“And that’s what you did,” she says. “I’m sure your parents are very proud of you.”
“They’re not, though,” Chad says. “Neither one of them has praised me for getting this job. My father told me to quit!”
“But you didn’t quit,” Ms. English says. “Because you do have character, Long Shot.”
“I don’t want to work at my father’s company,” Chad says. “I want to stay at the hotel until it closes for the season.”
Ms. English tsks. “You have to get on with your life.”
“But I don’t want—”
They’re interrupted by a silver-haired gentleman in a pink shirt who puts a hand on Ms. English’s back and says, “Hello, Magda.”
Ms. English rises from her stool and offers the gentleman her hand. He kisses it like someone in the movies, and Chad thinks, Who is this dude? The guy is gazing at Ms. English like she’s a Victoria’s Secret Angel, and Chad feels uncomfortable—like he’s the one interrupting them, not the other way around—and protective too. He gets to his feet.
“Hi,” he says. “I work for Ms. English.”
The gentleman turns to Chad, then looks at Ms. English. “This is your long shot?”
Ms. English chuckles. “It is indeed. Xavier, please meet Chadwick Winslow. Chadwick, this is Xavier Darling.”
Mario’s “I Love You” Playlist for Lizbet
“XO”—Beyoncé
“Let My Love Open the Door”—Pete Townshend
“Whatever It Is”—Zac Brown Band
“Never Tear Us Apart”—INXS
“Come to Me”—Goo Goo Dolls
“Everlong”—Foo Fighters
“Head Over Feet”—Alanis Morissette
“Never Let You Go”—Third Eye Blind
“Wonderful Tonight”—Eric Clapton
“Swing Life Away”—Rise Against
“Something”—The Beatles
“You’re My Home”—Billy Joel
“I Believe”—Stevie Wonder
“Better Together”—Luke Combs
“You and Me”—Lifehouse
“All I Want Is You”—U2
“In My Feelings”—Drake
“Lay Me Down”—Dirty Heads
“Sunshine”—World Party
“Crazy Love”—Van Morrison
“Stand by My Woman”—Lenny Kravitz
It’s late on the night of the twenty-fourth, so late it’s the twenty-fifth, and Mario slips between the sheets of Lizbet’s bed and starts the ritual of unbraiding her hair. He likes the way it looks all kinked and long, so she indulges him. Lizbet isn’t fully awake but her desire stirs at the feel of his hands in her hair, his front pressed against her back. Because she’s in that liminal state between waking and sleeping, her animal instincts emerge, and she loses all inhibition. Their lovemaking is a storm—and this night, she hears the tapping of rain on her cottage’s roof, then the tree branches swiping at her windows, then a sharp crack followed by a grumble of thunder. Lizbet’s and Mario’s bodies move over the bed in a darkness that’s briefly illuminated by flashes of lightning. It’s cinematic, she thinks; how beautiful they are in those split seconds when their bodies are silvered by the electrical charge in the air.
Afterward, they lie flat on the bottom sheet, the duvet kicked to the floor, and Lizbet wonders if she’s ever been this happy. She has focused all of her energy not on fighting the old, but on building the new, just as the sign at the end of her bed has been urging her to do for nearly an entire calendar year. She wishes that back on September 30, she could have somehow known that one day she would be lying in bed next to Mario freaking Subiaco after having impressed the hell out of the new owner of the Hotel Nantucket, where she was the general manager. Would she have believed it?
Mario expels a breath. “I love you,” he says.
The rain has stopped, the wind has died down, the lightning and thunder have rolled past.
“What?” Lizbet says, though of course she heard him perfectly.
Mario faces her. “I love you,” he says. “I’m in love with you.” He starts laughing. “I honestly can’t believe it. I’m…what? Forty-six, almost forty-seven, and in all those years, I’ve told only three other women I loved them. One was Allie Taylor in sixth grade, and yes, that was real love, the purest kind, awkward and unrequited. One was my mother, of course. And the third was Fiona. I loved Fee, but that was different because, although I would have lain down in traffic for her, we weren’t romantically involved.”
Lizbet’s heart feels like an exploding star in her chest. She realizes it’s time for her to say it back, but she wants to hear more.
“How can you be so sure with me?” she says. “Explain yourself.”
“Working backward?” Mario says. “When you ended things a few weeks ago, I thought, Okay, she’s not ready, no problem. Things had gotten serious pretty quickly and I knew you were coming off this other relationship, so I told myself I understood. But I was hurt by it, which was a new feeling for me, or new since sixth grade when Allie Taylor went to the Valentine’s Day dance with Will Chandler instead of me.” He grins.
Lizbet touches his face. He loves her.
“Before that? I wouldn’t say it was love at first sight, but when I saw you in the parking lot that first day in those sexy heels telling JJ to leave you alone even though the dude was down on one knee proposing, I thought, That poor guy blew it but I’m not going to.”
“Stop,” Lizbet says, though she’s grinning.
“Before that…” Mario says.
“There was no ‘before that,’” Lizbet says. “That was the day we met.”
“Before that, Xavier told me that he’d hired a lioness named Elizabeth Keaton to manage the hotel. He said you used to run the Deck with your boyfriend but that you’d parted ways and you were looking for a fresh start.”
“Lioness?” Lizbet says.
“Direct quote. You don’t forget a description like that. I was so intrigued that I did some stalking. I saw the feature about you and JJ in Coastal Living, then I checked out the Deck’s website, and I developed a little crush on you.”
“You did not!”
“I did,” Mario says. “You reminded me of Allie Taylor.”
Lizbet swats him and he says, “I’m serious. She had blond hair like yours and pale blue eyes and that sweet-but-tough thing going that I haven’t encountered in any other woman until I met you. I always said I was going to find Allie Taylor someday and marry her.”
Lizbet is starting to feel a little jealous of Allie Taylor.
“But when I checked Facebook, I saw she was married with four kids at private schools in Manhattan and I also realized I was happy for her in that life. The magic was gone. But when I look at you…” Here, Mario traces his finger from Lizbet’s shoulder down her arm. “I feel like I’m twelve years old again and everything is shiny and new and colorful and full of wonder. And that’s how I know that I love you.”
“I love you too,” Lizbet says.
“There’s a reason why I’m telling you tonight,” Mario says, “even though I’ve been in love with you for most of the summer.”
“What’s the reason?” she says.
“Xavier was crazy about the bar, our numbers are good, and you said he was happy with the hotel.”
“He raved,” Lizbet says.
“So today it finally felt real,” Mario says. “It felt sustainable, like I can dig in here. I can stay here and do my thing with the bar and you can run the hotel, and in the off-season we can go wherever the spirit moves us. I still own a place in LA. It’s a bungalow with a little pool out back and an avocado tree.”
“An avocado tree?” Lizbet says. She kisses Mario and pulls the duvet onto the bed. All she wants is to go to sleep dreaming of swimming pools and movie stars, an avocado tree and some Craftsman furniture in Mario’s bungalow. Tomorrow, she will still have to charm Xavier, still have to make sure everything is beyond the beyond for him; a hotel experience isn’t made in one afternoon or even one night. Lizbet closes her eyes and Mario starts breathing deeply but Lizbet can’t settle. She’s in a happy bubble, insulated and safe, but isn’t there the teeniest tear, threatening to deflate it?