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Wayne struck a match over the cinnamon candle and watched as the flame flickered, growing strong as it swallowed up the thick black stem. He glanced again at the far mirror, at the button-up shirt he’d stupidly donned with the dark jeans and the hair he had tried to handle with a little bit of gel.
It had been a long time since he cared what a woman thought about what he looked like.
Always so handsome, or so the world had always said about him. He’d never necessarily felt that way about himself. He had never had to. He’d had love, and then he had lost it. That had nothing at all to do with his looks or lack thereof.
It was six thirty, which meant that Elise would arrive in a half hour. Truthfully, since Elise had moved into the Bloomingfeld Bed and Breakfast and “given Wayne his house back,” the house had felt empty all over again. It had been that way in the year after his wife’s death—something to be expected, something missing—but slowly, Wayne had gotten used to it, “marking his territory” and making it his own or at least something he could stand after such a horrible reality.
It had only taken a little, slight, brief romance with someone special to remind him just how alone he really was in the world.
The timer blared on the stovetop. He turned quickly to slip his hand into the oven mitt, yank open the door, and remove the admittedly glorious-looking butter chicken. He waved the oven mitt over the top through the steam and beamed at what he had created.
I’ve still got it.
His wife had never been particularly domestic. He’d teased her about it, laughing as she’d burnt the toast, delivered him runny eggs, and somehow got worse, year after year, at mixing a cocktail. Wayne had decided a long time ago to take this as a challenge. Cooking? He’d mastered it. And he and his wife had reaped the rewards of that.
Of course, it had been a long time since he had cooked for anyone new.
He’d told himself to get over this one.
When he had first seen Elise Darby on the ferry over to the island (after he’d had to meet up with his wife’s mother, a really traumatic lunch meeting that had left him stripped down and nostalgic), he had thought, a beautiful woman, alone in the world. I wonder what went wrong to bring her here?
At this, he had demanded of himself why he’d thought anything had gone wrong with her. Obviously, people chose to be alone all the time. Some people preferred it.
Wayne had felt true love, had had constant companionship, had found his soul mate, and then she had been taken away. He guessed that was why he felt those who were alone hadn’t planned it. Maybe they’d just never known what true love was and didn’t know they were meant to keep looking for it.
Not that everyone had unlimited energy to keep looking.
Elise had found a way to step back into his life. She had appeared at The Grind with a bleeding leg and large, eager eyes. Wayne could have bantered with her for hours. With a quick joke, he could make her dizzy with laughter.
It was like he had cast a spell over her.
And she had over him, as well.
When she was around, he didn’t dwell on the past in the same way.
He felt hope or something kind of like it.
Wayne hustled to set the table as the chicken cooled a bit. He added garlic bread to the oven and grabbed an aged bottle of wine from the bottom of the cabinet. He second-guessed the way he had set the oven, then readjusted.
He felt like a teenager, preparing for his first date.
Fifteen minutes before seven, he leaned against the counter, yanked the cork out of the bottle of wine, and poured himself a glass. Let it breathe, a voice in the back of his head reminded him. He didn’t have time. He wanted to escape these rapid, whirlwind thoughts that raced through his mind.
Elise Darby. Why did he have to like this woman so much? She had brought with her chaos and nothing but trouble.
“If I had another daughter for you, Wayne...”
Dean had actually said those words to him two years before when Wayne and Dean had bonded after the death of Dean’s wife. Two widowers, out on the sailboat, living their single days beneath the sun.
Why hadn’t Dean ever mentioned his affair with Allison Darby?
Had he forced himself to forget?
Elise, I don’t want to be forward, but I haven’t felt this way about anyone in years.
My wife died three years ago.
I know the island is up in arms about what a playboy I can be—
But they all know it’s because I’ve been to hell and back again.
I’m prepared to change for you if you want to try this.
I think life is a strange, turbulent thing. I never know what will happen next.
Maybe that’s the best part of it.
At that moment, Wayne’s phone buzzed on the countertop.
The name that appeared across it was one he hadn’t seen in a long, long time.
He frowned at it for a good few seconds before he lifted a shaking hand and brought the phone to his ear.
“Cindy?”
“Wayne. Hey.” Cindy’s voice was unstable.
Had she maybe heard about her potential half sister? About her father’s affair?
“Hey, Cindy. It’s good to hear from you,” Wayne said. Even though I haven’t heard from you in years, and I wanted to rely on you. We should have been there for each other. You gave up on me. You dropped me.
