Contemplating his cool demeanor and their talk later that evening, Kate felt nervous as a game show contestant. It felt like if she chose the wrong briefcase or gave the wrong answer, she stood to lose everything. And wasn’t that telling? Was she really fit to commit if she equated this huge life decision with being a contestant on Deal or No Deal? Didn’t that analogy speak volumes?
Her phone rang, making her jump and jarring her out of her morose thoughts. A photo of her sister Elle’s beautiful smiling face flashed on the screen. Kate was supposed to meet her for tea at the Forsyth Galloway Inn, their family’s inn, which was located near Forsyth Park.
It would be a quick meeting before Kate’s first appointment at the hair salon. Elle and their mom, Zelda, wanted to talk about plans for a special post-honeymoon homecoming celebration for Gigi and Charles.
Kate blinked at the time. Ugh, she was late, which meant Elle was calling to prod her along. Kate let the call go to voice mail and texted On my way. Be there soon. Now she had to get a move on so she didn’t have to add lying to her list of transgressions—right below regretting her marriage.
Nothing like hitting the ground running on her first day back. Kate sighed. Better to stay busy than to dwell on the discussion that was coming later that evening.
Even so, Kate just didn’t feel like making excuses for her tardiness. What was she supposed to say? She had gotten off to a slow start this morning because she felt flu-ish and exhausted again. She gave herself one last look in the vanity mirror. She looked tired. She undid the top button on the pink-and-red Kate Spade bubble-dot smocked dress, fluffed her curls and pursed her lips. Maybe the neutral pink lipstick was washing her out. She plucked a tube out of her makeup bag and colored her lips with the brightest red lipstick she owned.
If that didn’t distract from the dark circles under her eyes, nothing would.
What was wrong with her? She was only twenty-six years old, too young to be sidelined by a virus or jet lag from a trip to Vegas. Stress really was a killer. She and Aidan had been married less than forty-eight hours and the honeymoon was already over.
Okay, so that wasn’t exactly fair. Theirs wasn’t exactly a typical wedding and they hadn’t even taken a honeymoon. So, if there had been no honeymoon, it couldn’t be over before it even started.
Unlike the marriage.
Keep talking, Kate. Keep thinking and talking and trying to explain it all away.
The bottom line was that she was not fit for marriage. Proof was...coming home from Vegas and having absolutely no idea what she was going to eat this week. Zero. Nada. Her cupboards were bare. If she didn’t feel like grocery shopping after work, she didn’t have to, since she was single. If she wanted to eat a pint of Ben and Jerry’s Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough ice cream for dinner—which happened to be the only thing in her freezer right now—she need not answer to anyone but herself...and her bathroom scale.
Being single allowed her to fly off for the weekend at a moment’s notice... That was exactly what she should be doing right now. Though she hadn’t been that spontaneous since she and Aidan had gotten back together.
But she should be having fun, not planning meals and grocery shopping. She should be taking trips and enjoying her life. She worked hard at the salon and had built a steady clientele. She certainly wasn’t rich, but she was making enough money that she had been able to buy a house without help from anyone, and she had even saved a respectable amount, adding yearly to her 401(k). If she wanted to use the rest of her hard-earned money to travel the world while she was young and unencumbered, she was entirely free to do so.
She grabbed the last bottle of water from the refrigerator and scooped up her keys and purse off the entryway table before letting herself out the front door. All the while, she tried to ignore the voice inside her that pointed out that even before the surprise wedding, she hadn’t really been free and unencumbered. She had gotten pretty involved with Aidan...and his sweet daughter, Chloe.
It hadn’t felt like she was shackled to Aidan until now. In fact, they had been doing so well. But true to form, in all of her matters of the heart, one day things were going well and the next...they were over.
A few minutes later, Kate had pointed her car in the direction of Forsyth Park. The short drive gave her time to let her mind squirrels run rampant, time to get out the raw emotion that was sitting on the surface and bury the rest of these strange feelings where she didn’t have to deal with them. At least not right now. Not in front of Elle and her mother.
By the time she arrived at the inn, she had her game face firmly in place. She parked her red vintage Thunderbird in a space next to the inn’s kitchen door. The sprawling butter yellow Victorian mansion turned bed-and-breakfast on Whitaker Street had been in her family for more than one hundred fifty years and had been a thriving business since 1874.
Kate and her sisters had grown up in the big old house with its ornate ironwork and creaking mahogany floors. Of course, each of them had moved on, pursuing her own dreams and identity separate from the inn. But all three of the Clark sisters loved to come home.
As Kate sat there behind the wheel of her car, she realized she felt like a fugitive. She and her mom and sisters had spent countless hours in the inn’s kitchen dishing gossip and sharing their secrets. But today, Kate couldn’t even seek the counsel of the women she trusted