Ultimate Cedar Cove Collection (Books 1-12 & 2 Novellas)

16 Lighthouse Road
204 Rosewood Lane
311 Pelican Court
44 Cranberry Point
50 Harbor Street
Christmas in Cedar Cove
6 Rainier Drive
74 Seaside Avenue
8 Sandpiper Way
Falling for Christmas
92 Pacific Boulevard
1022 Evergreen Place
1105 Yakima Street
1225 Christmas Tree Lane
Debbie Macomber

www.mirabooks.co.uk

All the characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author, and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all the incidents are pure invention.

All Rights Reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Enterprises II B.V./S.à.r.l. The text of this publication or any part thereof may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, storage in an information retrieval system, or otherwise, without the written permission of the publisher.

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out or otherwise circulated without the prior consent of the publisher in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

MIRA is a registered trademark of Harlequin Enterprises Limited, used under licence.

Published in Great Britain 2013.

The News Building, 1 London Bridge Street,

London SE1 9GF

© Debbie Macomber 2013

ISBN 978 1 4720 7440 9

Version: 2018-07-18

Table of Contents

Title Page

Dedication

Dear Reader

Some Residents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-One

Chapter Thirty-Two

Chapter Thirty-Three

Chapter Thirty-Four

Chapter Thirty-Five

Chapter Thirty-Six

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Chapter Forty

Chapter Forty-One

Chapter Forty-Two

Chapter Forty-Three

Chapter Forty-Four

Chapter Forty-Five

Chapter Forty-Six

Chapter Forty-Seven

Chapter Forty-Eight

Chapter Forty-Nine

Chapter Fifty

Chapter Fifty-One

Chapter Fifty-Two

Preview

16 Lighthouse Road

Praise for the novels of #1 New York Times Bestselling Author DEBBIE MACOMBER

“As always, Macomber draws rich, engaging characters.”

—Publishers Weekly on Thursdays at Eight

“A multifaceted tale of romance and deceit, the final installment of Macomber’s Dakota trilogy oozes with country charm and a strong sense of community.”

—Publishers Weekly on Always Dakota

“Macomber closes book two with a cliffhanger, leaving readers anxiously awaiting the final installment to this first-rate series.”

—Publishers Weekly on Dakota Home

“Ms. Macomber provides the top in entertaining relationship dramas.”

—Reader to Reader

“Sometimes the best things come in small packages. Such is the case here….”

—Publishers Weekly on Return to Promise

“Macomber’s storytelling sometimes yields a tear, at other times a smile.”

—Newport News, VA Daily Press

“Popular romance writer Macomber has a gift for evoking the emotions that are at the heart of the genre’s popularity.”

—Publishers Weekly

“Well-developed emotions and appealing characters.”

—Publishers Weekly on Montana

Dear Friends,

Welcome to Cedar Cove, Washington. I hope you enjoy meeting my new friends. And I hope that once you do, you’ll feel as comfortable with Olivia, Grace, Charlotte, Cecilia, Jack, Ian, Seth and all the others as you would your own next-door neighbors. You see, they’re my neighbors. Well…not exactly. Cedar Cove is based on my own hometown of Port Orchard, Washington, but the characters and their stories come from my imagination. However, anyone who’s walked the streets of Port Orchard will recognize buildings and events I’ve described. The library, the new City Hall, even the Seagull Calling contest are part and parcel of life in Port Orchard.

After creating stories that involved Alaska, Texas and North Dakota, I received dozens of letters with suggestions for stories in other states. While I was trying to make up my mind, it occurred to me that there are few places I enjoy more than my own beautiful state of Washington. Every small town I’ve created over the years, whether it was in Alaska or Texas, was a bit of life as I know it—the life I experienced raising my own family right here in Port Orchard. With the Cedar Cove series, I’m just making it official.

Before you ask about the length of this series, I’ll tell you. The answer is that I don’t know. It’ll be as many books as it takes to tell all the stories. My goal, as always, is to enable you to pick up the first book or the tenth and immediately experience a sense of welcome.

So sit back and enjoy some romance, with a bit of mystery with a little wisdom thrown in. Acquaint yourself with a whole community of new friends. I know they’re all anxious to introduce themselves to you!

P.S. I love to hear from readers. You can reach me at P.O. Box 1458, Port Orchard, WA 98366 or through my website at www.debbiemacomber.com.

In memory of

Rita Adler

December 26, 1950–December 12, 2000

We shall miss you.

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

One

Cecilia Randall had heard of people who, if granted one wish, would choose to live their lives over again. Not her. She’d be perfectly content to blot just one twelve-month period from her twenty-two years.

The past twelve months.

Last January, shortly after New Year’s, she’d met Ian Jacob Randall, a Navy man, a submariner. She’d fallen in love with him and done something completely irresponsible—she’d gotten pregnant. Then she’d complicated the whole situation by marrying him.

That was mistake number three and from there, her errors in judgment had escalated. She hadn’t been stupid so much as naïve and in love and—worst of all—romantic. The Navy, and life, had cured her of that fast enough.

Their baby girl had been born premature while Ian was at sea, and it became immediately apparent that she had a defective heart. By the time Ian returned home, Allison Marie had already been laid to rest. It was Cecilia who’d stood alone in the unrelenting rain of the Pacific Northwest while her baby’s tiny casket was lowered into the cold, muddy earth. She’d been forced to make life-and-death decisions without the counsel of family or the comfort of her husband.

Her mother lived on the East Coast and, because of a storm, had been unable to fly into Washington State. Her father was as supportive as he knew how to be—which was damn little. His idea of “being there for her” consisted of giving Cecilia a sympathy card and writing a few lines about how sorry he was for her loss. Cecilia had spent countless days and nights by their daughter’s empty crib, alternately weeping and in shock. Other Navy wives had tried to console her, but Cecilia wasn’t comfortable with strangers. She’d rejected their help and their friendship. And because she’d been in Cedar Cove for such a short time, she hadn’t made any close friends in the community, either. As a result, she’d borne her grief alone.

When Ian did return, he’d blamed Navy procedures for his delay. He’d tried to explain, but by then Cecilia was tired of it all. Only one reality had any meaning: her daughter was dead. Her husband didn’t know and couldn’t possibly understand what she’d endured in his absence. Since he was on a nuclear submarine, all transmissions during his tour of duty were limited to fifty-word “family grams.” Nothing could have been done, anyway; the submarine was below the polar ice cap at the time. She did write to tell him about Allison’s birth and then her death. She’d written out her grief in these brief messages, not caring that they’d be closely scrutinized by Navy personnel. But Ian’s commanding officer had seen fit to postpone relaying the information until the completion of the ten-week tour. I didn’t know, Ian had repeatedly insisted. Surely she couldn’t hold him responsible. But she did. Unfair though it might be, Cecilia couldn’t forgive him.

Now all she wanted was out. Out of her marriage, out of this emotional morass of guilt and regret, just out. The simplest form of escape was to divorce Ian.

Sitting in the hallway near the courtroom, she felt more determined than ever to terminate her marriage. With one swift strike of a judge’s gavel, she could put an end to the nightmare of the past year. Eventually she would forget she’d ever met Ian Randall.

Allan Harris, Cecilia’s attorney, entered the foyer outside the Kitsap County courtroom. She watched as he glanced around until he saw her. He raised his hand in a brief greeting, then walked over to where she sat on the hard wooden bench and claimed the empty space beside her.

“Tell me again what’s going to happen,” she said, needing the assurance that her life would return to at least an approximation of what it had been a year ago.

Allan set his briefcase on his lap. “We wait until the docket is announced. The judge will ask if we’re ready, I’ll announce that we are, and we’ll be given a number.”

Cecilia nodded, feeling numb.

“We can be assigned any number between one and fifty,” her attorney continued. “Then we wait our turn.”

Cecilia nodded again, hoping she wouldn’t be stuck in the courthouse all day. Bad enough that she had to be here; even worse that Ian’s presence was also required. She hadn’t seen him yet. Maybe he was meeting somewhere with his own attorney, discussing strategies—not that she expected him to contest the divorce.

“There won’t be a problem, will there?” Her palms were damp and cold sweat had broken out across her forehead. She wanted this to be over so she could get on with her life. She believed that couldn’t happen until the divorce was filed. Only then would the pain start to go away.

“I can’t see that there’ll be any hang-ups, especially since you’ve agreed to divide all the debts.” He frowned slightly. “Despite that prenuptial agreement you signed.”

A flu-like feeling attacked Cecilia’s stomach, and she clutched her purse tightly against her. Soon, she reminded herself, soon she could walk out these doors into a new life.

“It’s a rather…unusual agreement,” Allan murmured.

In retrospect, the prenuptial agreement had been another in the list of mistakes she’d made in the past year, but according to her attorney one that could easily be rectified. Back when she’d signed it, their agreement had made perfect sense. In an effort to prove their sincerity, they’d come up with the idea that the spouse who wanted the divorce should pay not only the legal costs but all debts incurred during the marriage. It could be seen as either punitive or deterrent; in either case, it hadn’t worked. And now it was just one more nuisance to be dealt with.

Cecilia blamed herself for insisting on something in writing. She’d wanted to be absolutely sure that Ian wasn’t marrying her out of any sense of obligation. Yes, the pregnancy was unplanned, but she would’ve been perfectly content to raise her child by herself. She preferred that to being trapped in an unhappy marriage—or trapping Ian in a relationship he didn’t want. Ian, however, had been adamant. He’d sworn that he loved her, loved their unborn child and wanted to marry her.

As a ten-year-old, Cecilia’s entire world had been torn apart when her parents divorced. She refused to do that to her own child. In her mind, marriage was forever, so she’d wanted them to be certain before making a lifetime commitment. How naïve, she thought now. How sentimental. How romantic.

Ian had said he wanted their marriage to be forever, too, but like so much else this past year, that had been an illusion. Cecilia had needed to believe him, believe in the power of love, believe it would protect her from this kind of heartache.

In the end, blinded by the prospect of a husband who seemed totally committed to her and by the hope of a happy-ever-after kind of life, Cecilia had acquiesced to the marriage—with one stipulation. The agreement.

Their marriage was supposed to last as long as they both lived, so they’d devised an agreement that would help them stay true to their vows. Or so they’d thought…. Before the ceremony, they’d written the prenuptial contract themselves and had it notarized. She’d forgotten all about it until she’d made an appointment with Allan Harris and he’d asked if she’d signed any agreement prior to the wedding. It certainly wasn’t the standard sort of document; nevertheless Allan felt they needed to have the court rescind it.

Her marriage shouldn’t have ended like this, but after their baby died, everything had gone wrong. Whatever love had existed between them had been eroded by their loss. Babies weren’t supposed to die—even babies born premature. Any sense of rightness, of justice, had disappeared from Cecilia’s world. The marriage that was meant to sustain her had become yet another source of guilt and grief. Experience had taught her she was alone, and her legal status might as well reflect that.

She couldn’t think about it anymore and purposely turned her thoughts elsewhere.

Attorneys milled about the crowded area, conferring with their clients, and she looked around, expecting to find Ian, bracing herself for the inevitable confrontation. She hadn’t seen or talked to him in more than four months, although their attorneys were in regular contact. She wondered if all these other people were here for equally sad reasons. They must be. Why else did anyone go to court? Broken vows, fractured agreements…

“We have Judge Lockhart,” Allan said, breaking into her observations.

“Is that good?”

“She’s fair.”

That was all Cecilia asked. “This is just a formality, right?”

“Right.” Allan gave her a comforting smile.

She checked at her watch. The docket was scheduled to be announced at nine and it was five minutes before. Ian still wasn’t here.

“What if Ian doesn’t show up?” she asked.

“Then we’ll ask for a continuance.”

“Oh.” Not another delay, she silently pleaded.

“He’ll be here,” Allan said reassuringly. “Brad told me Ian’s just as keen to get this over with as you are.”

The knot in her stomach tightened. This was the easy part, she told herself, dismissing her nervousness. She’d already been through the hard part—the pain and grief, the disappointment of a marriage that hadn’t worked. The hearing was merely a formality; Allan had said so. Once the prenuptial agreement was rescinded, the no-contest divorce was as good as done and this nightmare would be behind her.

Then Ian appeared.

Cecilia felt his presence before she actually saw him. Felt his gaze as he came up the stairwell and into the foyer. She turned and their eyes briefly met before they each, hurriedly, looked away.

Almost simultaneous with his arrival, the courtroom doors opened. Everyone stood and began to file inside with an eagerness that defied explanation. Allan walked beside Cecilia through the mahogany doors. Ian and his attorney entered after them and sat on the opposite side of the courtroom.

The bailiff immediately started reading off names as though taking attendance. With each name or set of names, a response was made and a number assigned. It happened so quickly that Cecilia almost missed hearing her own.

“Randall.”

Both Allan Harris and Brad Dumas called out.

Cecilia didn’t hear the number they were given. When Allan sat down beside her, he wrote thirty on a yellow legal pad.

“Thirty?” she whispered, astonished to realize that twenty-nine other cases would have to be heard before hers.

He nodded. “Don’t worry, it’ll go fast. We’ll probably be out of here before eleven. Depends on what else is being decided.”

“Do I have to stay here?”

“Not in the courtroom. You can wait outside if you prefer.”

She did. The room felt claustrophobic, unbearably so. She stood and hurried into the nearly empty hall, practically stumbling out of the courtroom in her rush to escape.

Two steps into the foyer, she stopped—barely avoiding a collision with Ian.

They both froze, staring at each other. Cecilia didn’t know what to say; Ian apparently had the same problem. He looked good dressed in his Navy blues, reminding her of the first time they’d met. He was tall and fit and possessed the most mesmerizing blue eyes she’d ever seen. Cecilia thought that if Allison Marie had lived, she would have had her daddy’s eyes.

