needed something more to keep her here. And Simon wasn’t it.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Hope
After last week’s “fish situation,” which Gemma did get a good laugh from, she offered to listen out for the girls during their nap, and in exchange Hope decided to pick up a fresh strawberry pie from Island Bakery on the way back to the house. It would be a reward for Gemma working so hard to finish her book, and an excuse for the sisters to sit outside and enjoy a fine, warm evening, hopefully with less drama than the weekend had brought them.
First, she had to get through her meeting (because that’s what it was, surely) with John without letting the nerves get to her too much.
Only they weren’t nerves, she realized, as she stopped outside the Lakeside Inn. What she was feeling was excitement. It was something she hadn’t felt in a very long time, and damn did it feel good.
She walked up the brick paved path to the front porch, where John was waiting, tapping at something on his phone from one of the rocking chairs. He looked up when she said hello and immediately put his phone in his pocket.
“You can finish your email or text,” she said as he stood.
“Later,” he said, giving her a grin.
She sighed happily and turned to take in her surroundings. It had been a long time since she’d been to this inn and her memory didn’t do it justice. Like many others, it was painted white, with crisp black shutters, and a wide porch lined with rocking chairs. The lawns were carefully maintained, the grass green and lush and the flowers so well taken care of that she didn’t see a weed or wilting petal in sight. The inn faced the town, with its back against the lake, but standing here, from a distance, she could see the white dotted store fronts and flags and lampposts that made the island what it was. More than just a piece of land. It was a community, for those lucky enough to be a part of it.
“Should we go in?” John asked, and Hope nodded. She was eager to see what the Altmans had done to the place, and when she pushed through the door into the lobby, she realized that nothing had been done.
That the inn, much like Gran’s house, and Darcy Ritter’s house, was frozen in time. It was like walking into a memory. A place where everything had stayed the same in a moving world.
In some ways, that was what she loved about it.
She caught her reflection in a mirror near the umbrella stand, John at her side.
So much was the same, only so much had changed. Before, when she visited the island, she was a girl. Her life, while planned out for her in so many ways, was still wide open. She didn’t have to follow the carefully laid course—it was just easier to do so. She could have veered to the left, at any moment, and chosen her own path.
Like she was doing now.
“Thoughts?” John slid her a wide-eyed look, and she did her best to suppress a laugh.
“Carpet needs to go,” she whispered in his ear.
He laughed. He had a great laugh: rich and loud and warm. The kind of laugh you yearned to hear again. The kind of laugh that said so much about his character. He was honest, sincere, and kind.
And in another lifetime, he could have been someone she loved.
“Wait until you see the dining room,” he said, motioning for her to follow him to the back of the lobby, where the floor-to-ceiling windows boasted a view of the lake even if they were flanked in heavy gold drapery.
Merriment made his eyes twinkle as he turned to look her way, and she could only shake her head. Really, what was there to say?
They continued their tour to a few of the unoccupied bedrooms upstairs, each done up in heavy wallpaper with matching fabric on the upholstery and bedding, and only once they were outside, on the back deck that dropped down to the pool area and beachfront, did they allow themselves to speak freely.
“It needs a lot of freshening up,” she confirmed. “But so much potential! Do you think the new management has any ideas?”
He gave her a funny smile. “Oh, I think they could be convinced.”
She spread her arms wide, taking in the view of the South Bay lighthouse in the distance, and the harbor on the other side. “I mean,