Dear God, he was still wearing his wedding ring. His wife was dead, several years now, and he was still wearing her ring. It was sweet, really. When you think about it in the abstract. And kind. And good. But as the person he was currently holding, it was also unnerving. And a little strange. And exactly what I needed to see to remind me of yet another reason why this just couldn’t happen.
He nuzzled my neck and with a strength I didn’t know I had, I pushed him away. “I’ll send you that email, put all those ideas together. Then how about we meet in the conference room this afternoon? Start making some real plans?” I scooped up his hands and gave them a squeeze, but moved them safely away from me. It was harder to think clearly when there was actual touching involved.
He looked puzzled. “You’re leaving . . . now?”
I didn’t want to. Jesus Christ, I didn’t want to, which is why I knew I should. I also didn’t trust myself to actually answer, so I nodded instead. He looked like he wanted to argue with me, to try to get me to stay . . . but in the end nodded back. This wasn’t going to happen. It couldn’t.
“Why don’t you go out first, I’ll wait here a bit,” he suggested, straightening his tie.
“Sneaky,” I chided. “But a good idea. Don’t forget about switching my room, though.”
“Your room?” he asked, confused.
“My new suite, remember? I expect a TV in there, by the way.”
“No TV.”
“Goddammit,” I muttered.
I heard him laugh as I peeked into the hallway and made sure it was all clear. By the time I made it to the staircase, the lump in my throat was long gone. I was an expert at squashing it all down. I’d been doing it my entire life.
“You never call, you never write, it’s like you’ve forgotten all about me.”
“When have I ever written you?”
“An actual letter? Never. But an email every now and again might be nice, just so I know you haven’t fallen off the mountaintop.”
“I haven’t fallen off the mountaintop.”
“Well, that’s a start,” Barbara said, and we both laughed. “I know when you first dig in at a new property you tend to go radio silent.”
“You know me, you know me very well,” I replied, feeling my grin spread across my face. No one on the planet, not even Roxie and Natalie sometimes, knew me like my boss did. Friends got some of you, most of you, but when you spend forty hours a week with someone, they see everything. And she could read me like a book. I don’t rely on much in this world, but knowing I had someone like Barbara in my corner was a constant that I needed in my life.
And knowing me like she did, she knew I could handle things on my own and gave me a very long leash. I just had to check in from time to time which, when buried in my work, I had a tendency to forget to do.
“Sorry I’ve been MIA, I meant to throw up a flare so you knew I was still breathing.”
“No big, but now that I’ve got you, how are things going, kiddo?”
“I should have an actual status report ready to email to you tomorrow, but so far, so good. Really good, actually. Full swing, all systems firing, green across the board.”
“What’s wrong.” A statement, not a question, from my boss was never a good thing.
“What do you mean?”
“When you start in with your mission control lingo I know something’s up. Spill.”
I bit my lip. Whatever could be up? I’m only making out with the man who hired me whenever we can steal a few minutes away, the man who will ultimately decide whether I’d done a good job or not, the man who holds the fate of my partnership in his hands while I’m dying to hold something else in my hands, whatever could be up?
“It’s all good, Barbara, I just get carried away sometimes. They were showing SpaceCamp in the TV room the other night.”
“Mm-hmm,” she said, not buying it for a second. “How’s the Bryant family doing?”
“Pretty good, I think. Some resistance at first, especially from the son, but he’s on board now.”
I heard her shuffling some papers. “Archibald, right?”
I stifled a laugh. I’d have to ask him about that later. “He goes by Archie, but yes. He’s playing ball now.”
“That’s good. How fast do you think you can wrap this up?”
I frowned. “Um, we’re just at the very beginning stages, but I’m on track. Why, what’s up?”
“Nothing, nothing’s wrong. Just some stuff going on here at the home office. I’d love to have this locked down sooner rather than later, that’s all.”
Now I wondered what was up. “Is there something I need to know?”
“Oh goodness, no, nothing like that.” She laughed, and I instantly felt better. If Barbara said everything was good, then everything was good. “Just thinking ahead to the fall, trying to line things up. You know me, always planning ahead.”
“Did you ever find out if the Waterside Hotel in Virginia was bringing someone in to consult?”
“I did, and let me tell you that story, it’s a doozy,” she said, and launched into the tale. We chatted for a while and I brought her up to speed on everything going on at the hotel. She made some notes, made some suggestions that were astute as always, and by the end of the conversation I thought she’d forgotten about the beginning of the conversation.
“You take care of yourself up there, and if you ever need to talk, you know you can always talk to me. You know that, right, kiddo?”
“Of course I do,” I assured her, crossing my fingers behind my back. I could, just not about this.
Maybe after I was partner. Then I could tell her. Only after. Until then, I was determined to squash this down.
