Page 11 of Story Of My Heart

As Tate finishes up with Fallon, I notice a woman approaching us with a confident stride. She’s tall, with long blonde hair that catches the light, casting a golden hue around her like some kind of ethereal halo. Her eyes are a vibrant green, sparking with warmth and intelligence. I can’t help but feel slightly intimidated by her poised appearance.

“Tate, it’s been too long!” she exclaims, her voice carrying a melodious tone that fills the space with friendliness.

Tate turns and his face breaks into a wide smile. “Daisy! You’re looking as stunning as ever. How have you been?”

“Busy, but good.” Daisy turns her gaze to me. She extends a hand, her smile bright. “I’m Daisy, the manager here at the resort. It’s so nice to meet you.”

“Piper.” I take her hand, feeling the warmth of her grasp. “Nice to meet you, too, Daisy. Tate has told me a lot about you.”

Daisy laughs lightly, a sound that seems to fit perfectly with her sunny disposition. “Only good things, I hope. Tate and I go way back. I also knew his brother, Hudson, quite well. We grew up together here.”

Tate nods, a hint of nostalgia flickering across his features. “Daisy was practically part of the family. Still is.”

I smile, watching the easy exchange between old friends. It’s clear Daisy holds a special place here, and her connection to Tate—and even the elusive Hudson—adds another layer to the rich tapestry of relationships at the resort. I can’t wait to find out more about what makes my boss tick throughout our days here.

By the time we’ve made it to our particular cabin, I’m certain that everyone on the property has been made aware that Tate has returned to Sunset Lake, with a girlfriend in tow, from the excitement radiating off of Fallon when she looked in our general direction. The whole town will know by the time they’ve all gathered around the dinner table, I’m sure of it.

Opening the door to our accommodations, I have to laugh to stop myself from screaming. They’re the sort of thing a seasoned realtor would describe as quaint. Not that they aren’t nice. The cabin is charmingly decorated without being tacky, the bathroom is outfitted with some gorgeous hand-painted tiles that Fallon had mentioned as being by a local artist, and there is a wonderful amount of natural light streaming in through the windows. The bed itself looks amazingly comfortable, and is made up like a fluffy mountain range. But therein lies the problem. Bed. Singular. There isn’t a lot of room around it either. There is nowhere inside the four walls for privacy. And…

Only. One. Bed.

This cabin is meant for either one individual or for a very close and intimate pair. Given my hastily concocted cover story, Fallon wouldn’t have any reason to provide us with anything else. I’m sure she thought she was helping and setting the stage for some vacation romance on this very long weekend.

Setting my suitcase on the mattress, I kick off my shoes and take a cautious seat on top of the comforter, waiting with bated breath to see where Tate decides to position himself. To my relief, he opts for the small sofa on the opposite wall.

“I was so determined to not come down here in person if I didn’t have to. I really fought Oscar on coming to check the place out myself,” he groans, swinging his legs onto the couch and settling his feet onto the arm. “But I’m starting to be happy that I did. This place looks nothing like how it used to. I know Oscar would chalk it up to the rose-colored glasses of childhood nostalgia, but believe me, I have never felt anything of the sort. I can see now why Mom was so panicked. Dad really was mismanaging this place right into the ground, and it’s not fair to put the burden on Ledger to turn the ship around all on his own. I’ve already got a list of at least fifteen things that need to be fixed up or tossed out just from our brief walk through the front door. I can’t imagine what things look like behind the scenes. Like with the actual mechanicals.”

He makes a rough hand gesture toward me, one that I’ve come to understand quite well over the years. Unclasping the front pocket of my messenger bag, I grab a black Moleskine and the travel case for his favorite Montblanc, tossing them gently his way. As he starts scribbling, I’m struck by the realization that he isn’t panicking about the other much bigger elephant in the very tiny room. In fact, he hasn’t mentioned it at all. His mind is reeling, so I don’t even think it’s hit him yet.

“Tate. I appreciate your investment in your… investment. However, I think we need to talk about the other thing.”

“What other thing?” he asks, eyes never leaving his notes.

“The girlfriend thing?” I remind him with an incredulous tilt of my head.

“Ah. Yeah. That.” Tate’s pen stops, hovering in midair. He taps the end against his lips in thought, then shrugs. “I guess we just wing it. I apologize for not coming up with something in advance.”

“I’m not winging it. We need to set boundaries, or this is going to get weird. Fast.”

“Alright. Fine.” He caps his pen with a sigh, closing the notebook and setting them both neatly on the floor. Bringing a hand to his jaw, he massages his beard. “The family already thinks of me as standoffish about being touched. I’ve never been a touchy-feely, cuddly sort of guy. So we don’t need to do anything on the PDA front. And frankly, I think you know me well enough to answer any questions they may have or play along with any jokes about me. It’s not like we’re strangers. We’ll just say you’re a woman from my building—which is true—and go from there.”

“Okay … I guess.” He’s right on several fronts. I don’t think I’ll have any problem faking my way through this. I’m not particularly worried about myself, however. “What are you going to do if they ask any questions about me?”

As I ready my hair for a loose braid, the casual domesticity of the moment strikes me. It’s a sharp contrast to the edgy lines of our usual interactions, confined within the walls of offices and structured meetings. Here, in this shared vulnerability of night routines, something shifts, subtly but irrevocably. Despite the simplicity of the action, it feels intimate, a shared moment that doesn’t fit neatly into the employee-employer checkboxes. Maybe it’s the softness of the hour, or the way his words hang between us, but as I meet his reflection in the mirror, I can’t help but feel that we’re tiptoeing around something deeper, something potentially messy. It’s as if standing here, in the quiet before the storm, we’re both on the brink of acknowledging something that could shift everything. And yet, we hold back, because some truths, once spoken, can’t be unheard.

“I know how you take your coffee. That’s a start.” Tate offers. The grin on his face fades the longer he looks at me, and the realization that he doesn’t know very much about me at all starts to settle in. “Why girlfriend? You couldn’t be my platonic best friend?”

“Who brings a platonic best friend to meet the family over a long weekend? Especially one of the opposite sex?” I counter, still in utter disbelief that I have to spell this out for him. “And what average guy would bring their assistant, let alone have an assistant, Mr. Secret Billionaire?”

He raises his hands, conceding to my point. Looking at him sitting there on the couch, a grown man running his own multi-million dollar company, I have to wonder about the bigger picture.

“And more importantly, how have you made it this many years and never had a serious girlfriend?”

He swallows, straightening his shoulders in indignation. “I don’t believe in love, so what would be the point?”

“You don’t believe in love,” I repeat his statement dumbly, rolling the words around on my tongue. “That’s a lot to unpack. You designed a dating app.”

Tate wags a finger at me in defiance. “That was for my thesis, remember? Besides, my intention was to definitively prove, once and for all, that there’s no such thing as romantic love.”

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