Page 85 of The Mistakes I've Made
A laugh escaped her lips, and I felt a sliver of the worry I had over her fall away.
“Yes,” she said. “She was actually quite good. It was how my parents met.”
“Your dad did Polynesian dancing?”
She laughed again. “No. She was hired to dance at one of the original Hart hotels. My dad couldn’t take his eyes off her. She gave him lessons for their first date.”
“I can’t imagine your father trying to hula.”
“That makes two of us.”
“Did she ever teach you?” I asked, already picturing my dark-haired beauty in a grass skirt, her hips moving to the beat of drums.
“Yes,” she answered. “But I haven’t practiced in a long time. It’s like going to the beach. After she died, I just stopped. It was easier to ignore the things she’d loved rather than face the fact that she wasn’t there to do them with me anymore.”
“So, you haven’t been too busy to go to the beach?” I said.
She shook her head. “No,” she answered, her eyes trained on the coastline.
“I’m sorry if I forced you to face something you weren’t ready for.”
Turning toward me, she met my gaze. “You didn’t,” she answered. “If anything, you gave me the push I needed. I’ve finally realized I’ve been doing the exact same thing my dad has been doing for years.”
“And what’s that?”
“Avoiding,” she replied. “Only I’ve been avoiding small things, like beaches and hula dancing.”
“What is he avoiding?” I asked, cupping her cheek.
“Me,” she answered. “I think that every time he looks at me, it’s just another awful reminder of what he lost.”
I let out a heavy sigh, unsure if I could ever meet her father without pummeling him to the ground first. “When my brother lost his arm, he went through a long period of grief. He said it was like mourning the life he’d once had. For three years he went on like this, never letting us in, just sort of adrift. He said the grief nearly consumed him because he became obsessed with the past—how things used to be and how they were nothing like that now.”
“But things weren’t great back then either,” she said. “When she was alive, I mean. It wasn’t magic and rainbows. He was still gone all the time. It still sucked.”
“The mind has a way of forgetting the bad times and overemphasizing the good ones, I imagine.”
“I just wish he’d see me,” she confessed.
“I know,” I answered, hating that she was hurting, knowing that I cared far too much, and realizing I had no idea how I’d be able to let go of her in five weeks.
“Holy shit,” Lani whispered under her breath as we entered the swank hotel. “This place is amazing.”
“Is this what they consider an inn at Hart International?” I asked, taking a quick glance around the lobby, which was so massive that it could probably encompass the entire first floor of Molly’s inn, no problem.
“Yeah, the use of the wordinnthrew me, too. I’ve never seen the word used in any of our other properties. I’m guessing it’s a regional thing. But, then again, we have hotels all up and down the East Coast, and none of them are called inns.”
“Maybe it’s an effort to stand out against the other hotels,” I suggested as we made our way to the check-in counter.
It was a slow process. Leilani meticulously inspected every aspect of the lobby—from the groupings of chairs to the flooring to the wood beams that stretched high above us.
“I would think it’d do that on its own,” she said.
“True,” I agreed. “But hotels in the Outer Banks aren’t exactly the best. It’s why there are so many rental houses.”
She looked at me, a slightly amused expression painted across her features. “I know, why do you think I’m trying to revamp the one I have?”
I chuckled. “Well, come on then. Don’t let me distract you any further. Go forth and work, woman!”
