He wasn’t sure what to say. “How are you?”
“Why did you do this?” she asked.
Confusion rippled over him. “Do what?” Had something else happened? Had his mother said something to her? He was planning on telling her his mother knew the truth about them now.
“Why were you so nice to me? Why did you help me, let me stay with your family? Why are you so nice?”
Adrian tried to wrap his head around where she was coming from. Undoubtedly, she’d just received a shocking bit of news from Bethany Harold. He couldn’t think how to bring the conversation around and get to what was really bothering her. “You think I helped you just because I’m nice?”
“I know you are. I saw how you interacted with your nieces. How you bought a gazillion raffle tickets just to help out a town you claim to hate.”
His Adam’s apple bobbed. “I still don’t know what you’re asking.”
She huffed through the phone. “Why me? Why did you even care? You could have left me on that mountain. You should have left me. If only I’d stayed lost.”
“Gabby,” he said, wishing he was there with her. “Where are you? Let’s meet up, we can talk.”
“Why?” she demanded.
He knew she wasn’t asking about meeting up. He got to the point. “I did it because something about you struck me, and I didn’t want to let you go, Gabby.”
“My name is Goldie.”
“You told me yourself, it’s Gabby. I want to call you who you really are. Gabrielle Bybanks, a woman with fire inside of her, a woman who glows and warms people just by being near them. You are like the sunlight. Not gold, but sun. You’re Gabrielle, and I’m going to call you that.”
“No. Don’t. Please don’t.”
He could hear the heartache in her tone. He longed to reach through the phone and hold her the way he had the night before. No one should be alone after finding out news like what she’d discovered.
“She’s my birth mother,” Gabby blurted. “Bethany Harold. She’s my real mom. I can’t do this. I can’t be your fake girlfriend. Does everyone lie? Isn’t anyone ever honest? I thought I was getting to know you, but maybe I don’t know you at all.”
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I never should have suggested being my girlfriend the way I did. I didn’t see our relationship that way. It was never a lie to me. Believe it or not, I do care about being honest.”
“Most people don’t, I guess,” she said. “My mom didn’t, apparently. Or rather, the woman I thought was my mom.”
Adrian was anxious to make it right. “I told my mom the truth, right after you left. I told her I just met you and how hard I’m crashing for you.”
“Adrian—”
“I mean it. You’ve become more to me in these last few days than I ever thought possible. Please don’t leave without saying goodbye.” Without letting him see her one last time.
“I’m saying it now. Goodbye, Adrian.”
He made a final effort before she hung up. “Don’t go yet. Take a detour, come to the cabin with me. There’s something I want to show you.”
She waited long enough to reply that he thought maybe, just maybe, she was about to give in. Her voice came through more muffled than before. “I can’t. Bye, Adrian.”
“Gabby? Gabby!”
She didn’t respond. She’d ended the call.
Adrian darted the rest of the way to his car. He’d intended on opening the lockbox right away, but this couldn’t wait. He had to get back to the B & B before Gabby headed for home.
CHAPTER TWENTY
GOLDIE’S LIFE HAD TURNED UPSIDE down. It was so common for her to take a wrong turn here and there, to find herself displaced without meaning to be. But she’d never felt more lost than she did right now.
She managed to make her way out to Rustic Ridge, to gather her students’ papers back into her portfolio and stuff her belongings into her duffle bag. She managed to mutter to Jordan at the reception desk that she wasn’t coming back. She topped her truck off with gas, and then she was on the road.
Part of her wanted to wait for Adrian, but she rammed that part way off her emotional grid. She couldn’t handle anything else right now. She couldn’t handle him or his family. She couldn’t handle being in the same town with a woman who’d cast her aside. She didn’t want a relationship, not when everything ended in betrayal or displeasure or angry spats.
What she really wanted was to close her heart to anyone ever again.
She thought of Adrian’s confessions about his family, and how they were the reason he’d opted to build his company several states away. Was there a family anywhere that got along? What was the point of family if this was all it turned out to be?
Her phone blinked his name. He was calling her.
She gripped the steering wheel, waiting for the call to pass. She couldn’t talk to him right now. The road was before her, and she drove with more confidence than she’d ever had. There was that, at least. At least this time, she knew exactly where she was going.
Too bad it did nothing to appease the sorrow in her heart.
***
Adrian stared at his phone. He should probably stop trying to call Gabby. It was clear she wasn’t going to answer. Maybe he should have told her when she’d first arrived at his house. Then again, it wouldn’t have made things any better, and he wasn’t entirely sure it was his place to tell her something that important. She was feeling betrayed, and he couldn’t blame her.
With the lockbox perched on his bed, he figured he could understand the feeling.
He hadn’t really grieved his father’s death. Part of him didn’t want to open the lockbox. He had the feeling his dad was doing all of this to mock him. He’d always belittled his business ideals. It hadn’t mattered how much
