Confessions from the Quilting Circle - Maisey Yates Page 0,35

that was driving her now something she couldn’t control. She didn’t want to control it. She had been... She had been the best that she could be for everyone.

For years.

She hadn’t been able to fall apart when Jacob had died, because what was the point? There was too much to handle. She worked until she was exhausted. Fell into bed and slept dry-eyed and then woke up and did it again the next day. It would have hurt everyone if she lost it. Emma, her mother... What was the point of it all?

She felt close to falling apart now.

And maybe this was why she and Anna had struggled to find closeness as adults. They were united by a love of the Lighthouse Inn, their mother. Shared memories from their childhood. But Rachel had always taken care of Anna. Anna was five years younger and she’d helped with her sister from the beginning, been a proud big sister who’d adored her sister’s chubby cheeks and fuzzy red hair.

When she’d been a teenager she and her friends had stayed at her and Jacob’s house sometimes, to feel more independent, even though they were just on the other side of the wall from their mother.

And somewhere in there Anna had grown up. Separated herself. Found her own life. But Rachel had always been the caretaker. The one who’d watched over her. Anna had always been rowdy, wild and in need of caring for. Until she’d started dating Thomas, whom Rachel had imagined was the kind of steadying influence she’d needed.

But it hadn’t brought them closer together.

They were different. Too different to get along. Too different to deal with each other.

She was just so angry right now. It was better than being wounded.

Giving in to it, right in Anna’s face, had felt amazing in the moment. To unleash it all instead of shoving it down had been a high and she wanted to ride it as long as she could.

She stormed back to the Lightkeeper’s House and grabbed her car keys, then drove furiously toward town. When she pulled up to J’s, she took a deep breath before getting out of the car, and she asked herself if she was really going to do this.

If she was going to be that vision of angry Rachel that she’d had of herself about a half hour ago, storming in and causing her daughter a massive amount of embarrassment.

She wasn’t going to cause her daughter embarrassment. But she was going to talk to her.

She got out of the car and slammed the door shut, crossing the street. And then she stopped.

She could see Emma there through the window, talking to customers. Laughing. She had a pad in one hand, and she was writing down orders.

Her red hair was up, and she was wearing a gray T-shirt, white apron and a pair of jeans. She looked...impossibly like an adult. Like the college student she was soon going to be. And very much not like a little girl whose life Rachel could control.

It wasn’t even about control.

It was just about having to let go of way too many things and not wanting this to be another one of them.

She let her arms fall slack at her sides, and her purse dropped to the sidewalk.

She saw herself way too clearly just then. A ticking time bomb pretending she had it all together while yelling aimlessly at her sister, just looking for a target for the anger and pain that lived in her and finding her convenient.

She was pushing away her sister. She was smothering her daughter because she was terrified of what her life might look like if she had only herself to be responsible for.

She was ruining everything.

Not Anna. Not Emma.

And all that righteous rage drained away and left her feeling exactly as she was. Sad. Tired.

Alone.

The door to the diner opened, and Adam popped his head out. “Did you want to come in?”

“No,” she said, deep in the throes of thwarted anger. What a terrible feeling that was. Worse than being turned on with no relief. Worse even than looking forward to leftovers all day and finding out someone else had eaten them first.

She closed her eyes and breathed in, then out.

“Maybe I’ll come out, then.” He slipped out the door and stood in front of her. It was weird to not have a counter between them. She wasn’t sure she’d realized how tall he was. She was usually sitting, and he was usually standing, and the counter