She would continue working here at the bookshop for now and then figure something else out. It was the only thing she could do.
“It is true that I’m attracted to you. You grew up into all... this.” She gestured at him, trying to keep her tone light. “Any woman would be lying if she said she wasn’t attracted to you. And I’m grateful for your friendship and all you’ve done to help me with the renovation. But that’s all it is. Nothing more. That’s all it can ever be. I don’t... I don’t want anything with you.”
It was so untrue. In this moment, she wanted everythingabout him. He was a good man who loved his mother, and she was not a good person. She had been selfish and self-centered, hurting her own mother so deeply.
“You aren’t a very good liar, Emma.”
Wrong. She was a great liar. She’d been lying to herself to think she could ever have this.
“I’ve got to get back to work. Thanks for being a shoulder.”
She could see the hurt in his eyes, and it tore at her. But she didn’t know what else to do.
“Anytime,” he murmured.
As Emma headed back to the other room, she added one more thing to the long list of reasons to be upset with herself.
She was doing the right thing, wasn’t she? Even if it felt like she was tearing her own heart out in the process.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Rosie
By Friday night, the shock of her daughter’s revelation had begun to ease, and Rosie had come to accept her new normal.
Pam’s exodus had left everything in a complete disaster. The records were tangled and her notes were in a shorthand that no one else could read but Pam. Rosie knew it would be months before things were sorted and back on track.
She would worry about how she would clean up the mess another day. For now, she planned to enjoy an evening’s entertainment with her daughter and granddaughter, watching a children’s play about some karate princesses.
“Thanks for letting me tag along with you and Olive on your date,” Emma said as Rosie pulled up to the town’s performing arts center.
“I’m delighted to have you,” she told her daughter honestly. “I love any chance to spend time with you.”
Even with all the chaos surrounding Pam’s departure from the company, Rosie found peace, at least, in knowing that she and Emma seemed to have made great strides in healing any lingering rift between them.
Now that the truth was finally out between them, Emma seemed free to talk to her in a way she hadn’t been before. They had stayed up late the other night going through home movies, laughing about some memories, crying a little about others. They were finally finding their way through the darkness.
She couldn’t say everything was perfect. Though Emma had finally told her the truth about Gary, her daughter still seemed subdued, even sad at random times.
Rosie had asked her a few times if everything was all right and each time Emma would assure her she was simply tired from trying to wrap up the renovations at the bookstore.
She suspected something else might be going on but hadn’t wanted to press her daughter. If something else truly was bothering her, Emma would tell her when she was ready.
She had also been surprised that Emma seemed to have changed her mind about coming to work for Lucas Construction. When Rosie had suggested perhaps Emma could arrange things at the bookstore, as she had suggested, to enable her to come into the construction company a few days a week, Emma had declined.
I think I’ll focus on Rainy Day for now, she had said. Rosie had decided not to push the matter. If Emma wanted to have a bigger role in the company, she would have to speak up. Rosie wouldn’t pressure her.
When the three of them walked into the smaller of two auditoriums in the town’s performing arts center, her gaze instantly seemed to find Andrew. He and his mother sat on the second row, with several seats open next to him.
Rosie’s mind instantly flashed back to those delicious moments when he had kissed her. How lovely it had been to share her burdens with someone else, to lean on him for comfort and support when she had been feeling overwhelmed.
For so long, Rosie had struggled through everything alone. She had forgotten how wonderful it felt to share her fears and her pain with someone else for a while.
Simply seeing him again in the auditorium, hair slightly messed as he gazed at her with a smile of welcome, sent butterflies spiraling through her.
Nancy waved vigorously to them and gestured to the empty seats beside them. Rosie knew she ought to pick a seat somewhere else, somewhere far away from Andrew Morgan, with his afternoon shadow and his comforting shoulders and the scent of pine and new books that clung to him.
“Oh look. There’s Nancy and Andrew. Looks like they have room for us on their row,” Emma said, plucking the choice out of Rosie’s hands.