As Long As I Have You (London Sullivans 1)

by Bella Andre

  “He’s been really nice and helpful.” Mari tried, and failed, to hide her blush. “Tell me more about your parents.”

  “Mum puts on exhibitions at the V&A. We grew up running around the museum after hours.”

  “From what I’ve read online, the Victoria & Albert Museum looks incredible.”

  “There are so many places in London you’ve got to see. I know some people think the city is dirty and crowded, but I love it!”

  “I do too, at least from the little I’ve seen so far.”

  “Charlie also loved London.” Alice paused. “Is it okay for me to talk about him?”

  “Actually, it’s a bit of a relief.” Mari was surprised to realize how true that was. “Coming here isn’t only about figuring out if I should reopen his store—it’s also about learning who he was. Tell me, what did he love about London?”

  “Charlie was fascinated by the history of the Underground. My dad was a train engineer for a long time, so they always bonded over Tube trivia.”

  “Your father drove trains on the London Underground?” Mari marveled. “I can’t think of a more quintessentially British job, other than guarding Buckingham Palace.”

  “If you really want British tradition, you should come for our big Sunday roast this weekend. I know my parents would love to meet you. Malc will probably talk your ear off about the year he lived in the States.” Before Mari could reply, Alice jumped up from her stool. “Oh! I’ve been talking so much that I almost forgot to pick up the cosmos seeds I need from Petersham Nurseries. Sorry I wasn’t more help. I’ll swing back as soon as I get another free moment. I’d love to tackle the patio garden in the back next time, if you’d like?”

  “You have no idea how much I would appreciate that. It seems like such a big job for a nongreen thumb like me that I was tempted to ignore it for the time being.”

  “Don’t worry, I’ll make it beautiful for you and your customers. I have some extra plants that I can’t squeeze into my own tiny garden, so I’ll bring those with me next time. And if you’re up for it, either Owen or I will come by to take you to our parents’ house on Sunday.”

  Alice Sullivan was a whirlwind, in the best way possible. If Mari could channel only half her energy, she’d be done sorting out the bookstore in no time.

  As the bookstore door closed behind the other woman, Mari took a step back to look at their progress. Now, two shelves in each section they’d worked on looked perfect. Though it might not be much progress in the grand scheme of things, at the very least it gave her a sense of how the store could look once all the shelves were dusted and put into good order.

  Her accountant’s brain guesstimated there were approximately two hundred and fifty shelves in the store. At a half hour cleanup time per shelf, that was three forty-hour weeks put into nothing but shelf cleanup and reorganization. Who knew how much time it would take to take care of everything else, like painting and creating a website and ordering new inventory? Still, she’d never been afraid of hard work before. Just because this particular business and location and connection to her father had a tendency to send her emotions topsy-turvy didn’t negate her work ethic.

  The buzzing in her pocket interrupted her thoughts. Pulling out her phone, she saw Carson’s face on the screen. She clicked to accept the video call. “Hi.”

  “Hey, sis. How’s England so far?”

  “England is amazing.” Knowing he would see the truth in her face, she didn’t bother trying to spin anything. “The store, on the other hand…” She did a slow scan of the room so he could see it.

  He let out a low whistle. “That looks pretty daunting.”

  “I’ve just calculated that it’s going to take me three weeks just to clean up the shelves. But I’ve decided there’s no use in panicking about it, when the best thing I can do is just get on with it.”

  “I like your positive outlook,” he said, “and I know you wanted to tackle this on your own, but—”

  “I’m not on my own. I seem to have been semi-adopted by a couple of members of a local family who were close to Charlie. They’ve both been in to help already, and I’ve been invited to have a roast lunch with them this Sunday.”

  “After the way Mom talked about your birth father our whole lives, it’s a little strange to think that he had close friends, isn’t it?”

  She nodded. “I keep thinking that if he wasn’t such a bad guy after all, then why did he never reach out to me? I mean, maybe it was harder when I was still a kid and he knew how angry Mom was. But once I was an adult, he could have at least held out an olive branch.”