“It’s almost over,” Ian said, his voice low and devoid of emotion.

“Yes,” she returned. After a moment’s silence, she added, “I didn’t follow you out here.” She wanted him to know that.

“I figured as much.”

“It felt like the walls were closing in on me.”

He didn’t comment and sank onto one of the wooden benches that lined the hallway outside the courtrooms. He slouched forward, elbows braced against his knees. She sat at the other end of the bench, perched uncomfortably on the very edge. Other people left the crowded courtroom and either disappeared or found a secluded corner to confer with their lawyers. Their whispered voices echoed off the granite walls.

“I know you don’t believe me, but I’m sorry it’s come to this,” Ian said.

“I am, too.” Then, in case he assumed she might be seeking a reconciliation, she told him, “But it’s necessary.”

“I couldn’t agree with you more.” He sat upright, his back ramrod-straight as he folded his arms across his chest. He didn’t look at her again.

This was awkward—both of them sitting here like this. But if he could pretend she wasn’t there, she could do the same thing. Surreptitiously, she slid farther back on the bench. This was going to be a long wait.

“Well, hello there,” Charlotte Jefferson said as she peeked inside the small private room at Cedar Cove Convalescent Center. “I understand you’re a new arrival.”

The elderly, white-haired gentleman slumped in his wheelchair, staring at her with clouded brown eyes. Despite the ravages of illness and age—he was in his nineties, she’d learned—she could see he’d once been a handsome man. The classic bone structure was unmistakable.

“You don’t need to worry about answering,” she told him. “I know you’re a stroke patient. I just wanted to introduce myself. I’m Charlotte Jefferson. I stopped by to see if there’s anything I can do for you.”

He raised his gaze to hers and slowly, as though with great effort, shook his head.

“You don’t have to tell me your name. I read it outside the door. You’re Thomas Harding.” She paused. “Janet Lester—the social worker here—mentioned you a few days ago. I’ve always been fond of the name Thomas,” she chattered on. “I imagine your friends call you Tom.”

A weak smile told her she was right.

“That’s what I thought.” Charlotte didn’t mean to be pushy, but she knew how lonely it must feel to come to a strange town and not know a single, solitary soul. “One of my dearest friends was here for years, and I came to visit with her every Thursday. It got to be such a habit that after Barbara went to be with the Lord, I continued. Last week, Janet told me you’d just arrived. So I decided to come over today and introduce myself.”

He tried to move his right hand, without success.

“Is there something I can get you?” she asked, wanting to be helpful.

He shook his head again, then with a shaky index finger pointed at the chair across from him.

“Ah, I understand. You’re asking me to sit down.”

He managed a grin, lopsided though it was.

“Well, don’t mind if I do. These dogs are barking.” She sat in the chair he’d indicated and removed her right pump in order to rub some feeling back into her toes.

Tom watched her, his eyes keen with interest.

“I suppose you’d like to know a little something about Cedar Cove. Well, I don’t blame you, poor man. Thank goodness you got transferred here. Janet said you’d requested Cedar Cove in the first place, but got sent to that facility in Seattle instead. I heard about what happened there. All I can say is it’s a crying shame.” According to Janet, Tom’s previous facility had been closed down for a number of serious violations. The patients, most of whom were wards of the state, were assigned to a variety of care units across Washington.

“I’m so glad you’re here in Cedar Cove—it’s a delightful little town, Tom,” she said, purposely using his name. She wanted him to feel acknowledged. He’d spent time in a sub-standard facility where he’d been treated without dignity or compassion. In fact, Janet had told her the staff there had been particularly neglectful. Charlotte was shocked to hear that; she found it incomprehensible. Imagine being cruel to a vulnerable person like Tom! Imagine ignoring him, leaving him to lie in a dirty bed, never talking to him…. “I see you’ve got a view of the marina from here,” she said with as much enthusiasm as she could muster. “We’re proud of our waterfront. During the summer there’s a wonderful little festival, and of course the Farmer’s Market fills the parking lot next to the library on Saturdays. Every so often, fishing boats dock at the pier and sell their wares. I swear to you, Tom, there’s nothing better than Hood Canal shrimp bought fresh off the boat.”

She hesitated, but Tom seemed to be listening, so she went on.

“Okay, let’s see what I can tell you about Cedar Cove,” she said, hardly knowing where to start. “This is a small town. Last census, I believe we totaled not quite five thousand. My husband, Clyde, and I both came from the Yakima area, in the eastern part of the state and we moved here after World War II. Back then, Cedar Cove had the only stoplight in the entire county. That was fifty years ago now.” Fifty years. How could all that time have slipped away?

“Cedar Cove has changed in some ways, but it’s stayed the same in others,” she said. “A lot of people around here are employed by the Bremerton shipyard, just like they were in the forties. And naturally the Navy has a real impact on the town’s economy.”

Tom must have guessed as much, with the Bremerton Naval shipyard on the other side of the cove. Huge aircraft carriers lined the waterfront; so did rows of diesel-powered submarines. The nuclear ones were stationed at the submarine base out in Bangor. On overcast days, the gray flotilla blended with the slate colors of the sky.

Tom jerkily placed his right hand over his heart.

“You served in the military?” she asked.

The older man’s nod was barely perceptible.

“God bless you,” Charlotte said. “There’s all that talk about us being the greatest generation, living through the depression and the war, and you know what? They’re right. Young people these days don’t know what it means to sacrifice. They’ve had it far too easy, but then, that’s just my opinion.”

Tom’s eyes widened, and Charlotte could tell he agreed with her.

Not wanting to get sidetracked, she paused, gnawing on her lower lip. “Now, what else can I tell you?” she murmured. “Well, for one thing, we’re big on sports in Cedar Cove. Friday nights in the fall, half the town shows up for the high-school football games. This time of year, it’s basketball. Two years ago, the softball team took the state championship. My oldest grandson—” She hesitated and looked away, sorry she’d followed this train of thought. “Jordan showed real promise as a baseball player, but he drowned fifteen years ago.” She wasn’t sure what had prompted her to mention Jordan and wished that she hadn’t. A familiar sadness lodged in her heart. “I don’t think I’ll ever get over his death.”

Tom, feeble as he was, leaned toward her, as though to rest his hand on hers.

It was a touching gesture. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I didn’t mean to talk about this. My daughter lives in Cedar Cove,” she continued, forcing a cheerful note into her voice. “She’s a judge—Judge Olivia Lockhart—and I’m proud as can be of her. When she was a girl, Olivia was a skinny little thing. She grew up tall, though. Very striking. She’s in her early fifties now, and she still turns heads. It’s the way she carries herself. Just looking at her, people know she’s someone important. That’s my daughter, the judge, but to me she’ll always be my little brown-eyed girl. I get a lot of joy out of sitting in her courtroom while she’s presiding.” She shook her head. “Here I am talking about myself instead of Cedar Cove.” If she’d had questions to answer, Charlotte would’ve found this easier; unfortunately, it wasn’t possible for Tom to ask.

“We’re only a ferry ride away from Seattle, but we’re a rural community. I live in the town proper, but plenty of folks have chickens and horses. Of course, that’s outside the city limits.”

Tom nodded in her direction.

“You’re asking about me?”

His answering smile told her she’d guessed right.

Charlotte smiled, a bit flustered. She lifted her hand to her head and smoothed the soft wavy hair. At seventy-two, her hair was completely white. It suited her, if she did say so herself. Her face was relatively unlined; she’d always been proud of her complexion—a woman was allowed a little vanity, wasn’t she?

“I’m a widow,” she began. “Clyde’s been gone nearly twenty years. He died much too young—cancer.” She lowered her eyes. “He worked at the Naval shipyard. We had two children, William and Olivia. You know, the judge. William works in the energy business and travels all over the world, and Olivia married and settled down right here in Cedar Cove. Her children graduated from the same high school she did. The school hangs a picture of each year’s graduating class on the wall and it’s quite interesting to look back on all those young smiling faces and see what’s become of them.” Charlotte grew thoughtful. “Justine’s picture is there. She was Jordan’s twin and oh, I do worry about her. She’s twenty-eight now and dating an older man neither her mother nor I trust.” Charlotte stopped herself from saying more. “James is Olivia’s youngest, and he’s currently in the Navy. It was a shock to all of us when he enlisted. William and his wife decided against children, and I sometimes wonder if they regret that now. I think Will might, but not Georgia.” Although both her children were in their fifties, Charlotte still worried about them.

Tom’s eyes drifted shut, then swiftly opened.

“You’re tired,” Charlotte said, realizing she was discussing her concerns about her daughter and grandchildren more than she was giving Tom an overview of Cedar Cove.

He shook his head slightly, as if he didn’t want her to leave.

Charlotte stood and placed her hand on his shoulder. “I’ll be back soon, Tom. You should get some sleep. Besides, it’s time I headed for the courthouse. Olivia’s on the bench this morning and I’m finishing a baby blanket.” Deciding she should explain, she added, “I do my best knitting in court. The Chronicle did an article about me a couple of years ago with a photo! There I was, sitting in court with my needles and my yarn. Which reminds me, if you’d like I’ll bring in the local paper and read it to you. Until just this week, we only had the Wednesday edition, but the paper was recently sold and a new editor hired. He’s expanded to two papers a week. Isn’t that nice?”

Tom smiled.

“This is a lovely little town,” Charlotte told him, leaning forward to pat his hand. “You’re going to like it here so well.”

She started out the door and saw that her new friend didn’t have a lap robe. The ladies at the Senior Center would soon fix that. These halls got downright chilly, especially during Cedar Cove’s damp winters. How sad that this man didn’t have anyone who cared enough about his welfare to see that he had a basic comfort like that.

“I’ll be back soon,” she told him again.

Tom nodded and gave her a rakish little grin. Oh, yes, he’d been a charmer in his day.

As she walked out the main door, Janet stopped her. “Did you introduce yourself to Tom Harding?”

“I did. What a dear man.”

“I knew you’d think so. You’re exactly what he needs.”

“He doesn’t have any family?”

“There’s no next of kin listed in his file. It’s about five years since his stroke, and apparently he’s never had visitors.” She paused, frowning. “But then, I don’t know how much we can trust the record-keeping at Senior Haven.”

“How long was he there?”

Janet shrugged. “I don’t recall exactly. At least five years. After he was released from chronic care.”

“Oh, the poor man. He’s—”

“In need of a friend,” Janet finished for her.

“Well, he found one,” Charlotte said. She’d always been a talker. Clyde used to say she could make friends with a brick wall. He meant it as a compliment and she’d taken it that way.

On second thought, she wouldn’t ask the women at the Senior Center to knit Tom a lap robe; she’d do it herself, just as soon as she finished the baby blanket. By her next visit, she’d have something to give him, something to keep him warm—the lap robe…and her friendship.

Judge Olivia Lockhart had a difficult time with divorce cases, which were her least favorite duty in family court. She’d served on the bench for two years and figured she’d seen it all. Then there were cases like this one.

Ian and Cecilia Randall were asking to rescind their handwritten notarized prenuptial agreement. As soon as that was out of the way, they would file for the dissolution of their marriage. The attorneys stood before her with their clients at their sides.

Olivia glanced at the paperwork, noting that it had been dated and signed less than a year ago. How a marriage could go so wrong so quickly was beyond her. She looked up and studied the couple. So young, they were, both of them staring down at their feet. Ian Randall seemed to be a responsible young man, probably away from his home and family for the first time, serving in the military. The wife was a fragile waif, impossibly thin with dark, soulful eyes. Her straight brown hair framed her heart-shaped face; the ends straggled to her shoulders. She repeatedly looped a strand around her ear, probably out of nerves.

“I must say this is original,” Olivia murmured, rereading the few lines of the text. It was straightforward enough if unusual. According to the agreement, the spouse who filed for divorce would assume all debts.

Apparently they’d had a change of heart in that, as well as in the matter of their marriage. Olivia glanced over the brief list of accumulated debts and saw that they’d been evenly split between the couple. If the marriage had lasted longer, of course, the debts would have been more punishing—a mortgage, presumably, car payments and so on. Which would have provided the discontented spouse with an incentive of sorts to stay in the marriage, Olivia supposed. In any event, the current debts amounted to seven thousand dollars. Ian Randall assumed all credit card bills and Cecilia Randall had agreed to pay the utility bills, which included a three-hundred-dollar phone bill and oddly enough, a two-hundred-dollar charge to a florist shop. The largest of the debts, she noticed, was burial costs, which they had agreed to share equally.

“Both parties have reached an agreement in regard to all debts accumulated during the time of their marriage,” Allan Harris stated.

Clearly there was more to this situation than met the eye. “Was there a death in the family?” she asked, directing the question to the attorney who’d spoken.

Allan nodded. “A child.”

Olivia’s stomach spasmed. “I see.”

“Our daughter was born premature, and she had a defective heart,” Cecilia Randall said in a barely audible voice. “Her name was Allison.”

“Allison Marie Randall,” the sailor husband added.

Olivia watched as husband and wife exchanged glances. Cecilia looked away but not fast enough for Olivia to miss the pain, the anger, the heartache. Perhaps she recognized it because she’d experienced it herself, right along with the disintegration of her own marriage.

The two parties continued to await her decision. Since everything was in order and both were in agreement, there was little to hold up the procedure. This hearing was simply a formality so they could proceed to the dissolution of their marriage.

“Seven thousand dollars is quite a lot of debt to accumulate in just a few months,” she said, prolonging their wait.

“I agree, Your Honor,” Brad Dumas inserted quickly, “but there were extenuating circumstances.”

Olivia caught sight of her mother in the viewing chamber. She often sat in the front row, almost always occupied with her needles and yarn. But Charlotte wasn’t knitting now. Her fingers clenched the needles that rested in her lap, as though she, too, understood the significance of what was happening.

