Melanie didn’t want to be buddies with her ex. She didn’t want to be on the same team, creating some kind of fictional united front because that’s what adults did. She was freshly divorced, and she had the right to take some time to herself while she figured out her life again. She had the right to a little bit of privacy!
And she couldn’t even get that much.
Melanie looked up to see Tilly standing in the doorway, and her heart sank. Tilly dropped her gaze.
“That was my dad?” Tilly asked.
“Yeah. He says he’ll be back in five days.”
Tilly nodded. “Is he mad?”
“That you’re here?” Melanie asked. “No, I think he’s relieved. At least he knows where you are.”
“But you’re mad,” Tilly said, her tone tinged with bitterness. “I’m not your problem, right?”
“I’m sorry you heard that,” Melanie said. “You aren’t anyone’s problem. You’re the girl I raised.”
Tilly didn’t answer, and Melanie sighed.
“Tilly, why are you here? I mean, really. Because if you had free run of the house for two weeks, I don’t see why you’d come out here instead.”
“It was Simon,” Tilly said, and her chin trembled. “With Dad away, we were going to do a road trip together. And we started driving, and he said some mean and stupid things, and we started fighting, and...”
“But you have the car—”
“It’s my car,” Tilly retorted. “I dropped him off at a bus depot and drove off.”
Melanie couldn’t help the smile that tugged at her lips. “You kicked him out. I like that. So why come here?”
Maybe Adam was right and Tilly wanted to feel safe. Was Melanie more of a mom to Tilly than she’d admitted?
Tilly rolled her eyes. “I wanted some time at the lake. My tan needs work.”
Apparently, the sharing time was over. Melanie sighed and turned back to the groceries. Tilly’s phone pinged again.
“Is that Simon?” Melanie asked.
“Yeah.”
“Is he apologizing and begging for your forgiveness?” Melanie asked.
Tilly didn’t answer. That meant no, and it didn’t surprise her. Simon had never respected Tilly.
“You want some free advice?” Melanie asked. “Turn off your phone and work on your tan. As long as he’s getting answers to his texts, he’s still in control.”
“You’re divorced. I’m not sure you’re the one to give relationship advice,” Tilly said.
Melanie turned back to putting away the groceries. That girl’s barbs always were rather well aimed.
Tilly’s phone pinged again. She didn’t start typing this time, though. From the corner of Melanie’s eye, she saw Tilly turn her phone off and tuck it into her back pocket. Taking advice? That would be a first!
“You’re worth more than him, you know, Tilly,” Melanie said.
Tilly didn’t answer, and she walked out of the room, peeling her shirt off as she went, revealing a bikini top underneath.
Five days.
CHAPTER FIVE
LATER THAT EVENING, Melanie dished the steaming marinara sauce into a bowl. It smelled great, if she did say so herself. She’d spent the better part of her adult years perfecting this recipe. Her spaghetti and meatballs were carbs swathed in comfort. And for too many years in her marriage to Adam, she’d needed some comfort of her own.
Outside the kitchen window, the wind ruffled the leaves on the apple tree. The apples were small, dense and green still. She’d never been at the lake house when the apples were ripe, she realized. Adam had paid for a landscape company to come and take care of the property on a regular basis... What had happened to all those apples? Did they just drop and get thrown out?
She’d pick them this year—make apple pies and sauce. That could add to making this place homier...more hers. Food mattered—good, wholesome, tasty food that could make her grateful for the moment she was in and stop thinking about the pain of the past.
There was the rumble of an engine, and Melanie leaned forward for a better view past the gnarled, twisted limbs of that apple tree. Logan’s black truck came to a stop, the engine turned off, and she found herself smiling in spite of herself.
“Who’s here?” Tilly asked from behind her.
“A friend of mine,” Melanie said.
“Who?”
“Logan McTavish. You met him earlier.”
“So that’s who you were cooking for,” Tilly said.
“You know what?” Melanie turned toward the teenager. “I’d have cooked this regardless. I’m worth a decent meal, too.”
Maybe Tilly needed a few lessons in how to take care of herself, because Melanie hadn’t done nearly enough in that regard over the last few years. It was too easy to get sucked into giving, giving, giving and feeling like a saint because of it. She wished she’d done less of that now. Tilly could have seen an example of a woman who didn’t hand herself over for all the wishes and needs of others.
Melanie wiped her hands on a towel and headed for the front door. She pulled it open just as Logan came up the steps. He held a bottle of wine in one hand.
“Hey,” he said with a smile. “Something smells good.”
“Come in,” she said. He handed her the wine and came inside.
Logan had changed his clothes since she’d seen him earlier. He was now in a pair of relaxed charcoal dress pants and a black ribbed T-shirt. They might both be twenty years older, but his physique hadn’t lost anything over the years. He was well muscled and his stomach was flat. How had he maintained that? He caught her appraising glance, and she felt her cheeks heat.
Tilly had left the room again, leaving them in relative privacy.
“How did it go today?” she asked, turning back toward the kitchen.
“I found Junior,” Logan said, following her. “He’s a psychiatrist now.”
“Really?” That was hard to picture—little Junior Wilde, the blond-haired kid who used to resent Logan so much.
“He’s married with kids, has his own practice—he’s all grown up,” Logan confirmed.
“Was it...nice to see him?” she asked hesitantly.
Logan sighed. “Not entirely. He doesn’t trust me. He
