I don’t know how to do this. How do you do something you don’t really want to do?
How do you break your own heart?
The idea of walking away from her causes me physical pain. Bile creeps up my throat. My shoulders get so tight that I wince. My chest threatens to cave in on itself.
But no matter how I think about it, there’s no way to have both. I can’t have my cake and eat it too. I can’t get the job and future in veterinary medicine that I want, that I’ve dreamed of for my entire life—the job I promised my mother I’d get someday—and have Sophie here so she can keep the Honey House too. There are too many obstacles down an already bumpy path.
She deserves a man who will be with her day or night and help her live her best life.
That man’s not me.
I don’t think.
Pap watches me with the eye of a man who’s trained to discern every tiny detail about behavior. Of course, he’s particularly good with animals, but he’s not bad with the human variety either.
“How do you think she’ll take it?” he asks. His tone is careful, cautious, as if he’s feeling me out. He suspects there’s more to the story.
“Good, I think,” I say with much more certainty than I feel. “Montgomery stayed with us last night. She’s completely aware of what’s going on.”
“And she’s all right with it? It’s so hard to believe that she’d leave everything she’s ever known.”
I shrug. “I guess so. I mean, she knew all of this before we got married.”
That’s why we got married, but I can’t tell you that.
Pap walks by me and toward the coffeepot. He pours himself a cup and adds a teaspoon of sugar. He stirs it slowly, as though if he keeps doing it, some magic answer will be written out in the steam.
Hell, if that were the case, I’d fill a bathtub up with the stuff to get a clearer answer faster.
I try to take a drink of my coffee and nearly choke.
“You know what?” he says. “The only thing I can tell you is to follow the sun.”
“Do you mean your heart?”
He grins. “No. I do not. I mean follow the sun.” He takes a sip of his coffee and lets that sink in. “Most mammals find their way home by scent. But many animals, everything from birds to dung beetles, follow the sun.”
He moves around the counter and stands in front of me.
“When I met your grandma, something happened inside of me that I couldn’t name. It was like a light turned on deep inside my soul. Whenever I was with her, I felt warmth. It’s the only way I can describe it.”
I nod, understanding that feeling. It’s the same thing that happens when Sophie is around. I haven’t been able to label it, but warmth? That sounds about right.
“The same thing happened to me the first day of vet school,” he says. “I felt lit up on the inside. Like . . . somehow every part of me was brighter and better. Things made sense when I was working with animals too.”
“Yeah. I get it,” I say. “You remember that I almost went to medical school, right?”
He laughs. “Yes. And you called me and said you hated people, so you wanted to know more about veterinary medicine.”
“And when I walked into that building on campus, it was like everything clicked.”
I take a drink of my coffee and remember that day. I had a meeting with a professor to see if it was an avenue I wanted to pursue, and I walked out of there knowing it was exactly what I wanted to do for the rest of my life.
So why is this decision not as easy?
“Follow the sun, kiddo,” Pap says. “Go where your soul feels warm. Cause the least harm to those around you, and bring the sunshine to those that you can. You’ll know what choices you need to make in life if you follow the sun.”
The door opens behind us, and Grady walks in. Pap tosses me a final smile. Then he cuts Grady off and ushers him into an exam room.
“How’s that garden today, Grady? Any tomato plants left?” Pap asks before the door closes.
I sit on a stool behind the counter—the one that Dottie usually uses. I grab her pen and find a sticky note and write her a little message.
You were really late today. Good thing some of us can be on time.
Handsome
I toss the pen down and sit back in the chair.
Follow the sun, huh?
But what if it’s a cloudy day? What if I can’t feel the sun at all?
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
SOPHIE
What’s for dinner?” Liv asks.
I pin the phone between my ear and shoulder. “Pizza. I’m not cooking tonight. Every muscle in my body hurts.”
“Ooh. Sounds like a good story there.”
“Hardly,” I scoff, taking glasses out of the dishwasher and putting them into the cabinet. “Unless you want to hear me tell you about taping off trim and patching dings in the wall.”
“Yeah. Not interested.”
“Didn’t think so.”
“So, any news on your husband?” she asks, not missing a beat.
I know her question stems only from her wish for me to be happy. She still thinks in her misguided but well-meaning way that he will make the right choice. But the situation with Holden is what I’ve been avoiding all day.
Of course, it was impossible to completely block it, and him, from my mind. In such a small amount of time, so much of the Honey House now reminds me of him.
I can see him sitting at the table when I look into the dining room. The warm glance of appreciation he cast my way for the meal I’d prepared for Dr. Montgomery. And him. I really made it for him.
As I gaze out of the kitchen window, I see the backyard alight with the string lights someone hung for our wedding party.
Our first dance.
The first moment I was in his arms.
Our first kiss.
His cologne lingers in my bedroom. The bathroom has traces of his presence, and I can barely even look at the kitchen counter without blushing.
One minute, and I’m smiling and giggling and convincing myself that he’s enjoyed this too. And I’m picking out every sliver of a sentence that he’s said that could be construed as meaning that he might want to stay. He could work for Fred. He’d still be doing what he loves. And . . . he’d be here. Where I am.
That minute is fleeting and replaced just as fast by another. That moment is filled with dread and a foreboding fog swirling around my head. The notably rational, obvious reasons that he will be going to Orlando if he gets the job elbow the hope away, and I’m left feeling like I just lost my best friend.
Just knowing would be easier, regardless of the outcome. The indecisiveness is what’s killing me, and I don’t know how long I can do it.
“Soph?” Liv asks.
“What? Sorry. I was . . . trying to unload the dishwasher.”
“I just asked if there was any news on Holden.”
“Not yet. Montgomery came, and I think it went well. So it’s probably just a matter of time before he gets the job offer.”
She pauses. “You still think he’s going to go?”
I close the cabinet and blow out a breath. Conflict wars inside me. My brain tells me that he will go. My heart says he won’t.
“Honestly? I don’t know.” I bite my bottom lip and worry it between my teeth. “He did say that Fred offered him the clinic. Or a job there, at least. So maybe that helps.”