Olivia hesitated, which was completely unlike her. She was known for being swift and decisive. What this couple needed was a gentle, loving hand to guide them through the grieving process. Ending their marriage wouldn’t solve the problems; personal experience had taught Olivia that. If the Randalls insisted on going through with their divorce, Olivia would be helping them pave a one-way road to pain and guilt. However, she had no legal reason not to rescind the agreement.

“I’m going to take a ten-minute recess…to review this agreement,” she announced. Then, before the members of either party could reveal their shock, she got up and headed toward her chambers. She heard the rustle of the courtroom as everyone stood, followed by a flurry of hushed whispers.

Sitting at her desk, Olivia leaned her head against the high-back leather chair and closed her eyes. It was inevitable that she’d see the comparisons between herself and Cecilia Randall. Fifteen years ago, Olivia had lost her oldest son. All those years had come and gone, but the pain of Jordan’s death had never faded, and it never would. In the twelve months after the drowning accident, her entire world had crumbled. First she’d lost her son and then her husband. Over the years, small problems had crept into her marriage—nothing big, nothing overwhelming or unusual, just the typical stress experienced by any couple with dual careers and three demanding children. But after Jordan’s death, that stress had multiplied tenfold, had become insurmountable. Before Olivia could fully appreciate what they were doing, they’d separated. Not long afterward, Olivia and Stan found themselves standing in front of a judge, and the divorce was declared final.

Three months later, Stan had shocked her and everyone else by remarrying. Apparently he’d been confiding his problems to this other woman for some time, keeping the relationship a secret from Olivia.

A knock sounded at her door and before Olivia could answer, her mother let herself in.

Olivia straightened. She should’ve known her mother would take this opportunity to speak with her. “Hello, Mom.”

“I’m not disturbing you, am I?”

Olivia shook her head. Her mother knew the door was always open as far as she was concerned.

“Oh, good.” Charlotte immediately got to the point—her point. “What a shame it is, that young couple wanting out of their marriage when they’ve barely had a chance to get to know each other.”

Olivia was thinking the same thing, although she couldn’t and wouldn’t admit it.

“It seems to me that neither of them is very keen on this divorce. I could be wrong, but—”

“Mother, you know I can’t discuss my cases.”

“Yes, yes, I know, but sometimes I just can’t help myself.” Charlotte started to back out the door, then apparently changed her mind. “I don’t know if I ever told you this, but your father and I didn’t get along the first year, either.”

This was news to Olivia.

“Clyde was a stubborn man, and as you might have noticed I have a strong will of my own.”

That was an understatement if ever there was one.

“Our first year, all we did was argue,” Charlotte said. “And then, before I knew it, I was pregnant with your brother and well…well, we worked everything out. We had a lot of good years together, your father and I.” Her hands tightened around her purse and her knitting bag. “He was the love of my life.” As if she’d said more than she’d intended, Charlotte moved out of the room and gently closed the door behind her.

Grinning, Olivia got to her feet. Leave it to her mother to say exactly what she needed to hear. Her decision made, Olivia returned to the courtroom. Once she was seated, the Randalls and their attorneys approached the bench. Cecilia Randall stepped forward with her big, soulful eyes staring blankly into space. Ian Randall’s expression was hard and unflinching, as though he was preparing himself for the inevitable.

“I cannot discount the possibility,” Olivia began, “that these parties entered into this agreement in contemplation of the very issue—this matter of divorce—that is set before this court. They obviously placed great value on their marriage and that value served as consideration for such a contract. Their intent was clearly to avoid the outcome they now seem to be pursuing—an easy divorce. Therefore, I am not setting aside the prenuptial agreement. The issue will need to be resolved at trial. In the meantime, I strongly urge these parties to seek out counseling or apply to the Dispute Resolution Center to discuss their differences.”

Both spouses and their lawyers leaned closer, as if they couldn’t possibly have heard correctly.

Allan Harris and Brad Dumas immediately started shuffling through their notes. The sight was almost comical as the two attorneys hurried to reread the prenuptial agreement.

“Excuse me, Your Honor.” Brad Dumas reacted first, raising his hand.

“Both parties are in agreement,” Allan Harris argued. “Mr. Randall has agreed to set aside the prenuptial and has willingly taken on responsibility for a share of the debts.”

“What did she say?” Cecilia Randall asked, looking to Allan Harris.

“To clarify, Your Honor,” Brad Dumas requested, his expression puzzled.

“The agreement stands as written,” Olivia stated.

“You’re not setting aside the agreement?” Allan Harris spoke slowly. He sounded confused.

“No, Counselors, I am not, for the reasons I’ve just indicated.”

Allan Harris and Brad Dumas stared at her.

“Is there a problem, gentlemen?”

“Ah…”

She waved them aside. “See the clerk and set a trial date.”

“Does this mean we can’t go through with the divorce?” Cecilia asked her attorney.

“I want the divorce as much as you do,” Ian Randall insisted.

Olivia slammed her gavel. “Order in the court,” she told them. If the couple chose to argue, they could do so on their own time.

Moving as though they were in shock, Allan Harris and Brad Dumas picked up their papers and briefcases.

“Is there any other option?” Cecilia Randall asked Allan Harris as they walked toward the doors.

“We might be able to appeal, but…”

“But that’ll drive up the costs even more,” Ian protested, close behind with his own attorney. Apparently Brad was still too dumbfounded to speak.

“I don’t understand what’s happening,” Cecilia muttered once she’d reached the courtroom doors. “Can’t we do something?”

“The judge said we have to take this to trial?” Ian Randall sounded incredulous. “Just how expensive is that going to be?”

“Very,” Allan Harris answered quickly, as if he’d take delight in running up his client’s husband’s tab.

“But that’s not what I want,” Cecilia wailed.

“Then I suggest you do what the judge recommended and seek counseling or contact the Dispute Resolution Center.”

“I’m not airing my problems to a group of strangers.” With that Ian Randall slammed his way out of the court. Brad Dumas followed his client, but not before tossing Olivia a disgruntled look.

Allan Harris stood there shaking his head, his expression incredulous.

The bailiff read off the next number and still Allan remained.

Cecilia Randall turned away, but not fast enough to disguise the fact that her eyes had filled with tears. Olivia felt her heart break just a little—and yet she was convinced she’d done the right thing.

“How did this happen?” Cecilia asked.

“I don’t understand it,” Olivia heard Allan Harris mumble. “This is crazy.”

Cecilia Randall shook her head. “You’re right,” she murmured, shrugging into her coat. “None of this should have happened, but it just did.”

Two

Olivia groaned when the telephone rang for the fifth time Saturday morning. No doubt this call, like all the others, was the result of Jack Griffin’s newspaper piece published that morning. The newly appointed editor of the Cedar Cove Chronicle had for some reason decided to write an article about her. He’d run the headline Divorce Denied across the editorial page. Olivia sighed; all this unwanted attention was disrupting her weekend, and she resented it.

“Hello,” she said, making sure her voice conveyed her irritation. If this caller felt compelled to discuss her judgment, then she wasn’t in the mood to talk. She’d brought each of the four previous conversations to a swift end.

“Hello, Mother.”

Justine, that was a relief! Olivia had been waiting to hear from her daughter all week. “How are you?” It used to be that they spoke on a regular basis, but no longer. Justine was dating a man Olivia considered disreputable, which created ongoing tension between mother and daughter. Consequently Justine avoided her. Warren Saget was a forty-eight-year-old land developer—twenty years her senior—who had put together more than one shady deal. The age difference didn’t bother Olivia as much as the man himself.

“Did you know your name was in the paper this morning?” Justine asked.

As though anyone would let Olivia miss seeing it. Starting the first of the year, the Cedar Cove Chronicle had gone to two editions a week and this was the very first Saturday edition. Maybe Griffin should’ve stuck to one paper a week, Olivia thought grimly, since he obviously couldn’t scrape up enough real news. His entire column had been about the day he’d spent sitting in her courtroom, listening to the judgments she’d made. Although he didn’t mention the Randalls by name, he said her ruling in that instance had come from the heart rather than from any law book and he applauded her decision, calling her gutsy and unconventional. Olivia wasn’t opposed to receiving praise, but she’d prefer not to have attention drawn to that particular case. While he’d mentioned her in a vaguely flattering light, he certainly hadn’t been as kind to others in her profession. He appeared to have a bias against attorneys and judges, and wasn’t afraid to share his opinions on the subject.

It was just Olivia’s luck that Jack Griffin had chosen her courtroom that day. Just her bad luck, she amended.

“What happened?” Justine asked. “I mean, it’s obvious Jack Griffin doesn’t have much respect for the law, but he seems to like you.”

Olivia could hear the amusement in her daughter’s voice. “I don’t even know the man,” she said dismissively.

“That’s interesting. I thought you’d been holding out on me.”

“Holding out?”

“As in you’d found yourself a man.”

“Oh, please,” Olivia moaned.

“Well, he seems to have made himself your champion. Especially over that ‘divorce denied’ thing.”

Olivia had known she was taking a risk when she’d made her ruling on the Randall case. Her personal feelings had no role on the bench, but she was absolutely certain those two young people would be making a terrible mistake if they went through with the divorce. She’d merely put up a roadblock, hoping it would be enough to force them into dealing with their problems instead of running from them.

“Jack wrote that you weren’t afraid of making a controversial decision.”

“I’ve already read his column,” Olivia said in an effort to keep her daughter from repeating any more of it.

“So you know all about it?”

Olivia sighed. “Unfortunately, yes.” Then, hoping to change the subject, she asked, “Are you free for lunch this afternoon? It’s been weeks since we had a chance to visit.” Justine had come for Christmas, but she’d left as soon as the gifts were opened and dinner had been served. Olivia had no idea where she’d spent New Year’s. Then again, she did know—and wished she didn’t. Her daughter had spent the night with Warren Saget. “Your grandma and I are getting together. We’d love it if you could join us.”

“Sorry, Mom, Warren and I already have plans.”

“Oh.” She should have guessed. Warren kept a tight rein on Justine. She rarely had any free time these days. That distressed and annoyed Olivia, but whenever she mentioned it, or even hinted as much, her daughter became defensive.

“We’ll get together soon,” Justine promised. “Gotta go now.”

Olivia was about to suggest they set a day and a time right then, but before she had the opportunity, the line went dead.

Grumbling to herself, she finished writing out her grocery list, then reached for her jacket and purse. The January weather was gray and bleak. It was raining lightly—more of a fine mist, really—as she locked the front door and hurried down the porch steps to her car. Olivia loved her home, which looked out over the water on Lighthouse Road. The lighthouse itself was three miles away, situated on a jut of land that led into the protected waters of the cove. Unfortunately it couldn’t be seen from her property.

She had a number of stops to make—the grocery, the dry cleaner, the library. She hoped to get everything done by noon, when she was meeting her mother for lunch. She wished again that Justine could have joined them.

She picked up her dry cleaning and returned her books to the library, then swung over to the local Safeway, where she always did her weekly shopping. Thankfully, she was early enough to avoid the usual Saturday morning crush. She began with the produce aisle, where she stood debating whether a head of lettuce was worth this outrageous price.

“Judge Lockhart. Didn’t expect to run into you here.”

Olivia turned to confront the very man who’d managed to upset her morning. She recognized his face from that day in her courtroom—the man who’d sat right in front, notebook and pen in hand. “Well, well, if it isn’t Mr. Jack Griffin.”

“I don’t believe we’ve had the pleasure of a formal introduction.”

“Trust me, Mr. Griffin, after this morning’s paper, I know who you are.” He was around her age, Olivia guessed, in his early fifties, and about her height. Dark hair, starting to gray. Clean-shaven, with pleasant regular features, he didn’t strike her as outstandingly handsome but he had what she could only describe as an appealing quality. He smiled readily and his gaze was clear and direct. He seemed a bit disheveled in a loose raincoat, and she noticed that his shirt was casual, the top two buttons unfastened.

“Do I detect a note of censure?” he asked, his smile flirting with her.

Olivia wasn’t sure how to answer. She was annoyed with him, but letting him know that would serve no useful purpose. “I suppose you were just doing your job,” she muttered, tossing a green pepper into her cart. Rubies cost less per pound, but she had a fondness for green peppers and felt she deserved a treat. Especially after this morning. Green peppers were a whole lot better for her than butter-pecan ice cream.

She started to push her cart away, but Jack stopped her.

“They’ve got a coffee shop next door. Let’s talk.”

Olivia shook her head. “I don’t think so.”

Jack followed her as she sorted through the fresh green beans. “It might’ve been my imagination, but you didn’t want to see that couple go through with the divorce, did you?”

“I don’t discuss my cases outside the courtroom,” she informed him stiffly.

“Naturally,” he said in a reasonable tone as he continued walking at her side. “It was personal, wasn’t it?”

Losing her patience, Olivia turned and glared at him. As though she’d admit such a thing to a reporter! He’d make the whole episode sound like a breach of professional ethics. She’d done nothing wrong, dammit. She’d acted with the best of intentions, and she’d remained steadfastly within the law.

“You lost a son, didn’t you?” he pressed.

“Are you gathering information on me for your next article, Mr. Griffin?” she asked coldly.

“No—and it’s Jack.” He held up both hands, which was supposed to reassure her, Olivia supposed. It didn’t.

“I nearly lost my own son,” he said.

“Do you always pester people who prefer to go about their own business, or am I special?”

“You’re special,” he answered without a pause. “I knew it the minute you made your judgment in the Randall case. You were right, you know. Everyone in that courtroom could see they had no business getting divorced. What you did took guts.”

“As I explained earlier, I cannot discuss my cases.”

“But you could have a cup of coffee with me, couldn’t you?” He didn’t plead, didn’t prod, but there was a good-natured quality about him that was beginning to work on her. He had a sense of humor, even a certain roguishness. She gave up. It probably wouldn’t hurt to talk.

“All right,” she agreed. She glanced down at her cart, calculating how long it would take her to finish.

