Page 28 of 500 First Editions (The Romantics #3)

But she just stared at the spot where her mom and sister had been standing. “I hate getting my nails done. I can’t type with long nails and I don’t like people touching my hands.”

“You hold my hand all the time.”

She blinked back tears and steeled herself without so much as a single drop spilling down her cheek. “I don’t mind with you.”

I took her hand in mine and squeezed. “Show me around.”

“What?”

“I want to see where you grew up. All the embarrassing baby pictures. Don’t lie and tell me there aren’t photo albums.”

“I don’t know where they are,” she whispered. “I was in California for college when my mom moved into this house. I’ve never lived here.”

“Wanna drive by the house you grew up in and show me?”

Willow looked down at the vinyl floor. “We’re sleeping there.”

Oh shit. “I had no idea.”

She gave a little shrug. “Bev’s rental is where I grew up. It’s the house my mom and Shep moved into when they got married. It’s the only one I remember living in. I lived there until I moved out for college and my mom sold it to Bev. She turned it into a short-term rental property.”

I had so many questions. I turned Willow to face me and cupped her soft cheeks in my hands. But instead of kissing her lips the way I wanted to, I pressed a tender kiss to her temple. “Take me somewhere that feels like home.”

Lisa Winslow lived in a small white-sided house in the middle of nowhere. Land stretched as far as the eye could see, bracketed by the clear summer sky and the crunch of car tires on gravel.

The screen door flew open the moment I slowed to a stop.

Lisa hurried down the front steps, dodging a package that had been left in front of the door.

She was in an eclectic combination of an old, oversized T-shirt I assumed had once belonged to Shep, a pair of rubber garden boots, and cut-off denim shorts.

Her hair was in a raucous mess on top of her head, and dirt streaked her arms and legs.

“Do you like wine, tequila, or lemonade?” Lisa shouted as we got out of the car. “Because I have all three. Although, technically I poured the tequila into the lemonade so it’s a two-fer.”

I could see why Willow liked Lisa.

“Tequila-ade,” Willow said.

Lisa froze mid-stride and looked her up and down. “Did you just leave your mom’s?”

We both nodded.

Lisa snapped her fingers and pivoted, heading right back inside. “I’ll open the other bottle of tequila.” She kicked off her boots before darting inside.

I followed Willow inside and the smell of flowers immediately smacked me in the face.

Bouquets littered every flat surface. Large ones, small ones, and ones with kinds of flowers I had never even seen before. It looked like a florist shop exploded all over the place.

“Lisa?” Willow called out as she eased around a giant vase full of sunflowers.

“Kitchen!”

We followed the sound of her voice and found her in a sun-drenched kitchen filling glasses with ice.

A pitcher of—what I guessed was—spiked lemonade sat beside them.

Without a word, she ran a knife through an orange, cutting it into segments.

I watched as she squeezed a wedge into a glass, dropped it in, then filled it with lemonade.

“Poor man’s margarita,” Lisa said as she handed the first one to me.

“Thanks for coming over. I love my folks, but they’re driving me batshit crazy.

I got them out of the house for an hour.

” She stuffed a glass into Willow’s hand.

“Please don’t ask me how I’m holding up.

Just so it can go on record and we don’t have to talk about it, I miss him and I feel like shit. ”

“I was going to ask if you wanted some of these flowers to disappear,” Willow said as she looked around. “I’m not sure where your couch is.”

As if on cue, Lisa sneezed three times. “On top of all that, I’m allergic to goldenrods, and every florist in the state uses them as filler. At least the puffy allergy eyes hide all the crying I’ve been doing.”

“You got a trash bag?” I asked.

Lisa didn’t hesitate to reach under the kitchen sink and hand me one.

While she and Willow talked in the kitchen, I went through each bouquet, pulling out the goldenrods and throwing them away.

It took nearly a half an hour. My hands were covered with pollen, and I was fairly certain I’d send Lisa into anaphylaxis if I hugged her.

I found a garbage can outside and disposed of the trash bag, then dipped into the bathroom to wash my hands. On the way out, I paused by the fireplace mantle. Through all the vases and arrangements, framed photos littered every spare nook and cranny.

There were the obvious ones: Shep and Lisa on their wedding day, the two of them traveling together and living life.

But there were older photos too. Ones of Willow and Shep when she was a kid.

Photos of Willow and her sister, and a few of Shep and Amber.

They were all neat and tidy, not a speck of dust coating the frames.

A bookshelf was tucked in the corner, each shelf full of Willow Winslet books in every edition and cover style. Photos were displayed on each shelf of Shep and Willow or of Shep and Lisa posing with Willow at book signings.

No wonder Willow had brought me here when I told her to take me somewhere that felt like home.

“You don't have to do it right now, but you should,” Lisa said. I had found them sipping bootleg margaritas at the kitchen table with a cardboard box between them.

Willow traced the edge of the box with her finger. “I feel bad taking your stuff.”

“Just go through it,” Lisa said. “If you can. If you don’t feel up to it, that’s fine too.

Your grief might be different than mine, and that’s okay.

” She drained her glass and patted Willow’s arm.

“If you don’t want to take it with you when you leave town, I’ll keep it here since you’re on the road all the time.

But he kept a lot of memories of you.” Her lips pursed.

“He would have wanted you to have them. To know how much he loved you.”

“I know,” Willow said through a forced smile. “He told me every time he called.”

“Go through the box.” Lisa’s whisper was nearing desperation as car doors slammed outside. “Great,” she groaned. “I thought I had at least twenty more minutes.”

The front door opened and closed, and a white-haired couple let themselves in. The woman looked like Lisa, but she was much older.

“Autumn!” she exclaimed. “Look at you. Prettier every time we see you. Love the hair.” She fluffed the snowy cloud on top of her head. “Do you think I could pull that color off?”

Willow’s expression immediately brightened. “Of course you can."

“Don’t go giving her any ideas, darlin’,” the man wearing a “world’s best granddad” T-shirt said as he gave Willow a one-armed hug. “Congratulations on your last book. You did a super job, kiddo.”

Willow paled. “You didn’t read it, did you?”

“Of course not,” he said with a dry chuckle. “But we bought every copy the store had just so they’d order more."

“Ryan, these are my parents,” Lisa said. “If they feel you’re in need of grandparents, they’ll ceremonially adopt you.”

“We’ve got eighty-six grandbabies,” Lisa’s dad said with a grin.

“And counting!” her mom chimed in.

“I’m an only child who never had kids of her own,” Lisa whispered as loudly as possible. “So they steal other people’s kids.”

“They don’t actually kidnap them,” Willow said.

“Say, Lise,” her mom said. “We stopped at the bookstore to make sure Autumn’s books were displayed with the covers facing out, and I found this little read on grieving.” She produced the paperback and handed it over. “I marked some passages you might want to take a look at.”

Lisa looked at Willow and me and rattled the ice in her empty glass. “I’m going to need another round.”