She checked the list she’d made. Pine nuts, check. Next was plate up the salad and turn the heat on under the casserole she’d made earlier.

She walked to the fridge and retrieved the orange she’d sliced earlier and the watercress.

She arranged both on the plates and then added the warm pine nuts and dressed it. She switched on the heat under the casserole, making sure it wasn’t too high.

“Voilà.” She handed him a plate and he handed her a glass of champagne.

“To friendship, long but no longer lost.”

She tapped her glass lightly against his and they carried their plates to the table.

“This place is stunning.” He glanced back at the house. “You used an architect from LA?”

“San Francisco. He understood my vision for the place. I wanted to make the most of all that was good about it—the old beach house didn’t make the most of the view.”

“I remember. I wondered if you’d sell the place.”

“I thought about it. But then I thought Grandfather Rafferty might come back to haunt me if I gave away the land he’d worked so hard to get.”

He grinned. “Good call. He was one scary guy according to my grandmother.” He picked up his glass and drank. “I think he’d approve.”

“Probably not. My father always said he had no interest in the house, only the land. The views. The ocean. The garden. Those are the things he loved. That’s why I didn’t feel guilty knocking the original beach house down and starting again. I think my father would have approved, though.”

“I’m sure he would.” Nate ate his salad. “He’d be glad to see you back here, that’s for sure.”

“What about you? You took over the family business. You weren’t going to do that. You had so many plans.” It was one of the things he’d said to her when he’d ended their relationship. I want more than this, Joanna. More than Silver Point.

He put his fork down. “I grew up seeing how hard my parents worked in that place. How much they sacrificed. I didn’t want that. I didn’t want to spend my life serving food and drink to people I didn’t know. It seemed like a small life to me, when there was a whole world out there. I wanted a piece of that.”

Joanna listened and waited. This wasn’t the end of the story. It couldn’t be, because here he was running the Surf Café.

He glanced at her. “You haven’t changed, have you?”

“What do you mean?”

“Anyone else would have been hammering me with questions about now.”

She frowned. “I assumed you’d tell me what you wanted me to know. I believe in respecting a person’s privacy. People aren’t public property. They shouldn’t have to reveal everything.”