Page 1 of Perfect Satisfaction

PROLOGUE

“Arek? Where are you?”

“Here!” I yell back. I need not say more since I’m in my favorite place in the world, and the man calling my name should be able to find me with ease. I’m lying beneath a million stars thinking about the past and making wishes for the future.

Tonight’s a night for it.

I feel heavy footfalls shake the earth behind me as my grandfather makes his way to the end of the natural jetty behind his cabin.

His feet finally stop by my head. “You scared the hell out of—”

“Who, Gramps? Certainly not my father,” I snort derisively, interrupting my grandfather.

He barks out a laugh before dropping his body down next to mine. “I’ll never lie to you, boy. The man doesn’t know you’re gone. But your grandma’s upset.”

Shit. Growing up there were few rules save one—don’t upset my grandmother. Now? “Sorry about that,” I mutter.

“She knew you were hurting. Saw you jump in the car and race off. Fortunately she’s a smart woman and put two and two together pretty fast. Called me. Figured you were headed this way.” The small, three-season family cabin in Mooseberry, Maine is not far from where I grew up in Massachusetts.

The cramps I’d finally settled from churning begin anew. Fresh tears track down my face before I lash out, “How can you sit there acting as if losing her doesn’t mean a damn thing to you?”

“Because it’s not the cancer that’s going to take your grandma from me, Arek. I lost her years ago almost in this exact spot.”

I try to find words, but he finds them faster. “She’ll die and I’ll go on living, still loving her. That doesn’t change.”

I suck in a harsh breath as he tells me the truth about the reason why he and my grandmother divorced—and about the history behind what started him writing his newspaper column. It’s a birthright my father sullied further.Not that it had such auspicious beginnings, I think wearily. “How could you do that, Gramps?”

“To this day, I can’t answer that question.”

“I’d have divorced you too!”

He lets out a hollow laugh. “Would you? Do you think it’s happenstance that we live next door to one another?”

My eyes widen. “You mean . . .?”

“She can’t forgive me, but we’re a part of each other. A person can’t close off their heart so easily. Even broken, love is still beautiful.”

“I’m not certain I want to find a love like that. Lies and pain? No thank you.”

“Yet that’s the only thing I want for you.”

I rear back as if he’s slapped me.

“‘They that love beyond the world cannot be separated by it. Death cannot kill what never dies.’”

“I’m not certain William Penn understood the concept of extramarital affairs and cancer!” I shout at the man who has been the cornerstone of my life.

He bumps my shoulder. “Don’t be too certain.”

We’re silent for a long while, just me, him, and the stars. I tip my head back, staring at the speckled sky, making wish after wish, begging for them to come true. When I drop my chin, his jaw is clenched, face stoic.

Just then, a shooting star darts across a sky full of them. My heart thumps erratically against my ribs. Is it an answer to my prayers?

“Even a bright shiny new star can’t make up for the one that’s meant to be your guiding light when it winks out.”

I recall an elusive memory from my childhood where we sat around a campfire not far from where we are right now. “You’ve said that before.”

“Yes, I did. I meant it then, and I mean it more now.” His voice cracks on the last word