Page 66 of Be My Reason

“Um, so are we good?” he yells after me. “Do you want me out?”

I turn and yell back,“No, Ryan. You are a great partner and I do think you have a good heart—at least for those of us you call family. Just don’t screw up again.”

I leave him standing on the beach and go up to shower. But first I have to send a text to Nate.

Me:I’m coming home, can we talk? Are you still there?

My heart surges when almost immediately he responds.

Nate:I never left, baby.

Chapter Twenty-six

Driving back from the coast, I think about how to make my apology to Nate. This is new territory for me. Flowers seem too girly. A card seems too cheap. He has to know it is sincere and from my heart.

Thirty minutes later, I’m climbing the stairs to our apartment, my hands full of two chocolate shakes and a couple of orders of fries from the same place we went on our night in high school. I’m so nervous. I know, based on the tone of the last text he sent me, that he probably won’t leave me or anything that drastic. But I’m terrified of his reaction and have come fully prepared to grovel.

Nate quietly watches me cross the room over to where he sits on the couch. I place my offering on the table before him and he eyes them with pursed lips and then raises his eyebrows at me.

I sit on the couch next to him and angle my body towards him, taking a calming breath. “Nate, I can’t begin to tell you how terrible I feel for not trusting you. You were right the whole time. Not about Ryan’s feelings for me—he doesn’t want me—but about the bakery. He was planning on selling franchises. He was planning it from the very beginning.”

Nate cocks his head to the side, staring me down, inviting me to continue the apology.

“He even said that he orchestrated the contract so that he could legally get away with it even though he told me that wasn’t his plan when I took him on. You should know that what you saw that day, on his kitchen table, those were the franchise negotiations that he was going to destroy. You see, he changed his mind. He changed it months ago when we became such good friends that he didn’t want to screw me over.”

Nate looks bored with my apology so I decide to throw in some more groveling. “I am so sorry I didn’t trust you. I just thought because you don’t like him, that you. . . well, it doesn’t matter because I was wrong. I was so wrong and you were right and I promise to trust your instincts in the future. Well, not about him wanting me, but about other stuff . . . ” I trail off feeling like I’m rambling on when I look up to see a smirk on Nate’s face and I can tell he is trying to suppress a laugh.

“What?” I ask, confused about his reaction.

“Um . . .” He smiles up at me sheepishly. “Emma kind of called me and told me the whole story this morning. I guess she didn’t want me to high-tail it out of here without talking to you first.”

I throw afrench fry at him. “You idiot.” I smile. “You let me go on and on like that when you knew the whole time?”

“Well. . . yes.” He shrugs. “It’s such a rare occasion thatyouare apologizing tome, that I figure I should milk it for all it’s worth.” He reaches over to take my hand. “I still don’t trust the guy. And, Brooklyn, you should make him sign a new contract.”

“I know, and he said he will,” I assure him.

He nods his head.

“But, Nate, we still need to work on some of our issues.” I squeeze his hand. “I mean, first you shut me out and run away because you didn’t trust me with your feelings and then I needed space because I didn’t trust that you were being straight with me.”

He reaches over and pulls my face around to his. “I know I screwed up, baby. I’m sorry I hurt you when I left. My head was messed up and I wasn’t thinking about anything but myself.”

Over shakes and fries, he talks to me about his mom and I realize that it was her, as much as it was Claudia, who screwed him up so badly.Fucked up by two women, he once told me. All this time, I thought the words of his tattoo were in French because of his ex-wife. Now I know they also bear the scars from his mother.

“So, is this okay? Are we okay?” he asks, pushing a piece of my hair behind my ear.

“Yes, we’re okay.” I reach out to run my fingers across his strong jaw.

He kisses the palm of my hand.

“But, there will be ground rules,” I say.

His eyes go wide and he smiles up at me with a raised eyebrow.

I whack him in the back of the head. “Notthoseground rules, you idiot.Myground rules.”

“Anything.You name it.” He pulls me onto his lap.

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