“Do you want a ride back to your Vespa?” he asked.
She'd rather this be their final interaction because she didn't want Dixon witnessing their last moment. “You and Dixon go on. My scooter's parked right around the corner.”
“Sure?”
No.“Yes. I'll see you soon.”
His touch parted from her and cold whooshed across her skin. He paused at the driver's door to look back. Smiled.
Miraculously, she managed a return smile.
Then he was driving off in the SUV.
Then the SUV was out of sight.
ChapterTwenty-Four
Exhaustion and anxiety—Gemma's least favorite combo—pounced on her the moment she came awake the following morning after the world's worst night of sleep.
She was scheduled to swing by the house of Gracie's friend Wanda, newly returned from Oregon, at seven this morning. Today's gloomy weather might as well have been holding up astay in bedsign. But, for Gemma, there was no better time to leave her house to retrieve Gracie's diaries than this. She was desperate to occupy her body and mind with any activity that might distract her from worries about Jude.
Following her stop at Wanda's, she planned to read the relevant diary passages before meeting up with Gracie, Colette, and her mother at Marigold Manor for brunch.
“Gemma!” Wanda crowed when she answered Gemma's knock. “Come in, come in.”
“Thank you.” Wanda's place looked just as she remembered it. Lots of lace and needlepoint, the fragrance of an orange-scented cleaning product suspended in the air.
“Gracie's diaries are just in here.” Wanda's pale pink head led the way down the hallway. She swept open a closet door and gestured to the collection of diaries. They stood upright, spines out.
As Gemma searched for the volumes she sought, Wanda regaled her with a list of the ways her son-in-law had annoyed her during her recent visit with her daughter.
Satisfaction swept through Gemma when she spotted the diaries embossed with1944and1945. She slid them free. Thanking Wanda profusely, Gemma gave the diminutive woman a hug.
“You're welcome, doll. I adore Gracie. When she asked me if I'd keep her diaries safe, I jumped at the chance. She's been a dear friend to me.”
With the diaries stowed in her backpack, Gemma steered to Cinnamon and Spice Bakery through swaths of fog. The bakery only had three high-top tables with stools, but Gemma was able to score one of them after purchasing a chocolate, chocolate chip muffin.
The muffin was incredibly good. Jude would love it, chocolate enthusiast that he was. The thought gave her a pang. She earnestly wished that he was here with her, tasting this, gazing at her in the way that made the backs of her knees tingle.
If anything happened to him—
Don't go there, Gemma.
It didn't take her long to locate the point in time in the diaries when Paul had been sent from D.C. back to France. June 1944.
She skimmed pages and pages of tidy cursive, stopping several times to read the most revelatory sections.
* * *
Gemma arrived at Gracie's room to find her three red-headed female ancestors busy with brunch prep.
Colette was pouring Bloody Marys from a thermos that no one would drink but her. Her mother was opening store-bought fruit salad and apologizing because she hadn’t brought something homemade. Gracie was placing napkins and silverware on the small, round table in one corner of her room. Gemma set muffins from the bakery next to the eggs and bacon Colette had cooked at home and transported here.
Once Colette had squeezed in a satisfying amount of telling the others what to do and once Mom had squeezed in a satisfying amount of fretting, they settled around the table.
Gracie had drawn her curtains wide to reveal a view of pine trees and, beyond that, road. Fog still clung to the ground, giving the earth a fairytale quality. White below, white-gray above. Gemma noted that the overcast sky was lightening subtly as the day went on, as if its glum mood first thing this morning was improving by degrees.
“Drink up!” Colette said, eagerly following her own order. After draining a third of her Bloody Mary, she smacked her lips with a sigh.
