"Every time I figure some part of you out, you sprout something off in another direction," she said.

"I've only been in love once—the genuine deal—and it was everything I wanted. I haven't figured out what I want now, beyond what I have. I don't know, Logan, if I've got the courage to step up to that

edge again."

"Things keep going the way they are for me, if you don't step up, you might get pushed."

"I don't push easily. Logan." It was she who stepped to him now, and she took his hand. "I'm so

touched that you'd tell me, so churned up inside that you might feel that way about me. I need time

to figure out what's going on inside me, too."

"It'd help," he decided after a moment, "if you could work on keeping the pace."

* * *

Her clothes were dry but impossibly wrinkled, her hair had frizzed and was now, in Stella's opinion, approximately twice its normal volume.

She dashed out of the car, mortified to see both Hayley and Roz sitting on the glider drinking something out of tall glasses.

"Just have to change," she called out. "I won't be long."

"There's plenty of time," Hayley called back, and pursed her lips as Stella raced into the house. "You know," she began, "what it means when a woman shows up with her clothes all wrinkled to hell and

grass stains on the ass of her pants?"

"I assume she went by Logan's."

"Outdoor nookie."

Roz choked on a sip of tea, wheezed in a laugh. "Hayley. Jesus."

"You ever do it outdoors?"

Roz only sighed now. "In the dim, dark past."

* * *

Stella was sharp enough to know they were talking about her. As a result, the flush covered not only

her face but most of her body as she ran into the bedroom. She stripped off her clothes, threw them

into a hamper.

"No reason to be embarrassed," she muttered to herself as she threw open her armoire. "Absolutely none." She dug out fresh underwear and felt more normal after she put it on.

And reaching for her blouse, felt the chill.

She braced, half expecting a vase or lamp to fly across the room at her this time.

But she gathered her courage and turned, and she saw the Harper Bride. Clearly, for the first time, clearly, though the dusky light slipped through her as if she were smoke. Still, Stella saw her face, her form, the bright ringlets, the shattered eyes.

The Bride stood at the doorway that connected to the bath, then the boys' room.

But it wasn't anger Stella saw on her face. It wasn't disapproval she felt quivering on the air. It was

utter and terrible grief.

Her own fear turned to pity. "I wish I could help you. I want to help." With her blouse pressed against

her breasts, Stella took a tentative step forward. "I wish I knew who you were, what happened to you. Why you're so sad."

The woman turned her head, looked back with swimming eyes to the room beyond.

"They're not gone," Stella heard herself say. "I'd never let them go. They're my life. They're with my father and his wife—their grandparents. A treat for them, that's all. A night where they can be pampered and spoiled and eat too much ice cream. They'll be back tomorrow."

She took a cautious second step, even as her throat burned dry. "They love being with my father and Jolene. But it's so quiet when they're not around, isn't it?"

Good God, she was talking to a ghost. Trying to draw a ghost into conversation. How had her life

become so utterly strange?

"Can't you tell me something, anything that would help? We're all trying to find out, and maybe when

we do ... Can't you tell me your name?"

Though Stella's hand trembled, she lifted it, reached out. Those shattered eyes met hers, and Stella's

hand passed through. There was cold, and a kind of snapping shock. Then there was nothing at all.

"You can speak," Stella said to the empty room. "If you can sing, you can speak. Why won't you?"

Shaken, she dressed, fought her hair into a clip. Her heart was still thudding as she did her makeup, half expecting to see that other heartbroken face in the mirror.

Then she slipped on her shoes and went downstairs. She would leave death behind, she thought, and go prepare for new life.

SEVENTEEN

The pace might have been slow, but the hours were the killer. As spring turned lushly green and temperatures rose toward what Stella thought of as high summer, garden-happy customers flocked

to the nursery, as much, she thought, to browse for an hour or so and chat with the staff and other customers as for the stock.

Still, every day flats of bedding plants, pots of perennials, forests of shrubs and ornamental trees

strolled out the door.

