“Looks like someone has an admirer.”

She watched him a moment, batting the toys about, then turned to grab a bottled water from the fridge. She had to squint to read the handwritten note tacked up beside Iris’s fish.

Check the microwave. I thought I’d give you a second chance since you missed out last time. Welcome home.

Curious, she opened the microwave to discover a plastic leftover container. She found herself smiling as she peeled back the lid, delighted by the mingled aromas of tomato sauce and Italian herbs. Spaghetti. The man was full of surprises.

In the living room, she retrieved her cell from her purse and pulled up Wade’s number.

“You’re home,” he said in lieu of hello, as if he were simply picking up the thread of their last conversation. She found it strangely comforting.

“Yes, I’m home. Safe and sound, as promised.”

“How was it?”

Christy-Lynn pulled in a breath then let it out slowly. “Emotional.”

“But you got Rhetta to agree?”

“After two hours of arm twisting, yes. I still don’t think she’s grasped how much this is going to change their lives.”

“No second thoughts?”

“About the trust? No. About everything else . . .” She let the rest dangle, not sure she wanted to go there with Wade. He had warned her, after all.

“What’s everything else?”

“Nothing, really. It’s just that I’m starting to see that I’m going to need to be more involved than I thought. At least in the beginning. There’s so much they both need, so many details to take care of, and I’m not sure Rhetta’s up to handling it by herself. She doesn’t even have transportation. She asked me to take her and Iris to the cemetery to see Honey’s grave.”

“And did you?”

Christy-Lynn held her breath a moment. She hadn’t meant to tell him about the cemetery, but it was out now. “What else could I do?”

Wade was quiet for a moment, as if weighing his next words very carefully. Christy-Lynn braced for an I told you so. Instead, he surprised her by changing the subject. “You sound tired.”

“It’s been a long two days. I’m going to eat your spaghetti, and then I’m going to take a long hot bath and climb into bed. And thank you by the way. That was . . . thoughtful.”

“Get some rest. I’ll drop the key by tomorrow.”

After dinner, which turned out to be delicious, she filled the tub and indulged in a long hot soak, then crawled between the sheets with the latest Barbara Claypole White novel. All she wanted at the moment was to lose herself in someone else’s story and not think about the tangle of emotions she’d brought back with her from West Virginia.

She was reaching for the crisp new novel when she saw Wade’s manuscript, still untouched and gathering dust on the nightstand. She picked it up, propping the stack of unbound pages against her knees, and began to read. Not because she felt guilty, but because she was suddenly curious about the man who bought mouse toys for her cat and left homemade spaghetti in her microwave.

It was 2:00 a.m. when she finally forced herself to set the manuscript aside, her eyes too tired to focus on one more sentence. She was only halfway through the stack but had already scribbled several pages of notes. The End of Known Things had the potential to be a beautiful story of growth and redemption. The premise was largely sound, and the prose was gorgeous, woven in a way that managed to feel both lush and spare. It was his main character—Vance—that was the problem. Midway through the second act, he had simply fallen flat, as if Wade had suddenly forgotten who he was writing about. Or had never known to begin with.

It wasn’t a fatal flaw or even serious as long as he was willing to work on it, but as she flicked off the light and slid under the covers, she couldn’t help wondering what had caused the sudden rift in Wade’s writing. Perhaps he’d simply lost touch with the story he’d started twenty years ago. A lot could happen to a person in twenty years, and from what he’d told her, a lot had—a career ended, a love lost. Was it possible that in closing the door on that part of his life he had also closed the door on his creativity? It wasn’t hard to imagine. There was certainly plenty in her own past that she was reluctant to look at.

Because looking made it real.

Christy-Lynn was returning from lunch with Missy and Dar when she saw Wade’s Jeep parked outside the store. She found him in the café, seated at his usual table, banging away at his laptop.

“Looks like you’re on a roll.”

Wade pecked out a few more words, then looked up and smiled. “Hey, you. I came to drop off your key.”

Something about that smile, all white teeth and scruffy jaw, always took her by surprise. He was the only man she’d ever met who could leave the house without shaving or combing his hair and still look like he was ready for a GQ photo shoot.

“Sorry. I ran out to meet Missy for lunch.”

Wade fished the key from his shirt pocket and handed it to her. “No worries. I got some work done while I was waiting.”

Christy-Lynn could feel Tamara peering furtively around the espresso machine, no doubt drawing her own conclusions about the key exchange she had just witnessed. She’d be sure to set her straight the moment Wade was gone.