“Hewaswonderful. We were married almost thirty-eight years. We were so happy, but…” She heard her voice thinning despite her best efforts. “He had a stroke five years ago. At the dinner table, of all places. We thought—we thought we’d caught it in time. He went to the hospital, they did all the things, stabilized him, gave me hope. Overnight, he had another one, and—” She swallowed. It had been a long time since she’d tried to put the awful simplicity of it into a sentence. “He never woke up. He was fifty-seven.”
“Oh, MJ. I’m so sorry.” There was no pity in his face, just genuine, heartfelt sympathy.
“Thank you.” She reached for her napkin for the tears she certainly hadn’t expected to shed tonight. “I don’t usually—” She gestured to the air. “Sorry.”
“For loving your late husband?” He set his hand on the table between them, palm up, silently offering support. The simple gesture made her eyes sting again. “Never apologize for that.”
She put her fingers on his in gratitude for the sympathy.
“And something tells me you haven’t been out much in these past five years.”
She just smiled. “Do I look like the ‘go out on the town’ type to you?”
“You look like the most trustworthy, nurturing, kindest, and sweetest lady I’ve ever met.”
The compliment took her breath away, so overwhelming, she eased her hand away. “And what about you?”
He lifted his brows in question.
“Have you been married or…”
He nodded. “Twice, actually. Once, when I was quite young, and it didn’t last. No kids, no hard feelings, just a mistake. I waited a long time to try again, and did when I was just past forty. I married a woman named Diana who had three daughters and so many opinions, I didn’t know where to go to be safe.” He chuckled. “We stayed married for fifteen years, then about ten years ago, we split up. Again, not acrimonious, but now…” He looked uncomfortable for a moment, and MJ leaned closer, instinctively knowing this was the kind of insight and information she needed.
“But now?” she urged when he simply didn’t finish.
“Now, I’m here, in Utah, at this spectacular restaurant with a charming lady. Would you like dessert?”
And…just like that, he changed the subject.Why?
“Gracie brought home some cream puffs,” she said.
He lifted a brow. “Yes, please. Let’s go.”
And that, she knew, was the end of that moment of revelation.
For whatever reason, Matt Walker, who’d engraved his Rolex with the first name Graham, who paid in cash for everything—including this dinner, she noticed, as he slyly slipped a few hundred-dollar bills into the bill folder—was just not forthcoming about his past.
Steppinginto a kitchen lit only by the light under the stove and the Christmas trees outside the window, MJ slowed and felt her whole body tense. She heard it before she saw it—a slow, treacherous plink of water falling from the ceiling to the floor.
A leak.
“Oh, no,” she murmured.
“What’s wrong?” Matt asked, his ears probably not that trained to a problem at the lodge.
“Listen.” She tapped the pendant lights over her work island, eyes up on the ceiling to search for the source of the sound.
“Eesh. I know that sound,” he said. “It’s…there.” He pointed to the mudroom, a drip from the seam in the ceiling falling onto the tile floor.
She grunted in frustration, already moving for towels. “You must think this place is on the verge of extinction. Which wouldn’t be wrong.”
“What’s above this?” he asked.
“Roof. And there’s an ice dam somewhere.”
“Not something we have in Florida,” he said.
“The snow slides and then refreezes, and the water has to find a way out,” she explained, stress squeezing at her. “We’ve patched and repatched and we cannot afford a new roof right now and?—”
