He smiled, leaning across the counter and popping a piece of calamari into his mouth.
Lizzy had never seen him so laid-back. He wasn’t angry and brooding; he looked… comfortable, even happy. It was like running into your dentist or your fifth-grade teacher at the supermarket. It was hard for your brain to compute them in a new setting, and you’re left wondering if you really knew them at all.
“All right, I think that’s it,” Emma said, arranging the boxes in a perfect semicircle.
George looked down at the array, his forehead furrowed. “Why do we have enough food to feed a dozen people?”
“I think you’re vastly underestimating how hungry I am right now,” Emma said, stealing a french fry before turning around to grab plates from the shelf behind her.
“I’m just impressed George got you to agree to order food from a place with ‘shack’ in the name,” Will said, taking a long sip of his beer.
Emma turned back around with the plates and sighed dramatically. “It’s called growth, Will. I highly recommend it.”
He laughed, a sound so full and rich that Lizzy felt it in her chest. And for the first time in twenty-four hours, she allowed herself to relax. She leaned back in her chair and let her smile become easy as she turned to him.
“Thanks for inviting me tonight,” she said, meaning it.
He maintained her gaze for a heavy beat, then replied, “Thanks for coming.”
Then Emma gasped, and all eyes went to her as she smacked George’s hand away from her plate. “Don’t even think about it, Knightley. This lobster roll ismine.”
Two hours later, the farmhouse table in the dining room was covered with the remnants of dinner, and Emma was sitting beside Lizzy, explaining her job as a modern art advisor and the intricacies of international art sales. Lizzy had to admit she’d never really cared about the art world before, but Emma’s explanation was better than most shows on Bravo.
“…Sothenthis guy tried to sell the piece in Europe, but someone must have sent the link to his ex-wife because she ended up calling literally every museum in London, Paris, and Madrid, telling them that the painting was hers until the divorce was finalized. It was such a mess!” she said, taking a long sip of her wine.
Across from them, George chuckled. “Sometimes I think you love the drama more than the actual art.”
“Artisdrama,” Emma replied. “That’s why I’m so good at my job.” Then she turned back to Lizzy. “What about you? What do you do?”
She debated how to answer, if she could somehow make the bakery sound more exciting than it really was, but Will spoke first.
“Lizzy is a fantastic journalist.”
Her attention snapped to him. He stared back, taking a sip of his beer.
“Are you serious?” Emma said, impressed. “That’s amazing.”
Lizzy rolled her eyes. “Writing a few articles in high school and college does not make me a journalist.”
Will’s expression turned sardonic. “You went to school for it.”
“Undergrad, yes. But I still need my master’s if I want to get into foreign affairs coverage.”
“Have you applied anywhere?” George asked. “Will and I went to Columbia. We might know some people.”
She smiled. “I got into Columbia, actually.”
George’s eyebrows shot up. “You got into Columbia’s School of Journalism?”
She nodded while Emma batted her hand in the air.
“Of courseshe got into Columbia’s School of Journalism,” Emma said.
Will’s attention was still on Lizzy, barely concealing his surprise. “When do you start?”
She let out a shaky sigh. “That’s a good question.” She took a deep breath and decided to just get it over with. “I should have started a few weeks ago, but my dad had a stroke in March, two days after I got the acceptance letter. I arrived at our family’s bakery for my shift and found him. I…” Her voice faltered, then she shook her head. “I thought he was dead. The paramedics said if I had been five minuteslater, he would have been. He was in the hospital for a couple of weeks after that. Even after he got out, he couldn’t be on his feet for long, couldn’t keep track of numbers. And I was the only one who knew how the bakery ran. How to fill orders, how to prep… everything. So I deferred for a semester, hoping to work out a plan. But right now there’s still no plan, and I have just a couple of weeks to decide what I’m going to do, so…” Her voice trailed off and she shrugged.
Emma and George were quiet, frozen in place. But Lizzy barely noticed. She was too busy maintaining Will’s gaze, watching as his hard brow softened.