“Thirty minutes,” he suggested, grinning triumphantly. “I’ll meet you there.”

That settled, he walked away. Olivia couldn’t help it, she was curious about this man and his comment about almost losing his own son. Perhaps they had more in common than she’d realized.

Twenty-five minutes later, her groceries in the trunk of her car, Olivia entered Java and Juice, the coffeehouse next to the Safeway. Sure enough, Jack was waiting for her, hands cupped around a steaming latte. He sat at a round table by the window and stood when she approached. It was a small thing, coming to his feet like that, a show of good manners and respect. But that one gentlemanly gesture told her as much about him as everything else he’d said and done.

She sat in the chair across from him and he waved to the waitress, who appeared promptly. Olivia ordered a regular coffee; a minute later, a thick ceramic mug was set before her.

Jack waited until the high-school girl had left before he spoke. “I just wanted you to know I meant what I said—I admire what you did last week. It couldn’t have been easy.” Olivia was about to remind him yet again that she couldn’t discuss her court cases when he stopped her, shaking his head. “I know, I know. But in my opinion you made a bold move and I couldn’t let that go unnoticed.”

Olivia would have preferred he not publish his opinions for the entire town to discuss. However, there was nothing she could say or do that would change what had already seen the light of the printed page.

“How long have you been in Cedar Cove?” she asked instead.

“Three months,” he answered. “Are you purposely turning the attention away from yourself?”

Olivia grinned. “I sure am,” she told him. “So—you have a son?”

“Eric. He’s twenty-six and lives in Seattle. When he was ten, he was diagnosed with a rare form of bone cancer. He wasn’t expected to live….” His face darkened at the memory.

“But he did,” Olivia said.

Jack nodded. “He’s alive and healthy, and for that I’m deeply grateful.” Then he went on to say that Eric worked for Microsoft and was doing very well.

Olivia’s gaze went automatically to his ring finger. Jack had mentioned his son, but not his wife.

He’d obviously noticed her quick look. “Eric survived the cancer,” he said, “but unfortunately my marriage didn’t.”

So he understood on a personal level what had occurred in her own life. “I’m sorry.”

He shrugged carelessly. “That was a long time ago. Life goes on and so do I. You’re divorced yourself?” Although he asked the question, she was fairly certain he already knew the answer.

“Fifteen years now.”

The conversation flowed smoothly after that, and before she knew it, she had to leave to meet her mother for lunch. Reaching for her purse, Olivia stood and extended her hand to Jack.

“I enjoyed getting to know you.”

He rose to his feet, taking her hand in his. “You, too, Olivia.” He briefly squeezed her fingers, as if to say they’d formed a bond with one another. When they’d first met today—and definitely before that—she’d been irritated with him, but Jack had managed to thwart her displeasure. By the time she walked out the door, Olivia felt she’d made a friend. She was well aware that Jack Griffin was no ordinary man, though; she wouldn’t make the mistake of underestimating him.

Ian Randall sat in his car outside his wife’s apartment building, dreading what was certain to be another confrontation. The judge had made it plain that the prenuptial agreement wasn’t going to be rescinded. Now what? They had a few options, none of which suited him or, apparently, his wife.

Cecilia was the one who wanted the divorce. She’d been the first to hire an attorney. Hell, she’d rammed this whole stupid idea down his throat. She wanted out. Okay, fine. If she preferred not to be with him, he was hardly going to fight for the privilege of remaining her husband. But now they were faced with a stumbling block in their attempt to end the marriage, such as it was. All because they’d written that agreement, intended to safeguard their wedding vows. Some decision had to be made.

There was no point in waiting any longer. He climbed out of his car and slowly entered the building, approaching the first-floor apartment they’d once shared.

Ian was irritated that he had to ring the doorbell to what had recently been his own home. After their separation, he’d had to move on base. Fortunately, his friend Andrew Lackey had allowed Ian to store a few things at his house. He leaned hard against the buzzer now, fighting down his resentment. Releasing the button, he retreated a step and squared his shoulders. He steeled his emotions the way he’d been taught in basic training, unwilling to reveal any of his thoughts or feelings to Cecilia.

His wife opened the door, frowning when she saw who it was.

“I thought we should come to a decision,” he announced in resolute tones. No matter how many times he told himself he shouldn’t feel anything for her, he did. He couldn’t be in the same room with her and forget what it was like when they’d made love or when he’d first felt their baby move inside her. Nor could he forget how it had felt to stand over his daughter’s grave, never having had the opportunity to hold Allison or tell her he loved her.

Cecilia held open the door. “Okay.”

The hesitation in her voice was unmistakable.

Ian followed her into the compact living room and sat on the edge of the sofa. They’d picked it up second-hand at a garage sale shortly after their wedding. Ian had refused to let Cecilia help him move it, since she was already three months pregnant. His stubbornness had resulted in a wrenched back. This old sofa came with a lot of bad memories, just like his short-lived marriage.

Cecilia sat across from him, her hands folded, her face unrevealing.

“I have to tell you the judge’s decision was kind of a shock,” he said, opening the discussion.

“My attorney said we could appeal it.”

“Oh, sure,” Ian muttered, his anger flaring. “And rack up another five or six hundred dollars’ worth of legal fees. I don’t have that kind of money to burn and neither do you.”

“You don’t know the state of my finances,” Cecilia snapped.

This was the way every discussion started with them. At first they were courteous, almost too polite, but within minutes they were arguing and everything exploded in his face. They seemed to reach that level of irrational anger so quickly these days, or at least since Allison Marie’s birth—and death. Ian sighed, feeling a sense of hopelessness. With the way things were between them now, it was hard to believe they’d ever slept together.

Ian diverted his thoughts from their once healthy and energetic love life. In bed they’d found little to disagree about, but that was before…

“We could always do as my attorney suggested.”

“And what’s that?” Ian had no intention of taking Allan Harris’s advice. The other man represented his wife’s interests, not his.

“Allan recommended we do what the judge said and take our disagreement to the Dispute Resolution Center.”

Ian remembered Judge Lockhart making some comment about that, and he remembered his own reaction at the time. “What exactly is that supposed to do?” he asked, trying to sound reasonable and conciliatory.

“Well, I can’t say for certain, but I think we’d each present our sides to an impartial third party.”

“What will that cost?”

“Does everything boil down to money with you?” Cecilia demanded.

“As a matter of fact, yes.” This divorce had already set him back plenty. He wasn’t the one who’d wanted it in the first place, he told himself stubbornly. Sure, after Allison died, they’d had a few arguments but he’d never expected it to lead to this.

Cecilia had never understood what it’d been like for him, although he’d tried to explain countless times. He hadn’t received her “family gram” until the end of the tour. His commanding officer had withheld the information about the premature birth and death of his daughter, since there was no possibility of a humanitarian airlift or any way of contacting Cecilia. When he finally reached the base, he hadn’t had a chance to absorb the reality of their loss.

His wife gave him a disgusted look. “Do you have any suggestions, then?” she asked in a superior tone of voice that set his teeth on edge. She knew he hated it when she spoke to him as though he was still in grade school.

“As a matter of fact, I do,” he said, and got to his feet.

“Fine. I can’t wait to hear it.” Cecilia crossed her arms in that huffy way of hers.

“I say we simply go on with our lives.”

Cecilia frowned. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Do you plan to remarry?”

“I—I don’t know. Maybe someday.”

As far as he was concerned, Ian was through with it. Never again would he subject himself to a woman’s volatile emotions or fickle whims. “Not me. I’ve had it with marriage, with you, with the entire mess.”

“Let me see if I understand what you’re saying.” Cecilia stood, too, and started pacing the small living room, passing directly in front of him. He caught a whiff of her perfume, and it was all he could do not to close his eyes and savor the scent. He hated that she still had the power to make him weak, to leave him wanting her….

“You can figure it out, I’m sure,” he said, purposely being sarcastic because he was angry now. He couldn’t be near Cecilia and not feel a rush of resentment. Not just at her but at himself for harboring emotions that wouldn’t go away.

She ignored his attitude. “Are you suggesting we not divorce?”

“Sort of.” He didn’t want her to assume he was seeking a reconciliation. That wouldn’t work; he already knew it. In the months after Allison’s death, they’d both tried to make the best of a painful situation, without success.

“Sort of?” she echoed, then waved her hand at him. “Tell me more. This whole concept of yours intrigues me.”

He’d just bet it did. “We could pretend we’re divorced.”

“Pretend?” Cecilia didn’t bother to hide her anger. “That is the stupidest idea I’ve ever heard. Pretend,” she repeated, shaking her head. “You think we can ignore all our problems and pretend they don’t exist.”

He glared at her, not trusting himself to speak. Okay, maybe she was right. He didn’t want to deal with this divorce.

“You’re always looking for the easy way out,” she said scornfully.

He might be a lot of things, but irresponsible wasn’t one of them. The Navy trusted him with a multi-million-dollar nuclear submarine—didn’t that prove how dependable he was? Dammit, he’d been brought up to meet his obligations, to stand by his word.

“If I was trying to escape my responsibilities, I’d never have married you.” Ian knew the minute he uttered the words that he’d said the wrong thing.

Cecilia flew across the room. “I never wanted you to marry me because of Allison! We would’ve been fine….” She faltered and abruptly looked away. “I didn’t need you….”

“The hell you didn’t. You still do.” If for no other reason than the health benefits the Navy provided, his wife and daughter had needed him.

“You would never have married me if it wasn’t for the pregnancy.”

“Not true.”

She swept the hair away from her face. “I can’t believe I was so stupid.”

“You!” he burst out. Apparently Cecilia thought she was the only one with regrets. He had his own, and every one of them included her.

“Allison and I were…” She hesitated, suddenly inarticulate. “We…”

“Allison was my daughter, too, and I’ll be damned if I’ll allow you to tell me what my feelings are. Don’t go putting words in my mouth, or discount the way I felt about her. Just because I couldn’t be here when she was born doesn’t mean I didn’t care. For the love of God, I was under the polar ice cap when you went into labor. You weren’t even due until—”

“Now you’re blaming me.” She thrust her hand over her mouth as if to hold back emotion.

It didn’t do any good to talk. He’d tried, damn it to hell, he’d tried, but it never got him anywhere. He just couldn’t find any middle ground with her.

Rather than prolong the agony, he stormed out of the apartment. The door banged in his wake, and he wasn’t sure if he’d closed it or Cecilia had slammed it after him.

He left the building, fury propelling his steps, and got into his car. Feeling the way he did just then, Ian realized he shouldn’t be driving, but he wasn’t about to sit outside this apartment. Not when Cecilia might think he sat there pining for her.

He revved the engine and threw the transmission into drive. The tires squealed as he sped off, burning rubber. He hadn’t gone more than a quarter mile when he saw the red-and-blue lights of a sheriff’s car flashing behind him.

Damn it all. He eased to a stop at the curb and rolled down his window. By the time the officer reached his vehicle, Ian had removed his military driver’s license from his wallet.

“’Morning, sir,” he said, wondering how good an actor he was.

“In a bit of a hurry back there, weren’t you?” the officer asked. He was middle-aged, his posture rigid, his hair worn in a crewcut. Everything about him screamed ex-military, which meant he just might be inclined to cut Ian a little slack.

“Hurry?” Ian repeated and forced himself to relax. “Not really.”

“You were doing forty in a twenty-mile-an-hour zone.” He glanced at the license and started writing out a ticket, apparently unimpressed by Ian’s military status.

From the looks of it, Ian wasn’t going to get the opportunity to talk his way out of this one. He quickly calculated what the ticket would cost him, plus the rate hike in his insurance.

Thanks, Cecilia, he thought bitterly. The price of marriage just kept going up.

Grace Sherman and Olivia Lockhart had been best friends nearly their entire lives. They’d met in seventh grade, which was when students from both South Ridge Elementary and Mariner’s Glen entered Colchester Junior High. Grace had served as Olivia’s maid-of-honor when she’d married Stanley Lockhart soon after her college graduation and was godmother to her youngest son, James.

The summer following their high-school graduation, Grace had married Daniel Sherman and they quickly had two daughters. When Kelly, her youngest, turned six, Grace had gone back to school and earned her Bachelor of Library Science degree. Then she’d started working for the Cedar Cove Library, and within ten years had been promoted to head librarian.

Even while Olivia was attending a prestigious women’s college in Oregon and Grace was an at-home mother with two small children, they’d remained close. They still were. Because their lives were busy, they’d created routines to sustain their friendship. Lunch together once a month. And every Wednesday night at seven, they met for an aerobics class at the local YMCA.

Grace waited in the well-lit parking lot for her friend. She hadn’t felt good when she left the house. The sensation was all-encompassing. Physically, she was tired, her weight was up and she didn’t have her period to blame anymore. For years, she’d managed to keep within ten pounds of what she’d weighed in high school, but during the past five, she’d gained an extra fifteen pounds. It had happened despite all her efforts. Somehow the weight had crept on. She was dissatisfied with other aspects of her appearance, too. Her salt-and-pepper hair was badly in need of a cut. On second thought, perhaps she’d live dangerously and let it grow. She was in the mood for a change—although she wasn’t convinced it would make much difference.

Emotionally, she wasn’t feeling any better. After thirty-five years of marriage, she knew her husband as well as she did herself. Something was troubling Dan, but when she’d gently asked him about it, he’d bristled and they’d had an argument. He’d hurt her feelings and Grace had rushed away without resolving the issue.

For most of their marriage, Dan had been employed as a logger. When hard times fell on the industry, he’d taken a job with a local tree-trimming service. The work wasn’t as steady as either of them would have liked, but with her income and some inventive budgeting, they managed. There wasn’t any extra for small extravagances, but those had never mattered to Grace. She had her husband, her children, her friends and a decent roof over her head.

