Aurelie ran theEnglish peas and leeks under the crystal clear stream from the ceramic farm sink in Paige’s kitchen.The cool water sent shivers down her spine as she teased her fingers through the current.It was so like the water at the edge of Paige’s property: strong and carrying life in its flow.She gazed out the window at her friend’s land, at the river and mountains she’d come to consider her protectors.The heart-rate monitor–like spikes and dips of the mountains illustrated that life wasn’t a straight line; it rose and fell, and in her experience, the world was richer for it.
Herworld was richer for it.
She pulled out her work phone, wondering how to tell Paige everything, including the fact that her personal phone was down for the count until she could replace it.Where would she start?Normally, she would just dive in over a glass of wine, both of them talking in the circular, patternless way that only they understood until everything on both their chests was out in the open between them.But things had been strained lately.Well, not strained so much as tense.
Paige couldn’t just plop down on the couch with a glass of cabernet and spend the evening dissecting Aurelie’s visa delays and her father’s untimely release from prison.Even though everything she had, everything she’d earned, was threatened by this news.Her father was a nightmarish genius when it came to making her life hell, and Aurelie doubted that her responsibility in his prison sentence had dampened that particular talent of his.
But Paige could barely meet Aurelie for a coffee, and usually that happened at work when Paige had a break in patients and no daughter or spouse who needed her in the moment.
Aurelie shook the water off that round of veggies, set them on a plate to dry, then reached for a leek that had escaped her notice before.She didn’t blame Paige, nor resent her for the changes in her life that led to their recent disconnect.If anything, she envied the easy way Paige had transitioned from a globetrotting adventurer to a content partner and mom who still managed to sneak away with her husband from time to time.She was going out that week for their anniversary.
Still, Aurelie needed to talk to her.All of them, in fact.Not about her personal issues—those were for Paige alone—but this dinner was a perfect excuse to share what had happened on the road today and with the Michaels’s property.
For starters, the actor Paige was mildly obsessed with—a kid she’d known when she was younger and had since become theone who escaped Banberry and got famous—was next door.Looking like sin on crackers, unfortunately.Her body had completely betrayed her by reacting so viscerally to him.He was attractive.So what?
He was also planning on buying the Michaels’s property, like he had other places in town already.
Not on her watch.
They needed to make a united front and tell this land baron to get the hell out of Banberry.And fast.
Between the guillotine hanging over her head in the form of her permanent H-1B visa, her father’s release, and the man who’d just bought the property next to Paige to top it all off, Aurelie’s thoughts spiraled.The whole day had been like a two-story neon sign telling her she didn’t belong in Banberry, even though staying was the only thing she knew for sure she did want.
Her heart pounded against her chest, echoing that statement.Stay, it told her.
Oh, I plan on it.It just might not be my choice anymore.
But going home to Turks was equally untenable, both for personal reasons—her father’s potential for retribution, for one—and more complex ones.Banberry was her home, and it was in trouble.As a nurse who’d sworn to do no harm, she’d stay and help even if it meant hiding out in the barn and evading immigration officials.
“A penny for them?”Paige slid in beside Aurelie, taking the leek from her hand.“I think this one’s rinsed well enough, now,” she teased her friend.Aurelie’s cheeks burned hot.The poor vegetable looked altogether as wilted as she felt.
“Sorry,” she said.“A lot on my mind.”
“Does this have something to do with why Brad found all your work clothes strewn by the side of the road?”
Aurelie gasped, turned off the water and shook her hands dry, wiping the residual water on her pants.She’d completely forgotten about her scrubs.She was headed toward the door in full panic when Paige put her hand on Aurelie’s arm.
“It’s okay, he put them inside your front door at the bottom of the stairs.He almost sent out a search party until I told him you were here with Maddie.What happened?”
The heat from her cheeks built up behind her eyes, and for the life of her, she couldn’t figure out why.She was fine; the car hadn’t hit her.Her purchases were safe, she’d spent the past hour cuddling with her god-child at the one Banberry event she wouldn’t miss for the world: the Connors’s family Sunday dinner.But so much had shifted in her world, she felt off-balance.
And apparently more emotional as she’d ever been.This was impacting her more than she thought.
“I’m fine, but we do need to talk.I just… Some of it I need to do alone with you and the rest I need everyone here for.”
Paige grew serious, and Aurelie saw a hint of their old connection buried in her hard stare.She’d need that when it came to formulating a plan for the jerk who’d bought the old Michaels’s property.They’d need to be on the same team to make that particular problem go away.
“Are you okay, Aury?”
Aurelie nodded.“More or less.”
“Here, sit,” Paige said, pulling out a stool from behind the breakfast bar for Aurelie.She nodded, following her friend’s gentle guiding hand to the hardwood stool Owen had made at Paige’s request when they’d renovated his outdated kitchen to her cooking tastes.He was a craftsman of the best kind; he could translate something from his wife’s description and bring it to fruition.Aurelie envied his artistic skills that she, too, had called upon a time or two to help make a customized piece for her small space.
“Tell me everything,” Paige said, rubbing soft circles on Aurelie’s back.For the millionth time that day, Aurelie thought of her mother, the loss as acute now as it was three years prior.
Aurelie opened her mouth to share her concerns over losing her work visa and, therefore, her home in Montana, but froze when Owen walked in, a squirming Maddie in his arms.
“This little one is clean and dry and hungry as a bear,” he said, adding a roar for his daughter’s benefit.Maddie squealed with delight, her small, delicate hands popping in and out of the floral blanket she was wrapped in.
