Page 46 of Escape to Lighthouse Cove

The rest of the dinner passed pleasantly enough, Becca’s good humor and Lewis’ laidback vibe providing a welcome reprieve from Bab’s terse Mainer personality. Still, as the meal went on, Grace sensed undercurrents within the family that she didn’t fully understand. Lewis’ father, she could tell, was absolutely not spoken of, ever, like he’d never ever existed. Becca was cheerful, almost relentlessly so, but at certain moments Grace thought she saw how exhausted she looked, like it was all so mucheffort, and she certainly understood that.

Sometimes Lewis would slide her a look that Grace couldn’t interpret; it seemed as if he was both concerned and exasperated by his mom, and Grace didn’t know why. Jacob, of course, didn’t say a single word through the whole meal, and it wasn’t until the end and Bab was brewing her awful instant coffee that the subject came up.

“The boy doesn’t talk,” she stated in her abrupt, matter-of-fact way.

“No, he doesn’t,” Grace agreed as she brought dirty plates to the sink. Jacob, thankfully, was outside with Lewis, looking at their fishing trawler.

“Why not?”

“I don’t know,” Grace admitted. “He was always quiet, but after I left my husband, he stopped talking completely.”

“Misses him?” Bab guessed, her eyes narrowed shrewdly, and Grace shrugged.

“Maybe? Except…” Jacob hadn’t given any indication that he missed Brad. Of course, he hadn’t said anything, but even so her son had many effective ways of communicating. If he’d really wanted to see his father, Grace was pretty sure Jacob would have let her know. “I don’t think that’s it,” she told Bab. “But I don’t know what it is.”

“Well.” Bab shrugged philosophically as she dumped the seemingly prerequisite and unasked for three spoonfuls of sugar in Grace’s coffee. “There’s nothing wrong with being quiet.”

Grace couldn’t help but laugh at that refreshing perspective, one that Jacob’s teachers hadn’t shared. “No,” she agreed, and accepted the cup of coffee she already knew she was going to have to choke down. “There isn’t.”

26

The weeks passed and in May it rained for a week, so Grace and Jacob were stuck indoors, either at the lodge, where they played Uno and checkers, or up at Grayhaven, where Jacob played chess. His lessons almost always ended with a meal or at least a coffee with Noah, keeping the conversation light and easy, because surely they’d had enough soul-baring ones already. All in all, it was surprisingly pleasant, despite the lowering gray skies, the sleeting rain, the sea that was whipped up into angry swells all around them.

Unfortunately, it postponed their picnic to see the cottages, which Grace had been looking forward to, and, she acknowledged, had probably built up too much in her mind as something almost but of course not quite resembling adate… so maybe it was a good thing it hadn’t happened yet, and she’d had less opportunity to embarrass herself. Again.

As it was, they’d been spending plenty of time together, and she still had that unfortunate awareness of Noah as a man, in ways she always had but which were now painfully acute. The smell of his aftershave. The warmth of his fingers brushing against hers when he handed her a mug of coffee. The way his smile, once so rare, suddenly lit up and transformed his face, and how his laugh somehow made her laugh, simply by the sheer, joyous sound of it.

She knew how he pursed his lips when he was thinking, and how he stared off into the distance, his forehead knitted, when he was thinking about something he didn’t want to say. Probably, she thought, about Jem, but she knew better than to ask. If Noah wanted to tell her, he would, in his own time. So far they’d kept away from all that stuff, and that was okay.

The rain was pouring as Grace walked with Jacob up to Grayhaven, their umbrella getting blown inside out several times during the walk, so by the time they reached the gates, despite their rain boots and waterproofs, they were pretty damp.

“Come in, come in,” Isaiah called to them, sounding both pleased and anxious at the dripping sight of them. “You’ll need to warm up… and maybe some hot chocolate, I think.”

Grace smiled gratefully at him. In the short space of a few weeks, Isaiah had become the grandfather Jacob had never had—he’d never known her own dad, of course, and Brad’s dad had been too busy playing golf and making deals to bother much with his slightly socially awkward grandson.

“Thank you, Isaiah,” she told him as she stepped inside, shivering a little in her damp clothes. Even though it was mid-May, the day was surprisingly chilly.

While Isaiah went to make hot chocolate, Grace headed upstairs with Jacob. They’d been in Grayhaven plenty of times, but they hadn’t seen anything beyond the few rooms they’d been in—Noah’s study, the guest bedroom where they’d once slept, and the kitchen.

As ever, Grace was curious about all the closed doors they passed, but she’d never dared to open one and peek in, and she didn’t now. Snooping felt like searching on the internet—sneaky and off limits. And one thing she didn’t want to mess with was Noah’s trust.

“Hey there.” He rose from behind his desk, a smile breaking across his face like a wave as they came into the study, Jacob going right to the chessboard as usual. Grace smiled back, a big grin that she couldn’t keep from splitting her face. This friend thing was kind of nice. Even if a growing part of her didn’t want it to bejusta friend thing.

Noah was wearing another sweater, this one in mulberry. He looked really good in sweaters, Grace mused as she took off her coat and hung it to dry on the back of a chair. Even holey, raggedy ones. He looked good in jeans, too, especially faded ones that clung to his thighs and, well, butt. Yes, she was noticing.

Something friends generally didn’t do, so maybe she needed to stop.

Then again, maybe she wouldn’t.

“So, how’s my favorite chess prodigy?” Noah asked as he gently ruffled Jacob’s hair. “Ready to learn the Ruy Lopez opener? Oh, I know you know it,” he continued, holding up a hand as if to forestall Jacob’s protest, “but I’m talkingcounteringit, okay? Serious stuff. You ready?”

Grinning, Jacob gave a nod, and Grace had to look away, moved nearly to tears by how naturally Noah interacted with her son.

Noah gave her a quick glance as he settled himself in front of the board, opposite Jacob. “I’d suggest you get some fresh air, but I don’t think it’s that kind of day.”

“No, definitely not…” She paused and then asked hesitantly, “Would it be all right if I… looked around?” She thought of all the closed doors she had yet to open—both physically and metaphorically, if she was honest. “I don’t mean snooping,” she added hurriedly, as she glimpsed something flicker across Noah’s face that didn’t seem all that encouraging. “Just, I don’t know, maybe is there a library or something?”

“There is a library,” Noah confirmed after the briefest of pauses. “It’s opposite the drawing room we went in the—um, a few weeks ago.”