Like a Memory (Sea Breeze Meets Rosemary Beach #1)(54)

At the memorial for my son, I had wanted Bliss there. To stand beside me. To give me comfort. I needed her. Yet I didn’t deserve her. There was a grave marked “Baby Finlay” that said I didn’t deserve any happiness.

Bliss was happiness for me.

“Who was she? The girl from the letter. .”

No one had asked me that. Octavia’s letter had said that she hoped I lived happily with the woman I threw her away for. We had all read the note. Her father made sure I saw it. He blamed me for Octavia getting off her meds. For me turning my back on her. And he should. When she’d wanted to talk I should have let her. Then my son would still have had a chance.

“I love her. I have since I was sixteen years old. But that doesn’t matter anymore.”

Lila Kate turned her head and I felt her gaze on me. “Why? Because a sick woman acted out of her own darkness? Her own battles? Where were her parents? Why didn’t they know she was hurting? She wasn’t yours to protect. Y’all had ended things. Letting Octavia’s actions determine your choices isn’t fair. Not to you or the girl you love.”

I didn’t have a response to that. I just knew it wasn’t that simple. “Not now. . I can’t.” I replied turning to finally look at her.

She frowned then leaned back in her seat. We drank our coffee and sat in silence for the next hour.

When footsteps sounded on the steps I turned my attention toward them. Cruz appeared from the beach. He’d been running. He was sweating and in his running shorts. He’d come to the memorial but he had been unsure what to say to me. Most had been.

“Hey. Y’all got room for one more?” he asked.

Lila Kate immediately stood up. “I was leaving,” then she turned and did just that. Like she always did. When Cruz Kerrington was around she exited. There was no secret that she disliked him. Her actions had made that clear years ago.

“Always could make that girl clear a room. Can’t figure out why she hates me so damn much.”

I would argue that he was being stupid. That he did know. But in all honesty, I don’t think he does. He is too self-absorbed to have noticed.

“You gave a fourteen-year-old Lila Kate her first real kiss then moved on to another girl a week later. While little Lila Kate was in love you were making a legacy as a womanizer for yourself.”

Cruz sat down. “Really? She hates me because I kissed her? That was what like eight years ago? That can’t be it.”

I didn’t have the energy to explain it or point it all out. Instead I shrugged. He could believe what he wanted.

“What about you? You making it?”

I was living. “Sure.” What else did I say to that?”

“I’m sorry, man. I should have come by before now but I didn’t know what to say. Still don’t.”

There was nothing he could say. “How’s working for your dad?” I asked him.

He let out a groan of frustration. “Hard. I miss college.”

The Kerrington Country Club would be his one day. He knew it but he also didn’t want it. He just didn’t have the balls to tell his dad that. He had two younger brothers. Blaze and Zander. He should let one of them have it.

“Do either of your brothers have interest in it?”

He shook his head. “Blaze is off in L.A. still. Trying to be the next Zac Efron. And Zander is planning on the Marines.”

I’d seen Blaze on the television nighttime drama he was making a name for himself on. But only once and I hadn’t watched the whole show. Phoenix had been watching it and wanted me to see Blaze.

We talked about nothing important and for a few short moments I didn’t think about my reality.





Bliss York

I SHOULD HAVE kept driving. But I didn’t. The sign was already taken down and the windows were dark. Nothing there now. It was empty. I sat in my car and thought about the first day I had walked in there and applied for a job. It was just a couple months ago. Yet my world had completely altered since then.

Octavia’s sign was gone. There was a “For Lease” poster on the door. The same door I had walked out of and dropped boxes then came face to face with Nate. Who I never expected to see again.

Would this all be different if I hadn’t applied for a job here that day? If I’d gone somewhere else and never locked eyes with Nate? Would he have stayed with her, married her, had his son? Tears stung my eyes as I thought of the life he could have had.

It had been three weeks now since he’d left. Not a second went by that I didn’t think of him. That I didn’t worry about him. That my heart didn’t ache for all he was going through. But I couldn’t call. I couldn’t ask him if he was okay or how he was doing. I could do nothing.

Today I would start my new job. I was going to be the new director for youth services and marketing at the Sea Breeze Library. Saffron and Holland’s mother was a famous author so she had pulled a few strings for me. I didn’t know it however until I had gotten the job. My boss had mentioned Blythe Corbin doing a signing because of me getting the position. I’d asked mom if she knew anything about it and she said no. I wasn’t sure how Blythe had known I applied.

As much as I enjoyed Live Bay working there wasn’t what I wanted to do. I preferred to go there as a customer. Serving my friends was taxing at times. I didn’t know how Larissa put up with it.