“All right, fine. But don’t blame me when it ruins a beautiful friendship.”

Ashley smiled. “You’re right. We do have a beautiful friendship and nothing is going to ruin that. Great. I’m excited. Not that I can cook anything fancy. My mom taught me. Basic stuff, but I was interested so I’ve learned a few things myself. I’m guessing your stepmother never taught you.”

“No. She said I was a disaster in the kitchen.”

“And then along came Cliff—no wonder you have no confidence.” Ashley studied her. “What’s your favorite food?”

“I don’t know. I associate food with stress and tension.”

“It’s why you’re so slim. Okay, let me think...” Ashley wrinkled her nose. “We’re going to make a basic pasta sauce. Start there. Then tomorrow, we’ll do something different.”

“If I cook, there will be no tomorrow.”

Ashley laughed. “I’ll take the risk. Now we’re going to go into the bookstore.”

Joanna was about to resist but then she thought, Why not?

If she was going to revisit her past, she might as well revisit all of it.

16

Ashley

Ashley placed onion and garlic on the chopping board and handed Joanna the knife.

Joanna shook her head. “Cliff always said my knife skills are terrible. I’m slow, and everything is uneven.”

“It’s an onion, Joanna. You just need to chop it. It doesn’t matter if you’re slow, and it doesn’t matter if the pieces are uneven. No one is going to be measuring them. The only thing that matters is that you don’t chop your finger off.”

Joanna picked up the knife with a glum expression. “Fine.” She peeled the onion awkwardly and then cut it in half. “Cliff could chop an onion so fast you couldn’t even see the knife moving.”

If Cliff hadn’t already been dead, Ashley would have said a few choice words to him. “That’s a party trick. When you’re watching a movie do you care how many takes a scene took? No. You just care about the end product. Food is the same. When we’re eating this sauce, we’re not going to care how quickly you chopped the onion. While you do that, I’m going to pick some oregano from the pots outside.” Was it safe to leave Joanna? Just how bad was she with a knife?

Ashley lingered in the kitchen long enough to satisfy herself that Joanna wasn’t going to chop her finger off and then walked onto the terrace to pick the herbs she wanted.

She paused for a moment. Breathed in the scent of flowers and salt air. Heard the crash of the waves on the rocks beyond the garden. Was there a more idyllic spot in the whole world?