“Look, moron,” she said, and he felt an unwilling tug of affection for her total lack of sentimentality. “We were good together. It was the timing that sucked. I wasn’t ready to settle down two years ago. I am now. Simple as that.”

“Seems like you’re leaving a lot out of that equation.”

“So why don’t you fill me in?” she said with another sex goddess smile.

I loved you. You left me. You left me when I wanted to have a family with you, when I thought we were happy, and you walked away like I was nothing.

But the feelings behind those words were old and tired, and not worth putting into words.

“Hi.”

It was Faith. She looked at both of them, then stuck out her hand. “Faith Holland.”

“Hi.” Nina took her hand. “Wait a sec, Faith Holland? Holy shit! Jeremy’s ex, right?”

“That’s right.” She looked at Levi, her cheeks flushing. Otherwise, her expression was calm.

“Faith,” Levi said, “This is my ex-wife, Nina. Nina, Faith is my...” He looked at Faith, hoping she’d supply the appropriate word.

“Neighbor,” Faith said.

Women. You never knew what they were up to.

“Holy crap!” came another voice. “Nina?”

“Jeremy!” Nina jumped up and hugged him hard, like they were old pals. “It’s so great so see you!”

Jeremy, Levi was pleased to note, did not hug her back, just gave Levi a look as Nina babbled and grinned.

There’d been one night after Nina had re-upped when Jeremy had invited him up to the house, broke out the twenty-four-year-old single malt scotch and had very thoughtfully gotten drunk with Levi, and Levi had been able to be a normal person, to act not like a cop or a soldier or a big brother or the man of the house, but like a poor slob whose wife had left him.

Levi caught Faith’s hand and tugged her into the seat next to him. “Stay,” he ordered.

“I’m not your dog,” she said.

“Please stay.”

There. She squeezed his hand. “Whatever you want, neighbor.”

He narrowed his eyes. Now was not the time for sass. She blushed, and for some reason, it made his chest ache.

“Watch it, Chief,” she said. “I think I see a smile.”

Before he realized what he was doing, he leaned in and gave her a quick kiss on her soft, pink lips.

Which did make Nina stop talking.

“Oh!” she said. “You two are...together. I didn’t...wow.” She sat down, as did Jeremy, as if they were on a double date. “So, let me get this straight. Levi, you’re dating Faith, who was once engaged to your g*y best friend.”

“Yes.”

She nodded appreciatively. “Am I the only one who thinks that’s weird?”

“Seems kind of perfect to me,” Jeremy said.

Nina grinned, her perfect smile not quite masking her sharklike intentions. “Well, this is awkward, Faith, because I’m here to try to get my husband back.”

Faith nodded sympathetically. “Wow, that is awkward. But you mean ex-husband, right?”

Score one for Faith. She smiled sweetly, then looked at him, then back at Nina. “That being said, we’ll let you guys talk. Jeremy and I were about to grab dinner.”

“Oh, my gosh, you two are still BFFs? That’s so cute!” Yep. A great white.

Faith smiled calmly. “Yes, we’re adorable. Very nice to have met you.”

“Same,” Nina answered.

Faith slid out of the booth and looked at him. “See you around.”

“Okay,” he answered, wishing she’d stay.

With that, the cavalry left, Jeremy giving his shoulder a sympathetic squeeze as he left.

“So where were we?” Nina asked.

“We were nowhere,” he answered. “You were telling me we should get back together, and I’m about to tell you that won’t happen.”

“Well, you know what, hotshot?” Nina said, nibbling a nacho with ridiculous sex appeal and a studied casualness. “Your little birdie is right. We have a lot to talk about. Give me a couple hours of your precious time. I’m here for the weekend, at least. Staying at the Black Swan.” She raised her eyebrows and smiled at him from around the chip.

The Black Swan was where they’d spent their wedding night.

“Fine,” he said. “Get it over with.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

SO HIS EX-WIFE WAS BACK.

