It Takes Heart Page 6

  Chet and Tammy rattled off their to-do lists.

  Brandon checked his watch. “I want to see what’s under all this wood. Can you stay, Mike?”

  “Can’t. I’ve got to check on my crew. But I’ve got your digits. I’ll text about tomorrow.”

  “I’ll stay,” Geneva said. “Bran, you and I have to get our schedule straight.”

  Brandon inwardly groaned.

  “Sounds good. Go team.” Chris raised a hand, and they each slapped him a high five. When it came to Bran’s turn, Chris’s smile widened. “C’mon, brother. This is how we do it here.”

  After a beat, Brandon slapped his brother’s palm. Still, doubt remained; despite being 100 percent qualified for this job, he wasn’t sure how he could actually do it with Geneva around.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Geneva shut the door behind Mike, Chris, Chet, and Tammy and turned after a momentary but shallow breath to herself—the darn smell—only to find that Brandon wasn’t in the room.

  “Brandon?”

  She walked out of the accordion doors onto the balcony. Her hair flew upward with a gust of wind, damp from the last bit of rain she had driven through in her golf cart.

  Earlier, after Brandon had walked away from the lunch tent, Geneva had retreated back to her beach house. Seeing and speaking to him had affected her exactly as she’d thought it would—it had shaken her up. She’d never seen such blankness in his eyes. Shy Brandon, easygoing even in the most tense moments, had been angry at her.

  Had she expected anger? Yes. Had she expected to care? No? Yes?

  Turned out, Geneva cared a lot. In fact, it had lit a fire under her behind.

  She’d taken out one of her two trusty black duffels; she’d thrown her clothes into it. She’d gathered her work items and stuffed them into her messenger bag.

  Her focus had shifted to any place but Heart Resort and Brandon’s judgment.

  Because Brandon . . . he was today as he had been four years ago: a reflection. He mirrored back the past, when they were children and then lovers. Geneva didn’t want to be held back.

  But the Traveler’s notebook, open on the kitchen table, had given her pause.

  It takes two.

  She’d thumbed the other old notebook open and come upon a box she’d checked when she’d arrived at Heart Resort: Live next to the ocean. Her thoughts had flown to Beatrice. And Chris, who’d advised her on her finances when she’d started Harris Interiors; Gil, who’d connected her with trustworthy people when she’d lived in Los Angeles for a short time.

  And Brandon . . .

  She couldn’t leave Heart Resort, even with him there. She might be a rolling stone, but she knew what she was made of. The Pusos were part of her chosen family.

  Geneva found Brandon around the corner, on the deck’s east side. He was facing out, leaning forward onto the railing on his elbows. And though on the drive to Hinga she’d bolstered herself for this talk—because they would need to get this out of the way—she wasn’t adequately prepared.

  Because seeing his outline against the sky took her breath away.

  It had been a long four years.

  She halted at the building’s corner and braced herself against the wood. After a beat she called out, “Hey.”

  “Hey,” he said, out to the empty space in front of him.

  “Can I come closer?”

  “You’re asking now?”

  Ouch. She let out a breath. She wasn’t sure if she deserved that, but she would let it go. She approached him and mimicked his stance, feeling the cool wood against her arms. When she looked over, straight on to his profile, what rushed back was familiarity and nostalgia, the memory of the bar at Chris and Eden’s wedding.

  What also surged back was need, a geyser unearthed.

  She flipped around so her back was to the railing. She let out a slow, deep breath and imagined that need transforming itself into a force field to protect her heart. Because she was staying, and she couldn’t let herself fall into this.

  “I did see you this morning, next to Ligaya,” she said.

  “You didn’t want to show yourself then?”

  She half laughed, more to herself, remembering her kerfuffle with the universe, the bargaining with her heart, her apologia in staying. If only it were as easy as it sounded. “I was hoping I could get out of here without you seeing me.”

  His face sported a grimace. “That’s funny and not funny, especially since you were the one who left without saying goodbye.”

