Page 67 of Summer on Lilac Island

Eloise felt like she was going to pass out in Deirdre’s living room.

Everything was spinning, and not in the romantic way she’d felt since the engagement. This was the kind of spinning that tipped

things over, knocked them down.

In a haze, she marched over to Alice’s house, the cabin her father had built log by log all those years ago.

“Is it true?” Eloise asked, letting herself in. Alice was sitting at the table, snacking on carrots while squinting down at

a pile of bills. “You slept with Liam while you were married to Dad?”

At the way Alice’s head fell into her hands, Eloise’s fears were confirmed.

Turning on her heels, she bolted out of the house as quickly as she could.

“Eloise,” she heard her mother call out after her. “Please let me explain.”

But Eloise didn’t want explanations. She didn’t want to listen. She wanted to yell, to shriek.

With all the fluctuations over the years—Gus coming in and out, Georgiana rebelling, Rebecca getting married and moving away—Eloise’s

parents had been the one steady fixture. Not just how they loved her, but how they loved each other. It gave Eloise a model

of something she hadn’t been able to build for herself but still knew existed, knew was possible.

Now suddenly she wasn’t so sure.