in, because the only thing she said to me was that you and she had an amazing time together, and things were going to change.”
Graham tried not to smile or think about what her words could’ve meant. “Did either of them tell you what went down?”
Bowie and Brooklyn shook their heads. “Rennie said you knew, that she’d tell me but had to get back to Seattle for work.”
“She texted me and asked me to come and pick her up at the resort. I did. She didn’t say a word to me until we were in the middle of the ocean, and then she really let it all out.”
“Let what out?” Brooklyn leaned forward and stared intently at Graham.
Graham looked around the bar to make sure everything was okay. “Theo’s married.” He paused and let the words sink in. “And not in the ‘I’m separated and getting a divorce’ sort of way.”
“What the—” Bowie bit back whatever he was going to say because Brystol approached the table. She set down their order of cheese curds and made her way to the next table. Bowie leaned forward and whispered, “Are you fucking kidding me?”
Graham shook his head slowly. “Nope. There was a couple at the hotel who recognized Theo, and when they approached him, he referred to Rennie as hotel staff helping him to his room because he was drunk.”
Brooklyn covered her mouth and gasped. “Oh my . . . Rennie didn’t seem too upset when she was at the house this morning.”
A smile spread across Graham’s face. He hoped he was the reason she was no longer upset. Of course, he also knew how Rennie felt. “I think, regardless of his infidelity coming to light, they would’ve broken up sooner rather than later. She’s been unhappy for some time and said a lot of things over the holiday that led me to believe, even if he was single, Theo wasn’t the guy for her.” Graham was, though. He was, without a doubt, the man for Rennie, and he was going to do whatever he had to in order to prove it to her.
“That son of a bitch. I was nice to him.”
“You’re nice to everyone, Bowie. You don’t have a mean bone in your body,” Graham pointed out.
“Still. He ate my food! Slept for free in our hotel! And this is the shit he does to our Rennie.” Bowie threw his hands up in the air. Brooklyn tried to comfort him.
“Graham.” Brystol’s voice rang out from the bar area. She held the phone up in the air. He went to her, and she handed him the receiver. “Aunt Rennie is on the phone for you.”
Another smile broke out. She had called.
“Hello,” he said into the phone.
“Hey, I wanted to let you know I’m back at my apartment, and I have a new cell number.”
“Decided to go with a new one, huh?”
“I think it was the best decision. Do you have a pen handy?” He did and told her to rattle off her number. He would put it in his phone once they hung up.
“Do you want me to give it to Brooklyn? She’s here right now.”
“Nah, I’ll text it to her. Her number and my parents’ are the only ones I had memorized. Although, I could probably download my contacts from a backup or something. If I had done that, though, I wouldn’t have had an excuse to hear your voice,” she said to him. “And Graham, I really wanted to hear your voice.”
His heart soared and pounded loudly. “I know you just left, but when can I see you again?”
“I’ll be up on Friday.”
He knew his next question might not give him the answer he wanted, but he asked anyway. “Do you want to stay on the houseboat? If you already have plans with Brooklyn, I’d understand.”
Rennie giggled. “I want to stay with you. I figure I can hang out with Brooklyn while you work. Whatever. I’m not picky.”
“Oh, I’m totally picky. I want to spend as much time with you as possible.”
“Me too,” she said. “We do need to talk, though—and I don’t want you to think it’s something bad—but we need to make sure this is right for us, because we have a friendship on the line to consider and our friends. I don’t want us to move hastily and regret our actions down the road.”
Graham looked out over the bar. His eyes went to Bowie and Brooklyn, in love and happy after all these years apart. It