  Shame rode up her spine, but if there was one thing she hated, it was revisionist history. She hated it more than reliving the past; with the real truth, no matter how painful, one could simply look forward and move on. “That fight was our goodbye. And before that fight you knew the plan. You and I made the plan.”

  “There were a lot of changes and nuances to the initial plan we made.”

  “And you can’t expect for me to read your mind. You said you didn’t want anything serious. You said I needed to go.” Inwardly, she winced. You need to go had been his words, verbatim, and had been an unequivocal directive. He hadn’t minced his words, and it had ground her heart to bits.

  “I called you after you left, Geneva.”

  “Why would I have wanted to take your call when you made it clear that I didn’t belong there?” Snippets of their last night ran through her mind. The final fight, the harsh words they’d said to one another. Geneva had heard once that fights were a protective measure to push away the people one cared about to keep from getting hurt. That fight? It was a shove toward the other side of an impenetrable boundary.

  “Can we not rehash?”

  “That’s absolutely fine with me,” she spat out. It was fine enough. Whether or not they talked about it—or whether or not she wanted to make sure he remembered what the real story was—it wouldn’t change what they were facing now. She eased her tone. “But, we need to talk about us . . . and our current situation. Yes, earlier, when I saw you, I thought the first thing I should do was leave, but in thinking twice, I couldn’t. I would do anything for Beatrice, and really for your entire family. I’m only here for a couple of weeks. Surely there’s a way that we can make this work, maybe stay out of each other’s way?”

  Brandon laughed, face rising to meet the sun. “Oh man—stay out of each other’s way? There is no staying out of each other’s way with Pusos. You heard Ate Bea—there are Friday dinners. Heck, all of our dinners are planned, I bet. And frankly, our work overlaps. Someone’s going to pick up on what’s going on—”

  “No one’s going to pick up on what happened, in the past, especially if we don’t talk about it,” she emphasized. “I propose . . .” If she didn’t say the words right then, she might change her mind. If Brandon was still the same man, he would think about her next words. “That we work together because it’s in the best interest of your family. I don’t need to be in your space. We can work our schedules so if I need to be on site, I’ll send you a text to let you know. Heck, we can even share a calendar. We’ll need to meet and coordinate, and yes, Friday dinners, of course, but we can be deliberate.”

  Finally, Brandon looked at her.

  Score. She moved on. “I also propose that yes, we lie low while we’re here. Two weeks is two weeks. Thirteen days, actually, before I’m back on the plane and minding my own business. I won’t even be here for the grand opening—if I have the days mapped out, I’m leaving the day before. I’ll be watching it from my phone when your sister decides to livestream it, because you know she will.” The thought of the grand opening, of her friend’s joy, brought a smile to her face. All this effort would be worth it.

  Finally, he faced her. “You would do that?”

  “I would. Look around, Brandon. All of this belongs to your family. The private waterline, this resort. What did my mom say? ‘Buying a home means owning the land, the ground below it, and the spirit above it.’ It took my parents so long to buy that town house in Annapolis. I knew thei
r pride. And you four? This is your parents’ dreams, incarnate. I remember how they wanted the best for you all, and they worked so hard.” She conjured a vision of Tita Marilyn and Tito Joe, wise and gentle. Tears pricked her eyelids at the memory of them with her parents; they’d had a bond that Geneva had thought was indestructible. “A lot happened between you and me, but that was four years ago. The faster we can get this all done, the faster we get back to where we need to be.”

  Finally, he nodded. “Okay, I’m in.” He met her eyes. In them, she saw her own conflicted emotions.

  Because this tension between them? It was something. And it could grow to more, if they both weren’t careful. Already, being this close to Brandon, she had the itch to wave the white flag, to get down on her knees, to apologize.

  But, as much as Brandon didn’t want to admit it, their breakup had been a two-person decision. He’d had a hand in it, too; now, hindsight was as clear as their current view. They weren’t meant to last.

