IgentlyliftedTallyfromher chair and helped her start closing up the shop so she could get ready for the elopement. While I restocked the Chablis, she stood in the middle of the floor, staring at nothing, her hand pressed flat against her stomach like she was trying to hold herself together from the outside.
I stayed quiet. Gave her space.
She blinked once, hard, then crossed to the wine barrel where Nick had left his business card. Her hand shook as she picked it up. For a second, I thought she might keep it—tuck it away just in case—but then she tore it in half. Then again. And again. Tinypieces scattered across the floor before she gathered them up and dropped them in the trash behind the counter.
“I’m fine,” she said, voice flat.
She wasn’t.
She moved through the shop like she was checking off a mental list—champagne flutes straightened, camera adjusted, bottles lined up with unnecessary precision. Her hands were steady, but I caught the way she kept swallowing hard, the tension climbing up her neck into her jaw.
She wiped the counter twice.
Rearranged the same three cheese wheels.
Her breathing was too controlled. The kind of controlled that meant she was one wrong word away from shattering.
“Tally—”
“I need to finish closing,” she cut in, not looking at me. “Hoyt and Charlotte are counting on me. I can’t—” Her voice cracked. She cleared her throat. “I just need to focus.”
She grabbed her apron strings and tried to untie them. Her fingers fumbled. Once. Twice. She yanked harder, frustrated, and the knot pulled tighter.
“Damn it,” she whispered.
I crossed to her, gently batting her hands away. “Let me.”
She stood there, arms at her sides, staring at the floor while I worked the knot loose. Her shoulders trembled. She was holding her breath.
“Breathe,” I said quietly.
She let out a shaky exhale, and with it came the tears she’d been fighting since Nick walked out. Silent at first, then harder. Her hand came up to cover her mouth, like she could stuff the emotion back in if she tried hard enough.
I pulled the apron free and set it aside. “Come here.”
She shook her head. “I don’t have time to fall apart. I have to—there’s so much to do—”
“Tally.”
She looked up at me, eyes red and wet, and I saw it—the exhaustion, the fear, the sheer force of will it was taking to keep moving forward.
I wrapped my arms around her. She resisted for half a second, then collapsed into me, her face pressed against my chest as her whole body shook.
“I’ve got you,” I murmured into her hair. “I’m here.”
She cried quietly, fists clutching my shirt like I might disappear if she let go. I held her, one hand on her back, the other cradling her head, and let her get it out.
After a minute—maybe longer—her breathing steadied. She pulled back, wiping her face with the heel of her hand.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I don’t have time for this.”
“You just had your ex show up and tell you he wants nothing to do with your baby,” I said. “You’re allowed to fall apart.”
“But I can’t.” Her voice cracked again. “Charlotte and Hoyt are getting married in an hour. I have to be there. I have to take photos and make sure everything’s perfect and—” She pressed her hands to her face. “I just need to hold it together for a few more hours.”
And there it was.
The thing that floored me about her.
