Boston put her hand over Andi’s and squeezed. “I’m sorry. He sounds like a total asshole.”
“He is. A complete shit.” She stared at her new friend. “You know what really sucks? I miss being a couple more than I miss him. Which means I didn’t love him. I loved what we were together. So getting married would have been a mistake. I see that and appreciate it. I just wish I’d figured all this out nine and a half years ago. I feel like I wasted a decade of my life on him.”
“It helps to believe in karma.”
“I’ll give that a try. Wishing him to be run over and devoured by a wayward gang of cockroaches isn’t helping much.”
“Is he why you bought the house and moved to the island?”
Andi nodded. “I wanted a clean break.” She gave a strangled laugh. “I knew this was the land of families and tourists. That I would be cutting myself off from a normal dating scene. I thought that’s what I wanted. To be one of those cool single women who are so capable. They don’t need a man. Only, I might have acted a little hastily.”
Boston squeezed her fingers, then released her hand. “Leaving you stuck here with not a single man in sight.”
“Something like that.” She sipped her tea. “I do like the island and I know I’ll settle in. I want to open my own practice, so that’s all good.”
“Wade’s a great guy,” Boston told her.
“A great guy who isn’t the slightest bit interested in me.”
“How can you know that?”
“If he’s suffering from unrequited love, he’s doing a great job of keeping it a secret.” She shrugged. “It’s fine. I understand there’s a busload of seniors coming up for the weekend. There have to be at least a couple of single men in the group. Maybe I’ll make a play for one of them.”
Boston giggled. “You’ll be a trophy wife for sure.”
“Lucky me.”
Boston leaned toward her. “Wade’s careful, because of Carrie. He mostly dates off-island, if you get my drift.”
“No complications, no explanations?”
“Exactly. So don’t give up on him just yet. I’ve seen his brother naked, and if they’re anything alike, he’ll be worth the wait.”
Andi laughed. “If it’s okay with you, I’m not comfortable thinking about Zeke being naked.”
“Probably for the best.”
Andi had started to say something else when she noticed Boston’s smile quiver—as if it wasn’t as firmly in place as it should be.
Boston pushed the plate of brownies toward her. “Let’s skip lunch and eat these instead. You’ll feel better.”
Andi reached for one of the frosted brownies and sighed. “Chocolate is truly magical, isn’t it?”
“I’ve always thought so.”
* * *
Deanna was tired of being the odd man out in her own home. Colin wanted changes? Fine—she would change. The girls wanted a fun mom. She could do that.
She waited until the twins were busy with puzzles in their bedroom, then went into the family room to get their dollhouse. They were always begging her to let them play outside with it. To spread out their dolls and tiny pieces of furniture on the lawn. She had consistently refused. The small pieces would get dirty or lost. It was one more thing she didn’t need right now. Except if she wanted to show Colin she was trying, she needed to make an effort.
Not that she wanted to show him that. Not exactly. She wanted things to be back the way they had been. When he’d cared about her and she’d been more comfortable in her skin. So, as ridiculous as it was, she would take the twins’ dollhouse out to the lawn and let them do what they would.
She picked it up and staggered slightly. It was heavier than she remembered.
“Sydney, Savannah,” she called. “Come downstairs.”
She walked toward the back door, then rested the corner of the dollhouse on the counter as she fumbled for the door handle. The house slipped but she caught it.
The girls came running into the kitchen.
“Mommy, what are you doing?”
“Letting you play outside,” she said, focused on getting the door open.
It swung wide and she picked up the house again. She inched it through the doorway and started across the porch.
“Mommy, do you see Pickles?” Sydney asked.
Deanna sensed more than felt the cat slip past her. She shifted the house, trying to see the damn cat so they both didn’t break their necks, only she moved too quickly. The house tipped, and then the center of gravity slid to her right. She shifted, holding on, but it was slipping and heavy. Her foot came in contact with Pickles, and the cat howled.
Pickles darted between her feet, she stumbled and suddenly the dollhouse was sailing through the air. It arced over the stairs and tumbled to the ground.
The crash was oddly silent as thin walls crumpled and miniature furniture and dolls were ejected onto the lawn. The roof cracked as the entire structure flattened.
“No!” Deanna breathed, lunging forward, knowing it was too late. “I was only trying to make it fun.”
She looked at her daughters. Savannah’s eyes filled with tears while Sydney looked at her with an expression so like Madison’s loathing that she felt she was going to throw up.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I’m so sorry.”
She reached for Savannah. Her daughter stepped back, brushing tears off her face. Then the twins joined hands and raced back inside together. Deanna stood alone on the porch, the broken dollhouse on the lawn, unable to fight the sense of dread that told her the toy wasn’t the only thing shattered beyond repair.
* * *
“Can I take some to Madison when we’re done?” Carrie asked as she carefully rolled out the dough for the sugar cookies. “I’ll have to sneak them in. Slipping past enemy lines, like in an old war movie.”