  “Mari.” Carson’s voice was gentle. “Whatever his reasons were for abandoning you, none of them have been your fault. No matter what you find out while you’re in England, that fact won’t change.”

  From a purely rational standpoint, she knew her brother was right. And if her life was nothing more than a spreadsheet, the way she kept trying to force it to be every time she felt overwhelmed, rational would win every time.

  But emotion rarely ran along rational lines, did it?

  “Thanks for checking in,” she said, giving him a small smile. “How are things going for you?”

  “Crazy, like always.” He ran a hand through his hair, which was sticking straight up. Given the time difference, she guessed he had only just gotten out of bed. “But family comes first, so if you ever get to a point where you need serious backup, promise you’ll call me.”

  “I will.” Sunlight was streaming in the window. Before they hung up, she wanted her brother to see some of the reasons why she wasn’t willing to turn away from the hard work of putting the store back together, no matter how daunting the task. “I’ve shown you the mess. Now I’m going to show you the beauty.” Walking outside, she did another slow scan with her phone, this time of the river, the pub, the street as it wound down to the boathouse, then the other way toward the boutiques and corner grocer. “Isn’t it incredible?”

  “It couldn’t look more different than SoCal—and it couldn’t look more like you.” He grinned. “You’re going to knock this out of the park, Mari.” It was what she always said to him when he was going in for yet another important pitch meeting for his startup. And she had been right every time. “Something tells me Elderflower Island is where you’re meant to be.”

  No matter how badly she might secretly wish it was true, she wasn’t one hundred percent sure yet. Especially if she couldn’t get the bookstore up and running at a profit before the money ran out. And that wasn’t accounting for how furious her mother would be if she did end up staying.

  They hung up, and as Mari slipped the phone back into her pocket, she filled her lungs with fresh air. Yes, she remained confused as to why her father had behaved as he had. Yes, she was pretty darn far out of her comfort zone in running a bookstore—especially one that needed so much work before she could even reopen it. But it was one of her biggest dreams to own a bookstore. And right now, that seemed more important than anything else.

  Fueled with new determination, she headed back into the store and threw herself into cleaning and organizing the next shelf.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Rush hour on the Tube was a crush, as always. Tonight, however, Owen was too preoccupied with thoughts of Mari to pay the crowd much mind.

  He nearly laughed out loud at himself. Talk about a crush—he was acting more like a fifteen-year-old schoolboy than a thirty-six-year-old man. There was just something about Charlie’s daughter.

  She was beautiful, but in an utterly unique way.

  She had been hurt, but she wasn’t at all broken.

  She had been sent into a difficult situation, but still seemed full of hope.

  Hope. It was such a fragile thing, yet so damned important.

  Owen would never forget the night he’d found Mathilda lying unconscious on the floor of her cottage. Calling 999, he’d hoped with everything he had that she would be okay, that she would recover, that he wouldn’t lose one of th
e most important people in his life.

  A year on, her doctors agreed she was in fine form. She had made brilliant strides on all fronts, from speaking to writing to walking. Everything he’d hoped for had come to pass. And yet, he still worried about her.

  The conductor’s voice broke through his thoughts, alerting passengers that the Richmond station was the end of the District Line and to please disembark. Today, there had been good service on the line, so Owen had made it home from central London in little more than a half hour. Funneling out of the station alongside hundreds of strangers, he was glad for the walk down the high street to stretch his legs.

  Soon, he was on Elderflower Island and letting himself into his grandmother’s cottage. When he couldn’t find her at her writing table, in the living room, or in the kitchen, he called, “Gran?”

  He’d texted her several times throughout the day to make sure all was well, but he still held his breath, waiting for her response. Despite the immense progress she’d made, he couldn’t shake the fear that he would return one day and find her on the kitchen floor again. It was why he had kept his outings to a bare minimum for the past year.

