“I’m sorry, son,” his father said.
“What’s going on?” Cole asked.
His dad’s eyes drifted back down to the paper, but he didn’t respond. Cole stepped forward, dropped his wet backpack onto the linoleum, and took the paper from his father.
“What’s this?” His eyes scanned the page of his mom’s familiar handwriting but words that made no sense. “I don’t understand.”
“She’s gone,” his dad said.
“What do you mean ‘she’s gone’?”
“You can read, right?” his dad snapped. He chugged from his bottle of beer. “She got a better offer.”
Cole reread the letter. Phrases jumped out at him as he tried to piece it all together. I’m sorry. I’ve got to see where this goes. I know you won’t understand. I hope you can forgive me.
“She’s gone?” Cole looked at his dad. “Just like that?”
His father shrugged. “Just like that. This is why you should never trust a woman, Cole.” His drink sloshed as he gestured with the hand holding the bottle. “They’re all a bunch of liars.”
He’d gone to Chicago that night to tell Julianna, but he remembered almost nothing about the trip. He’d never gone so far alone, on a bus, but Jules deserved to hear the truth from him, no matter how devasting it would be.
He’d made his sister promise to stay and finish out the dance program—she was better off there, not around their father, who’d always drank too much, even before their mom left.
Cole would take care of everything.
Looking back, it had been a lot for a sixteen-year-old kid. Too much, in fact, which was why he and Jules ended up at Haven House that fall.
How many times had he walked into the house, wondering if his mother might’ve returned? How many times had he instead walked in to find his father in a drunken stupor, his anger turning to bitterness the more time passed?
Eventually, his dad had gotten his act together. He moved to Florida, took a job in insurance, married a woman named Marnie, and now Cole talked to him about once a month. He came back for the funeral, and that was the first time Cole had seen him in two years. The man was more of a story from Cole’s past than a father. Or maybe more of a cautionary tale. After all, he was the reason Cole stopped believing in love, marriage, women—all of it.
And Gemma was the sequel.
He’d fallen pretty hard for the perky blonde who picked him up at one of the many Harbor Pointe festivals a few summers ago. When she told him she was pregnant, Cole was full of shame. He knew better. He hadn’t intended to sleep with her, but she was so persistent, he’d been unable to resist.
Doing the right thing by her wasn’t the same as being in love, but he convinced himself they had a shot at the real thing.
For the first time, he challenged his dad’s stance on the whole institution of marriage, and all Gemma had done was prove his father right.
She solidified what Cole already knew—women couldn’t be trusted. Marriage was for fools.
And he vowed never to be a fool again.
Something about walking into Connor’s dark house was reminiscent of those early days after his mom left, and he found himself whispering a quiet prayer that his brother-in-law was okay—that Cole wasn’t about to find him drunk on the floor, or worse.
He walked through the entryway and into the living room. Particles of dust danced in the stream of light pouring in through a crack in the curtains, and there, on the couch, was Connor—asleep—surrounded by piles of clothes and cardboard boxes.
What the . . . ?
Connor stirred. Cole sat in the chair next to the couch but had to shift to remove a stuffed animal out from under him.
“Dude, what are you doing here?” Connor mumbled. He tried to sit upright amid the clothing and boxes that surrounded him.
“Came to check on you,” Cole said. He stood and moved toward the window. “You don’t mind if I open these, do you?”
Connor started to protest, but Cole pulled the curtains open anyway. Light filled the room, and Connor covered his eyes, letting out a loud groan in the process. “Give a guy a break, would ya?”
Cole moved to the next window and did the same thing. “Where are the kids?”
“Josh and Carly took them for ice cream,” he said.
Cole surveyed the room. “What is going on in here? Are you moving?”
Connor’s head fell back onto the couch, and he still covered his face with his hands. In the light, Cole looked around and realized they were surrounded by women’s clothing. Framed dance recital posters. Books. Photo albums. Boxes that had probably been packed away in a closet somewhere.
They were surrounded by Julianna’s stuff.
“What is all this?” Cole asked.
“I have to get rid of it. The guy from the resale store is coming to pick it all up this afternoon.” Connor rubbed his face with his hands, then sat up and looked at Cole.
“You can’t do this, man,” Cole said.
“I have to.” Connor sighed. “She’s everywhere. I can’t function because everywhere I go—there she is.”
“Yeah, but she hasn’t even been gone two months. You’re going to regret it if you get rid of everything.” Cole scanned the room. “Is that her wedding dress?”
His brother-in-law’s face crumpled and he nodded.
“Your kids might want this stuff,” Cole said.
No response.
“Look, I’ll tell you what—I’ll take it. I’ve got a guest room at my place, and I’ll just keep it for you until you’re ready.”
Connor wiped his face dry with the back of his hand. His lower lip trembled, but he nodded. “Thanks, man.”
“Don’t give it another thought,” Cole said. “Go take a shower, and I’ll load everything into my truck.”
Connor stood, dazed, and walked toward the stairs. At the doorway, he stopped, then turned around. “She was the best thing that ever happened to me.”
The words paralyzed Cole. He’d just been thinking about love—how it was a farce, how it didn’t exist. He had proof—first his mother, then Gemma. Heck, he could even make a case that Asher’s mom proved what he thought to be true.
But there was something in the way Connor said it, something behind his eyes that made Cole wonder if he was wrong.
Connor vanished up the stairs, and reality kicked back in. Maybe he and Julianna were the exception. Maybe they were the once-in-a-lifetime true love deal that people wrote stories about. But reality? That was much crueler.
Cole stood in the center of the living room, wondering what he’d gotten himself into. He was supposed to meet Charlotte and Amelia in just a few hours—if he intended to keep his end of the deal, that was. And now he had a whole room of boxes to clear out.
One at a time, he hauled them to the truck, neatly packing them in the bed, and saving the cab for the hanging clothes. He was on his seventh trip when he spotted a covered box in the corner. On the side, in bold black letters, were the words Letters from Charlotte.
He knelt down and pulled off the lid. The box nearly overflowed with stacks and stacks of stamped envelopes, all different colors, all with Julianna’s name on the front and Charlotte’s name in the upper left-hand corner.