She watched Olivia’s dark blue sedan pull into the parking lot and saw her climb out, gym bag in hand.

Grace slid out of her vehicle. “So, how does it feel to be a celebrity?”

“Not you, too?” Olivia complained as they walked toward the building. She held open the door for Grace. “I’ve had nothing but grief over that stupid article.”

Grace smiled as color instantly flooded her friend’s cheeks.

“I let him have a piece of my mind,” Olivia muttered, as they marched past a group of youngsters headed for the swimming pool. Once inside the locker room, they placed their bags on the bench, stripped out of their sweats and changed their shoes.

One foot braced on the side of the bench, Grace tied her running shoe. “You met Griffin? When?”

“Saturday.”

Grace raised both eyebrows. She found it interesting that Olivia was skimping on the details. “Where?”

“In town.”

“Hey, what’s up?”

“Up? Not one thing,” her friend said. “I just happened to run into Jack at the Safeway and we…chatted a bit.”

“Why do I have the feeling you’re not telling me something?”

Olivia slipped the sweatband around her forehead. “There’s nothing to tell, trust me.”

“Trust you?” Grace echoed, following her out of the locker room and into the aerobics area of the gym. Children and adults milled about, and Grace and Olivia had to stop several times to allow others to pass by. “Have you ever noticed that the only time people ask you to trust them is when they probably shouldn’t be trusted?”

Olivia paused, then started a few warm-up exercises on her own. “I hadn’t, but you’re right.” She propped her leg on the ballet bar and bent her forehead to her knee.

Grace leaned against the bar, envying her friend’s suppleness. Her own body was far less flexible. “Did you know people have been talking about the article all week?”

“Great.”

Disregarding her sarcasm, Grace continued, her voice deceptively mild. “Actually a lot of the talk has to do with Jack Griffin.”

Olivia raised her head. “Anything interesting?”

Grace shrugged and adjusted the waistband of her spandex shorts. “Oh, a few things.”

“Such as?”

Grace was determined not to make this easy. Olivia had never, to her recollection, shown this much interest in any man since her divorce. Grace had felt for some time that her friend should “get back into circulation,” as people called it. Appropriate comment for a librarian, she always thought. “You really want to know?”

The question seemed to require a great deal of thought. “No—forget it.” Then in the next breath, Olivia changed her mind. “All right, I’m curious. What have you heard?”

“He moved to Cedar Cove three months ago.”

“Old news,” Olivia muttered. “If that’s all you have…”

“From the Spokane area.”

This appeared to be something Olivia didn’t know. “Newspaper background, obviously?”

“Yes, from a paper with ten times the circulation of the Chronicle.” Grace wasn’t a gossip by nature, but she’d been wondering about Jack Griffin since she’d read his first Saturday column. She’d liked what he’d had to say, and it was apparent he approved of Olivia. She’d met him briefly at a Chamber of Commerce meeting shortly after he’d come to Cedar Cove but hadn’t formed an impression one way or the other.

“Why does a man give up working for a prestigious newspaper and move across the state to a town the size of Cedar Cove?” she asked Olivia.

Her friend shrugged. “Your guess is as good as mine. Perhaps he wanted to be closer to his son.”

“He has a son?” No one Grace had spoken to knew that.

“Eric. He lives in Seattle.”

That was interesting. But before she could comment further, their instructor, Shannon Devlin, entered the room, clapping her hands to gather her students around her.

“Trust me. There’s more to this career change than meets the eye.”

“Trust you!”

“Yeah, trust me,” Grace joked.

Olivia grinned and placed her hands on her hips as she rotated her waist, making deep bends as Shannon led the class in warm-ups. “You’ve been hanging around the mystery section of the library too long,” she whispered as they took their places in front of the floor-to-ceiling mirror.

Shannon was twenty, if that. A pretty girl with pliant limbs and a body devoid of fat. Grace’s own figure had once been that slim and perfect, she reminded herself—before two children and the onset of menopause.

The music, impossibly loud, gave her a surge of energy. She had a love/hate relationship with this class. If not for Olivia, she would have dropped out a dozen times. Unfortunately she needed the benefits of all this huffing, puffing and stretching. Despite the muscle pain, she didn’t mind the mat exercises, the sit-ups and such, but she hated Shannon’s little dance routines. Step back, slide left, cross right… Olivia never seemed to have a problem with the complicated patterns; Grace, on the other hand, had trouble living up to her name.

After fifty minutes of sweating and grumbling under her breath, plus cool-down exercises, they were finished. None too soon, as far as Grace was concerned. Not until they’d showered and changed back into their sweats did Olivia mention Jack again. The fact that she wanted to continue the conversation surprised Grace.

“Did you learn anything else about Jack Griffin?”

Grace had to think. It always seemed to take a while for her brain cells to stop bouncing around after her aerobics class. “You know more about him than I do,” she finally said.

Olivia reached for her gym bag. “I doubt that.”

“You’re interested in him, aren’t you?”

Olivia laughed off the suggestion. “Oh, hardly. I’ve got enough worries without adding a relationship to the mix.”

“Worries?” Sure, her friend had worries, but then everyone did.

“Mom’s getting on in years and Justine—I just can’t seem to talk to her anymore, and I haven’t heard from James in two weeks.”

“I thought he was out at sea.”

“He is, but he can still e-mail me.”

“Okay, okay, we all have kid problems, and our parents are a concern, but that doesn’t mean we have to stop living.”

“You think I’ve stopped living?” Olivia asked. “Because I don’t have a man in my life?”

Grace knew the question had offended her. First Dan and now her best friend, and Grace hadn’t meant to upset either of them.

“I didn’t mean it like that,” she assured her. “I just think you should leave your options open when it comes to Jack.”

“Why?”

“Because.” And that was all the answer she was willing to give, but Grace had a very strong feeling that the new editor of the Cedar Cove Chronicle was going to bring something exciting to Olivia’s life.

Three

Cecilia was working as a hostess at The Captain’s Galley the night she’d met Ian Randall, and she continued to work there five evenings a week. Her father, Bobby Merrick, was one of the bartenders and had gotten her the job.

Soon after graduating from high school, Cecilia had moved to Cedar Cove at her father’s urging. After a long estrangement, he’d contacted her with promises of making up for lost time. He’d seemed genuine, and because she’d felt cheated out of a father during her childhood, she’d readily agreed. Following her parents’ divorce when she was ten, Cecilia hardly ever saw her father and she welcomed this unexpected opportunity. Refusing to heed her mother’s warnings, she’d packed up her entire life and moved across the country, from New Hampshire to this small waterfront community in Washington. Within three months she knew she’d made a mistake. Her dreams of a college education were simply that. Dreams. Bobby’s idea of setting her up for the future was talking to his boss and getting her a job at the same restaurant where he worked. Being a hostess and cocktail waitress wasn’t how Cecilia wanted to spend the next few decades, but it was all too easy to imagine. Without intending it, she’d let her entire life get sidetracked.

Now she was about to be divorced, up to her ears in debt and utterly miserable. Her illusions about her father and men in general had been shattered. Bobby wanted to be her friend, but as badly as Cecilia needed a friend, she needed a father more.

One day, she vowed, she’d find a way to attend college but first she had to figure out how to pay for it. With the legal fees and what it’d cost to bury her daughter, she suspected she’d be at least thirty before she could afford to get an education. Bobby couldn’t help her out financially; he’d made that completely clear.

In an effort to supplement her income, she was putting in extra hours on weekends, serving drinks in the bar once the dining room closed at ten. Often she wasn’t home until two-thirty in the morning.

When she showed up for work late Friday afternoon, she knew she was in for a hectic shift. The aircraft carrier, the Carl Vinson, was in town, which meant a crew of 2,500 sailors. The Captain’s Galley served the best seafood in the area and the bar was a popular meeting place.

It was here that Ian had come for a drink one night last January. He’d had his eye on her, and she’d been watching him just as avidly. Then he— She gave herself a mental shake. Cecilia didn’t want to think about her husband, and tried to push him from her mind. It didn’t work.

She hadn’t seen or heard from him since he’d charged out of her apartment a week earlier. They hadn’t made any decisions about what to do next. That was typical of him, she thought angrily. He left every decision to her. If they were going ahead with this divorce, then their best option was the Dispute Resolution Center. Not that their dispute could ever be resolved… She sighed in resignation. Obviously, she’d have to make the appointment. Ian’s so-called suggestion that they pretend to be divorced was ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous!

The bar was already hopping when the restaurant closed. Cecilia collected her tray and joined Beverly and Carla, the two other cocktail waitresses. The lounge was thick with cigarette smoke and the smell of beer hung in the air, trapped by the smoke. The music came from a jukebox and was earsplitting loud. Cecilia had to struggle to hear her customers’ orders.

One man who drank alone seemed to speak softly in an effort to force her to lean closer. He was older, at least forty, and he sent out all the signals—he was interested in her. He gave her the creeps and Cecilia did her best to ignore him. The way his eyes followed her about the room made her skin crawl.

By closing time only a few patrons lingered; unfortunately her admirer was one of them. Cecilia’s feet hurt and her eyes smarted from the smoke. She was eager to collect her tips and head home. Just when she thought she was finished for the night, Ian and Andrew Lackey, another sailor, walked into the bar.

Cecilia tensed, especially when she noticed Ian’s demeanor. It was obvious The Captain’s Galley hadn’t been his first stop. Her husband didn’t hold his liquor well, never had, and generally avoided anything stronger than beer.

Her attention was on Ian when she should have been keeping closer tabs on the loner whose gaze had been glued to her for the last four hours.

“You wanna bite to eat?” The husky male voice spoke from behind her.

Cecilia whirled around.

“I’m Bart, and you’re Cecilia, right?”

“Right.” She watched Ian and his friend stroll up to the bar. Her husband seemed to be pretending she wasn’t there. But then, that was his preferred approach to anything awkward or inconvenient, wasn’t it? “Actually it’s been a long night,” she answered, her gaze flicking back to Bart. “Another time.” In your dreams, she added silently.

“You’ve gotta be hungry.”

“Ah…”

Ian finally glanced in her direction, and his eyes narrowed when he saw her talking to the other man.

“Hey, it’s no big deal. Breakfast, conversation.” Bart continued the pressure. “You look like you could use a friend and I can be a very good…friend.”

Cecilia was more concerned about Ian than ditching Bart. “I don’t think so.”

“Tomorrow then, just you and me.”

“I…” Her gaze flew from Bart to Ian, who was scowling heavily. She was afraid he’d cause a scene, which she wanted to avoid, for everyone’s sake.

Ian leaned toward his friend and whispered, but Andrew adamantly shook his head. Cecilia could see that Ian was looking for trouble and his friend was trying to dissuade him.

“Perhaps another night,” Cecilia said quickly, putting Bart off. That seemed the best way of getting rid of him before Ian did something stupid.

Her husband stepped away from the bar. “Is he bothering you?” he demanded, his words half-slurred.

“Butt out,” Bart snarled, angry at the interruption. He seemed to think he was making progress with Cecilia. He wasn’t, but Ian didn’t know that and apparently neither did he.

Andrew tried to stop him, but Ian shook off his hand and advanced a menacing step. He wasn’t about to back down, even if Bart outweighed him by fifty pounds. “In case you didn’t know it, you’re trying to pick up my wife.”

Bart glanced at Cecilia as if to gauge the truth. She didn’t dare meet his look.

“We’re divorced, remember?” she taunted, reminding her husband that it’d been his idea to pretend they were no longer married.

“The hell we are.”

“You’re the one who said we should just get on with our lives.”

“I…I…” Ian sputtered, searching for a satisfactory reply.

“Why should you care if I date another man?”

“Because until a judge says otherwise, you’re legally my wife!”

“Are you married or not?” Bart muttered.

“Married!” Ian shouted.

“Separated,” Cecilia said.

Bart reached for his jacket. “In that case, let’s go.”

“The hell she will.” Ian started toward Bart, but Andrew stepped between them.

“Anytime, buddy,” Bart growled.

“Right now sounds good to me,” Ian said, raising his clenched fists.

“Get out,” Cecilia cried. “Both of you! I have no intention of going anywhere with either one of you.” She ran toward the back room where her father had conveniently disappeared, supposedly checking inventory.

“What’s happening out there?” Bobby Merrick asked as if he wasn’t aware of the situation he’d left her to deal with on her own. Ian and Bobby had never gotten along, and Bobby avoided any confrontation between them by making himself scarce.

Cecilia shook her head. “Nothing.”

“Everything okay?”

“Ian’s here, looking for a fight. That’s all.”

Her father stared back, frowning. “I don’t want any trouble here. Tell him to take it outside.”

“Yeah.” Cecilia sighed wearily. “I did. And now I’m leaving.”

“Get rid of Ian first.”

“Not to worry, I’m sure he’s left.”

She retrieved her coat and purse, got her share of the tips and walked toward the front door, hoping she wouldn’t stumble upon her husband slugging it out with the loner. To Cecilia’s surprise, Ian hadn’t left, after all. They stared at each other from opposite sides of the room.

Beverly was the only other person in the bar, preparing the night’s cash for deposit; she muttered “good night,” still intent on her task.

“We’re closed,” Cecilia told Ian.

He paid no attention. “Were you actually going to leave with that sleazebag?”

The contempt in his voice rankled. “That’s none of your business.”

He looked at her for a long moment, then turned and stalked out the door.

Cecilia resisted the urge to hurry after him. Ian was in no condition to drive. She hesitated, arguing with herself. He wouldn’t appreciate her concern, and it might give him the wrong impression. Just a few minutes earlier she’d demanded he stay out of her life. The least she could do was follow her own advice and stay out of his.

The door opened and she glanced up expectantly, thinking it might be Ian. Instead, it was his friend. Andrew seemed awkward and unsure. She barely knew the other sailor, who’d recently been transferred to Bremerton.

“Yes?” she asked stiffly.

