“Hope, it’s not the same.”

“Wait a minute,” Gabi said. “Did I just hear what I think I heard? You’re sleeping with Lucca? Jeez. A girl goes to the French Riviera for a few days and the world turns upside down. What’s next? You’re not going to tell me Tony has run off with a stripper, are you?”

“You didn’t just call me a stripper, did you?” Hope asked.

“No!” Mumbling, she added, “I’m having trouble processing what I saw.”

Lucca raked his fingers through his hair, ignoring his sister as he said, “You’re right, Hope. It’s a double standard, so sue me.”

“Now, Lucca,” she chastised.

“Dammit, she’s my mother! I don’t care how old you are, no child likes to think about his parent having sex.”

“Yes, I’ll give you that one. But that’s your issue, Lucca. Not your mother’s. It’s not fair or right for you to expect her to quit living.”

Yeah, well. Maybe so. It still sucks to see your mother doing … that. “I may never eat ice cream again.”

“Who is Richard Steele, anyway?” Gabi asked. “Do you think he’s after her money?”

Hope rolled her eyes. “Have you looked at your mother recently? She’s gorgeous.”

“Richard is not a bad guy. But he’s not … Dad.”

Gabi closed her eyes and massaged her temples. Her voice fluttered from the backseat like a little bird’s. “I still miss him every day. They were married for decades. How can she be ready before I am?”

Lucca muttered a curse, and Gabi added, “What are we going to do, Lucca?”

He sighed heavily but had no answer. When Hope reached over and rested her hand on his leg, he laced his fingers through hers. “I don’t think we do anything, Gabi. Hope is right. It’s not really our business. That’s obviously what Mom thinks. Remember how she looked at us, the way she lifted her chin? You know that look as well as I do.”

“Proceed at your own risk,” his sister grumbled.

“Exactly.”

“She’s been acting so weird for months. Do you think that maybe she’s sick? Maybe she has cancer or some other dreadful disease and that’s why she’s acting so … crazy?”

“Crazy?” Hope repeated. “Again, Gabi, have you looked at Richard Steele lately? He’s gorgeous, too.”

Lucca shot her a scowl, but his thoughts drifted back to that day at the scenic overlook and Celeste Blessing’s advice. “The road of life,” he murmured before saying, “I don’t think Mom is sick, Gabi. I think she’s trying to figure out her way forward. It was her bad luck—and ours—that our paths had to cross while she was doing it.”

“I wished I’d stayed on the Riviera. What is happening to our family?”

Lucca leaned his head back against the headrest and closed his eyes. “We’re a new constellation and we have to reorient. One of our major stars exploded, but it’s refusing to fade away peacefully, and we’re left with a nebula that’s spewing out massive amounts of gas and radiation.”

Gabi shook her head. “You are so weird, Lucca.”

“I’m tired. I’m short on sleep.”

“Please. I don’t want to hear about your sex life,” Gabi said. “I’m over my limit.”

“Sleep,” Hope suggested. “Both of you. I’m a big believer in the healing power of naps. You’re not going to solve anything in the next hour of this trip, and you’ll feel better if you get some rest. I’ll get us home safe and sound.”

Gabi balled up her sweater and used it as a pillow. “Good idea. Maybe I’ll wake up, and this will all have been a dream.”

Without opening his eyes, Lucca brought Hope’s hand to his mouth for a kiss. “I’m glad you’re with me, Hope.”

“So am I.”

He didn’t speak again for almost ten minutes, and then he asked, “Do you own any black boots?”

THIRTEEN

Monday morning, Hope had to drag herself out of bed. A hangover from Romano family drama, she decided. For once she was glad she didn’t have parents and siblings to complicate her life.

Not that she hadn’t felt bad for Lucca, Gabi, and Maggie. It wasn’t a comfortable situation for any of them, though she did believe that the Romano children would come around once their emotions settled. She just hoped their reactions didn’t hurt Maggie too much in the meantime. Maggie was a nice woman who deserved the opportunity to find love again.

A voice inside her whispered, What about you? Don’t you deserve the same? Love, marriage … family?

“No,” she said aloud even as the image of Lucca rising naked from her bed flashed through her mind. She’d had family; she’d lost it. She could not—she would not—take that risk again. She wouldn’t survive losing it twice.

As usual, a morning spent with kindergarten students revived her. There was nothing like bright minds and inquisitive natures to make her feel like all was right with the world. And it kept her busy enough to shove the memories of caveman sex from her mind.

Then her conference period arrived along with an unexpected visitor. At the sound of a knock, she looked up to see Maggie Romano standing at the threshold of her classroom door wearing jeans, a forest green pullover sweater, and a worried frown. “Maggie? This is a surprise. Come on in.”

