Page 59 of Against the Current

But he hadn’t wanted to throw them overboard like that.

“My family was going through a lot at the time,” Ryan said, palming the back of his neck. “I didn’t want to add to the mess.”

“What a mess it would have been,” Tommy agreed.

“My grandmother and grandfather had too much,” Ryan said, waving his arms toward the mansion before them. “They spent and spent and spent. They assumed anyone else with less money than them wasn’t good enough. As a kid, it was just the environment I knew. But as an adult, I see how disgusting thatwas. Who cares about a sports car? Who cares about something that was stolen fourteen years ago? My grandmother spent two million in a year on clothes. Clothes! I can’t even fathom that. If she had lived longer, she would have had to sell the Sutton Estate.”

Ryan had never talked so long or passionately about how his grandmother had wronged the world.

Tommy remained quiet for a long time. “I tried to teach my children right from wrong. I think I got it right with Trisha. She’s a good one. And she’s a good mother, too.”

“Parenting isn’t easy,” Ryan said, trying to laugh.

From inside the house came the sounds of Willa and Rudy singing a song they’d learned at school for their new grandmother.

A blush crept across Tommy’s cheeks. “That’s the most beautiful sound I’ve ever heard.”

Ryan laughed. “Go on in and meet your grandchildren. They’ve been waiting for you.”

That afternoon, Ryan and Trisha sat on the back porch, watching Tommy, Rhonda, Willa, Rudy, and Gavin play a game of croquet with the new set they’d purchased for the upcoming opening party for the Sutton Bed-and-Breakfast. Ryan was surprised to see how at ease Willa was with Tommy and Rhonda. Apparently, Trisha had given her parents a pep talk ahead of time, telling them how to speak to Willa, what to do when she panicked, and how and when to hug her if Willa allowed it.

We’re all learning. All the time, Ryan thought.

Much later that evening, Ryan and Tommy operated the grill while Rhonda and Trisha made potato salad and the kids chilled by the television. It was an overcast night and chilly, and Ryan pulled on a Chicago Cubs sweatshirt.

“Traitor!” Tommy cried, pointing at the shirt.

“Man, I lived in that city for fourteen years! I turned into a fan,” Ryan said.

Tommy rolled his eyes. “Maybe we can watch a game one of these days.”

Ryan laughed. “Any time, my man.”

There was talk that Rhonda and Tommy planned to move back to Nantucket, if only to get away from the more poisonous of the remaining Reeds.

“There are some bad eggs in that family,” Tommy said, flipping steaks as the fire licked the griddle. “Sarah let all the power go to her head. I think it was her marriage to that Max Strong guy. He started losing money fast. And the rumor was that she’d married him for his money in the first place.”

“Never good to marry for money,” Ryan said. “It can be slippery.”

Tommy smiled and looked thoughtful. “What did it feel like when you knew you wanted to marry Trisha?”

Ryan’s heart swelled. He stepped back, listening to Trisha’s laughter echoing inside the kitchen. “It felt like a miracle that anyone so beautiful and smart and funny would want to spend more than five minutes with me,” he explained quietly. “It felt like a miracle that I would get to wake up every day beside her.”

“You didn’t think she’d say no?” Tommy asked.

Ryan laughed. “I was worried about it. I was stressed, tossing and turning in bed, wondering how I would say it, how it would go. But instead of saying yes, she said what took you so long? Which made me laugh a lot. I think I fell on the beach. After that, we went swimming at night, and we were yelling to the stars, and it was magical. We felt like the world belonged to us alone. I’ll never forget it.”

Tommy nodded and flipped the steaks again. He took his job very seriously.

“What did it feel like when you knew you wanted to marry Rhonda?” Ryan asked.

Tommy puffed out his cheeks. “It felt like when the sails first open on a boat and you really start to fly, you know? It felt like, all my life I’d been a messy Reed. I’d stolen things. I’d been told I wasn’t good enough to live anywhere but on the fringes of society. But Rhonda, she forced me to look at the beauty around me. She forced me to count the stars in the sky and look at every rainbow. We never had more than a few dollars, you know? And we struggled a great deal. But every night, we settled in together and reminded each other of how much we loved each other and our children. It was enough.”

Ryan couldn’t believe this was the first heart-to-heart he’d ever had with his father-in-law. He hadn’t known Tommy Reed was capable.

They’d wasted so much time apart.

Or—Ryan corrected himself—they hadn’t wasted that time. They’d needed that time to grow and heal and change. They’d needed time to separate and come back together again to make a family; to make a whole.