Page 23 of The Sandy Page Bookshop

Leah did remember. The man was probably in his thirties, preppy in that predictable Cape vacationer manner, and handsome. “Yes, you admired his sweater.”

“I lied. It was hideous.” Brad broke into a wistful smile. “But he wasn’t.”

“How did it turn into a date?”

“There was small talk about Ina Garten’s new memoir. Which led to an inquiry about local restaurants. I recommended the Impudent Oyster. He asked if I would join him.”

“Brad!” Leah punched him playfully in the arm. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I’m telling you now. Anyway, I have to go home and get ready. We’re meeting at eight.”

Leah did not bring up his grandmother, and neither did Brad. Instead she said, “Have a great time on your date.”

“ Hot date,” he said, as he hurried out, leaving her alone with Luke.

Leah wandered around the room as Luke finished his measurements, picturing how she’d arrange the space. Outside the windows, the light was shifting from gold to pink.

“So, no hot date for you tonight?” The words flew out of her mouth before she could stop herself. “I’m just joking,” she rushed to add.

Luke looked up from where he was kneeling on the floor marking points along the wall with a pencil, then back down at his work. “No.” Then, “That would be tomorrow night.”

“Oh.” So the joke was on her. “Well.” She would not ask with whom. Or where. Neither was any of her business. But suddenly she was dying to know both.

Luke stood, tucking the pencil behind his ear. “I’m joking, too,” he said. The relief that flooded through her was mortifying. “How about you?”

Every time she made eye contact with him it felt he could see straight into her thoughts. She felt a blush start to creep up her neck and willed it away from her cheeks. “What about me?”

“You’ve grilled Brad. You’ve practically harassed me. I think it’s only fair that I get a turn.” There was a mischievous twinkle in his eyes.

She narrowed her eyes. “First of all, harass is a strong word. And no. No date tonight for me, either.” Despite their playful banter, the admission swung her thoughts sharply back to Boston, to things she’d been trying hard not to think about.

An image of Greg getting dressed for a nice dinner downtown, just like they did most Fridays, flashed in her mind.

She wondered if he was taking Rebekah out.

She wondered if they’d come home and fall into bed after.

Leah turned to the window, trying to rid herself of them.

Luke must have sensed it. “Tell you what. Since neither of us has a hot date, there’s a spot I’d like to take you.”

“Now? Where?” She followed him out to the front of the store.

“No questions,” he said, without turning around.

“Wait.” Leah halted. “Do I need to change? Maybe I should run home real quick…”

But he was already out the door. “I’ll wait for you in the truck,” he called back.

They stopped at liquor store. “ This is what you wanted to show me?”

“Nope.” Scout was perched on the bench of the front seat of the truck, panting between them. Leah tried to peer around the dog to catch Luke’s expression. “Back in a minute.”

The next stop was Chatham Pier. It was an especially popular spot for tourists who liked to climb the upper decks to watch the seals diving and surfacing playfully about the fishing boats, before stopping in the small, shingled shed that served as a fresh seafood shop.

“You’re a Cape girl. Still like lobster rolls? ”

Leah nodded. “But you’ll never get a parking spot at this hour on a Friday night,” she told him. “See? Look how full the lot is. And the pier workers don’t let people drive down here anymore…”

Luke ignored her warnings, navigating the crowds of people and continuing on to the pier’s bottom lot. One of the workers flagged them down and approached.

“He’s going to ask us to leave,” Leah said.

Instead the guy pointed to a reserved spot. “Hey, Luke. You can park right there.”

Leah bit her lip and decided to shut up.

“Buttered or chilled?” Luke asked, not bothering to hide his smile.

“Buttered.”

Ten minutes later, they pulled into the far lot on Harding’s Beach. “Wait there,” Luke said, coming around to the passenger side. When he swung the truck door open Scout leapt over her.

“Are you holding the door for him or me?” she asked.

“Sorry about that. He loves the beach.” Luke held out his hand and helped her step down. “For what it’s worth, it was for you.” He went around the back and lowered the tailgate. “And so is this.”

He grabbed the takeout bag from Chatham Pier Fish Market and handed her a lobster roll. Then he slid a cooler in her direction and opened the lid. “I figured you probably outgrew the wine coolers you used to hide under your bed in high school, but I wasn’t sure what you liked now.”

She gasped. “You used to look under my bed?”