“Hello, Hope. I’m sorry to bother you at school, and I hate to put you in the middle of a family problem, but I just don’t know what else to do. My stubborn, thickheaded children saw me out on a date in an ice cream shop with a nice man, and from the way they’ve reacted, you’d think they’d caught me robbing a bank.”

So much for not being pulled into the middle. Busy with church youth group activities, Hope hadn’t seen Lucca or Gabi in more than a day. “What happened?”

“Nothing. Absolutely nothing! Gabi refuses to answer my calls. Lucca has apparently decided to go fishing today rather than come to work. Even Zach has made himself scarce. He and Savannah picked a heck of a time to go to Carolina to visit her nephew. But Richard and I must leave in an hour in order to make our plane, and I want to make one more effort to reach them before I go. You were there Saturday. I’m hoping if you will share what they said it will explain to me exactly why they’re acting like five-year-olds. Then I’ll know what to say in the messages I leave for them before I go.”

Go? Go where? Please, don’t tell me you are going to elope. Warily, she asked, “Where are you and Richard going, Maggie?”

“Austin. There’s an Innkeepers Association meeting.”

Oh. Thank goodness.

Hope had no desire to involve herself in the Romano family drama any more than she already was, but she considered Maggie a friend. Maybe a little communication could help. “Sit down, Maggie.”

“Thank you, but I can’t. I like to pace when I’m angry and disappointed in my kids.” She picked up the apple little Whitney Wilson had brought Hope and absently polished it against the sleeve of her sweater. “Honestly, they freeze me out because they caught me having an ice cream cone with my contractor? Can a woman not have any privacy in this town? Shoot, we went to the next town. You’d think I was a teenager looking for someplace to park instead of indulging in a double scoop of rocky road.”

Except, it had been more than rocky road, hadn’t it?

Hope drew a deep breath and debated how best to answer. She didn’t like telling tales, but Maggie probably needed to know the facts to prevent further misunderstanding. “Actually, it wasn’t simply the ice cream that caused the deep freeze, Maggie. Lucca noticed the motorcycle parked in front of the Matterhorn.”

Maggie halted midpace. “The motorcycle?”

“In front of the motel. He put two and two together.” For the second time in two days, Hope watched the color drain from Maggie Romano’s face.

“Oh.” The starch drained out of Maggie and she sank into the seat opposite Hope. “Oh. So they know that I … that we …”

Climbed the Matterhorn? “Yeah.”

“I see. Now I understand.” Maggie closed her eyes. “No wonder they won’t talk to me. That’s not what I … oh, no. They shouldn’t have found out. Not like that.”

Seeing her friend’s devastation, Hope felt a stirring of frustration with Lucca and Gabi. “I think everyone just needs a little time to process, Maggie. Your children love you, and they’ll come around.”

“Excuse me. I need to call …” Appearing scattered, she fumbled in her purse for her phone, dialed a number, then said, “Richard, I can’t go to Austin. I’ll call later and explain. You go on without me and please, take good notes at all the workshops.”

When she hung up, tears overflowed Maggie’s eyes and trailed slowly down her cheek. If Lucca had been there in that moment, Hope would have balled up her fist and popped his jaw.

“I’m a terrible widow. I don’t follow the rules.” Maggie lifted her hands to wipe her cheeks.

Hope gave her a sympathetic smile and handed her a tissue from the box she kept in her drawer. “I didn’t know there were rules.”

“Oh, there are always rules for everything. I broke a big rule when I was fifteen, and it changed my whole life. I told you about Zach. The little boy I named Giovanni. When it comes to rules, I always find out the hard way.” She delicately blew her nose into the tissue.

“Oh, Maggie.” Hope removed the tissue box from her drawer and set it within Maggie’s reach.

“I returned to my hometown after I recovered from the pregnancy and its consequences. Marcello arranged to meet me. I decided then not to tell him about the baby.” Maggie reached for another tissue. “On my eighteenth birthday, we married. Eloped.”

“Your parents didn’t approve?”

“Oh, no. They forbade me from seeing him, but that was another rule I ignored. I was young and in love. Deeply, madly in love. He was so handsome, and I know that he loved me then, too. We were happy. And when the twins came along, our parents came around, and all was right with the world … except, of course, we didn’t have Giovanni. I almost told Marcello about him when the twins were born, but I knew it would be a mistake. Marcello would have caused trouble. He wouldn’t have let it go. He would have found a way to destroy our son’s happy adoptive family. I couldn’t let that happen. I put our son’s happiness first.”