  “Hello, darling.” His grandmother came into the kitchen, holding a basket of newly dug-up potatoes from the kitchen garden, her cheeks rosy from the sunshine and exertion. “How were your meetings in town?”

  “Excellent.” He breathed a silent sigh of relief that she was okay. “The special holiday editions are coming along nicely.” He put the bag he’d carried home on the counter. “I picked up Chelsea buns from that baker you like on Archer Street in Soho.”

  “Always so thoughtful.” She gave him a kiss on his cheek. “Now, you had better get ready for your date.”

  He raised an eyebrow. “I don’t believe Mari would call it that.” It didn’t go unnoticed by either of them that he wasn’t disputing the word date on his own behalf. Truthfully, he wouldn’t have minded if it was a date.

  “Poor thing is probably too overwhelmed by everything that has happened. Come to think of it,” she added, her eyes twinkling, “you look a little overwhelmed too.”

  He had to laugh at her obvious delight in his reaction to Charlie’s daughter. “Sorry to disappoint, Gran, especially when we all know just how good your imagination is, but tonight will likely come to nothing more than eating Chinese takeaway and helping her give the rugs in the bookshop a good hoovering.”

  “Whatever the two of you end up doing together, I’m pleased to see you going out. I’ve lived a full and wonderful life—it’s time for you to go live yours.”

  “You’ve still got plenty of time left, Gran.”

  “I know that.” She shooed him out of the room. “Which is why I’m kicking you out to go charm the knickers off the island’s newest resident.”

  Only Mathilda Westcott would be so blatant about her intentions for Owen and Mari, all the way down to her more lascivious hopes for them, knickers and all.

  God love her. He couldn’t imagine a world without his grandmother in it.

  * * *

  Elderflower Island wasn’t large, but its residents certainly didn’t lack for the necessities. Chinese takeaway was on Owen’s must-have list, and Sue Yang’s kitchen never disappointed.

  Sue was bagging up the food when he walked in. “Hello, Owen.” She gestured to his larger-than-normal order. “Is your family visiting tonight?”

  This was the perfect chance to start getting the news out around the island that Mari was not only no threat to anyone, but the more locals who rallied around her, the better.

  “Charlie’s daughter is here,” he told Sue as he paid. “I’m taking dinner over to the bookshop, then helping her with whatever she needs done to get it back up and running. She’s a really nice person, and I’d like to see her succeed.” He lifted the bag. “I’m sure she’s going to love your food, Sue. Cheers.”

  Just that quickly, the underground island news network would start humming into overdrive.

  Owen was humming too as he headed down the street to Elderflower Island Books. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt like this. Walking with a new spring in his step, under a clear sky, surrounded by flowers that had never smelled quite so fragrant. It wasn’t simply that the past year had been overshadowed by worries about his grandmother.

  It was more a feeling that whatever he’d been waiting for his whole life was finally here.

  He knocked on the bookshop door. Through the window, he saw Mari turn. A smile lit her face—the same smile he knew was mirrored on his face.

  “Hi.” She looked a little shy as she opened the door and let him in. Until she smelled dinner, that was. “That smells amazing.” She put a hand over her stomach at the same moment it let out a loud growl. “I got into such a groove here that I forgot to eat lunch.”

  “I thought that might happen, so I ordered loads.”

  “How about we go up to the flat and eat in the kitchen you so thoughtfully cleaned yesterday?”

  As they headed for the stairs, he took a look around the shop—and was, frankly, astonished by everything she’d already accomplished. The shelves facing the door were dust-free and organized, the piles of books that had littered the floor and seats had been cleared away, and the floor had been polished. “You did all this by yourself?”

  “Your sister Alice came by to help.” Mari smiled. “She’s great.”

  “She is,” he agreed. But he also knew that Alice likely hadn’t been able to stay long, probably only the length of her lunch break. “You must be exhausted.” Between the hard work and jet lag, Mari was likely about to drop.

