Page 33 of Stuck With the Billionaire Grump

Which is good, because I feel shaky and strange and confused.

And I can’t stop thinking about Lucy. In a bad way.

In a good way, too.

I just need to go for a run or something. A long jog down the beach should clear my mind and make everything inside my head go back to normal. I’m certain of it.

Except, even as I lace up my running shoes and head out the back door of the cottage, my thoughts drift back to the guy I saw Lucy conversing rather intimately with after the basement situation. I don’t know him, but it looked like they knew each other really well. He was even stroking the sleeve of her jumpsuit, as if he often has the privilege of touching her.

For some reason, that bothered me.

It’s stupid.

I’m stupid.

This whole situation is stupid.

I start running the second my feet hit the sand. Lucy might be pretty and charming and oddly fascinating, but there’s no point in letting myself get all confused about my feelings for her. She’s just someone I knew as a kid. Someone who rarely smilesor laughs when I’m near her, despite the fact that she offers up those smiles and laughs to everyone else so freely.

She’s better off with that guy she was talking to. He’d make her happy. I’d just make her miserable. Clearly, that’s really all I’m good for where Lucy is concerned.

That shouldn’t bother me. It really shouldn’t.

But, no matter how fast I race down the coastline, I can’t outrun the fact that I am, indeed, very bothered.

Chapter Eleven: Lucy

“Did you guys hear old man Beaufort passed away last weekend?” says Tasha, leaning back against the couch cushions as she unfolds a Korean face mask and smooths it onto her face.

“That’s a cheerful topic for a slumber party,” replies Sam—or rather, Mayor Dechaine—with a sarcastic snort. She doesn’t look very Mayor-like at the moment, though, considering she’s in a bright pink pajama set.

In fact, we’re all in matching, brightly-colored pajamas. Even though we technically had the J-and-E B-B-B, I planned for this final low-key bachelorette event to take place the night before the wedding so that we could all enjoy some much-needed girly time after the chaos of this past week. One last final farewell to Josie’s single life, even though we’ll definitely still be having slumber parties until we’re old and wrinkly.

“Isn’t gossiping, like, a key part of slumber parties?” Mabel adds to the conversation.

“Who is old man Beaufort?” asks Brittany, mine and Josie’s cousin from Pennsylvania. She’s a small business owner just likeus, but didn’t hesitate to take time off to drive all the way out to the Cape for the wedding festivities.

“Roger Beaufort,” Amy clarifies for her. “He owns Beaufort Manor.”

That clearly means nothing to Brittany, who didn’t grow up in Mermaid Shores, so Amy’s twin, Ruby, jumps in to explain.

“It’s a huge estate out on the cliffs, not far from Blakeley Manor.”

“It’s not nearly as well-maintained as Blakeley, though,” Amy adds.

Ruby gives her sister a disapproving look. “Well, he’s just one old man. I don’t think he has any family. Meanwhile, the Linworths have been taking care of Blakeley as part of a team effort for over a century. There aretonsof Linworths.”

“My mom, for example,” Tasha chimes in.

Ruby grins at her. “Exactly. How is your mom, by the way? I’m in New York so much that I can hardly stay up to date with everyone back home.”

Tasha shakes her head and waves off Ruby’s question. “She’s fine. Same old Greta. Still trying to perfect the art of homemade vegan cheese.”

“Hey, at least she doesn’t give up on her goals,” replies Ruby with a shrug.

“Wait, can we circle back to Beaufort?” Mabel pipes up while she arranges an array of sugary snacks—all courtesy of Gigi Lee—on the coffee table. “If the old man has passed away, what will happen to the manor?”

That puzzles all of us. Mr. Beaufort was a notorious hermit. He came to this town as a tourist in the eighties, purchased the historic manor, renamed it after himself, and has been here ever since. Despite that, he’s rarely been seen around town, even during the off season when the tourists empty out and this place gets calm and quiet for a few months.

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