“I thought you should know Ian’s going to sea. He’s been transferred to the John F. Reynolds.”

That didn’t make sense to her. The John F. Reynolds was an aircraft carrier. Ian was a submariner, a nuclear electronic technician. “He’ll be away six weeks?” she asked numbly, not understanding the transfer.

“More like six months.”

Six months? “Oh.”

“That’s why he came by tonight. He wanted you to know.”

Cecilia wasn’t sure what to say.

“He didn’t mean to cause any trouble.”

Cecilia swallowed hard. “He didn’t…not really.”

Andrew peered over his shoulder as if he’d heard someone call his name. “I’ve got to go. I just wanted to tell you I’m real sorry about your little girl.”

“Th-thank you,” she managed to say. But he was already gone. She waited a few moments and decided her peace of mind was worth more than her pride. She had to be sure Ian wasn’t driving. Hurrying outside, she stood on the sidewalk, searching for her husband’s car. He was nowhere to be seen.

A sense of loss filled her, an emptiness. Ian was going to sea for six months and she hated the thought of it. She didn’t want to feel anything for him, but she did. At any rate, she told herself wryly, he had his wish—with Ian at sea, she couldn’t proceed with the divorce.

Tired and discouraged, Cecilia strolled toward her own ram-shackle car, shoulders hunched against the cold. She could smell the ocean tonight, and a low-lying fog was rolling in from the cove. A car drove slowly past. Looking up, Cecilia saw that it was Ian’s. Thankfully, Andrew was behind the wheel. As she watched, her husband’s gaze connected with hers.

Cecilia was shocked by the longing she saw in him. It was all she could do to keep herself from calling out. She yearned to wish Ian a safe voyage and see him off without this animosity between them.

But it was too late. Much too late.

Charlotte Jefferson wore her finest dress—navy dotted Swiss, with long sleeves and a full skirt—on her next visit to Tom Harding at the Cedar Cove Convalescent Center. She’d worked feverishly knitting the lap robe for him, and it showed excellent workmanship, even if she said so herself.

Tom was sitting in his wheelchair when she breezed into the room. “I told you I’d be back,” she said, smiling warmly, the newspaper tucked under one arm. Her new friend looked well. There was color in his cheeks and his eyes were clear and bright.

Tom nodded, obviously pleased to see her. His right hand pointed shakily to the empty chair.

“Thank you,” she said, sinking gratefully onto the seat. “I don’t usually dress up in my best except on Sundays, but I just came from the funeral of a friend of my husband’s.”

Tom stared at her blankly.

“We were friends with the Iversons for years,” she said. “He was a good man. Died of lung cancer. Used to smoke like a chimney.” She shook her head sadly, then crossed her legs and removed her left shoe. “I was on my feet most of the afternoon,” she explained. “I’m not as young as I used to be, and Lloyd Iverson’s death really shook me.” Sighing, she looked over at him. “How was your week?”

Tom shrugged.

“Are they treating you well?”

He nodded as if to say he had no complaints.

“How about the food?”

Another shrug.

“Speaking of food,” she said, brightening. “I got the most fabulous recipe for broccoli lasagna at the wake. I just love it when I find a good recipe. Last month we buried Marion Parsons, and a lady from her church brought the most incredible noodle salad made with—and this is the kicker—whipped cream. Spaghetti noodles with a marshmallow and cream dressing. It was out of this world.” It suddenly occurred to her that Tom might not be interested in hearing about the recipe exchange that went on at wakes.

“I’m glad to hear you like it here in Cedar Cove.”

He nodded again.

“I think I’ll make up a batch of that broccoli lasagna and take half of it over to my daughter. She lives alone now, and I just don’t think she eats enough vegetables. It doesn’t matter that she’s fifty-two, she’s still my little girl and I worry about her.”

Tom smiled faintly.

“Would you like me to bring you a piece, too?”

Grinning, Tom shook his head.

“You don’t like broccoli, is that it? You and George Bush. Not George W. I don’t know if he likes broccoli or not.”

Once more Tom shook his head.

“Broccoli’s good for the bowels. Now, that’s something we both need to think about, especially at our age.” She laughed outright, wondering how Olivia would react if she could hear her now.

Shuffling his right foot, Tom laboriously rolled the wheelchair over to his nightstand.

“You want me to get something for you?” she asked.

His white head bobbed.

“It’s inside the drawer here?” she asked.

His brown eyes were intense, and he indicated that she’d guessed right.

Charlotte eased open the drawer and found a pen, pad and a small coin purse that closed with a zipper. Years earlier, Clyde had carried a similar one. Thinking Tom might want her to write something down, she took out the pen and paper.

He frowned and shook his head.

She reached for the coin purse, instead, and glanced at him again.

Tom smiled and nodded.

“Do you want me to open it?” She realized that he must and carefully unzipped the small leather pouch. Inside was a folded yellow sheet of paper, which she removed. She set aside the coin holder and realized there was something enclosed in the paper. A key.

“What’s this?” she asked, openly curious now.

Tom sat back; he seemed to be waiting for her to discover the answer on her own.

Charlotte unfolded the single sheet of paper and saw that it was a receipt for a storage unit right here in Cedar Cove. How he’d arranged that, she couldn’t guess. She’d have to ask Janet Lester.

Uncertain what she was supposed to do with the key, Charlotte looked questioningly at Tom. “Everything seems to be in order,” she assured him, returning the key and the receipt to the pouch. She was about to place it in the drawer when he stopped her, leaning forward and clasping her forearm with his right hand.

His eyes pleaded with her.

“You don’t want me to put it back here?” she asked.

He shook his head, breathing hard from his exertion.

“What would you like me to do with it?”

He looked directly at her purse, which rested on the floor next to her large knitting bag.

“Take it with me?”

He nodded.

“Wouldn’t you rather I gave it to someone in the office?” Surely that would be more appropriate than for Charlotte to keep it.

He shook his head, his expression adamant.

“All right, but I feel I should tell Janet about this.”

He shrugged.

“Don’t worry, your key’s in good hands. I’ll make sure nothing happens to it.” She slipped the pouch inside her purse, then reached for her knitting bag. “I made you a lap robe. You need something to keep your legs warm. There’s a chill in the air these January mornings, isn’t there?” She settled the robe over his legs and stepped back to admire it.

Tom smiled, and made a shaky gesture to show his appreciation.

“You’re most welcome,” she said.

Tom’s eyes closed briefly and she understood that he was tired. It was time to go. “I’ll be back next Thursday,” she said, gathering her bags.

He gave a slight nod.

“Don’t you fret about a single thing. Oh, and I’ll bring you a slice of that lasagna.”

He grinned and shook his head.

“All right, I’ll spare you.” Tom was probably on a special diet, anyway. “I promise to take good care of this key for you.”

He sighed and patted the lap robe.

“The pleasure was all mine. Goodbye until next week.”

She left his room more quietly than she’d entered it, and immediately sought out the social worker. She didn’t want to take the key without letting someone know.

Janet was in her office, talking on the phone. When she saw Charlotte, she motioned her in and ended the conversation a minute later.

“Hello, Charlotte, what can I do for you?”

She explained about Tom Harding and the key.

Janet rolled her chair over to the filing cabinet and opened the top drawer. Extracting a file, she laid it on her desk. While she read through the file, Charlotte took a second look at the receipt for the storage unit. She saw that it was a renewal, which had been paid by the state—paid in full for the entire year. Apparently Tom had run out of funds for his care and become a ward of the state. What assets he owned were being stored in the unit and would be sold at the time of his death.

Janet continued to scan the file. “Unfortunately the information I have here is the bare minimum. Tom suffered a stroke five years ago, but there’s nothing about any family—and next to nothing about his background.”

“He seemed to want me to keep the key,” Charlotte said, unsure what she should do.

“Then I think you should. I know you have it, and so does Tom.”

“All right, I will.” That settled, Charlotte stood. “He’s a lovely man.”

“Yes, he is, but just a little mysterious.”

Charlotte had to agree and she admitted to being intrigued.

Grace Sherman grabbed a carton of milk and placed it in her grocery cart, then headed for the checkout stand. As she wheeled toward the front of the store, she decided to take a short detour and look over the paperback display. Books were her passion—books of all kinds, from classic fiction to mysteries and romances, from bestseller titles to biographies and history and…almost everything. That was why she’d gone into library work. She loved to read and often read late into the night. Her daughters shared her delight in books, although Dan had never been much of a reader.

As Grace reached the front of the store, she noticed that the lineups were long. She chose one, then got the current copy of People magazine and flipped through that while she waited. The truth came to her as she approached the cashier—she dreaded going home.

The realization left her breathless. They were low on milk, but it certainly hadn’t been necessary to make a special trip. She could easily have waited a day or two. Since she was here anyway, she’d thrown several packets of pasta into her cart, plus toilet paper and a couple of yogurts…as though to justify being to the supermarket at all. In fact, she’d been delaying the inevitable.

Dan had been in such a bleak mood lately. There seemed to be problems at work, but that was only a guess because her husband refused to talk to her about anything beyond the mundane. Any other inquiries were met with one-word replies. Television was vastly more interesting than sharing any part of himself with her.

Grace wanted to discover what was wrong, but he snapped at her whenever she tried. Every night it was the same. Walking into the house after work was like standing in an electrical storm; she never knew when lightning might strike. Because Dan was uncommunicative and morose, she chatted endlessly about this thing and that, in an effort to lighten his mood—and to forestall his outbursts of anger. They always came without warning.

Dan listened to her remarks, nodded at the appropriate times, even smiled now and again. But he contributed nothing to the conversation. The quieter he was, the harder she tried to draw him out, to no avail. Practically every evening he settled in front of the television and didn’t move until it was time for bed.

This was no marriage. They might as well be college roommates for all the love and affection they exchanged.

Their marriage had never fulfilled Grace’s expectations. She’d been eighteen and pregnant with Maryellen when she married Dan. He’d enlisted in the Army and almost immediately been shipped to Vietnam. The two years he’d been away were hell, for him and for her. When he returned, Dan was a different person from the young man who’d left. He’d become bitter and cynical, prone to rages; he’d also experimented with drugs and when she refused to allow them in the house they’d briefly separated.

For Maryellen’s sake, they’d managed to patch things up long enough for Grace to get pregnant a second time. Later, because of their daughters, Dan and Grace had tried hard to make their marriage work.

The war still haunted him and for years Dan used to be awakened by nightmares. He never spoke of his experiences. Those, along with everything else, were hidden away inside his head. Throughout their marriage, Grace had continually hoped things would improve. Once the girls were in school, once she finished her own studies and got the job at the library, once the girls graduated from high school—surely then everything would be better. Year after year of hoping, of looking for signs…

It wasn’t all bad. There’d been good times, too. When the girls started grade school, Grace had entered Olympic College and later commuted into Seattle to attend the University of Washington. Dan had been wonderfully supportive, working two jobs and helping with all their daughters’ assorted activities.

Maryellen and Kelly had both been difficult teenagers, but they’d turned into responsible young women. Dan deeply loved his daughters. Grace never questioned his devotion to them, but she seriously doubted he was still in love with her.

These last few years had been hard on his pride. His career was over, and his job with the tree service wasn’t nearly as satisfying as logging had been. Her salary now paid a larger share of the expenses, and she suspected that bothered him—not that he’d actually said so. But then, they didn’t talk about money, mainly because she avoided any subject that might distress him.

Although she was half an hour later than usual, Dan didn’t comment when she walked into the kitchen, carrying her groceries.

“I’m home,” she announced unnecessarily as she set the sack on the countertop.

Dan had already positioned himself in front of the television, watching the local news. His boots were off and his sock-covered feet rested on the footstool that matched his old overstuffed chair.

“I thought we’d have taco salad for dinner. How does that sound?”

“Great,” he answered without enthusiasm.

“How was your day?”

“All right.” His eyes didn’t waver from the television screen.

“Are you going to ask about mine?” she asked, growing irritated. The least he could do was show some interest in her and their life together, even if it was just a token effort.

“How was your day?” he muttered, his voice impassive.

“Terrible.”

No response.

“Aren’t you going to ask why?”

“You can tell me if you want.”

The man she’d lived with for thirty-five years couldn’t have cared less. Grace couldn’t stand it any longer. Each attempt to draw him out was met with denial and accusation. If she was unhappy, it was her fault, not his—that was his argument the last time she’d tried to talk to him.

Walking into the living room, Grace reached for the remote control and muted the sound. Sitting down on the footstool, she faced her husband.

“What?” he demanded, annoyed that she’d disrupted his news program.

Grace stared at him. “Do you love me?”

Dan laughed as though she’d made a joke. “Love you? We’ve been married for thirty-five years.”

“That doesn’t answer my question.”

“What do you want me to say? Of course I love you. I can’t believe you have to ask.”

“Is there someone else?”

He sat back and looked hard at her, then shook his head. “That’s a ridiculous question.”

“Is there?” she repeated.

“No. When’s dinner going to be ready?”

Grace had another question first. “Do you remember the last time we made love?”

“Are you keeping track?”

She wasn’t fooled. Answering a question with one of his own was a familiar trick of his. “No, but I can’t remember. Can you?”

“I hate it when you do this.” He shoved the footstool forcefully away and got up, burying his hands in his pants pockets. “If we’re going to have an argument, let’s make it over something worthwhile. I didn’t realize you were so insecure that you need to be told I still love you.”

“What I need is some affirmation that you want to be in this marriage.”

“I had no idea you were so paranoid.” He walked to the other side of the room.

“I’m not!”

“You suggested I’m having an affair.”

She didn’t believe it, and in fact, there was no real evidence, but she’d felt it might shock him enough to get his attention.

“What do you want from me?” he asked irritably.

“Some sign of life,” she cried.

He glared at her. “Did it ever occur to you that I might be tired?”

“Too tired to talk?”