  “Actually, I feel surprisingly good. I just kept telling myself to ‘keep calm and carry on cleaning.’” She let them into the flat, then went to refill and turn on the kettle. She might have spent only one night in Britain, but her tea-making instincts were that of a native. Over her shoulder, she said, “The queen would probably have my head for butchering the iconic phrase, wouldn’t she?”

  “On the contrary,” he said, “I think she’d be pleased by your stiff upper lip.”

  Mari got out plates and silverware while he unloaded cartons of kung pao chicken, chow mein, mu shu pork, egg rolls, and steamed rice onto the kitchen table.

  “Did Charlie have that?” she asked. “A stiff upper lip, I mean.”

  Her tone was mild, and she didn’t stop laying the table. But her surface nonchalance couldn’t disguise how much Owen’s answers about Charlie’s life and personality meant to her. He got the sense she was mentally sliding into place one small puzzle piece after another in the hopes that one day, she would finally be able to see a full picture of the father she’d barely known.

  “He definitely did,” Owen replied. “I never heard him complain about anything.”

  She met his eyes across the table. “It’s one thing never to complain—it’s another entirely to be truly happy.” The words were barely out of her mouth when she waved her hand in the air as if to erase them. “I swore I wasn’t going to pin you to the wall with a hundred and one questions about Charlie the second you walked in.”

  “When I said I’m happy to try to answer any questions you have about him, I meant it. And as to whether or not he was happy? My grandmother would probably know better than any of us, but despite how close they were, I’m not sure how much he opened up even to her.”

  “Did she know about me?”

  “I’m pretty sure she was the only one here who did. But she never told a soul. Whatever Charlie said to her went into the vault and has stayed there. Now that you’re here, however, I wouldn’t be surprised to find that she’s willing to talk to you directly.”

  Mari shook her head. “I wouldn’t want her to feel that she’s betraying his confidences. Everyone needs someone they can trust to hold their deepest, darkest secrets.”

  I want to be the one to hold yours.

  He nearly said the words aloud. But it would only frighten her away if she knew the impact she’d already
had on him. If she had any sense of how much he wanted to protect her. Help her.

  Kiss her.

  “I don’t imagine many people would feel that way,” he said in a low voice, unable to look away from her lips. Unable to keep from imagining how it would feel to have her in his arms.

  And to taste her.

  “We should be able to trust the people we love. And,” she added with a little smile that made his heart beat even faster, “you should be able to come here and eat Chinese food without having a philosophical discussion about trust and secret-keeping.”

  Owen would have been perfectly happy to continue their conversation—he’d never gone so deep, so fast, with anyone before—but this was clearly her cue to move away from talking about her father for the time being.

  She made tea with the green tea bags Sue had supplied. Bringing the teapot over to the table, along with two mugs, she said, “I’d love to hear about your experiences growing up here. All the buildings have such amazing history that I can’t help but think it must have been like living in a Harry Potter novel.”

  He waited until she’d served herself before he filled his own plate. “One look at my secondary school would only serve to confirm your suspicions that all British kids live in a J. K. Rowling novel.” He spoke around bites of food. Mari, meanwhile, was devouring the mu shu pork. “The campus comes complete with stone gargoyles at the gate.”

  “Seriously?”

  He pulled out his phone and showed her a photo of his school on the Internet. “Seriously.”

  She raised an eyebrow as she moved on to the shrimp fried rice. “You’re not going to whip out a wand and cast a spell over me, are you?”

  He laughed. “Believe me, if I could cast a spell to get the shop and flat organized as quickly and painlessly as possible, I would.” When a shadow fell across her face at the reminder of how much work was ahead of her, he quickly pivoted back to talking about his childhood. “As I told you before, my parents’ sacrifices for me are why I nearly continued with tax law—I felt I owed it to them and shouldn’t chuck it in after all they’d done to help me get the degree.”