The Wrong Mr. Right (The Queen's Cove Series #2)(102)

We sat in silence for a moment.

“I don’t know what else of hers I can cling to,” he said, very quietly, wincing. He shook his head. “I don’t want to forget her.”

“I don’t want to forget her, either.”

He crossed his arms and stared out the patio door at the backyard. “Deep down, I knew Claire wouldn’t agree with what I was doing, keeping the store the same.” He shrugged. He looked so helpless. So unlike my dad. “I didn’t know what else to do. I still don’t.”

An idea trickled into my head.

He gave me a side-long glance. “Honey, the store looks really cool. I don’t want you to quit.”

His use of the word cool made me smile. “You think it’s cool?”

He nodded. “I do.” He winced and put his head in his hands. “That carpet was ugly, wasn’t it?”

“The worst. It was disgusting.”

“I hope you burned it.”

A laugh burst out of my chest. It sounded rusty. “I threw it in the dumpster and gave it the middle finger.”

His chest shook and he laughed with me. Our gazes met and something settled in my chest.

“Romance, huh?”

I nodded. “Romance.”

“And you really don’t want to sell other best sellers? Crime thrillers, lit fic, fantasy, stuff like that?”

“Nope.” I crossed my arms over my chest. “I really don’t.”

He sat back and regarded me. “Okay, then. Pemberley Books is a romance bookstore. You’re the boss.”

My eyebrows snapped together, and I narrowed my eyes at him.

He lifted a shoulder. “I was going to give you the papers tomorrow on your birthday but might as well tell you now.”

“You’re giving me the store?”

He nodded. “It’s been yours for some time now. I should have done this years ago.” He rubbed a hand over his face. “I should have done a lot of things differently.”

I thought about how I hid away in that store for years, too afraid to do anything for myself. “Me, too.”

A bird landed on the fence, and I watched as it perched there. The store was truly mine now, but when I pictured myself there ten years from now, selling books and helping customers, something was still missing.

My dad stood to clear our plates.

“What about Veena?”

His hands stilled, rinsing the plates in the sink. “What about her?”

I frowned at him. “Seriously? You hurt her because you were scared. You’re being a jerk.”

The dishwasher door creaked as he closed it. He flattened his hands on the counter and looked down, thinking. “I don’t know, Hannah. I don’t know how to do both. I loved your mom so much and Veena—” His voice broke off. “I don’t know how to have both.”

“Mom wouldn’t want you to be unhappy. She’d want you to move on. You don’t have to forget her, but it’s okay if you date other people and fall in love again. She’d hate it if you were unhappy to honor her or something weird like that.”

Unease spiked in my throat. My words made my stomach pitch. My dad hurt Veena because he was scared.

I could have made something work. I could have at least asked my dad, I could have thought of other options, we could have tried long distance, but instead I shut him down. I wanted to go with him, and I said no to both him and myself.

Because I was scared of stepping outside my bookstore, like before.

I’d said some terrible things to him. I told him that he wasn’t the right guy for me, that it never would have worked anyway. That he was my practice guy. I put my head in my hands and my heart sunk into the floor.

Practice guy. That’s what I had said.

My throat tied itself in a knot. What a way to go, Hannah, I told myself. What a way to show him he meant nothing to you.

I do want you to choose yourself. I want you to choose us.

His words poked holes in my heart.

I pictured my mom across the table from us, crossing her arms with a skeptical expression.

This whole time, I had been so desperate to live exactly like her to make her proud.

“Oh my god.” My expression was incredulous. My throat worked. “Oh my god.”

“What?”

My head snapped up and our gazes met. She wouldn’t want me to follow her step for step, like she wouldn’t want my dad to be single for the rest of his life. She’d want me to make my own life. That girl singing karaoke in a gold dress? She’d be proud of me for doing the scary thing. For wearing the dress that made me feel pretty, for chopping my hair off even though I wasn’t sure if it would look good.

She’d be proud of me for taking risks and being brave.

Be brave with me, bookworm.

“He asked me to come with him,” I told my dad.

“Wyatt Rhodes?”

I nodded.

Tell me you feel nothing.

“And you said no.”

I nodded again. Shit. Urgency squeezed my stomach. The bright, happy memories with Wyatt pressed on me from all angles. My lungs were tight as I heaved a breath.

I had walked away. I had it. Wyatt and I had the thing I always dreamed about and I tossed it away like it was trash.

Puzzle pieces clicked into place, one after the other, and I chewed my lip. Wyatt had used everything is temporary as a shield but I had used Wyatt is leaving and I have to be exactly like my mom as my own shields.