She grinned as she spoke, her dark eyes bright with amusement. Boston knew it was wrong to encourage her to help Madison break the rules. As an adult, Boston should respect her neighbor’s particular obsession with homemade, organic and sugar-free foods. She should admire Deanna’s determination to keep her children healthy. And she would, if Deanna weren’t so sanctimonious about it.
“You may, but if you get caught, I’ve never seen you before.”
Carrie laughed as she reached for the cookie cutter. She pressed the daisy shape into the dough, making sure to cut all the way through.
“Thanks for helping with the cookies,” she said, glancing at Boston. “Dad said he was going to get to it, but you know how he is.”
“A guy?”
Carrie nodded. “He tries, but it’s not the same.” She moved the cookie cutter and pressed again. “You remember her, don’t you?”
“Your mom? Of course.” Boston turned the question over in her head. “Are you having trouble remembering things, Carrie? About your mom?”
“Some. I have pictures and stuff. There are specific memories, but they all seem like a long time ago. I wish she was here, but that’s different than missing her, isn’t it?”
“Some.” Boston touched her shoulder. “She loved you so much. She would be proud of you.”
“Thanks. Do you think Dad will ever get married again?”
“I don’t know. Have you asked him?”
Carrie rolled her eyes. “Like he’s going to answer that question? He doesn’t date much. At least not around here. I know what he’s doing when he goes away for the weekend.” She wrinkled her nose. “Okay, I don’t know exactly what he’s doing, but I know he’s meeting people. Women. Sometimes I think it would be nice to be more of a family again, you know?”
“Losing someone you love is hard.”
“Like when you lost Liam?”
Boston felt the stab clear down to
her heart. “Like that,” she agreed softly.
“Dad says parents aren’t supposed to outlive their children, but I didn’t like losing my mom, either. I don’t think anyone should die.”
“That would change things.”
Carrie’s eyes brightened. “The house would be really crowded if everyone who had ever lived here was still around.”
“You’d have to share a bedroom.”
“With a ghost. That could be fun.” She peeled away the excess dough, then carried the cookie sheet over to the oven. “Andi seems nice. For Dad, I mean. But I can’t tell if he likes her.” She slid the cookie sheet into the oven and set the timer. “I mean, I know he likes her but I’m not sure if it’s in a boy-girl way. Do you think Andi likes him?”
A question Boston happened to have the answer to, although she wasn’t going to share the information with her twelve-year-old niece. “I think you should let them figure it out on their own.”
“My mom’s been gone half my life, Boston. That’s six years. If my dad was good at dating, don’t you think he’d have a girlfriend by now? Someone has to help him.”
Boston laughed. “I think your points are excellent and still, I’m going to tell you to leave the poor man alone.”
“Andi’s really pretty. And a doctor, which is cool. Do you think she has a boyfriend in Seattle?”
“Carrie, stop meddling.”
“Why? We could get them together, and then Dad and I would move in next door.”
Boston put her arm around her niece. “I would like that, but people need to fall in love on their own.”
“Like you and Zeke?”
“Something like that.”
Carrie leaned against her. “It was love at first sight, wasn’t it?”
“You’ve heard the story a thousand times.”
Carried wrapped her arms around Boston’s waist and sighed. “Tell me just one more time. It’s my favorite story.”
Boston held her close and kissed the top of her head.
Holding this precious girl was as close to happiness as she’d been able to get in the past few months. If she held on long enough and tight enough, she could almost fill the hole in her heart. Almost.
“It was back in high school,” she began.
Carrie scrambled onto a stool and waited expectantly. “And you saw him. He had on a letterman’s jacket, right?”
Boston smiled. “Right.”
Chapter Thirteen
“I CAN SEE my bedroom window,” Lucy said, pointing.
Sydney and Savannah crowded close, wanting to look out, too. Raindrops rolled down the glass, obscuring the view.
“I like it up here,” one of the twins said. As they were wearing different clothes than the last time they’d been by, Andi couldn’t tell them apart.
“It’s kind of snug, huh? Like a den or a cave,” Andi said, then picked up the board game the girls had brought with them. “Candy Land? I love that game.” She smiled. “I know. Let’s take a bunch of blankets downstairs and we can sit by the window and play the game.”
The girls agreed that would be fun. The twins took charge of the game. Lucy carried the cookies Andi had bought. Andi stuffed juice boxes in a shopping bag, then grabbed several blankets from her small linen closet. A few minutes later they were choosing markers. Andi shuffled the deck of cards, then put them facedown.
One of the twins smiled at her. “You can go first.”
“That’s very nice of you, but you’re my guests. How about if Lucy goes first?”
Lucy beamed in surprise, then picked up the first card. The game was under way. Fifteen minutes later they’d completed the first game and started on a second. Andi let the three of them play so she could pass out cookies and get the juice boxes ready. Rain tapped on the windows. With new windows in place, plenty of light spilled into the room.
The space was coming together, she thought, glancing around. All the downstairs rooms were framed in. With the electrical and plumbing in place, insulation was next, followed by drywall. Talk about exciting.