What I would have an even harder time squashing down was the goose-down featherbed that came standard in my new Tower Lakeside suite! A king bed, four-poster no less, stretched out before a grand fireplace, resplendent in rose marble with ebony inlaid trim. If I stacked my pillows three high I found I could see both the crackling fire and the lake, the very definition of Hudson Valley luxury. Two bedrooms, two bathrooms, two balconies, and one glorious sitting room—this suite had a waiting list a mile long in the summer season. But good luck to anyone on that list. The same three families reserved it all summer long, June through August. They’d been coming here for years, multiple generations vacationed here together, occasionally renting out entire floors of the main tower. I’d seen how much it cost per night; I didn’t need a calculator to know that if they could afford four weeks of that, they deserved to see both fireplace and lake at the same time.
I used one of the bedrooms as my base of operations, asking housekeeping to help me clear out the furniture and move in my heavy artillery. Dry-erase boards, vision boards, a cheese board courtesy of Bailey Falls Creamery, and an entire wall dedicated to parking lot questions . . . the land of questions that hadn’t yet been answered but would be, and soon.
Things were beginning to move up on this mountain. We were still a couple of weeks away from Easter, plenty of time to roll out a few new ideas before the first wave of loyal guests returned.
The team was mostly on board with all the new changes, and Jonathan was ecstatic. He, like Archie, had initial concerns about the price reduction, but I’d eventually won him over, although we were still working out the details. He loved the idea about bringing the town back into the picture, and wondered why they hadn’t done it sooner. “Sometimes when it’s right in front of you, you can’t see it,” he quipped one day while we previewed some of Natalie’s TV spots that would run in the big East Coast markets next week.
Roxie was a big help as well. When she came up to chat with Archie about featuring Zombie Cakes on the dessert menu, the existing pastry chef took one look at her 7 Layer Blueberry Dream Cake and threatened to quit on the spot. The head chef was only too happy to take her resignation—apparently that’d been brewing for quite some time.
“He’s not leaving because of all the changes, is he?” I as
ked Mrs. Toomey when I heard the news. I’d hurried down to the kitchen before the dinner service staff started to find out.
“Mostly no, he’s been thinking of retiring for a while now, but I think he feels this place needs some new blood to take over, someone new in the kitchen who is a little more up-to-date.”
“Oh no, I feel terrible,” I moaned, leaning on the counter with my head in my hands. “I never wanted anyone to feel like they were being pushed out.”
“That’s not what’s happening here, dear, not at all. These changes are good. They needed to be made. The staff is excited, that I can promise you. And I’ll tell you something else,” she said, looking over her shoulder to make sure no one could hear her.
“What?” I asked warily, also looking over my shoulder.
“I haven’t seen Archie this happy since . . . well . . . since . . .”
“Since before his wife died?” I asked, wincing.
She thought a moment, her eyes going soft. “You know, I have to admit, I don’t think I’ve actually ever seen him this happy. And that’s the truth.”
And with that, she turned on her heel and headed back into the dining room.
Huh.
Speaking of Archie, the man was a machine. No no, not like that.
He worked sixteen hours a day. He never stopped. Once I got his buy-in on the changes, he was all in. Something I’d noticed in that very first meeting was proving true. He really valued other people’s opinions, and he listened. That was hard to find sometimes in a boss, but he really went out of his way to make sure the entire team was involved and felt they were being heard.
Had he always worked this hard? Or had work taken over his life since his wife passed away? When there was pain or hurt, or bad memories crowded in, work could be a literal lifeline, taking your mind away from what you couldn’t deal with and channeling it into something good, something tangible.
Was work how he coped too?
One night after dinner, I took a wrong turn and found myself in a part of the hotel I hadn’t been before. Having nowhere to go and not at all tired, I wandered a bit before heading back to my room.
Tucked away at the far end of the east wing, on the first floor down by some of the offices, there was a portrait gallery. Every generation of the Bryant family, starting with paintings of Ebenezer and Theophilus—the brothers who had started it all—hung on the walls. As I walked along the hallway, the same expression reflected back to me in many of the faces. Strong, fearless, patrician, and yet somehow all carefully guarded. No chink in the armor here, no insight into what made any of these folks tick beyond a sense of duty to their family and the life they’d created here on their mountain.
I could see suggestions of Archie here and there, Jonathan too—they all shared some similar features. The elegant jawline, the strong straight nose, the indigo eyes, all clearly noteworthy throughout the family history.
But at the end of the line there was a portrait I hadn’t expected to see, but was unable to tear my eyes away from.
Ashley Bryant. Archie’s wife. She was beautiful.
Icy blond hair, tumbling in soft curls. Gorgeous green eyes, captured by the artist in a tone resembling freshly grown summer grass. She had a warm smile, high cheekbones, and the same easy going “isn’t life grand?” expression that everyone in this family seemed to have.
An image jumped to mind of a picture I had in my apartment, one of the few photographs I’d actually taken the time to frame. Me with Natalie and Roxie after just crossing the finish line in my first-ever Tough Mudder race. Literally covered head to toe in dirt and mud, hay and somehow sunflower petals, I’d finished strong and immediately hugged my friends who’d come to cheer me on, and got them just as dirty as I was. It was one of my favorite pictures of the three of us. I told them I’d framed it because it was a great picture of all of us smiling, and that was true, but I also selfishly loved that picture because it reminded me of how strong I was. Covered in earth and sweat was when I felt the most alive, the most able to conquer anything and everything that got in my way, and whenever I looked at that picture I felt a flickering of pride, an emotion that wasn’t one I experienced often.
