in the same place any longer.
Or maybe the two of them had been growing apart since the move to Boston, and Tess hadn’t noticed. Just as she hadn’t noticed when Jeremy stopped loving h—
She swallowed back a raw sound, her cheeks wet and cold.
No. Belle was honest and direct, always. If she said her departure had nothing to do with Tess, she meant it.
Tess had to believe that. She would believe that.
With her thumbnail, she traced the stitching on the edge of the duvet. She breathed steadily, again and again, until her chest stopped hitching.
Her best friend had already left. In another week, Lucas would be gone from her daily life too. She’d spend virtually all her days and nights focused on work, without interruption. This year. Next year. Maybe all the years to come.
Somehow, the prospect sounded a lot less appealing than it had only a week ago.
Twenty-Two
Over a late dinner that night, Tess tried her best to stay cheery. She asked Lucas about his day. Laughed at the shenanigans of the kids in his children’s lesson. Rolled her eyes at his shameless flirtation and innuendo. Told her own stories about how she’d spent the afternoon.
As he played with her fingers from across the diner booth, she forced a grin. “So then I tried to mount the float again, and it flipped over on me again, and an elderly woman nearby looked at me with pity and offered to get me water wings.”
His head tilted in silent inquiry.
“You know, those inflatable armbands? I thought they were just for toddlers, but evidently not.”
He snickered at that.
Ducking her head, she watched the tendons in the back of his hand shift with every stroke of his thumb across her knuckles, every brush of their fingertips.
He lifted her hand, cupping it against the nascent bristles of his cheek and nuzzling into her palm. Then he simply looked at her for a moment.
“You seem tired tonight, älskling,” he finally said. “Are you ready to leave?”
She felt tired. Tired and old. “Sure.”
After giving her hand one last squeeze, he let it go and slid out of the booth. “Let’s go to my apartment.”
Minutes ago, he’d settled their bill and tucked a generous tip for their server beneath the salt shaker, so there was nothing keeping them in the diner. They walked out together, his arm over her shoulders drawing her close to his side.
The humidity hit her like a sweaty-palmed slap. “Ugh.”
“Just think of all the money you’re saving on moisturizer.” He smiled down at her. “Really, I don’t know how anyone can afford not to live near Florida.”
She wrinkled her nose. “My hotel room is closer than the clubhouse. Let’s go there instead.”
“Is Belle out with her, uh, friend tonight?”
She swallowed hard. “She left this morning.”
His head turned her way. “Left? The room?”
“The island. Her plane should be landing in Boston any time now.”
He slowed. “Weren’t you two supposed to leave at the same time?”
“Yes.” She tugged him back into motion. “That was the plan, but she decided to go home early.”
Her voice sounded thin, but he didn’t seem to notice.
He bent close and pressed a lingering kiss to her mouth. “I’m glad you didn’t leave with her.”
Housekeeping had apparently come and gone in her absence, because the duvets on both double beds were invitingly turned down, chocolates wrapped in gold foil resting on the pillows. Two new water bottles, their sides beaded with moisture, had appeared on the nightstands.
Her laugh emerged as a hiccup. “More chocolates and water bottles for me, I suppose.”
“That’s what you think.” After she lowered herself onto her mattress, Lucas grabbed both bottles and handed one to her. “I’m greedy.”
He opened the other, taking a long drink. Capping it again, he set it on the nightstand, sat down on the bed too, and settled himself against her wooden headboard.
There he remained, arms loose at his sides, eyes on her. In the lamplight, his rumpled hair was edged with gold, the well-honed muscles beneath his thin tee casting shadows across the soft cotton.
That forgiving light erased the damage from years in the sun, and he looked like what he was. An athlete, handsome and vital and…young. So young, when tonight she felt exhausted and dispirited. She might as well have bypassed middle age and hobbled directly into decrepitude. She might as well be four hundred years old.
For a minute, the disorientation of it all stole her words.
Somehow, she’d embarked on an affair with that man. Her. Tess Dunn. Her. Forty