say. Being a resort island, most of the businesses closed down in winter. Many restaurants were seasonal—their owners had primary residences in Michigan or Wisconsin, and the gift shops took long breaks too. Sales were low, she’d expected that, telling herself it gave her time to boost her inventory, and that she had done. She had an entire closet full of winter landscapes. But there were only so many snow-frocked trees that you could paint, she realized…
“Christmas is really magical here,” she said, holding onto the one shining moment of that long, cold stretch. She didn’t say that after the holidays, it was all downhill until April, when the snow finally began to thaw. “They put a tree right there—” She motioned out the window to the edge of Main Street, but Simon didn’t follow her gaze. Instead, she realized with a flutter, he was looking at her.
She felt her cheeks heat. She took a sip of her coffee. She’d forgotten to add sugar to it, but she found that she didn’t even care.
“And you?”
She glanced up to see the waitress already delivering their food, looking rather smug about that, if Ellie did say so herself. Couldn’t she have postponed things a little longer? Really, did the kitchen have to be quite so efficient?
Simon swallowed a mouthful of hash browns. “I started my own law practice, actually. It’s not easy, but it’s given me the opportunity to spend some time out here this summer.”
She didn’t let on that she of course knew he was a lawyer, just as he’d planned to be. It was forgivable, she supposed, given how small the island was and that all the locals knew all the locals and all the seasonal people too. And Simon and his family were seasonal people. They were property owners. That made them islanders. And that made their business, well, everyone’s business.
“My mom hasn’t been well,” he explained, “She wanted to get back here for the season and it seemed like an opportunity for me to help.”
“It isn’t anything serious?” She felt guilty for not knowing, even though she hadn’t seen Mrs. Webber on this island in at least two years.
“She had pneumonia over the winter,” he explained. “And she’s been struggling to get back on her feet. I’m hoping the warm weather will help her improve.” He grinned, and Ellie set a hand on his arm. Warm and soft, she let it stay like that for a moment.
“I’m sure that having you here will help her improve.” She grinned. Like old times.
“I’m fixing up the house for her, not doing much, of course, but more than my father can do. He’s getting on in age.”
“And you work remotely?” she asked, sipping her drink. She couldn’t peel her eyes from him. She feared that if she did, she would wake from a wonderful, delicious dream, one that she had had many times over the years, flashbacks, really, to the last summers she had spent on this island before it became her permanent residence. When Evening Island and Simon Webber were interconnected, one and the same, where it seemed that one couldn’t exist without the other.
He nodded. “I’m a contract lawyer, not a trial attorney. I spend a lot of time reading.” He went on to describe a current case.
Ellie nodded, opening her eyes, pretending to find this not only interesting but also new information, despite Gran filling her in on all she’d heard in her weekly quilting club. But what she was really thinking was that his smile was just as adorable as it was ten years ago.
“And you’re doing all that while helping around the house too?”
“Well, my fiancée is better with the domestic side of things…”
She felt the blood drain from her face. For a moment, she wasn’t even sure she was breathing. She stared at him, and his brow flinched, forcing her to recover, and quickly.
“Fiancée? Well, this is news!” She smiled brightly, even though her heart felt like it was breaking into a million pieces, just like it had all those years ago, when he’d left the island, gone to college, and the year after that, when he’d stayed at college to take summer classes instead of come back to the island like he used to.
Like he’d promised.
He shrugged, looking nonplussed. “Thanks, I guess. It’s what people do, right? Grow up? Get married?”
She nodded, smiled tightly. Yes, it was what people did. But not what she had done. It wasn’t by choice. It was more that