Ashley didn’t seem like a woman who’d ever had a hair out of place, a dress that was wrinkled, or forgotten a birthday. She had engraved stationery. She drove an immaculate car. This was a woman who’d lived for a finger sandwich.
None of this I knew for certain, mind you, but I’d been around enough of these types my entire adult life. But she wasn’t snobby. She was likely a genuinely good person, the kind you think you’ll hate immediately, but she’s so darn charming it’s impossible to do so.
I didn’t know her. I barely knew Archie for that matter. But staring at this gorgeous woman, cut down in her prime, I could see she was a perfect match for her husband.
A husband who was still wearing his wedding ring.
I allowed myself another moment to study this seemingly perfect woman, and when I was done tallying up all the many ways I was her total opposite, I went back to my room.
Chapter 12
“Is it weird that there’s this internationally known, highly rated resort twenty minutes from where I grew up and still live, and to this day I’ve never spent a night there?”
I was sitting across from Chad Bowman, town councilman and perpetual high school crush, listening as he told me his impressions of Bryant Mountain House. After meeting him at Callahan’s, we’d made plans to get together to talk about ways Bailey Falls and the resort could help each other out. I’d also wanted to pick his brain on how the town saw the Bryant family, and what they could do to win them back around, as it were.
“It does seem strange,” I agreed, scooping up another bite of my blue-plate special. It made sense that we’d meet at the diner since I’d promised Trudy I’d stop by the next time I was in town. And once I found out the special of the day was chicken and dumplings? Heaven. “But surely you’ve been up there before.”
“My family always made a point of going to their Easter brunch, we never missed that, and then when Logan and I moved back here we’ve gone hiking up there a few times, bought the day pass.”
“Easter brunch. Roxie talked about that too.”
“Oh yeah, everyone brought their kids up there when I was growing up. We always did Easter, sometimes we’d go for the Christmas dinner if my mom didn’t feel like cooking, but we never missed Easter. Egg hunt on the lawn, then brunch with those fucking killer hot cross buns.”
I scribbled in my notebook. “Roxie mentioned those too, they must be really good.”
“If I could figure out how, I’d have those buns in my mouth every single day.”
“Watch your mouth, Chad, this is a family establishment,” Trudy said as she sailed by with a tray of drinks. Ten seconds later she sailed by again, this time whacking him on the head with a stack of menus.
“Trudy, get your mind out of the gutter, you’re as bad as your daughter.” He grimaced, rubbing his head. He looked at me. “You knew what I meant, right?”
I blinked innocently. “All I heard was how much you loved those buns.”
“I’d kill to sink my teeth into a pair of those buns right now . . . ow!”
“What did I just tell you?” Trudy asked, leaning over the back of the booth and leaving a bright pink lipstick–stained kiss on his cheek. She winked at me. “How’re those dumplings?”
“They’re amazing, like light and fluffy balls.”
Chad raised his eyebrows, waiting.
Trudy said nothing.
“You’re not gonna smack her for talking about balls?” he asked.
“Now who’s got their mind in the gutter?” Trudy sang out, exiting stage left but not before landing one more good whack on Chad’s head.
“Honestly, I don’t even know why I come in here anymore,” he grumbled, leaning over the back of the booth and making sure everyone heard him say, “the service is terrible!”
“Sa
ys you!” came the reply from the kitchen, where Trudy had just disappeared through the swinging door.
“Anyway,” he said, pushing away his now-empty plate, “where were we?”
“Buns.”
“Right!” He rubbed his head absently, no doubt still feeling Trudy’s thwap. “The thing is, other than those holidays, it never really felt like the resort was a part of the town. I mean, don’t get me wrong, almost everyone I know has had at least a summer job at one time or another, but it always felt . . . detached from the town itself. It was always filled with rich families who came up to get away and sometimes they’d come down into town and marvel over how adorable our little country hamlet was, but then they’d go back up there and relax in their rocking chairs and play their croquet and have their fancy afternoon tea. Not that there aren’t rich people here in Bailey Falls. And not that we don’t have fancy afternoon tea, because Hattie Mae’s tea shop over on Elm Street serves traditional English cream tea every day at three on the dot. But I don’t know . . .” He sighed, his eyes going a bit dreamy. “Bryant Mountain House always just felt a little too highbrow for me. I can afford to stay there now, but do I really want to? Eh.”
“Eh?”
“Eh. I’ll get around to it. I must admit, I’ve always wondered how it is at nighttime. All those long hallways. Is it creepy?”
I snorted, thinking back to my first few nights there. “A bit. But we’re working on that. And I’m working on a plan to make it more accessible to townsfolk, as I’m calling you all in my head.”
“Makes us sound like characters in a Dickens classic.”
“There’s something very classic about everything up here, the hotel, the town, the people.” I scooped up the last bite of chicken. “The dumplings.”
“Don’t let Roxie hear you, she and Trudy fought for a week when she tried to change that recipe.”
“Change it, why would she change it?”
“She wanted to add kale.”
“No.”
“Yes. Trudy put her foot down.”