Chapter 1
Setting the final thank-you note atop the stack at her elbow, Danielle Parker glanced up at the clock above her kitchen desk, its gentle yet ceaseless ticking drowning out her usual sense of accomplishment in the wake of a completed task.
Twenty minutes to the exit ...
A minute or so to park the van . . .
Ten minutes to climb across every rock between the parking lot and the playground . . .
Twenty minutes of swinging and sliding . . .
Ten minutes for snack . . .
Her gaze jumped to the freshly wiped counter on the opposite side of the kitchen while her mind’s eye began a mental inventory of the tote bag her mother had all but snatched out of her hands mid-protest.
Pretzel sticks for Ava.
Veggie straws for Maggie.
Spencer’s favorite rainbow-colored—
She pulled in a breath. Had she even gotten the cracker box out of the pantry, let alone sealed them in a baggie and added them to the tote? Pushing back her chair, Dani crossed to the notebook she kept beside the toaster and ran her finger down the list she’d made just that morning—a list she knew by heart but still wrote, item by item, every time a trip to the park was on the day’s schedule. Or, in today’s case: not on the schedule but insisted upon by one’s visiting-from-out-of-town and refused-to-take-no-for-an-answer mother.
Bubbles.
Frisbee.
Butterfly net.
Picnic blanket.
Ava’s snack.
Maggie’s snack.
Spencer’s snack.
Sure enough, the day’s green checkmark was present beside the five-year-old’s name just as it was next to every other item on the list. Sinking against the side of the refrigerator, Dani waited for her heart rate to normalize as her focus traveled across the center island to the hardcover book marking her spot at the kitchen table and, finally, onto the list she’d temporarily abandoned in order to—
Sliding her view back to the oak table and the book she hadn’t noticed until that moment, she parted company with the magnetized pictures at her shoulder and made her way around the island, her eyes playing across the unfamiliar cover. Intrigued, she fingered the embossed envelope, followed the long black dashes denoting a breeze, and noted the whimsically inviting harborside village at the base of a hill, the muted glow of light from a single window both calming and alluring all at the same time.
Below the cover art and positioned across the book’s title was a blue sticky note with her mother’s bold handwriting:
There’s nothing on your to-do list you can’t do tomorrow.
Let this time alone truly be Dani time like you promised.
Now fill your well.
Love you!
Mom
“A promise made under duress, I might remind you,” Dani murmured.
And it was true. She didn’t need Dani time; she had Dani time every day. She had it in the mornings when she was making breakfast for Jeff and the kids, she had it in the car while singing along with the kids to whatever song came on their favorite kid-friendly station, she had it when she was sewing on Maggie’s latest scout patch, she had it when she was running to the food booth on the other side of the field to cover whichever teammate of Spencer’s had failed to bring a snack to practice that week, she had it when she was playing in the rec center pool with Ava while waiting for toddler swim to start, and she had it at night after the kids were in bed and she was helping Jeff brainstorm his latest client pitch.
That was the Dani time she wanted, the Dani time she craved regardless of what her mother believed. She didn’t need to go off on girls-only trips like Roberta, or join book clubs or card groups to fill some sort of inner well. She was a wife; she was a mother. She didn’t need time away to discover herself. She didn’t need to sit in a circle with other women and search for the meaning of life inside the pages of a book when her help was needed in Maggie’s or Spencer’s classroom. She didn’t need to enroll Ava in a kids’ day out class so she could go shopping “in peace” as her friends were fond of saying. And she most certainly didn’t want her kids to come home to a babysitter the way she, herself, had while growing up.
No. Jeff and the kids were her inner well. They filled her up just fine all on their own . . .
Reaching out, she peeled off the note, crumpled it inside her hand, and then flipped the novel over, the summary’s promise of adventure and self-discovery for thirty-four-year-old Amanda Frawlings sliding Dani’s gaze back to the clock and then below it to the day’s list and the next few items awaiting her attention.
Tomorrow’s list needed to be written . . .
Tuesday night’s baked ziti and Thursday night’s chicken and dumplings needed to be prepped and frozen . . .
She still needed to find the perfect snack recipe for—
A gurgled reminder of her propensity for skipping meals derailed her thoughts and pulled them back to the book and the bowl of fresh fruit just beyond it in the center of the table. Again, her eyes swept back to the clock.
Five minutes of Maggie jumping rope . . .
Ten minutes of Spencer chasing bugs around the picnic area with his net . . .
Five minutes—tops—of Ava blowing bubbles alone . . .
Ten minutes of Spencer and Ava running around trying to catch the bubbles Maggie blew . . .
Ten, maybe fifteen minutes of all three playing hide-and-seek —
A quick vibration against her hip rerouted her hand from the fruit bowl to her pocket and the thumbnail image now illuminated on her phone’s screen. Opening the message, Dani smiled down at the picture she’d all but demanded her mother send if Dani was going to heed the whole stay-home-and-take-a-little-time-for-yourself thing. In the captured moment, Maggie was trying desperately to blow a bubble but was having difficulty on account of the laugh she was clearly sharing with her brother and sister. In the background, behind Ava, Jeff, too, was laughing. Beneath the picture, a trio of moving dots let Dani know her mother was typing some accompanying commentary.
Sure enough, less than a minute later, her phone vibrated inside her hand with the arrival of another text, this one containing only words.
Kids loved the bubbles but now moving on to hide-and-seek. After that, Jeff mentioned feeding goats (?!?) and maybe making a quick stop at his office before heading home. Can’t wait to hear what you think of the book.
She looked again at the picture, ran her finger across the faces of her children and husband, and swapped the phone for an apple.
