Chapter 21: Both Suitcases

Hannah's POV

I said only this, in that doorway.

"Unpack, please. We're having pancakes."

Preston looked at me over Poppy's head.

Then he stood up, closed the suitcase, and slid it under the bed with his foot.

That was all I could handle before breakfast.

The hotel was a white building on the cliff road, and Bridget had taken a room on the third floor with a view of a parking lot.

Jack was sitting on the corridor carpet outside her door with his back against the wall.

He had been there since the dinner, the night porter told me, and had refused to leave.

"Is she talking to you?" I asked.

"She said, 'Go home, Jack.'" He shrugged. "I told her this was my home."

"Charming."

"I thought so."

I knocked.

Bridget opened the door in the linen shirt, with Max asleep behind her on the big bed.

Her duffel bag stood by the wall.

It was zipped.

"I've booked a flight," she said. "Not far. To my mother's. She said she has room."

"Your mother lives in Ohio."

"It's a good place to be nobody."

I came in and shut the door on Jack and sat on the end of the bed.

Max stirred and flung an arm over his head.

"Say what you came to say," said Bridget. "I deserve it."

I had practiced it in the car.

"I forgive the video," I said.

She stared at me.

"I don't mean it's fine. I mean I looked at it, and I know why you did it, and I think I'd have been tempted. I'd have been tempted to do worse."

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