But she didn’t think that moment existed. Not really.
She had done physically what Alison had done. Cut ties. Walked away. But emotionally, she never had. Emotionally, everything she felt was curated, protected. Preserved.
For the first time, she wondered if keeping the baby such a well-protected secret had to do with the fact that she didn’t want it touched by anyone else. Hadn’t wanted anyone else’s opinion. Because she hadn’t wanted to be absolved. She had wanted to hang on to the guilt. And with a few insightful words, Finn had pointed out to her why that wasn’t right or fair.
That was why she was holding it back from her friends now. Because she didn’t want to feel certain things. She wanted to feel only what she was ready to feel. She wanted to retain control over her perception of that moment, that event, that memory.
She took a deep breath. “There’s more.”
Over the next hour, she told them all about the baby. Getting sent away from her family. The pregnancy. And they did cry. They all ended up sitting on the floor, surrounded by empty pie plates weeping pathetically.
But neither of them asked why she hadn’t told them before. Nobody accused her of not trusting them. Nobody condemned her at all.
She wiped her face, her sleeve wet with her tears. “Wow,” she said, taking a shaky breath. “That was kind of as hard and sucky as I was afraid it would be.”
“I can’t imagine,” Rebecca said, shaking her head. “Though I do know a little bit about keeping secrets. And I know that they get so gigantic inside of you... I never told anyone that Gage caused my accident until years later. My anger felt so personal. It felt like mine. He was my monster, and I didn’t want to share him. I didn’t want to make him human by giving that name to anybody.” She took a deep breath. “It just makes it more powerful, though. And in the end, I think it’s always better to talk about it. Or maybe not always. But, when you’re ready, if you can...”
Lane nodded, her throat too tight for her to say anything.
Alison reached out and gripped her shoulder. “Life is hard sometimes. But at least we have pie. And friendship.”
Rebecca reached down and lifted her wineglass. “To pie and friendship.”
Alison did the same. “Pie and friendship.”
Lane repeated the motion. “But don’t forget alcohol.”
“Hear, hear,” Alison said, tipping her glass back.
Lane took a long sip. “Oh,” she said. “I’m sleeping with Finn.”
The shriek that followed was high-pitched enough that Lane was surprised it didn’t shatter her wineglass. “I knew it!” Rebecca shouted.
“Well,” Lane said, “I wasn’t back when you almost picked him up.”
“No,” she said, “I know. Because he never would have hit on me if he was already sleeping with you. But I knew that you weren’t neutral. You were trying to tell me that you were just friends with him all while you practically turned green you were so jealous.”
She scoffed. “I wasn’t jealous. Much.”
“I feel like my world just shattered,” Alison said. “So much for believing in platonic male-female friendships.”
Lane snorted, then tapped the side of her glass with her fingertip. “I’m not really sure if that’s ever what ours was. What I think is that I’m the master of denial.”
“Well, that is true.”
“And he apparently always wanted me.” She lifted a shoulder and took another drink of wine. “I just wasn’t ready. But that’s why I had to tell you the whole story. About Cord, about the baby. It all kind of leads to Finn. To what’s happening now. I guess I’m just... Ready to deal with it. Ready to move on.”
Of course, what exactly moving on meant, she wasn’t totally sure at this point. It was scary. Scary to think it, let alone say it.
It meant doing things because she wanted to. Or not doing things because she didn’t want to. It meant expanding the business because it mattered to her, not because she needed to prove something.
It meant... Well, it meant looking honestly at her feelings for Finn. Not in the context of everything she was afraid of. But in terms of what she actually felt.
“He clearly always wanted you,” Alison said.
“Really?” Rebecca asked. “I mean, I always got a little bit of a weird vibe off of both of them, but I didn’t know they wanted each other.”
“You’ve known them both for too long,” Alison said pragmatically. “When I met them I just assumed they were a couple, or at least that they were sleeping together. Until Lane introduced me to her boyfriend.”
Lane squinted and thought back. She had been dating a guy named David back then. The last guy she had dated, actually, before Finn. He had been nice. Very nice. And he had also been separate from her friends, and from her relationship with Finn.
It struck her then, with incredible clarity, the way she had structured her life. Finn had been right. Completely. He played the part of boyfriend, or even husband, without any of the romance. She had always chosen some other guy for that. While she had kept Finn close. While Finn had held her heart.
Oh, good Lord.
She didn’t want to ponder the full implication of that. Not right now. She had already been through too much.
“Well, it’s nice to know that you were all more in touch with me than I was.” She looked around, annoyed by the fact that they were all out of pastry. “I should probably go,” she said, “otherwise I’m going to chew my own arm off. Or break into Pie in the Sky and get some more food.”
“You just want to go bang your new boyfriend,” Alison said, her tone knowing.
“I know I would like to go bang my fiancé,” Rebecca returned.
“I’m not jealous,” Alison said, not sounding all that convincing. “I’m really not.”
“Oh, hey, how did everything go with Violet?”
Alison nodded. “Good. She’s going to start at the end of the week. Which is nice, because seeing as I have a lack of men and sex in my life I could really use more work to fill it with.”
“I mean, that’s what I did for years,” Rebecca said. “Bear in mind, I had never actually been with anybody until a few months ago.”
“Yeah,” Alison said. “That kind of confirms the fact that I should be able to stay busy but celibate. Actually, if I keep hiring cynical teenagers I can just make them all my surrogate children and live my life vicariously through them.”
“That’s depressing, Alison,” Lane said, slinging her arm around her friend as they all walked toward the door.
“Maybe a little,” she conceded. “Although, at least I’m standing on my own feet. Whatever happens... Whoever I end up with... Or more likely, don’t, I know who I am.”
“And I think I might be figuring that out, myself,” Lane said.
They all stepped outside onto the darkened street and Rebecca killed the lights to the store, then locked the door.
“Same time next month, ladies,” Alison said, stuffing her hands in her pockets and backing away. “Hopefully Cassie will have dipped her kids in antibiotics by then.”
“I’m sure we’ll see each other before then,” Rebecca said, patting Lane on the back before she headed toward her own car. “If Lane can be bothered to come up for air.”
“You guys are the worst.”
She shook her head and walked back toward the Mercantile, back to where she parked her car. And all she could think of on her way was that her friends weren’t the worst at all. They were actually the best.
And moving forward, moving on, didn’t feel as scary as she had thought it might.
CHAPTER TWENTY
LANE TEXTED HIM a little after three to let him know that she would be coming with dinner. He wasn’t entirely sure how he felt about that. Yes, she had come before while his brothers were there since the two of them had started sleeping together, but something had changed down at the lake. And as protective as he had felt over their relationship then, he felt even more protective now.
He didn’t want to answer questions. He didn’t want any of his douche bag brothers to have questions. Mostly, he liked it when it was just the two of them. It seemed simple then. At least, as simple as a situation like theirs could be.
But, given their pasts, he wasn’t entirely sure there was anything other than this strange antechamber between friendship and love for people like them.
“Are you daydreaming over there?”
Finn turned at the sound of Cain’s voice. “Do I look like the kind of person that daydreams?”
“You’re doing a damn good impression of one. Thinking about anyone special?”
“You know, Cain, sometimes I’m sad about our childhood. About the fact that the two of us didn’t get to be raised as brothers should be raised together. The fact that we know each other about as well as strangers I pass on the street. Right now is not one of those moments. Right now, frankly, I’m more than pleased that I mostly grew up as an only child.”
“Well, I grew up mostly as an only child too, so I can only guess, but I think that making you hate my very existence means that I’m really killing this big brother thing.”