Page 148 of Not Over You

“Oh yeah, we have tried to work a deal with him to get those two pieces of land for a while now. He wanted out of them a long time ago, but he would never agree to sell. Now we know why, don’t we?” Brady says with another knowing wink.

“You bought the dealerships...for what?”

“For the land. We want to build more here in Harmony Hollow, and they are great locations. After the gallery, we hope to do a museum and an Orpheum theater. Bring some art here,” Gabe answers matter-of-factly.

Though this is amazing news—we could use some culture here in Harmony Hollow—I am stunned. It was always clear Bran did not want to run those dealerships, but he felt obligated to. His father always made him believe he could do nothing but follow in his footsteps. Taking care of his mother and his two brothers was his reasoning for doing what his father had always expected of him.

Now it seems something has changed.

Hope blooms in my chest like a spring flower. Bright and colorful and alive. He did this for me. For us. Because he believed this gallery was going to take me away from him. He thought I was still looking for bigger and better. But I wasn’t.

Not when I found all of that with him.

“I--I... I need to go. I need to go,” I stammer, backing away from the gallery and rushing away before the guys can answer.

I need to find Bran and I need to tell him that there is nothing to forgive and that he can give me everything, even though he thinks otherwise.

He needs to know I already have everything if I have him.

CHAPTER 14

Bran

* * *

Sometimes you need to go back where it all started.

Seated on the sandy shore of the small lake on Connor and Hailee’s family land, I watch the lake ripple in the sunlight. It’s a beautiful day out and I still love coming here on days just like this. When we were growing up, we swam in the lake and sat on the dock out in the center during hot summer days. On warm nights, we lit a fire and lingered beneath the stars, talking and laughing.

One summer, when we were about nineteen, Paisley showed up in a cute bathing suit that drove me nuts. We were fighting at the time, because of my mistake at that party and she was making me pay for it. All I wanted was her and when she showed up with a date, I was fucking miserable. We had long stopped being just friends and I knew I fucked up sleeping with someone else.

When the couples paired off for the night, it wound up being just the two of us. Paisley swam out to the dock, and I followed her, unable to stay away from her. Sat on the dock, we didn’t talk for a long time. Not until I told her how sorry I was. And then we didn’t talk at all. Paisley kissed me for the first time in the middle of the fight, and we wound up making out for hours.

Smiling now, I remember how mad she was the next day. My girl likes to win when we fight and since we wound up with her tits in my hand and her tongue in my mouth, it felt like a loss for her. For weeks after, we barely spoke but whenever we wound up at the lake, we would go off and make out like the horny, love-struck teenagers we were. They were the best nights of my life, the ones I spent out here with her.

But the last night we were here, I ruined all that. Everything should have been perfect—we had finished college and were ready to start our life together. Everything was not perfect—my dad had died, Hailee was sick, and Connor was a fucking mess. When we came out here that last time, I knew I had to tell her goodbye. I had to tell her that I could not go with her when she went to grad school, and I did not want to do long distance.

It was all bullshit. Neither my mother nor my brothers wanted me to give up my life to take care of them. My mother adored Paisley and had been talking about us getting married long before we got together. She had always wanted me to leave Harmony Hollow behind. But my father had made me believe not only was it my duty to take care of them, but it was all I could ever do—all I was ever going to be good enough for.

“He was a cruel man, jealous of his own boys,” my mother insisted when we talked just a few days ago, “he should have never tried to hold you back. What he should of done was told you to go live your life the way you deserved—not take over for him and what he had failed at. None of us ever wanted you to stay here for us, Bran. You always belonged with Paisley.”

That call was me telling her I was going to sell the dealerships. That I was done hiding behind the shield of responsibility my father had saddled me with. For the past few years, Gabe and Brady have done builds and rehabs all over Crystal Cove and Harmony Hollow. Many times, they approached me offering to buy the dealerships because they wanted the land. Each time, they wore me down a little and when they came to me the day after my last big fight with Paisley, I knew it was time. It felt like a sign.

“I am selling, Ma, I will take care of you and the boys with the profits. I just don’t want it anymore. I never wanted it. It was my job to take care of you but...now I need to take care of Paisley. I need to be what she needs me to be.”

“Good sell it, burn it, I don’t care. Do what is right for you, son. I love Paisley and I know she loves you. She always brought the best out in you. You two should get a shot to finally be happy together.”

That was easier said than done—I did pick a fight out of petty jealousy and walk away from her again. Well actually, it was the first time I walked away. Before I always pissed her off until she stormed off and I had to grovel to get her back. And I will grovel again—because this time I won’t give her up. I won’t let her go again, even though just days ago I thought it was the only option I had. I cannot be without her again.

When I talked with Gabe the day after I came back to an empty house—after I stayed away until just before the sun came up—I agreed to sell. I said I would sell both the lots with the promise that all my salesmen had jobs with him somewhere. By the next morning, we were signing paperwork and Brady was dealing with off-loading all the cars and setting up my ten employees with jobs that would pay more than selling cars ever had.

That was when I realized how foolish I had truly been. When we signed the papers making them owners of my land, Brady commented on how glad he was to have more land so close to their new gallery. When he pointed out of my office, down the street at the big brick and glass building that has been vacant for almost a year, I realize what a fool I must look like to Paisley.

“That is the gallery? Right there on Kanesville?” I gaped down the street, cursing myself for not asking Paisley more questions about the location of the gallery.

When they confirmed that yes, their gallery with my girlfriend—who I thought was leaving me again for greener pastures—was down the street from my own office, I was stunned. What an asshole I had made of myself. For all my pretenses that I was going to do better this time, that I was going to work for us and fight for us, I gave up without a fight. That day she came home excited about the gallery, I should have been excited with her. Instead, I was jealous and anxious, afraid of losing her all over again.

Now I sit in the very spot where I first ended us for good—or so I thought—five years ago.

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