone in the bathroom with my thoughts swirling like a blender on high. Here I was, taking a risk on someone who had long closed the book on our relationship—hell, the entire series—ten years ago. Someone who was dating my brother. Someone who was moving forward with her life while I was still all caught up in the past, whether I wanted to admit it or not.
Someone I was, indubitably, insanely, still in love with. And always, always would be.?
Chapter twenty
MAGNOLIA
After Lee had locked himself in the bathroom, he left almost abruptly. Ever the gentleman, though, he tipped his hat to me as he backed out the door, keeping his eyes fixed on me the whole time.?
I tried calling Dane, but, yet again, he didn’t answer. I sat on the edge of the bar, watching the door for someone, anyone, to walk in. For someone to buy a drink, have a seat, bring their friends in. To bring me some answers.?
I knew that, out of all my friends, I was the one on the sinking ship. But it was my sinking ship, and I would go down with the band at the end if it meant that I gave it everything I had, even when there was nothing left to give.?
Because at the end of the day, this was the last connection I had to my mother. To Uncle Cole and the family that came before Charlie and me. To the generations of O'Malleys that crossed this threshold and called 21 McDonough Street home. Who raised their babies in the upstairs apartment and came down at night to run the bar when it was in its prime.?
A bar that was once a true staple in the community, a place that was a common area for Savannah’s Irish. A place that cost blood, sweat, tears, and most of all, pride to keep open.?
O’Malley’s was in my blood, and I couldn’t let it go. Not without a fight.?
Dane, on the other hand, I was happy to watch march out of my life if that was what he wanted. Something about it, though, felt uneasy to me. Almost as if I wouldn’t have the confidence to let him go if Lee wasn’t making this huge financial sacrifice to help keep the bar open and my tether to the Wilder family wouldn’t be truly severed.?
Because even being surrounded by the memories and ghosts of my own family, the Wilders had done so much for me, and I couldn’t, and didn’t, wantto let them go.?
I wondered what it was about the family that tied me to them. Was it the warmth and kindness that Eunice had extended to me for all of these years? The stability and firmness of Vance? The decades of friendship and, eventually, the dramatic up-and-down romance with Dane??Was it me holding on to what I felt for Lee??
I thought about the way he’d been looking at me since he got back—like I was some sort of puzzle he’d been dying to solve but had lost the instruction manual for. That time when he brushed past me in my kitchen, and I swear, the air between us got hotter than the oven. Every moment we spent together, I’d watch his eyes flickering like he was trying to memorize everything new about me—trying to convince himself that maybe I hadn’t changed, that I was still the same girl he left behind. But we both knew I wasn’t.
Grief had done its work on me. It had wrapped itself around my heart, making it heavier, quieter, until it turned me into a stranger, even to myself. I wasn’t the girl he’d walked away from.
But even still, it was like he was testing the waters, waiting to see if I’d jump back in. And God, part of me wanted to—if only to see where that look in his eyes was going to lead this time.
But I had to stay focused. I was distracted enough as it was with Dane’s hot and cold attitude, trying to keep the lights on in the bar, and making sure nothing happened to the legacy that my family left behind.? I didn’t have room for distractions. Or, at least, that’s what I kept telling myself.
One thing was for sure. I wasn’t going to let anything happen to O’Malley’s. To my home. To my livelihood. No matter who got hurt in the process.?
Even if it was me.?
Chapter twenty-one
LEE