  Geneva and Brandon were, at the core, seeking the opposite. Geneva chased adventure, the future; Brandon had his feet planted firmly in the past, and in Annapolis. In order to work on Heart Resort together, they would need to remember this difference.

  A flash of light in her periphery took Geneva’s attention, and she turned toward it. A camera was directed at them from below, on the surf. “What the h—”

  “Hey! It’s just me!” Tammy waved. “It’s picture perfect with the sun shining on you both against the clapboard!” She gave them a thumbs-up and an exaggerated wink. “How about one more?”

  Geneva spun so her back was to Tammy, her heavy thoughts about Brandon pushed aside. “I didn’t know there were going to be pictures.”

  “It’s no big deal, just candids for the website and socials,” he said. “Anyway, she’s gone now.”

  Geneva turned. “Yeah . . . I’m not a fan. Do you know how much we’re exposed on the net? Our personal lives, our locations. Stalking is already a normal, accepted act. The very least I can do is keep my face—”

  “Okay,” he interrupted. “Enough with the soliloquy.”

  “It’s not a soliloquy. I don’t even post pictures of myself on social media.” Privacy was precious, and social media never did serve its purpose in the end. Yes, it was a mode of communication, for networking, but it was also a tool that kept people in the past, stuck on their devices, full of regret.

  “All right, Geneva. I get it.”

  His tone pulled her back to the present. She was unraveling, which was exactly what she’d done four years ago. Which also meant their time was up. She stuck out a hand. “Give me your phone, Brandon.”

  “Why?”

  “You’ll need my new number.” Once he handed his phone over, she entered her contact information. “There you go. You have my digits. You know where I live.” She took a step back, now wanting space between them. With this offer laid out, her angst was replaced by eagerness. Her to-do list materialized in her head.

  She turned to walk away, then hesitated. She couldn’t let one last thing go. “Brandon?”

  He looked up from his phone. “Yeah?”

  “We agreed to keep our relationship a secret from your family those years ago because we didn’t want to cause any drama. We lied to them, and thank God, because we ended up breaking up. But I want to make it clear: I never once lied to you.”

  And before she allowed herself to fall into another conversation with him, she marched into the studio, the front door her destination.

  Geneva’s phone buzzed in her pocket as her golf cart rumbled out of Hinga’s parking lot. Nita.

  “I swear you have a sixth sense,” Geneva said, driving onto the main road. Her destination was Halik, a house on the northwest side of the island. Like its name suggested, it needed a kiss of pizzazz. Its initial pictures had depicted a dreary interior with dark-wood everything and without touches of color. Her plan was to paint a bright accent color against the back wall before its furniture arrived the next day.

  “You might end up cursing me for it,” Nita said.

  “Give it to me.”

  “The truck carrying the furniture? You won’t believe it, but it caught on fire.”

  Geneva veered onto the side of the road. “Say that again?”

  “It was part of a multivehicle accident just out of Tallahassee.”

  Geneva leaned back in the seat and shut her eyes. This can’t be happening. “No.”

  “Yes. I’m sorry. And, I called the warehouse, and unfortunately, they only have about half the items we need, and they won’t be able to get them on a truck until the end of the week. The rest will take at least two weeks to get to Heart Resort.”

  “No, that won’t do.” That would run into her deadline for the grand opening; it might prevent her from heading to Helena’s B and B on time. It was out of the question, especially with Brandon here. Geneva had planned to utilize the heck out of their shared calendar to keep distance between them; in truth, seeing one another would be unavoidable.

  Their first conversation had been bad enough.

  After putting Nita on speaker, she clicked onto her files on her phone and ran through the house names. Their images flashed in her head. “Have them send what they have. If you can email me a list of what those are, I can try to supplement with what I can find locally.”

  “Already done. It’s on our shared drive.”

  “Thank you. You’re fantastic. Are you sure you don’t want to work for me full time? Do I really need to share you?” What had been the to-do list in her head scrambled as priorities realigned.

  “All of this talent cannot be contained.” Nita laughed. “In truth, I just channel your motto. ‘Nothing stands in the way of Harris Interiors.’”

