Page 68 of Forgotten

Sandwiches were passed out, and Tamara and Logan decided to eat theirs outside. Flynn took his and said he was heading down to the ranch to get some sleep, and everyone agreed it was fine to leave me alone if Charlotte was there. Provided, of course, I didn’t try to get up and walk anywhere without help this time.

I pulled myself back up onto the bed, physically pulling my legs up so they crossed and letting Charlotte get on the other end. A platter of sandwiches sat between us, and the root beer sat on the table beside us, still somehow cold to the touch. We ate in relative silence for a few minutes, simply enjoying each other’s company, until I’d polished off one sandwich and was halfway through another and she was just finishing her first.

“Man, that’s just as good as I remember,” she said.

“Yeah, Madie’s granddaughter seems to have picked right up from the original,” I said. “I went there a couple weeks ago and was stunned at how similar it felt.”

“Well, I’m just glad Foley has something to draw people to it again. I remember people used to come from all over for Madie’s sandwiches.”

“Yup,” I said. “Lord knows we made the twenty-minute drive all the time. Dad practically lived on them when Mom died.”

An unexpected pang of pain went through my heart and I tried to shake it off. It had been a long time since I’d let myself think of those dark months after she passed and Dad tried to figure out how to survive with five boys. It wasn’t easy, but there were some rare bright spots. Carrying little Owen around and bringing him to the tiny park that used to be beside Madie’s after we all ate lunch there a couple times a week was one of them.

“So that actually brings me to something I wanted to talk to you about,” she said.

“All right.”

“I was thinking, we’re going to make a really serious go of this, right? Like, no fooling around, we’re going to be a couple and try to make it work. Right?”

It was the first time either of us had addressed our future, and though the question was serious, I couldn’t help but grin.

“Damn right,” I said.

She returned my grin with a smile. “Right. So I was thinking, it might be a little difficult if I am in Dallas or Houston or wherever all the time. Like, that might make being in a real relationship rather difficult.”

“Sure,” I said. “But we could make it work.”

“I think we could,” she said. “That’s not what I’m saying. What I’m saying is, at least for the beginning, I think it would be a lot better if I were in town more. Like, here.”

“Home? In Foley?”

She nodded. “I was thinking about taking a leave of absence… or maybe even quitting my job.”

“No way,” I said. “Absolutely not. You love your job. Don’t quit because of me. I wouldn’t be able to live with knowing you did that.”

“No, no, stop,” she said. “Hear me out.”

“All right,” I said.

“I was thinking, and I might be crazy, but, I’ve been around the hotel game for a long time, right? I know all the ins and outs. As a matter of fact, I’ve probably got more experience from the bottom to the top of the hotel industry than just about anyone my age does in the country, if not more. So…”

“So…”

“So I was thinking, what’s one thing this town really needs?”

“Fewer Andersons,” I joked.

“Besides that,” she said, rolling her eyes playfully. I shrugged. She dipped her hand into her bag and pulled out one of the extra-long pickles and took a bite. “A hotel.”

“Wait, what?”

“I want to see if I can do it on my own,” she said. “Run a hotel, that is. And Louisa County needs one. We have that rundown truck stop a mile out of the county, but ever since the old Louisa Lodge shut down when I was a kid, there hasn’t been a real hotel in town. What if I were to open one?”

“I think it’s a hell of an idea,” I said. “I just worry there won’t be enough clientele. Who wants to visit Foley?”

“Well, there’s Madies,” she said. “And I heard something about Collin wanting to start some kind of dude ranch experience.”

“Heh, yeah there is that,” I said, shaking my head at the long-sought plan by Collin to convince Luke that turning part of the ranch into a tourist destination was good for everyone.

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