Faith sighed. Tried not to worry. Failed. Took another bite of Peanut Brittle. Another sigh. She held out the spoon for Blue—it was his favorite flavor—and took another bite for herself. A movie flickered on the TV—one of those stupid old black-and-white movies she didn’t like—but it was better than the infomercials for those hellish workouts where the “before” body looked a helluva lot like the one she was in, and the “after” looked way too much like Nina Rodriguez’s.

Levi’s wife. He was mad at her, sure, but he’d loved her once.

Would he want another shot at that? The chance to do a better job? Maybe just to show that he hadn’t been wrong about the woman he married? She could see that, understand how Levi, who tried so hard at everything, would want a better result than a quickie divorce in which he’d had no say.

When she was first in San Francisco, Faith would occasionally dream that Jeremy was knocking on her door, confused as to why she wasn’t at their wedding. No, of course he wasn’t gay, where had she been? The wedding disaster...that was the dream. She should come with him; everyone was waiting at the church.

Waking up from those dreams had always been like a kick in the stomach.

She wondered if Levi had similar dreams after Nina left.

“She can fly a helicopter,” she told Blue, who was staring at the pint of Ben & Jerry’s. She gave him another bite.

Levi was home, she knew. She’d heard him come in after midnight, muted the TV and leaped for the door. Waited for his knock, which hadn’t come. Saw through the peephole that he was alone.

O’Rourke’s closed at eleven. So where had he been?

Faith sighed and got up from the still-muted Bogart movie. Maybe Levi had sent her an email; he never had before, but it was worth checking, even if it did qualify her for Pathetic Female status.

Nothing except a note from Sharon Wiles saying she had a permanent tenant for the apartment, so if Faith could pack up her stuff and be out by the end of the month, that’d be great.

Crap. She liked it here, across the hall from her man. Who might not be her man anymore.

No, no. No reason to think that (yet). Faith shut down the computer and went back to the couch. Fluffed the cushions. Folded the blanket.

This was where a mother would come in very handy. Pru would listen, but she wasn’t great with advice, and given her recent marital roller coaster, might well be wearing Vulcan ears and doing her husband. Jack—no. Dad, ditto. Honor’s mysterious boyfriend hadn’t materialized, and she probably wasn’t in the mood to listen to Faith’s relationship woes. Also, it was 2:32 a.m.

But a mother...

Faith stopped at the picture of her family on Pru’s wedding day, the last one taken of all of them. Next to it was the rose quartz heart. Levi hadn’t denied giving it to her, but he hadn’t admitted it, either.

Of course it was from him.

Faith picked up the photo.

The tarry guilt she’d felt all these years wasn’t easily scraped away. Faith could feel it lurking, waiting for another chance. But there’d been flashes since Levi had unveiled the facts of that day. Flashes of pure memories undimmed by the belief that she’d caused the accident. Memories of her mother’s love so pure and bright and strong, they were shocking.

2:47 a.m.

“Want to go for a ride, Blue?” she asked her dog, whose ears pricked up at the magic word. “Want to go in the car?”

* * *

FOR TWO DECADES, FAITH had not been on either Lancaster or Hummel Brook roads. It had taken some doing. Hundreds of miles of avoidance. Her heart began thumping as she approached the intersection, and she exhaled shakily as she pulled over and turned off the engine. Rolled down the windows halfway so Blue could have some cold, fresh air.

It was beautiful here, the place her mother had died. The night was clear, the fields bathed in white from the nearly full moon. Faith had been afraid that the land had been sold to a developer, who’d slapped up some McMansions and stuck in a painfully awkward street named Ciderberry Circle or Owl Hollow Lane or some such ghastly moniker.

But no. It was the same.

Blue whined, wagging his tail, eager to go out.

“You stay here, boy,” she said, her voice loud in the perfect quiet.

Pretty soon, maybe even later this week, Dad would start the ice harvest, calling up the troops at two o’clock in the morning at the very second the temperature fell to seventeen degrees. But tonight, it was only in the twenties.

Only the twenties. Spoken like a true upstater.