Lucy moved her marker, then took one of the juice boxes. “Thank you,” the ten-year-old said politely.
“You’re welcome.” Andi smiled at the girl. “School must nearly be out.”
“Next week.”
“That will be fun. Do you have any special plans for the summer? A family vacation?”
Lucy shrugged. “I don’t know. Daddy travels a lot for work. He says he likes to be home with us when he can be.”
“I’m sure he enjoys spending time with his girls.”
“He loves us very much,” one of the twins offered.
Andi studied the two of them, searching for some small difference. A slight pattern in the iris, the curve of an ear lobe. But there wasn’t anything she could see.
“I’m stuck,” she said at last.
The three girls looked at her.
“I can’t tell you apart,” she admitted. “I’m a doctor. Shouldn’t I be able to find something?”
The twins giggled. The one on the left—in a lavender shirt covered with cartoon kittens—raised her right hand and showed Andi a tiny scar by the base of her thumb.
“This happened when I was a baby. So you can know I’m Sydney.”
Andi wondered how many people were given the special secret of telling the identical twins apart. “Thank you for showing me that.”
“You probably need to know,” Sydney told her. “Because you’re going to be our doctor.”
“Am I?”
“Uh-huh. Mommy said so at dinner.” Sydney frowned. “She wanted to know why you don’t have kids of your own.”
Because her ex-fiancé was an idiot, Andi thought, careful to keep her expression friendly and open. And she’d been just as idiotic herself. “I would love to have kids of my own. I hope to someday.”
“You’re not a lisbon?” Savannah asked.
Lucy flushed. “Don’t say that.”
“But I don’t know what it is.” She turned to Andi. “Mommy said it at dinner. We asked Audrey later, but she didn’t know, either.”
Lucy squirmed on the blanket. “Just play the game.”
Lisbon? Andi tried to figure out what Deanna could have said that would make her children...
Lesbian, she thought suddenly, disliking Deanna more by the second. Talk about someone she didn’t want for a neighbor. And just because she was in her thirties and not married didn’t mean anything. She’d been in a long-term relationship that had ended. Would she be getting this much flak if she’d simply been married and divorced?
“I’m not from Lisbon,” Andi said smoothly. “Which is, by the way, a city in Portugal. I’ve always wanted to visit, though. I hear it’s beautiful. Lucy, is it your turn?”
Lucy smiled gratefully and reached for the next card.
Andi watched the beautiful girls playing on the blankets and wondered how on earth someone like Deanna had produced such great children. It must be their father’s influence, she thought, hoping she didn’t have to worry about a whole lot of contact with her less-than-appealing neighbor.
* * *
“And then she turns into a mermaid!” Sydney shrieked.
The high-pitched sound cut through Deanna’s head like a laser. The low-grade headache she’d been fighting for most of the day cranked up a couple of notches.
Savannah pushed one of the bath toys under the water in the large master bathtub. “She has to be rescued. Hurry.”
The girls giggled as they played, caught up in their imaginary world of water and mermaids. Deanna watched them from the master bedroom where she stood folding laundry. Her fingers were clumsy and she fumbled with the towels, unable to make the corners line up.
She was tired, sh
e thought, her head pounding, her eyes gritty. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d slept more than a few hours at a stretch. Every time she closed her eyes, she started to replay her and Colin’s conversations. The uncertainty fed the fear and she ended up staring at the ceiling for hours at a time, her thoughts circling.
As she wasn’t sure of the problem, she couldn’t find a solution. When she wasn’t terrified, she was furious. Colin was doing this to her and she didn’t know why. Asking wasn’t a possibility. When he called, he only spoke to the children. The way Madison was running to the phone when it rang, Deanna figured they’d set up prearranged times.
“Mom, I need help with my history project.”
Deanna turned and saw Lucy standing in the doorway to the bedroom. “Not now,” she said, her attention returning to the twins. “I have to watch your sisters.”
“Then when?”
“I don’t know.”
“You said you’d help me. You said it this weekend and yesterday.”
The pressure around Deanna’s head tightened. “I’m busy, Lucy. There are four other children in this house. Not just you.”
She picked up a towel, then let it drop to the bed when she realized her fingers were trembling. She felt the room sway a little. Low blood sugar, she thought. She hadn’t been eating much. She should go downstairs and get a snack. Just as soon as the twins were out of the bath.
“Mom, I need to go to the library, remember? You said you’d take me tonight.”
Audrey’s voice joined the shrill laughter of her youngest.
“Not tonight.”
“But you said.”
“I have a project for history,” Lucy said, holding out a worn book. “Mom, this is important. School’s out in two days and it’s due.”
“Move, you two.” Madison stepped between her sisters and pushed into the room. “Can Carrie spend the night this Friday? It’s my turn to have her here.”
“Mommy, the water’s getting cold. Can I turn on the hot water?”
The room swayed again. The pain grew until it nearly blinded her. Deanna felt herself sinking, drifting. Everything hurt.
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