“I’ve never been a conversationalist. You knew that when you married me. I’m not going to change at this stage of my life. I don’t know what’s bothering you, Grace, but get over it.”

“That’s not fair! I’m trying to get you to take some responsibility for what’s happening to us.”

“You’re the one who’s so unhappy.”

“Because I want more from our marriage than this.” She motioned with her arms in a futile effort to explain.

He frowned. “I’m giving you everything I have to give.”

So was she. Dear God, so was she.

“If it isn’t enough, I don’t know what to tell you.”

Her throat thickened with heartache. This was all there was, all there would ever be, and it wasn’t enough.

The phone rang and they both jerked their attention toward the kitchen wall. Tears rolled down her cheeks and she brushed them aside as she hurried into the other room.

“Let the machine get it,” Dan said.

“Why, so we can talk some more?”

“No,” he responded gruffly.

“That’s what I thought.” She reached for the receiver and cleared her throat before she spoke. “Hello,” she said, forcing herself to sound calm.

“Mom? Oh, Mom, you’ll never guess what?” Kelly cried. “I just got the news. We’re pregnant!” The joy in her youngest daughter’s voice was as pure and sweet as anything Grace had ever known.

“Pregnant? You’re sure?” Grace felt her tears start again, but these were tears of an altogether different kind. After ten years of marriage, Kelly and Paul were desperate for a child. They’d undergone countless tests and procedures, and Grace had about given up hope that her daughter would ever conceive. She longed for grandchildren and it hadn’t seemed likely. Not with Kelly’s fertility problems and Maryellen divorced. This was incredible news. Fabulous news.

Dan walked into the kitchen. “It’s Kelly,” she said excitedly, putting her hand over the receiver. “She’s pregnant.”

Her husband’s eyes lit up and he smiled. It was the first real smile she’d seen from him in months. “Damn, that’s great.”

“Oh, sweetheart, your father and I are thrilled.”

“Let me talk to Daddy.”

Grace handed him the receiver. Kelly had always been especially close to her father, and they chatted for several minutes.

Dan replaced the receiver and went over to the stove where she’d put the hamburger on to fry for their meal. He slid his arms around her waist from behind and hugged her.

“I love you,” he whispered.

“I know. I love you, too.”

“Everything’s going to be all right.”

“I know.” And it would. Grace had faith. Hope. And now she had a reason to continue, a reason to look to the future. Her marriage wasn’t everything she wanted, but maybe it was enough. She’d make it enough. She’d shared thirty-five years with Dan. There had been good times and some not so good.

A grandchild gave her hope for the future.

Four

“I’ll drive this evening,” Olivia told her mother. The previous time she’d gotten into a car with Charlotte driving, Olivia had sworn it would be the last. Her mother out on the roads was a frightening thing to contemplate. She suspected Charlotte was the type of driver who never had an accident, but caused them.

“Well, it’s my turn, although I have to admit I don’t like driving at night.”

Olivia removed her black robe and hung it in the small closet inside her chambers. Court was over for the week and her hot Friday-night date was with her mother. In fact, she ate more meals out with Charlotte than anyone. “I don’t mind driving,” Olivia told her.

“All right, if you insist.”

Olivia did insist. The previous driving adventure with her mother had ended up being a narrow escape. Apparently Charlotte had lost the ability to turn her neck in order to look behind her. She adjusted the rearview mirrors left and right and honked before barreling willy-nilly out of her parking space. She’d also confessed that her eyes weren’t what they used to be. It was a quandary. Olivia didn’t want to limit her mother’s independence, but she couldn’t help worrying.

“It’ll be a girls’ night out,” Charlotte said, sounding excited at the prospect. “But I have to be home by eleven. Harry worries if I’m not there.”

Her mother doted on her cat. “Not a problem. The play starts at eight, so it should be over long before eleven.”

“Shall we have dinner first?” Charlotte suggested.

“Sure, why not?” Olivia was in the mood to live it up. Her best friend was about to become a grandmother. Her seventy-two-year-old mother had a beau of sorts. Charlotte talked incessantly about her friend Tom at the convalescent center. The only person without something significant happening in her life seemed to be Olivia. She was ready for a change, ready for a risk. She’d hoped to hear from Jack Griffin, but he hadn’t phoned nor had he shown up in court again. He obviously wasn’t interested. Well, she could deal with that.

They arrived at the Playhouse shortly after seven-thirty. Plays were staged upstairs at the Community Theater, located on Harbor Street, which was the main road through the center of what was commonly referred to as downtown. The old theater still ran movies, but generally second-run features that had appeared earlier at the six-plex on the hill. The Playhouse was above the movie theater in small but cozy quarters. Every time Olivia attended a local production, she was astonished at the talent in a town as small as Cedar Cove.

Without assigned seating, Charlotte chose the very front row. No sooner had they settled in than Jack Griffin approached.

“Is this seat taken?” he asked, looking at the empty space next to Olivia.

“Jack!” She’d blurted his name before she had a chance to restrain her delight.

“Jack Griffin? Is this Jack Griffin?” Charlotte was immediately on her feet. Before Olivia could even guess what her mother intended, she’d wrapped both arms around Jack and given him one of her enthusiastic hugs.

He met Olivia’s gaze over Charlotte’s shoulder. She noted his surprise and amusement at such a vigorous greeting.

“I’ve been wanting to meet you,” Charlotte said, sitting down again—one seat over—and patting the empty space beside her. “That was such a wonderful column you wrote about Olivia. I made sure all my friends read it.”

Jack arched his brows—as though to suggest her mother might have been impressed but that hadn’t been the case with Olivia.

“I was so pleased with what you had to say about my daughter. She is a gutsy judge and an innovative thinker, too,” Charlotte continued.

Olivia was mortified, but she knew better than to say anything, so she smiled blandly and felt the heat radiate from her cheeks.

Charlotte had arranged it so Jack was now sitting between the two of them. Olivia hadn’t been quick enough to realize what was happening in order to avoid it. She was interested in spending time with Jack, but she’d prefer to do so without her mother present.

Soon, Jack and her mother were deeply engrossed in conversation. At one point Jack let out a hoot of laughter and abruptly turned to look at Olivia, still smiling.

Olivia could only wonder what was so funny; she was fairly sure it had to do with her. What could her mother have told him? No doubt it was something embarrassing from her teen years.

“Your mother’s hilarious,” Jack said a moment later, leaning toward her.

That was true enough. Olivia merely nodded, and Jack soon turned back to Charlotte for entertainment. Meanwhile, Olivia studied the program. To Kill a Mockingbird was an ambitious project for so small a troupe, but those who’d seen it had raved about the performances. She assumed Jack had come to write a review.

Olivia happened to be looking idly around the theater when Justine strolled in. She wore black pants with a cropped cashmere sweater in a soft green, her long dark hair hanging loose to the middle of her back. Her arm was entwined with Warren Saget’s and she gazed up at the older man with wide, adoring eyes. Olivia immediately felt her hackles rise. She didn’t like Warren, never had, and hated the fact that her daughter was dating him.

Warren had moved to Cedar Cove twenty years ago. He’d bought up large parcels of land and built row upon row of tract houses. The homes had been constructed of the cheapest possible materials and had quickly developed a host of problems. First, the roofs leaked and then the siding developed mold. Basements flooded, walls shifted, ceilings cracked. Lawsuit followed lawsuit.

Olivia didn’t recall how it was all settled—her own life was undergoing a series of traumas at the time—but somehow Warren and his company had survived.

It wasn’t only his business practices that distressed Olivia. Everyone knew that Warren had cheated on his wife—correction, wives. He’d flaunted his affairs until both women had filed for divorce and left town. The most recent Mrs. Saget had left five or so years ago, leaving Warren free to go through young women like a kid through a candy store. It hurt Olivia to see her own daughter fall victim to such an unscrupulous man.

Warren apparently liked his women young. The younger the better. A woman like Justine—tall, classy and beautiful—enhanced his image. She looked good on his arm, and Warren knew it.

Olivia wondered whose idea it was to see the play. To Kill a Mockingbird wasn’t the sort of entertainment she suspected a man like Warren would choose. The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas seemed more his kind of show.

Apparently Justine hadn’t noticed Olivia. Or if she had, she’d chosen to ignore the fact that her mother and grandmother were seated in the front of the theater. Justine and Warren sat in the last row, where the shadows were darkest and they couldn’t easily be seen.

This relationship had worried Olivia from the start and not solely because of Warren’s age and reputation. Over the years, Olivia had observed a pattern. Justine preferred older men and there’d been several, all quite similar to each other in situation and personality. Warren had lasted the longest. Olivia cringed every time she thought of her daughter marrying the likes of Warren Saget. But at twenty-eight, Justine had revealed no desire to marry. Olivia prayed Warren wouldn’t be the one to change her mind.

Her heart told Olivia that her daughter’s dating habits were linked to that fateful August day in 1986. Justine refused to risk the pain that real closeness could bring. She’d been with her twin brother when he died, and the love she felt for him had turned into agony. Caught up in her own grief, Olivia had failed to recognize the devastating effect his death had had on her daughter.

Olivia suspected that, deep down, Justine blamed herself. She’d been at the lake with Jordan and a whole slew of friends, not paying any attention to her twin. He’d been diving off a floating dock, joking and splashing, all of them laughing at their own antics. It’d been a hot lazy afternoon, and the world had seemed a beautiful place. Then within a matter of seconds all their lives were changed. Their capacity for innocent, uncomplicated pleasure was gone forever. Jordan, clowning around with his buddies, dove into the lake and didn’t surface. By the time his friends figured out it wasn’t a joke, it’d been too late. Jordan had broken his neck and drowned.

Justine had swum out to the dock and sat with Jordan’s lifeless body until the paramedics arrived, but there was no hope. The poor girl hadn’t slept a full night for weeks afterward. She’d been lost and confused, believing she should’ve been able to do something.

Olivia had her own share of regrets. If she’d been more focused on Justine’s grief, gotten her into counseling, spent time helping her deal with the tragedy…

But it’d been all Olivia could manage to make it from one day to the next. For the sake of her husband and her two other children, she’d tried to be strong. Each day had been filled with busywork so she wouldn’t have time to think. Pretending had failed miserably. Her marriage had collapsed, and her beautiful daughter had never recovered from the tragedy.

“I’ve been meaning to phone you,” Jack said, breaking into Olivia’s thoughts.

That was encouraging news. Olivia had been brought up to believe that girls shouldn’t phone boys—a bit of social conditioning she’d never shaken off. She’d dated since the divorce, but not much. Friends had attempted to matchmake, without notable success.

Jack appeared to be waiting for a response from her, some indication that she would have welcomed his call.

“I wish you had.” There, she’d said it, and it was true. She liked Jack Griffin and had thoroughly enjoyed their impromptu meeting and the talk that followed.

Jack stared at her as though he wasn’t sure he should believe her. He seemed about to say something when Bob Beldon stepped onto the middle of the compact stage. Bob and his wife, Peggy, ran Thyme and Tide, a local bed-and-breakfast. Bob was actively involved in the theater group.

Once he had everyone’s attention, Bob made several safety announcements regarding the fire codes and pointed out the exits. When he’d finished, he introduced the play and the actors. Before he left the stage, he looked at Jack Griffin and Olivia—and then Bob did the oddest thing. He winked at Jack.

“What was that about?” Olivia asked him.

“Bob’s a friend.”

“You knew him before moving to Cedar Cove?”

He nodded absently as he watched the actors take their places on stage. “It was Bob’s way of encouraging me,” he muttered.

“To do what?” Olivia pressed.

Jack squared his shoulders. “To ask you to dinner.” He glanced in her direction. “Are you game?”

Are you game? was certainly an inventive invitation.

“Did you ask her yet?” Charlotte bent forward in order to get a better look at them both.

“I just did,” Jack answered.

“Ask her what?” Someone Olivia didn’t recognize called out from two rows back.

Mortified, Olivia slid down in her chair and hunched her shoulders.

Jack slid down, too. “Will you?”

She nodded. Well, why not? She’d already admitted that she was anxious to hear from Jack. Now he’d taken the next step. A dinner date.

She intended to have a very good time.

Cecilia woke Saturday morning feeling more than a little depressed. She hadn’t heard from Ian. She’d deluded herself, thinking he’d call. He might already be out to sea; she wasn’t sure whether the John F. Reynolds had left port, but then how would she know? She got her information from rumor and an occasional issue of the Chronicle. Nor had Ian mentioned being transferred from the submarine to the aircraft carrier. Apparently there was a lot he hadn’t told her.

Cecilia wished now that she’d made friends with other Navy wives. She’d tried early on, but had felt like an intruder. The women had already formed cliques and she was an outsider. Between her job and the pregnancy, she didn’t have the time or emotional reserves to socialize with them. She had declined the few invitations she’d received.

When Allison was born, no one had come to the hospital and after her daughter’s death, Cecilia had rejected all attempts—by the other wives, by Ian’s family in Georgia, by nurses and a Navy chaplain—to help her cope with the loss. As far as she was concerned, it was too little, too late. Her father hated anything to do with death and dying and avoided her entirely. Other than giving her the sympathy card, all he’d done was pat her on the back, mumbling a clichéd condolence or two.

And Ian…wasn’t there.

It did no good to brood about Ian, the pending divorce and past hurts, so Cecilia showered and changed into a clean pair of jeans and a worn, comfortable sweatshirt. As always, Saturday was reserved for errands, but today she lacked the energy for it. Once she got to the grocery, her sole purchase was a big bouquet of flowers.

The cemetery was on the outskirts of town. A dense fog had rolled in; it was impossible to see across the street, let alone to the other side of the cove and the naval shipyard. Cecilia had purposely chosen this burial site because it overlooked the naval base. Maybe that didn’t make sense, but she’d wanted their daughter to be close to her father, and this was the only way Cecilia knew to make that happen.

