“I’d say you could join me…” Joe let the words trail off.
“Not sure if that would be against the rules,” Krista replied.
“I won’t tell if you don’t,” Joe countered.
“And that’s my cue,” Kit said, interrupting the conversation. “I’d love to hear more about this whole bed situation, but unfortunately, I have work to do. If you two don’t mind, I have a new soup recipe that needs my devoted attention.” She waved them out of the kitchen.
Krista shot Joe a bold little wink. “What she’s saying is we need to be quiet. I’m up for the challenge if you are.”
Joe swallowed. She spoke her mind—a lot. And God, he found it unfairly attractive.
“But, be that as it may,” Krista added, pulling Isabel’s diary from her bag, “we have a bit of work to do before taking over each other’s jobs today.”
She motioned for Joe to follow her into the living room. Frankie trotted ahead like he was escorting them, then jumped onto the couch, claiming Joe’s lap with zero hesitation.
“I’m going to pretend not to be offended,” Krista said, side-eying Frankie.
“Don’t worry, he knows you’re still his queen,” Joe replied.
“Sure he does…anyway.” Krista turned her attention back to the diary.
“Have you discovered anything new?” Joe asked, adjusting around the small but determined dog now curled on his thigh.
Krista sat beside him, close enough that he could feel the warmth of her leg. “A little,” she said, flipping through the journal. “There’s this section I wanted to look at with you.”
She paused at a page filled with looping, hurried handwriting. Joe leaned forward, squinting at the Spanish text. “I have no idea what that says.”
Krista smiled softly. “I know.” She traced a line with her finger. “The more I read, the more the language comes back to me. Andthis part is different.”
She read it aloud first in Spanish. A small shiver slid down Joe’s spine at the sound of her voice. Not from the words, but from the way she read them. She sounded reverent almost.
“What’s it say?” he asked, voice lower than before.
Krista exhaled slowly and translated: “Today we found a magical place. Where I can truly be myself. Sometimes I don’t want to leave. Sometimes I want to stay there forever.”
Joe leaned back, eyebrows lifting. “Sounds romantic.”
Krista nodded, her eyes lingering on the page. “Yeah. It does.”
They continued reading together, Frankie snoring lightly on Joe’s lap, blissfully unaware that the humans above him were untangling a decades-old secret.
“Any idea where this ‘place’ is?” he asked.
“Not really,” she admitted. “It’s vague. Could be anywhere. A grove, maybe. A clearing. Somewhere private. Whatever it was…it meant everything to her.”
Joe watched the concentration in her eyes, the sunlight catching in her hair and turning the loose strands to gold. Her lips moved faintly as she translated, and he had the inconvenient thought of what those lips had felt like last night.
Krista flipped ahead a few pages, her brows pulling together as she studied the looping script. “She talks about their special place again, in this next entry…”
Joe shifted closer as she read the new passage aloud in Spanish. Her voice was soft, steady, and almost melodic.
He didn’t understand a word of it, but hearing her read it gave him a strange, unexpected pull in his chest. “Okay,” he said, squinting at the page, “I caught maybe one thing in there. Water?”
Krista nodded, still studying the text. “She says, ‘The water there always sings. Jonah says the sound guides us—if we follow the echo, we’ll reach our refuge.’”
Joe sat back slowly. “Water that sings? So…what, a lake? A river?”
“Could be either,” she murmured, tapping the margin. “We have dozens of lakes and rivers around here.”
