Page 178 of Rewind It Back

“Because I love your son, and I won’t be the reason you two aren’t talking. And when he moves back to Boston, I’m going to be visiting often until I eventually move back here too. It’d be nice if we could be in the same room. For him.”

Her shoulders deflate, then she grabs a second mug to pour another coffee.

She’s not looking at me still. “You cut your hair.”

“I did.”

“Rio’s not with you?”

“He doesn’t know I’m here.”

Finally, she peeks over her shoulder at me.

“If you’re up for it, I’d like to explain myself. And if you don’t want to hear me out, I wrote it all down.” I slip the letter out of my back pocket and hold it out to show her. “If you still hate me afterward, I’ll have to live with that, but it’s killing him that you two aren’t getting along, and I love him too much to not try to fix this.”

She turns to face me, leaning back on the counter, assessing me. “I don’t hate you, Hallie. But you were practically my daughter, and you didn’t tell me.”

My throat goes thick. “I didn’t, and I have regretted that choice since. It not only lost me him, but it lost me you. I can’t change it, but I’m hoping if I can explain why I didn’t say something at the time, you might understand.”

Her jaw tics as she processes.

“I’m not here to give you an excuse,” I continue. “But I’d really like to see if there’s any way we could move forward.”

“For Rio?”

I nod. “Maybe for us too.”

Finally, she grabs the two mugs of coffee and brings them to her kitchen table, placing each on a coaster.

“Come on.” She takes a seat, gesturing to another empty chair. “Let’s talk.”

I join her, both of us bringing the coffee up to our lips and taking a drink.

“Thank you,” I tell her quietly.

“It’s your birthday tomorrow.”

My eyes flit to hers, shocked at her memory. “It is.”

“Doesn’t Rio want to spend it with you?”

I nod with a soft smile. “I have a flight home in the morning. I’ll get back there before his team lands in Chicago.”

“That’s good.” She takes another drink of her coffee. “I feel like I should’ve added alcohol to this.”

“You’re telling me.”

She chuckles and it’s nice to hear. This isn’t comfortable by any means, but she could’ve closed the front door in my face instead of sitting down and drinking coffee with me.

Mrs. DeLuca stands, going to the fridge before coming back with a bottle of Bailey’s, pouring a healthy amount in mine, then taking her seat and adding some to her own coffee.

“So, what is it you want to tell me?”

I take a long sip of my drink. “I need to tell you what happened two weeks before you found out about everything.”

She nods, and I can practically see her mentally preparing herself. “I’m listening. Tell me what you came here to say.”

Taking a deep breath, I do exactly that.

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