Their car had been broadsided right here. Right in the intersection. Maybe her mom had died on impact, maybe it had taken a few minutes. She hoped with every molecule of her heart that her mother hadn’t suffered, but the truth was, she’d never know.

Faith went to the bank that ran along the edge of the road, climbed down. This was where the car had rolled. A long way, all the way to the maple tree. Kevin Hart had been going fast indeed.

Over the years, she’d looked him up on Google from time to time; he’d had a concussion from the accident, and broken the ring finger on his left hand. A college student at the time, not drunk, just driving far too fast on the lonely country road, unaware that during his first semester, a stop sign had been put up at the intersection. The judge had given him community service. He was a civil engineer now. Maybe the kind who studied where stop signs should go.

Faith had never blamed him, not really.

She walked through the field, the brittle grass crunching softly under her feet, and came to the tree that had stopped their car. She remembered that sound, that final crunch, the shiver of the car, the patter as the splintered safety glass let loose.

Running her hand over the rough bark, she felt the smoother place where the tree had healed from the gash their car had left. The wood was still strong and smooth, all these years after that long-ago afternoon when the sky had been so blue.

She sat under the tree, distantly noting the cold, unyielding ground. It was so quiet tonight. No crickets, no coyotes yipping, no night birds. Just the quiet.

Maybe her mother had been planning to divorce Dad. Maybe not. Maybe, Faith thought, her mother had just been having a bad day and vented, inappropriately perhaps, to her youngest child. Maybe, for some reason, she thought her frustrations would be safe with Faith, that for whatever reason, Faith would understand. Maybe wanting more for your child than you had yourself didn’t mean you were unhappy.

That was the thing with a sudden death. Some questions would never be answered.

Faith would keep her mother’s secret. She’d let the guilt slink away, but she wouldn’t sully the memories her family held. The truth was, they all probably knew Constance wasn’t perfect; they were all intelligent, sensitive people, more or less. Maybe their beatification of St. Mom was more a choice than ignorance, and each one of them had tiny shards pricking their hearts, memories of Mom’s imperfections kept to themselves.

Mom had loved them all. She’d been a good mother, and John Holland had been a happily married man. Nothing could ever erase those truths.

Faith looked over to the spot where she’d thought she’d seen her mom standing that day, telling her she’d be fine.

Mom had been right, hadn’t she? Faith had survived the wreck, had turned out pretty well for a girl without a mother. Had found a profession she loved and had become successful, had survived heartbreak, had created a life in a strange city, had become somebody who loved the life she was living.

Too bad Mom couldn’t see her now.

“I miss you,” Faith whispered.

Then she blew a kiss into the air, the same gesture she thought her mother had made to her, that last time she’d ever seen or imagined her. Connie’s kiss for her littlest girl, returned, finally, after nineteen and a half years.

And this time, the heat of tears in her eyes was welcome.

When Blue appeared, having apparently wriggled his way out of the car window, she was glad for his furry head in her lap, his silky ears and big heart.

* * *

FAITH APPEARED ON her father’s doorstep at seven that morning. She’d gone home, slept for a couple of hours, then awoke twenty minutes ago, sure of what she had to do.

“What’s the matter, sweetpea?” Dad asked, ushering her in. “Baby, are you okay?”

“Hi, Daddy, I’m fine. Hey, Mrs. Johnson.”

“Heavens, she needs coffee,” Mrs. J. surmised. “She, with her hair in a snarl and yet appearing in public.”

“This isn’t public, Mrs. J. It’s home. Is Honor up?” she asked.

“Honor is up,” her sister said, coming into the room, dressed for work, hair band firmly in place.

“Good,” Faith said. “Um...I need a minute with you all.”

“I’ll leave you alone,” Mrs. Johnson said.

“Oh, stay,” Faith said. “It’s not like you won’t be eavesdropping, anyway.”

“You are in my kitchen,” the housekeeper said with a hint of a rare smile, “even though this monstrous house has eleven rooms, half of which nobody ever uses.”

They all sat around the table, Mrs. J. handing Faith a cuppa joe. “Thanks,” Faith said. “So here’s the thing.”