  “You are absolutely right.” Buoyed now by her assistant’s reminder that she was capable and determined, and that every minute counted, Geneva said, “All right. I need to get off this resort and find some furniture. Talk soon.” After she hung up, she looked back at Hinga, where Brandon was probably brooding.

  And this was why she’d always stayed in constant motion—in her business, where she was the sole proprietor, it was all up to her.

  Geneva pressed the gas on her golf cart and turned right toward the entrance of the resort. She passed a resort employee; he raised a hand. “Slow down! Ten miles an hour!”

  She eased her foot’s pressure on the gas. Geneva sipped her breaths to allow for her heart to slow.

  This is going to be hard.

  And it wasn’t just about finding furnishings. Could she and Brandon work together?

  Geneva arrived at the front reception building at the entrance of the resort, where five white resort vans were parked side by side, along with three personal vehicles; one she recognized was Gil’s minivan for the girls. One of those white vans would be her best bet to get her to Nags Head, so she checked into the building, where she was greeted by the wonderfully frigid AC.

  Geneva recognized Sal Medina, head of security, who’d picked her up from the airport the other day. She exhaled with relief. In that short ride, they’d bonded; she’d found out he was of Brazilian descent and one of the resort’s first employees—he’d known the original owners of the peninsula. He was tanned brown from the sun and had more salt than pepper in his hair. He was sitting next to a sandy-haired, pink-cheeked younger woman also in a Heart Resort shirt, with a name tag that read Rhiannon G.

  Surely one of them could help her. “Afternoon. I was wondering if I could borrow one of the vans?”

  Sal’s eyebrow plunged. “I’m not able to give you the keys, but we can definitely assist. Where would you like to go?”

  “Nags Head.”

  “Where in Nags Head?”

  “Actually, hold on.” Feeling sheepish—she had been in a rush—she pulled up her phone. Nita had already texted her two furniture stores that might have stock. “I’m looking for boutiques and home stores. And I have these two places I need to go to.” She zoo
med in on her phone and turned it around so Sal could read it.

  Sal tilted his head back and peered through his glasses. “Hmm.” He passed the phone to Rhiannon.

  “Yes, ma’am. I know exactly where that is,” Rhiannon said in a southern accent. “I live in Nags Head, and shopping’s my jam. I can even take you someplace better than those two stores.” She did a double take with Sal. “That is, if that’s okay with you, Mr. Medina. It’s only ten miles away.”

  “Yes, of course.” He moved to hand her the keys, but a strange look passed over his face. Geneva watched the interaction but forgot about it as Rhiannon stood. “But remember . . .”

  “Yes sir, I know.” Rhiannon opened the door for Geneva. “I’ll drive safely.”

  “What’s going on?” Geneva asked as she followed Rhiannon to the van. The doors popped open, and Geneva climbed in.

  Rhiannon buckled her seat belt. “Oh, Mr. Medina thinks I have a lead foot. Which I don’t. He’s got a skewed sense of speed because he drives mostly on the resort.”

  Geneva snorted. “God, if he saw the way I was speeding in the cart earlier.”

  “I know, right?” She placed the gear in reverse and glanced at Geneva. “Ready?”

  Geneva hadn’t been ready. Nags Head was only ten miles away, but in those short eight minutes—yes, eight—she lost ten years of her life. Rhiannon was not only a speed demon but also a swerver; she tailgated and wove, as if to instigate the car in front of her, all on the two-lane road.

  Geneva all but kissed the ground when she disembarked from the van.

  “Here we are,” Rhiannon said, arms out. “Everything you ever need is in that magical place.”

  Geneva gazed upon the ramshackle barnlike building in front of them. There wasn’t a store sign to be seen, nor was the parking lot marked by lines. She’d expected a bona fide building of a large furniture chain. She wouldn’t even have minded an outlet mall where there was, at the very least, a Pottery Barn where she could order multiples of everything. “Um, where are we?”