“James did. I just helped him drink the wine coolers.”

“Thieves.”

“You probably should’ve thought of a better hiding place.”

He swung the cooler around so she could peer inside. Tucked in ice was a six-pack of Corona, White Claws, and a bottle of rosé. She was touched by the selections. “What are you having?”

“Whatever you are,” he said.

She grabbed the six-pack. Together they hiked across the beach, past the lifeguard chairs, and up into the dunes. Gulls cried overhead. Up there, nestled in a hollow between strands of dune grass, they settled into a secluded spot.

Luke laid out a beach towel and cracked open a Corona and passed it to her.

“Do you always drive around with a cooler in the truck?”

“No,” he said, laughing. “But I like to bring Scout down here to run along the beach at the end of a long day. Sometimes I run with him. Sometimes I bring my dinner up here and take in the view. It’s a good place to think.”

“I’ll say.” She did not add that this was the first spot she came to when she returned.

Nor that this was the place where she went when her mother died.

Instead she stared out at the ocean. The tide was making its way in, the waves lapping gently at the shoreline.

To their right the sun had slipped low on the horizon, glazing the sky with streaks of gold.

For a while they ate their lobster rolls in silence, watching Scout zip up and down the sand.

“So this is your regular Friday night in summer?” she asked.

He swallowed a bite of his lobster roll and turned to look at her. “Summer is my busy season. I don’t have much personal time.”

“I don’t know what I’d be doing if not for the shop. Besides that, all I have is time.”

She could feel Luke studying her, as well as the questions that hovered in the air between them. To his credit he let her be, and they sat that way a long time finishing their rolls and beers, and looking out at the sea.

“Are you going to the high school reunion next week?”

“What? I didn’t even know there was one.” Leah had never been to a reunion. She couldn’t imagine she’d want to see anyone who was still in the area.

“They do a general reunion every five years for anyone who wants to come back for it.”

“So you’ve been before?”

“To a couple. It’s nice to catch up with people. Hear about what they’re up to these days. Meet their spouses, hear about their kids.”

“Sounds dreadful. As someone with no spouse or kid to speak of,” she added. She did not also say someone whose life has recently blown up and definitely does not want to talk about it to people she hadn’t seen in seventeen years.

“It could be fun.” He looked at her. “Want to go?”

“With you?”

He shrugged casually. “With or without me,” he said. “It might be nice for you to get out of the shop, talk to old friends.”

The old friends part was a stretch, as she didn’t keep in touch with anyone from home anymore, but he wasn’t wrong about taking a break from the shop.

She’d done nothing except work herself to the bone that summer.

Maybe it was the beer softening the edges of her usual defenses or maybe it was sitting up there in the dunes.

Maybe it was Luke Nickerson. “Okay,” she said, surprising herself.

“Okay?” He seemed just as stunned. “No argument? No comment on how provincial it will be?”

“I’ll go,” she said, ignoring his teasing.

“With you.” She reached for another bottle and handed him one, too.

The beer was cold and crisp on her tongue, and she savored it.

“Despite Sam Adams and all, I never drink beer when I go out in Boston,” she admitted.

“I can’t remember the last time I had one. Probably here.”

“Cocktails more your thing?”

“Dirty martinis. Dry, three olives. That was my fiancé, Greg’s thing. Somewhere along the way I guess it became mine, too.”

“You know you can get those on the Cape,” Luke said.

She laughed. “The thing is, I don’t miss them. In fact, I’m not sure I even liked them all that much.”

“So the martini was Greg’s thing?” She knew what he was asking.

“Was,” she confirmed. “Just as Greg was my fiancé. Not sure if you knew, but we broke off our engagement.”

“I did not know. But I did wonder.”

So he had thought about her status. “Now that I’m back, I’m beginning to think Greg and I didn’t make a whole lot of sense. But it was still a shock how quickly things fell apart.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Luke said. “Endings are always hard.”

“You know, you make all these plans. And you just keep going, doing your thing, assuming it will all work out accordingly—until life throws something at you. That’s the real test. How you handle the stuff life throws at you.

” She was rambling, she knew, but she didn’t care.

The cat was out of the bag. There was no getting it back in.

“I’m not sure, but I think he may be seeing someone already. Someone from his past. So that’s a kick in the ass. But other than that, I think I miss the idea of our future more than the future itself.”