“Wayne, I’m sorry to call you like this. I know... that there’s a lot to be said,” Cindy whispered. “But I just heard from him. I just heard from him for the first time in almost three years, and I don’t know what to do.”
Wayne swallowed the lump in his throat. He knew exactly who she was talking about.
“What did he say? Where is he? Is he okay?” Wayne asked. His words fell out of his lips in slow-motion.
“He didn’t say much. He just told me... that he’ll be home. Tonight,” Cindy said.
She burst into tears after that. Wayne’s heart hammered in his rib cage. He glanced at the clock on the oven. Elise was supposed to be here in seven minutes.
Why was this happening now?
“You know how he feels about his father,” Cindy continued. “When I told Fred about the call, he stormed out to go drink at the Pink Pony. I wanted to scream at him. Ask him where do you think Michael gets it, huh? But I didn’t have the heart.”
Tears swallowed her words again. Wayne closed his eyes tightly.
“When is he getting in?” Wayne finally asked.
“In the next few hours, I guess,” Cindy said between sobs. “Megan’s off the island this week, and I’m in this big house alone. I don’t want to go to Tracey or Alex with this...”
“Of course not,” Wayne said.
“So here I am. Asking you...”
Wayne shivered. “Okay. Okay. I’ll be there as soon as I can, okay? Pour us both a glass of wine, and we’ll wait up for him.”
“Like the old times,” Cindy said softly.
“Yes. But he’s twenty-four now. He probably has a lot of stories to tell us. A lot of life he’s lived,” Wayne said, wanting to sound optimistic.
In truth, the fact that Michael was returning home like this wasn’t exactly a good sign. It meant something had gone wrong during his fanatical attempt to run away.
“Thank you, Wayne,” Cindy breathed. “I hope you’re right.”
When Wayne hung up, he blinked at the perfect spread on the table, the flickering candle, along with the beautiful butter chicken. He remembered that cute little dimple that formed in Elise’s right cheek, the way his heart floated into his throat when he saw her—the way he had imagined cuddling close to her in bed.
The way he had pictured them growing closer, growing older, making the kind of decisions you only made when you were forty-something and had seen enough of the world to know what mattered most.
But Michael mattered more, right then.
Hurriedly, Wayne grabbed his jacket and hustled toward the back door. Cindy’s house was up on Pontiac Trail Head, just a few houses from her father’s. Wayne knew the route well. After all, Cindy had been forever-best-friends with his wife.
Tara and Wayne had spent endless alcohol-fueled afternoons and frantic nights up at Cindy’s.
Cindy and Fred were in the back of almost all of Wayne’s memories of his early years with Tara.
Even at his wedding, Cindy had shoved him drunkenly against the wall and said, “If you ever hurt my best friend, I swear to God above, I’ll make sure you...” But she hadn’t been able to get through it. She had burst into laughter, so much so that tears had fallen from her eyes.
When Tara had found the two of them, both in outrageous giggle fits, Cindy had confessed, “I tried to threaten him, but he’s just so gosh darn in love with you. He looks like a little puppy dog! Have you ever tried to threaten a puppy dog? I haven’t, until now, and it nearly destroyed me.”
“Gee. Thanks!” Wayne had cried.
Tara had rolled her eyes at them. “I don’t know what I just got myself into. My best friend and my husband are in cahoots. The world may never recover.”
Wayne hustled up to the Pontiac Trail Head. All the while, he stared at his phone as it trickled from 7:00 in the evening to 7:03. Was Elise a punctual person? He didn’t know her enough to know. She had said that she was responsible and drama-free outside of the great state of Michigan. Obviously, the events of the recent weeks had made her the number-one biggest drama queen on all of Mackinac Island.
She was the source of so much gossip.
And now that she had been seen with Wayne so often, he’d been bundled up in that gossip, as well.
He tried his best to write up a text message.
There was so much he couldn’t fully explain.
He hadn’t even fully told her that his wife had died.
He hadn’t revealed so much of himself.
He had just been that flirty bachelor—the character he knew could woo a woman on command.
But with Elise, he wanted to be real.
Finally, outside of Cindy’s enormous house, he forced his thumbs to draw up some kind of pathetic response.
If Michael had ruined his chances with Elise, then so be it, he guessed.
Michael had to come first.
Even if he had been gone, without a single word, for nearly three years.