Bachelor at Her Bidding (Bachelor Auction Book 2)(39)

In case Rachel needed her as backup? “Understood,” he said. “And thank you.”

*

Rachel was just writing up her notes on her last patient when there was a knock on her door.

“Yes?” she said, looking up and expecting to see Shannon.

She was glad she was sitting down when she saw Ryan with an armful of flowers. And she hated the fact that her heart did a flip at just seeing him. But he’d made it clear that they were through; she was just going to have to become immune to him.

“What do you want?” she asked coolly.

“To give you these.”

“I don’t need flowers,” she said, knowing that she sounded ungracious – but she was still angry with him for getting her so wrong. For thinking that she didn’t have Phyllis’s best interests at heart. For not listening to her and walking out on her.

He blew out a breath. “This looks as if I’m gussying up an apology. Which I guess I am, but it’s still a valid apology. Rachel, I’m sorry I treated you so badly, and I’m so far in the wrong I don’t even know where to start making amends.” He bit his lip. “I know it’s a big ask, but will you hear me out?”

Part of her was tempted to say no. He hadn’t listened to her, had he?

Then again, two wrongs didn’t make a right.

And if she could understand why he’d reacted the way he had, maybe it wouldn’t hurt quite so much.

“OK,” she said, still not smiling.

“Where should I put…?” He nodded at the flowers.

She was tempted to suggest the trash, but that wasn’t fair. “On the floor, I guess.” She gestured to the chair on the other side of her desk. “Take a seat.”

He placed the flowers carefully on the floor and sat down.

“First of all,” he said. “I’m sorry. I know you had Gram’s best interests at heart. And I went off at the deep end without listening to you properly.”

Yeah. He could say that again.

“Jolene talked to me today,” he said. “She said exactly the same things that you did.”

“And you listened to her?”

He nodded.

Part of Rachel was glad that he was seeing sense and doing the right thing by his grandmother; but part of her was still hurt that he’d refused to listen to exactly the same suggestion from her.

“What’s the difference?” she asked. “Why did you listen to Jolene where you wouldn’t listen to me?”

“Because I’m not involved with her. Not like I am – was,” he amended, “with you.”

Past tense. Well, that was fine by her, because a sleepless night had hardened her resolve. She wasn’t giving him another chance to hurt her.

But she wasn’t totally unreasonable. She’d listen to him. She just wasn’t letting him back in her life.

“I know you’re not my ex… but that was all I could hear, when you suggested that Gram moved to residential care. It’s what Lucille said, too.”

Lucille. The ex he never talked about.

Maybe he’d talk about her now. It was too little, too late, but part of Rachel still wanted to know the truth. In her experience, if you gave people enough space eventually they’d fill the silence, so she waited.

Finally he spoke. “I met Lucille in Bozeman. I’d been headhunted by one of the top restaurants in the city when I came back from Paris. I was the pastry chef there, and she came to join the team as senior chef. We fell in love, and we talked about opening our own restaurant. We wanted to be the first place in Montana with a Michelin star, to prove to people our food was among the best in the world.”

Same job, same world view. It should’ve worked.

“But then I came back to see Gram on one of my regular visits and I realized how ill she was. I talked to Mrs. Rodgers – our next door neighbor – and she told me Gram had got very forgetful and had a few falls. Mrs. Rodgers was worried about her. I knew then that I had to do something. It wouldn’t be fair to uproot Gram and drag her out to Bozeman where she doesn’t know anyone, especially if I was going to be working crazy hours while Lucille and I were setting up the restaurant and not able to spend any time with her. So the obvious solution was for me to come home to Marietta and look after her myself – just as she and Grandpa looked after me when my parents were killed.” He dragged in a breath. “Family comes first, and I couldn’t have lived with myself if I’d put the dreams of that Michelin star before my grandmother.”

She could see the pain in his eyes and she had a nasty feeling she knew what was coming next.

“Lucille wasn’t happy about it. She said I was being totally selfish and not thinking of her and I should just put my grandmother in a home.”

Now Rachel understood why it had been such a hot button for him – why he’d been so insistent that he wasn’t dumping his responsibilities. But surely he’d been able to see that she wasn’t like Lucille?

“Lucille wanted me to choose between her and Gram. She wanted me to put her and the restaurant first – but how could I live with myself if I did that and let my grandmother down when she needed me?” His face was anguished. “There wasn’t a choice. So I asked Lucille to move here with me. I know it’s out of the city, but I thought maybe we could do something here.” He sighed. “But she said it was a hick Montana town and she didn’t want to live here. She said I was crazy if I was going to turn down an opportunity like the one we had in Bozeman.”