Page 94 of Zane

“You’re fortunate to be married to someone who likes to cook,” his mom said with a smile. “Neither Dan nor I are very good cooks, but we get by.”

“I love having Zane here to help with the cooking,” Rori said. “I’m hoping he never leaves.”

Zane wanted to groan at Rori’s words because he just knew his mom was going to jump on them.

“I hope he never leaves too,” his mom said, right on cue.

He glanced at Kelsey and found her watching him, perhaps waiting for his response to that, since it pertained to their future.

“I’m not sure that’s possible, Mom,” Zane said. “You know that.”

His mom nodded. “I know, but a mom can always dream.”

“You should propose your restaurant idea to Kayleigh and Hudson,” Lee said. “Maybe you could open it at the resort.”

“Kayleigh knows about my idea,” Zane told him. “So, if it was a possibility, I’m sure she would have said something already.”

He had a hard time thinking about a future in Serenity because he’d never considered it before. But right then, he had a hard time thinking about a future anywhere. Uncertainty surrounding his health and his marriage made it a challenge to envision his future beyond the next day or so.

“Maybe I should talk to Alexander,” his mom said. “Parent to parent.”

“Mom. Please don’t do that,” Zane protested. “I have no idea what my memory is going to do, so I need to focus on getting healthy before I consider opening a restaurant.”

“That’s true,” his dad said. “You have time to figure it out.”

Zane didn’t necessarily feel that was the case, but he didn’t voice that.

“How is your job going, Kelsey?” his mom asked.

“It’s going well,” Kelsey said.

“Do you enjoy working nights?”

“I’m not sure ifenjoyis the word I’d use. But I’ve worked evenings before, so having a job with hours different from the norm isn’t unusual for me.”

“I remember when Dan and I were both doing our ER residency, and there were times we worked opposite shifts and hardly ever saw each other. It was terrible.”

“In Chicago, Zane and I were fortunate that we worked similar hours at the same restaurant.”

“It wasn’t like that in Tampa?” his mom asked.

Kelsey shook her head. “We were working at two different places. Zane’s restaurant didn’t need a hostess, so I got a job somewhere else.”

“Was that difficult?”

“It was an adjustment, but we made it work. Zane’s days were longer than mine, but I always stayed up until he got home.”

“So you were waiting for him the night of the accident?”

Kelsey nodded, emotion crossing her face. “It was the worst few hours of my life as I was trying to figure out what had happened. I was in denial at first. Telling myself that he wasjust working late, even though his phone showed he’d left the restaurant already.”

“You had tracking on him?” his dad asked.

Kelsey hesitated a moment before answering. “Our phones were set up to show our locations to each other.”

It was a bit weird to listen to Kelsey talk about him. It felt like they were talking about another person who had the same name as him. It was rather surreal.

Zane was still trying to figure out what kind of man he’d become, and he wasn’t entirely sure he was happy with all the changes. It made him not want to regain his memories because he didn’t know what would happen to him. Would he revert to who he’d been, or would this experience bring his priorities back to where they should be?

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