Five-minute walk to petting zoo on southern edge of park . . .
Ten minutes of rooting around for quarters, inserting them into the feed machine, filling up three tiny hands, and then nonstop giggles over the feel of goat tongues . . .
Five minutes back to the parking lot . . .
Five minutes of bathroom trips . . .
Ten minutes to the office . . .
A few minutes to grab whatever Jeff forgot on Friday . . .
Ten minutes to get home . . .
Satisfied she had plenty of time to eat an apple and still make a sizeable dent on the rest of her to-do list, Dani opened the book and began to read. Page by page, and bite by bite, she made her way through chapter 1, and then chapter 2, the author’s writing style sucking Dani into the main character’s plight so fully she barely caught the dribble of juice from her apple before it dropped from her chin to her shirt. As she wiped it away with her thumb, the ever-increasing rumble in her stomach sent her to the pantry for a handful of pretzels and a chocolate-chip cookie she carried, along with the book, into the living room.
Chapter 3.
Chapter 4.
Chapter 5.
* * *
She stretched, pulled the meticulously folded afghan off the back of the couch and onto her shoulders, and then tucked her feet into the space between the armrest and the edge of her cushion . . .
Chapter 6.
Spurred on by the description of the coffeehouse in which Amanda now found herself looking up at a handsome stranger with ocean-blue eyes and a smile capable of powering the quaint riverside town, Dani returned to the kitchen for her own cup of coffee. With barely so much as a glance upward, she plucked a mug from the cabinet, turned on the kettle, rifled through the assorted instant coffees, settled on a packet of hot cocoa mix instead, and waited for the water to boil . . .
Chapter 7.
She poured the steaming liquid into her waiting cup, stirred, set the spoon beside the mug, and reached for the light switch . . .
Chapter 8.
Chapter 9.
She carried the now-empty mug to the sink, set it inside, and filled it with water to soak. Slowly, deliberately, she moved her head—if not her eyes—left and then right, the movement welcomed by her neck and shoulders . . .
Chapter 10.
The bounce of a car’s head lamps across her book temporarily hijacked her attention first toward the stainless-steel refrigerator and then the window and its view of the driveway. She felt the pull of curiosity as to why Jeff hadn’t pulled into the garage, but it didn’t last as she quickly calculated how long it would take her to read the last two pages in the chapter before the door opened . . .
She dropped her eyes back down to the book and continued reading, a smile spreading across her lips as Amanda walked into the middle of a field of wildflowers, spread her arms wide, and—
A loud knock pulled Dani back into the moment, her smile morphing into a frown as the front porch light, set to come on somewhere between five and seven o’clock depending on the season, showed two adult-sized figures waiting on the other side of the door’s stained-glass insert. Sighing, she set the book on the center island and hurried across the room, her mind’s eye mentally inventorying the dinner she’d planned and whether there was enough for whatever unexpected guest Jeff had extended an invite to while at the park with the—
She looked from the porch light to the darkness beyond and then to the digital clock on the built-in microwave.
6:45.
“Six forty-five,” she echoed aloud. “How on earth did it get to be six—”
Wrapping her hand around the muted copper knob, she yanked open the door. “So much for a quick stop at the office, mister—”
Her words bowed to a gasp as her gaze fell on the pair of state troopers standing, shoulder to shoulder, on the welcome mat, the porch light illuminating their drawn faces and hooded eyes. Confused, she looked past them to the driveway and the police car parked where her minivan usually sat.
“Danielle Parker?”
She leaned forward, craning her head just enough to afford a view of the rest of the driveway. Nothing . . .
“Ma’am?”
She abandoned her fruitless inspection and drew her attention back to the man on the left, his large dark eyes fixed on hers. The second man—his hair cut close against his ears—shifted his weight across his thick legs. “Yes . . . I’m Danielle Parker. Is there something—” Stopping mid-sentence, she looked outside a second time, her gaze drifting from her next-door neighbor’s darkened windows to the troopers. “It’s Roberta next door, isn’t it? Something happened on her girls’ trip to the city? Is-is she okay?”
The men exchanged glances.
“Oh no . . . Does Doug know yet?” she managed past the lump rising inside her throat.
Reaching up, the first trooper grabbed hold of his hat and pulled it from his head, revealing a mop of dark blond hair in the process. “Could we come inside?” he asked.
“Come inside?” she echoed. “But . . . Yes, yes, of course. I’m sorry. I don’t know where my manners are. I’ve been waiting for my husband and my mom to get back from the park with my kids and it seems I’m not the only one who has lost track of the time somehow.”
She waited for them to step all the way in and then, after glancing down the road in the direction Jeff would surely come, she closed the door. The quieter cop’s eyes dove to the floor, the tip of his tongue gliding across what she guessed to be dry lips.
“Can I get you something to drink?” she offered, gesturing toward the kitchen.
Shaking his head, the hat-holding trooper cleared his throat, his eyes leaving hers and traveling toward the kitchen table. “Perhaps you’d like to sit?”
“Right . . . Sure . . . Okay.” She stopped halfway to the table and turned back to the men, the beat of her heart audible inside her ears. “Did Doug take the kids to his parents’ house? Do you know? Because if not, I can take them for a while if he wants. Or my husband or I can drive them wherever they need to go.”
The trooper looked quickly at his partner, cleared his throat a second time. “Ma’am, we’re not here about your neighbor. ”
She pulled back. “You’re not?”
“ No. ”
“Then . . .” The question died on her lips as the trooper stepped forward, his Adam’s apple rising and falling with a hard swallow.
“Ma’am, there’s been an accident.”
