“Ah, but that can wait another day. Your John matters, too. And I’ll bet that Kevin would be happy to stay here tonight.”

“He and Earl went to get another bed . . .”

“Earl told me. Which was when I came up with the idea for Kevin to sleep in the cottage.” Then Winnie ambled toward her van, her long plait bouncing on her back. The van rumbled to life, and off it went into the gathering sunset.

* * *

By the time the men returned, it was dark. Still, using Kevin’s truck headlights to guide them, they managed to unload the bed and haul it inside without scratching, nicking, or dropping anything. Annie put sheets and a warm blanket on the mattress for her brother; Restless promptly leaped on top and snuggled down.

“Out!” Annie cried, and everyone laughed, and Earl took his granddaughter by the arm and his granddog by the leash, and they said good night. At the top of the hill, Earl reached inside Kevin’s truck, turned off the headlights, and turned with a final wave.

“I’ll be back in the morning,” Annie then told her brother. “Will you be okay? There’s lots to eat, and soup if Donna wants . . .”

“Out, yourself!” Donna called from the bedroom. “Kevin and I lived under the same roof for over twenty years. We’ll be fine.”

“And John is waiting,” Kevin whispered to Annie. “Earl called him after he talked to Winnie.”

And that’s when Annie knew that love on Martha’s Vineyard was often the result of a conspiracy.

* * *

As much as Annie had grown to love the little black-and-white, furry ball, she was grateful that he hadn’t been in his house during the night, encroaching on her space in John’s bed. Or in the morning, when John had pulled her close and they’d made love again. Each time they were together, it felt more and more right. She hadn’t realized how wrong she and Mark had been together, how she’d never just felt free to be herself. She stared at the Vineyard light that slid through the blinds now and warmed her face. For so many years, she’d been convinced she’d never love again, yet here she was, wondrously in love with a man who loved her back.

John reached over to her again, and Annie laughed. “You are a crazy man!”

“A lovesick man,” he mumbled into his pillow. And she moved onto him, finally believing that this really was happening, and that she could trust it.

“You’re right, I was crazy,” he said a short time later when he finally admitted that he was spent, “so I think it’s time we got married.”

Though she’d heard him perfectly fine, Annie whispered, “What?”

“I want to marry you, Ms. Sutton. If you’ll have me.”

She toyed with the dust flecks that danced on the sunlight. “John, I don’t know. . . .”