Marin chuckled. “I’m ready.”
A middle-aged white man walked into the room, his graying hair neatly combed back, perhaps to cover a bald spot. “Good morning, ladies. I’m Peter Harkness.”
Marin recognized his name from the paperwork. This was the attorney who would be handling today’s closing. “Nice to meet you, Mr. Harkness.”
“Please call me Peter. You must be Ms. Easterly?”
“Marin.” She held out a hand, and he shook it.
The sellers had already left town, so they had completed their part of the paperwork electronically. It would only be Peter, Marin, and Charlotte signing documents in person today. Marin sat at the conference table and spent the next hour completing what felt like hundreds of documents. She signed until her hand cramped, but with Charlotte and Peter’s guidance, she eventually got through it.
And then, he handed her a set of shiny keys.
Marin couldn’t have stopped grinning if she’d tried as she walked out of the office, and she definitely wasn’t trying. She wasecstaticto be a homeowner.
Charlotte followed her outside. “Headed over to your house right now?”
“I need to swing by the apartment and get Ember first. She and I will check it out together.” Marin paused. “Would you stop by for a few minutes? So we can talk?”
Charlotte’s gaze dropped to the sidewalk. “I have a showing to get to now, but maybe I could stop by in an hour or so? I’d like to see the house, now that it’s yours.”
“Okay. Please do.” Marin gave her what she hoped was an encouraging smile. They needed to clear the air between them. Right now, that kiss hung like a neon sign over their heads, a reminder of the line they’d crossed.
As she watched Charlotte walk away, Marin hoped desperately that they could redraw that line. Her attraction was stronger than ever now that she knew how it felt to actually kiss Charlotte, but she also knew this was more than chemistry. She had real feelings for Charlotte. If things were different, she could fall for her.
If things were different, Charlotte could bethe one.
Because not only was Marin ridiculously attracted to her, she loved being around her. She enjoyed sharing meals with her and watching Charlotte play with Ember. She loved every moment they spent together, and if she closed her eyes, she could see a future where she spentallher moments with Charlotte.
Well, fuck. This was a bigger problem than she’d realized, a problem she wasn’t sure how to remedy. Had she already fallen? Was it too late to rein herself in to preserve their friendship? Maybe it would be less painful to walk away rather than continue to pine over a woman she couldn’t have. No. She would find a way to fix this. They certainly weren’t the first friends to share an ill-advised kiss. They could move past it.
Besides, the universe clearly wanted them to be part of each other’s lives. There was no other explanation for how they’d both ended up in Vermont two years after the accident.
So, Marin drove to her apartment to pick up Ember. Last week, she’d gone on a bit of a shopping spree, buying furniture for her newbedroom and living room, kitchen essentials, and other things she needed to furnish her new house. When those items were delivered, she could officially move in. She hoped she and Ember would be sleeping in their new digs within a week.
The drive to the house took almost thirty minutes. A light snow had started to fall, which almost made her turn around and head back to the apartment. She’d gotten more comfortable behind the wheel over the last few months, but driving in snow still made her nervous. Fresh snow was so pretty, though. It sparkled where it had drifted along the side of the road.
Marin’s muscles were clenched tight by the time she pulled into the driveway. It was long, with a slow curve leading to the house, and today, it was covered in about an inch of fresh powder. She needed to hire someone to plow for her.
Living outside the town limits meant she’d have a lot of things to consider now that she hadn’t before, but she was up for the challenge. This house and the twenty acres of unspoiled nature it sat on would be more than worth it.
“What do you think, Ember?” she asked as she parked in front of the house.
The puppy stared out of her crate on the back seat, expression curious. Marin came around to get her and set Ember on the ground beside the car. There was a fenced-in yard in back, but the front yard should be safe enough, as long as Marin kept an eye on her. Her driveway was pretty long, and she lived on a dirt road with little traffic even if Ember wandered that far.
The puppy trotted across the driveway and climbed a snowbank, tail wagging as she realized the snow was firm enough to support her small body. Marin snapped a quick picture of her up there, which she texted to her niece Jen. Then she took a selfie of herself with the house visible behind her, which she sent to her sibling group chat.
Immediately, excited responses started rolling in. Even Nancy commented with congratulations on the new house. Jen sent a stringof excited emojis and promised to visit as soon as tax day was over. As an accountant, she was extremely busy this time of year.
Smiling, Marin called Ember to follow her to the front door. “Let’s go inside and check out our new house, okay? We’ve got so much land here, Ember. I think you’re going to love it. I can’t wait to watch you grow up in these hills.”
Already, Marin felt calmed by her surroundings. There was no sound but the rush of wind through the trees. She’d never lived anywhere this remote. The prospect of privacy and space was intoxicating. She used her new key to unlock the door, immediately grateful that the previous owners had left behind a mat inside the door where she could dry Ember’s feet before she tracked wet paw prints all over the hardwood floors.
“I’m never getting over these views,” she told the puppy as she walked to the windows along the back of the house, looking out at the mountains in the distance. Ember stood at the window beside her, tail wagging.
Marin turned to survey her new home. The living room felt bigger without furniture, a blank slate for her to decorate exactly how she wanted. Despite the house being relatively small in square footage, the oversize windows and sprawling fields outside helped to make it feel open. Marin had spent so much of her life feeling confined, trapped in the metaphorical closet. Here, she was free in the most literal sense.
Marin lost all track of time as she wandered through the house, taking pictures and measurements, planning out where her furniture would go and what she had left to buy. The next thing she knew, there was a knock at the front door.
