Page 72 of The Damaged Hearts Bargain

“Yeah, well, things change.”

“Fast, in your case.”

“This isn’t really your business, Syd.”

“You’re right, it’s not. Except I care about you and I’d like you to be happy. And also, to stick my nose even further into business that isn’t mine, I think you’re your own worst enemy sometimes.”

“Right.” Cal looked at the blue waves of the ocean, how they moved in distinct patterns as the breeze ruffled them.

“You just have this image of what you are, of what you deserve. And it’s not realistic. I don’t know, it’s not my business and I can’t change you, Cal. But if this girl makes you happy then maybe she’s worth fighting for, you know?”

“No, there’s going to be no fighting.” Cal sniffed. “Now, did you actually want something or was this just a welfare check again.”

Syd sighed. “Welfare check, I suppose. And just so you know, there’s a job going down here if you want it.”

“What happened to Odysseus or whatever his name was?”

“Cameron. He left. Went to follow some girl to a music festival in the Czech Republic of all places.”

“Ouch,” Cal said. “So we’re both single then?”

“This isn’t a come on,” Syd said. “We had our time and you might have your six week rule, but I’ve got my own rules. I don’t go back to yesterday’s dinner. This is nothing more than a head’s up that there’s a space to be filled if you want to fill it.”

“Right, thanks. I’ll get back to you by tomorrow, alright?”

“Fine by me,” Syd said. “Look after yourself, Cal.”

She hung up. Looking after yourself. That’s what she needed to do. She needed to look after herself and stop pretending that things had changed.

She breathed in a deep breath of sea air.

“Found you.”

She looked up and Lucy was standing over her. “I wasn’t hiding.”

“Fair. But it still wasn’t easy to find you,” Lucy said. She lowered herself to the sand. “I’m sorry.”

“Nothing to be sorry about.”

“Yes, there is. You know it as well as I do. You were falsely accused again. That was unfair and uncalled for.”

“Not really,” Cal said, digging her fingers into the hot sand. “I mean, money went missing, I was looking after the cash register. It’s a natural leap to make.”

“Yeah, except Elspeth came in to get the cash that Pen owed her from sponsoring the readathon and took it out of the register.”

Huh. “Moira mentioned something about Elspeth. But then she needed to go catch one of those kids of hers.”

“I’m not sure that I’m sorry really covers things,” Lucy said. “But I am. I didn’t think you’d stolen anything.”

Cal considered this. “The problem is that being here, there will always be that doubt. It might be a tiny little thing right now, but it can grow.” She shook her head. “I’m sorry, Lucy. Really, I am.”

Lucy’s face dropped. “You can’t mean it.”

Cal’s heart hurt in her chest. “Are you going to get angry if I say that it’s not you, it’s me?”

“No, but…”

“But it is me, Lucy. I feel like I might have led you on.” Cal sighed, looking at the sand trickling through her fingers. “The truth is that… that I’ll always have this hanging over me. That it makes trusting people hard, and it means that my default setting is always going to be that someone doesn’t believe me.”

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