She watched the field stock bagged and burlapped, and scurried to plug holes on tables by adding greenhouse stock. As mixed planters, hanging baskets, and the concrete troughs were snapped up,

she created more.

She made countless calls to suppliers for more: more fertilizers, more grass seed, more root starter,

more everything.

With her clipboard and careful eye she checked inventory, adjusted, and begged Roz to release some

of the younger stock.

"It's not ready. Next year."

"At this rate, we're going to run out of columbine, astilbes, hostas—" She waved the board. "Roz,

we've sold out a good thirty percent of our perennial stock already. We'll be lucky to get through

May with our current inventory."

"And things will slow down." Roz babied cuttings from a stock dianthus. "If I start putting plants out before they're ready, the customer's not going to be happy."

"But—"

"These dianthus won't bloom till next year. Customers want bloom, Stella, you know that. They want

to plug it in while it's flowering or about to. They don't want to wait until next year for the gratification."

"I do know. Still..."

"You're caught up." With her gloved hand, Roz scratched an itch under her nose. "So's everyone else. Lord, Ruby's beaming like she's been made a grandmother again, and Steve wants to high-five me

every time I see him."

"They love this place."

"So do I. The fact is, this is the best year we've ever had. Weather's part of it. We've had a pretty

spring. But we've also got ourselves an efficient and enthusiastic manager to help things along. But

 end of the day, quality's still the byword here. Quantity's second."

"You're right. Of course you're right. I just can't stand the thought of running out of something and

having to send a customer somewhere else."

"Probably won't come to that, especially if we're smart enough to lead them toward a nice substitution."

Stella sighed. "Right again."

"And if we do need to recommend another nursery ..."

"The customers will be pleased and impressed with our efforts to satisfy them. And this is why you're

the owner of a place like this, and I'm the manager."

"It also comes down to being born and bred right here. In a few more weeks, the spring buying and planting season will be over. Anyone who comes in after mid-May's going to be looking mostly for supplies, or sidelines, maybe a basket or planter already made up, or a few plants to replace something that's died or bloomed off. And once that June heat hits, you're going to want to be putting what we've got left of spring and summer bloomers on sale before you start pushing the fall stock."

"And in Michigan, you'd be taking a big risk to put anything in before mid-May."

Roz moved to the next tray of cuttings. "You miss it?"

"I want to say yes, because it seems disloyal otherwise. But no, not really. I didn't leave anything back there except memories."

It was the memories that worried her. She'd had a good life, with a man she'd loved. When she'd lost

him that life had shattered—under the surface. It had left her shaky and unstable inside. She'd kept that life together, for her children, but in her heart had been more than grief. There'd been fear.

She'd fought the fear, and embraced the memories.

But she hadn't just lost her husband. Her sons had lost their father. Gavin's memory of him was dimmer— dimmer every year—but sweet. Luke was too young to remember his father clearly. It

seemed so unfair. If she moved forward in her relationship with Logan while her boys were still

so young ...

It was a little like no longer missing home, she supposed. It seemed disloyal.

As she walked into the showroom, she spotted a number of customers with wagons, browsing the

tables, and Hayley hunkering down to lift a large strawberry pot already planted.

"Don't!"

Her sharp command had heads turning, but she marched right through the curious and, slapping her

hands on her hips, glared at Hayley. "Just what do you think you're doing?"

"We sold the point-of-purchase planters. I thought this one here would be good out by the counter."

"I'm sure it would. Do you know how pregnant you are?"

Hayley glanced down at her basketball belly. "Kind of hard to miss."

"You want to move a planter, then you ask somebody to move it for you."

"I'm strong as an ox."

"And eight months pregnant."

"You listen to her, honey." One of the customers patted Hayley on the arm. "You don't want to take chances. Once that baby pops out, you'll never stop hauling things around. Now's the time to take advantage of your condition and let people spoil you a little bit."

"I've got to watch her like a hawk," Stella said. "That lobelia's wonderful, isn't it?"

The woman looked down at her flatbed. "I just love that deep blue color. I was thinking I'd get some