that floated right over Edie’s face, and simultaneously stopped Lila’s heart. It was from Theo. It had flashed up so quickly that by the time she got herself under control, she’d missed it, and now all she wanted to do was open it. She rummaged around the sofa for her phone, but she must have left it in the kitchen.
“You just went ghostly white,” Piper said. “What’s wrong?”
“I got a text,” she said, breathless, her mouth drying out as she got up, carrying the iPad with her on her search for her phone. “From Theo.”
“Go!” Charlotte said. “Check it and call us back later!”
The others all agreed, their heads nodding simultaneously. She snatched her phone from the kitchen counter, said her goodbyes to the girls, and then settled back down on the sofa with her phone in both hands. She swallowed, her tummy aflutter with butterflies, and opened the text.
It read simply, You don’t even know me.
Heat spread over Lila’s face and down her neck. All she could do was be honest with him, since that’s what she wanted most from him. She returned, I don’t know your favorite dinner dish or what makes your skin boil, but I want to.
Lila’s stomach burned with unease. She had never been so transparent with anyone, but he’d looked so vulnerable at times that she thought he needed to hear she had faith in their connection, and if he’d just let her in, they might find there could be something wonderful between them.
When he didn’t text back, she texted again: Seafood.
A plume of exhilaration swelled inside her when the bubbles showed on her phone. He typed, What?
She replied, That’s my favorite dinner dish—any kind of seafood.
But he didn’t come back, and her heart sunk at that knowledge.
Lila clearly wouldn’t get the chance to talk about the sale of the coffee shop, why he was suddenly leaving, what the papers were saying about him, or what the note in his office had meant. She knew she shouldn’t waste her time trying if he wasn’t willing to reciprocate. She could only go out on a limb so many times before giving up. So she sent one final text and went to bed:
Your life can’t start until you let go of whatever is holding you back.
As Lila crawled under the covers in the silent cabin, she wondered if that had been advice for Theo or for her.
Nineteen
Rex put his little hands over his ears to stifle the loud growl of Judd’s tractor. When Judd had heard from Adele that Lila was helping out at Fireside Cabins, he came right away. Lila had no idea that Adele had said a thing—she’d only mentioned it to Adele when she’d put a sign on the coffee shop apologizing for closing its doors. The next thing she knew, Judd was rolling up the hill on his tractor with Rex and his hound dog in the front seat, the large reel on the back of the machine grinding the fallen leaves and snow, leaving green grass in its wake like a colossal vacuum cleaner.
“You reckon Winston can hear anymore?” Rex called out to her over the ruckus. “He sits with my daddy every day and it’s so noisy.” The little boy had gotten out of the tractor after seeing Lila in the yard, and now the two of them stood in their coats and scarves, warming their hands next to the small crackling fire in the fire pit on the side of the main cabin that Eleanor had lit for them. The flames licked their way into the air, causing the snow on the edge of the fire pit to glisten. “His back legs tapped like crazy when he found out he’s gettin’ to ride on a Saturday too,” Rex continued. “He usually just lays on the floor all day on weekends, waitin’ for Monday when he can get back to work with Daddy. He loves it.”
“It seems like he does,” Lila said with a laugh.
“Sometimes I wonder what Winston thinks ridin’ in that tractor.”
Lila looked down at Rex. “You’re an old soul,” she told him after the tractor had moved further away from them, easing the clatter. “You think a lot. I can tell.”
“I’m always thinkin’,” Rex said, kicking a small stone from the patio into the grass. “Lately I’ve been thinkin’ that I won’t get to see Theo again.” His face dropped, his bright eyes clouding. “And my grandma said she might not get her coffee anymore. He moved,