The lawn was spongy and damp, and her feet sank into the earth as she walked toward the grave. She squatted down and brushed a few dead leaves away from the small, flat headstone. The vase was too narrow to hold all the flowers, so she sorted through and removed the prettiest ones and arranged those inside. When she’d finished, she divided the remaining flowers among the other graves in the row.

Standing, she found Ian several feet back, watching her.

Neither spoke. He wore his thick Navy coat, with his white sailor’s cap. His hands were buried in his coat pockets, arms pressed against his sides.

“I saw you leave the grocery store,” he murmured.

“You followed me here?” She didn’t like the idea of that.

He nodded. “It isn’t a habit, if that’s what you’re thinking. I just happened to see you and wanted to talk.”

Cecilia thrust her own hands into her pockets, waiting, unsure what to say.

“I wondered if this was where you were heading,” Ian continued, “and I was right.” He paused, shrugging. “I thought we could talk.”

She stiffened. “What’s there to talk about?” The last time she’d seen him, he’d been drinking and argumentative.

Ian sighed, glancing past her, past the row of graves. “I want to apologize for showing up at the restaurant the other night.”

“Andrew told me you’re leaving on the John F. Reynolds.”

“Yeah.” He didn’t elaborate, or explain the transfer.

“When did you get assigned to the carrier?”

“You’d know the answer to that if you hadn’t been in such a hurry to file for divorce,” he said with unconcealed bitterness.

“We couldn’t—can’t—even talk without snarling at each other.” Then and now. It hurt so badly to be standing on one side of their daughter’s grave while he stood on the other.

“Does it matter?” he asked. “I’m in the Navy—that hasn’t changed.”

She shook her head. The reasons were unimportant; he didn’t owe her an explanation. Defensiveness had become an automatic response, a means of keeping people at a distance. Especially him…

“Damn,” he said impatiently. “Why is it so hard to talk to you?”

Didn’t he already know? What else could she say?

“Like I said, I’m sorry about the other night. It won’t happen again.” He turned away, his movement abrupt.

“You’re leaving soon?” she called after him, not wanting him to walk off just yet.

He turned back to face her and nodded.

“I’d like to know about the transfer.”

He stared down at their daughter’s grave. “I requested it. If I’d been assigned to the carrier when Allison was born, I could’ve been airlifted home. To be with you…. It’s a moot point now, but I didn’t want to risk anything like that ever again.”

She hadn’t known such a transfer was possible.

“I’ll be away for six months,” he told her.

It sounded longer than a lifetime. Her reaction must have shown on her face.

“I can’t help that,” he said.

“I know,” she whispered.

“I suppose you’re worried about your divorce.”

He always referred to it like that, emphasizing whose decision it had been. “The delay doesn’t matter,” she said. “I don’t have any money for attorney’s fees, anyway.”

“I thought you wanted to take it to the Dispute Resolution Center?”

“I did, but with you at sea, it’d be a waste of time, wouldn’t it?” She could talk to an impartial third party, but without Ian available, they wouldn’t be able to resolve anything.

“We’re still legally married then—right?”

Cecilia guessed this was his way of telling her he regretted last week’s suggestion about pretending they were divorced.

“Yes,” she said. “You don’t need to worry that I’ll be dating anyone else.”

He frowned.

Perhaps she’d read him wrong. “That’s what you were saying, wasn’t it?” She couldn’t help recalling his reaction to the man in the bar.

He looked at her blankly. “No, but I’m glad to hear it. No man likes to think of his wife with someone else, regardless of the situation.”

Now Cecilia was confused. “Exactly what are you saying? Do you want us to be married? Or do you just want me to remember that I’m still legally bound to you?”

“I want you to keep in mind that we’re stuck together—legally and financially—until we can sort this mess out, all right?”

Cecilia nodded, crossing her arms. She had a feeling she wasn’t going to like his reasoning.

“The last time I was away…” He paused and glanced toward Allison’s gravestone. “You ran up the credit cards. While we’re still married, I’m legally responsible for those bills, so I’d appreciate it if you used some discretion.”

It would have hurt less if he’d punched her.

“You mean you’re worried about me spending money while you’re at sea?” She couldn’t believe he’d say such a thing. “Every penny I spent, every single penny that went on those credit cards, was so I could bury Allison.” Cecilia started to shake, first with anger, then with outrage. How dared he? How dared he! If she’d needed a reminder of why she could no longer stay in this marriage, he’d certainly given it to her.

“I didn’t mean that the way it sounded,” he said.

“It won’t happen again,” she said in a deadened voice, consciously echoing his earlier words.

Ian shook his head. “I don’t even know why I mentioned that. I’m sorry.”

She ignored him. Her lack of response should be answer enough.

“You do this every time,” he said, sounding exasperated. “I try to talk to you, get things into the open and you clam up on me like I’m not even here.”

Her arms remained folded, her head down. “Every penny I charged was so I could bury our daughter,” she repeated dully. “And the three-hundred-dollar phone bill… I know it upset you, but—”

Suddenly she could no longer control her voice—or her emotions.

“But that was for me!” she cried, shouting the words at him, hurling them in her anger and pain. “So there wouldn’t be two funerals that day instead of one. I’m sorry, Ian, for being so weak, but I’m not like you. I needed my mother…I needed to talk to someone. My dad couldn’t deal with it and you weren’t here. My mother…” Unwilling to have him witness her tears, she whirled around and started searching frantically through her purse.

“Cecilia?”

She found what she was looking for and tore open the small plastic holder. “Here,” she choked, taking out the VISA card and throwing it at him. The card landed on the wet green grass. “Take it! I don’t want it….”

He hesitated before picking it up. “You might need it for emergencies.”

As though the death of their daughter hadn’t been one.

She shook her head vehemently. She’d rot in hell before she’d use any credit card with his name on it again. She’d get one with her own name. Her maiden name.

Ian examined the card, and ran his thumb over the raised letters that spelled out Cecilia Randall.

“I didn’t come here to get your credit card.”

“Well, you have it now,” she returned flippantly, refusing to look at him.

Ian said nothing. A long moment passed. “I’m sorry, Cecilia,” he finally whispered.

“What for this time?”

There was another pause. “I’m going away for six months,” he murmured. “I wish we’d been able to settle this divorce business before I left, but…”

They’d been over this too many times already.

“I’d like to leave without bad feelings between us. I know you’d rather not be married to me anymore, but we can’t do anything about that right now.”

“And your point is?” she asked, deliberately sarcastic.

“Dammit, Cecilia, would you listen to us? Is this what you want? Is this how you want things to be? I don’t. I followed you here because I thought…I hoped there’d be a chance for us to end this on a friendly note.”

“Divorces aren’t friendly.”

“You’re right, but does that give you any pleasure?”

It didn’t. She knew why he’d come. Ian would leave for sea in a few days, and when he left he wanted to go without a huge knot in his gut over her.

“Goodbye, Ian,” she said softly. “Have a good tour.”

He frowned, as though he wasn’t sure he should trust her. “Do you mean it?”

She nodded. “I don’t want to fight, I never did. Go with a clear conscience. When you get back, we’ll settle all the legal stuff.”

“Thank you.” His relief was evident and his eyes softened as he turned away. Cecilia watched him disappear into the fog, watched until she could no longer see his dark shape.

She closed her eyes. She pictured how their parting might have been if Allison had lived. She’d be standing on the pier with all the other Navy wives and Ian would kiss her goodbye, kiss Allison and then her again, one last time. Then he’d run toward the aircraft carrier and she’d hold the baby in her arms, raise Allison’s tiny arm so she could send her daddy off with a wave. Instead, they bade each other farewell standing over their daughter’s grave.

Justine had avoided her mother all weekend, and with good reason. The minute they were together, Olivia would start to criticize Warren. Not openly, but she’d insinuate things. For instance, she’d mention some piece of gossip she’d supposedly heard about one of his ex-wives. Or she’d refer to problems with one or other of the homes his company constructed.

In Justine’s opinion, the fact that she was seeing Warren was none of her mother’s business. Okay, he was a few years older. And she’d concede that his reputation wasn’t the greatest. But there were things about Warren that her mother and most other people didn’t know and never would. Warren trusted her and his confidence meant a great deal to her.

The second reason Justine had been avoiding her mother had to do with her brother James. A year earlier, without warning, he’d joined the Navy and as a result, was away from home for the first time. He missed his family, and their mother fretted about him. Now her younger brother had made another life-altering decision and had left it to Justine to announce to their family.

“Tell her for me,” he’d pleaded, and because she loved him she’d foolishly agreed.

Now a confrontation was inevitable. Monday morning, she’d half decided to call her grandmother and let Charlotte deliver the news. She went as far as picking up the phone and actually dialing the number. At the first ring, she’d replaced the receiver, berating herself as a coward.

All afternoon, she’d had difficulty concentrating on loan applications and staff meetings—she was the manager of the Cedar Cove branch of First National Bank and had plenty of responsibilities to occupy her. Justine sighed; she knew she had to tell her mother in person and as soon as possible.

After work, she drove straight from the bank to the family home at 16 Lighthouse Road. She’d lived here until she left for college ten years ago; she’d returned for short periods in the intervening years. It was home in a way no other place had ever been. Every time she took the curve in the road and came upon it, Justine experienced a sensation that had been impossible to reproduce anywhere she’d lived since.

She parked out front. Her mother must have been looking out the window when she drove up, because she opened the door as Justine climbed the steps to the porch.

“Sweetheart,” Olivia said, holding out her arms for a hug. “This is a pleasant surprise.”

Justine forced a smile.

“You’re just in time for dinner.”

Justine could never figure out why her mother insisted on feeding her. It was the same with her grandmother. A maternal need to nurture, she supposed. Not that she needed nurturing anymore. Well, not that kind. “Great,” she said, without enthusiasm. Her stomach was in knots already.

Olivia took a good look at her. “Something on your mind?”

Radar. Justine swore her mother had radar.

“Why don’t you make a pot of tea?” she suggested.

Her mother froze. “You’re pregnant, aren’t you? Dear God, don’t tell me you’re going to marry Warren!”

“Mother, just make the tea and no, I’m not pregnant.”

“Thank God.” Her relief couldn’t have been more evident. Did she even realize how insulting her reaction was?

Olivia moved into the kitchen and Justine followed.

“That was rude of me, honey. Forgive me,” her mother said, putting the kettle on the burner. She sighed. “You know the way I feel about Warren.”

Justine didn’t need to be reminded.

“But you seem to enjoy his company and that’s all that matters.”

Justine didn’t respond to her mother’s halfhearted apology. What was the point? Yes, she liked Warren, but she wasn’t blind to his faults, either. The most appealing thing about him was his age. Justine liked older men. They were settled, confident and, for the most part, secure. She didn’t intend on having children herself and was looking for a mature relationship. She found most men her own age childish and irresponsible.

Olivia poured the tea and carried two cups to the dining-room table. “All right,” she said when they’d both sat down. “If you’re not pregnant, then what’s wrong?”

Justine ignored the question and doctored her tea. “I heard from James last week.”

Her mother stared at her blankly. “What does James have to do with this?”

“He sounded good.”

“Good?”

“Happy,” she elaborated.

“Does he have a new girlfriend?”

She couldn’t believe her mother hadn’t made the connection. “Not…exactly.”

“He’s seeing the same girl as before? Selina? I can’t recall her surname at the moment.”

“Solis.”

“Hmm. Every time James mentions her, they’re fighting over one thing or another.”

“They’re getting along just fine at the moment,” Justine said, struggling not to laugh outright. Her mother appeared to be completely dense.

“I’m glad to hear it.”

“Are you, Mother?” Justine pressed.

“Of course I am.” Olivia hesitated. “Are you trying to tell me that James and Selina are engaged?”

“No, I’m here to tell you they’re married.”

“Married?” Olivia came out of her chair and just as quickly sat down again. “Married? Without letting me know? Without a word until the deed is done?”

“James was afraid of how you’d react.”

“He should be a lot more afraid of what I’m going to say now,” Olivia muttered grimly. “Why would he think such a thing? What about Selina’s family? Was it as much of a shock to them?”

“Apparently not.”

“How do you mean?”

“Selina’s father insisted they be married by a priest.”

“James isn’t Catholic.”

“He’s converting.” Justine could see from the bewilderment in her mother’s eyes that she found it difficult to take in the news. The son she’d raised Protestant had converted to Catholicism overnight.

“He must love her very much,” Olivia responded thoughtfully.

“I’m sure he does.”

“So in other words, my son and this young woman I’ve never met were married in a Catholic ceremony without telling anyone from our family?”

“Yes,” Justine concurred.

“Why?”

Justine held her breath for an instant. “James wanted you and Dad there, but he was afraid you might disapprove.”

“For the love of heaven, why? Because Selina’s Hispanic? James knows us better than that.”

Justine shrugged. She disagreed with what her brother had done, but it was too late to worry about that.

“When will I meet her?”

“Mom, there’s more.”

Olivia set the cup back into the saucer.

“Selina’s pregnant, isn’t she?”

Finally, Mom. It took you long enough. “I talked to Selina myself,” Justine said cheerfully. “She sounds delightful. James is crazy about her and I’m sure she’s going to make him a good wife.”

Her mother didn’t look nearly as certain. “How far along?”

This was the hard part. “She’s due in four months.”

“Four months,” her mother echoed. “I’m going to be a grandmother in four months?”

“It seems that way.”

Her mother didn’t say anything for several moments, then her eyes glistened and Justine could tell she was struggling not to cry.

“Mom, does being a grandmother bother you so much?”

Olivia shook her head and dabbed at her eyes with the napkin. “Oh, no… I just wish my son had the courage to tell me himself.”

Justine hugged her close. “He’s waiting to hear from you now. Do you want me to dial the phone for you?”

Her mother nodded. “Please.”

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