“Not yet.” She paused her thumping efforts. “Say, is Rafe going to have the house finished before the snow flies? Are you going to need a place to stay? Because if you do . . .” She looked over her shoulder at the boardinghouse.

“He promises it’ll be finished before cold sets in.” I listened to my own voice and felt confident it wasn’t expressing the doubt I felt inside about Rafe’s timetable.

“Oh, honey.” Celeste gave me a sympathetic smile. “It’s going to be all different for you, isn’t it?”

Apparently she’d heard something else entirely, something I’d tried to hide even from myself. “It will,” I said honestly. “Some things, a lot of things, will be better. But spending winters with Aunt Frances was great, too.”

“Everything comes to an end,” Celeste said kindly. “But those winters helped develop a wonderful relationship between you and Frances that will last forever.”

Before I could decide whether or not to point out how contradictory her statements were, Celeste smiled. “And there’s your sweetheart. You two have a nice night, now.”

Rafe, who was indeed striding toward me, gave Celeste a wave and swept me into a big hug. “Hey,” he murmured into my hair.

“Hey, back,” I said, loving him, but a tiny part of my brain was thinking about Celeste and Aunt Frances. There’d been a few rough patches for the two women. After so many years running the boardinghouse, it had been hard for my aunt to watch it survive, and thrive, under someone else’s care. Thanks to Otto’s help and understanding, though, she came through the rough days and was now as perky and sunshiny as I’d ever seen her.

“Well, there you are.” My perky aunt opened the front door and glared. “Late. Are you ever going to be on time to anything?”

I broke away from Rafe’s embrace and mercilessly tossed him under the bus. “His fault. I would have been on time except he needed a hug.”

“True fact,” Rafe said, nodding.

“True fact?” She snorted. “What a ridiculous phrase. Redundancy at its finest.”

My aunt’s dry tone made me grin. If Aunt Frances was being snarky, all was right with the world. We walked up the front steps and I handed her a plastic container filled with a thick, reddish liquid. “Kristen says hey.”

“Is this her new cider vinaigrette dressing? Thank you, dear heart.” She patted me on the head, something I permitted from only two people in the world, and right then they were standing within five feet of each other.

In short order, the four of us were in the backyard, drinks in hand, waiting for the chicken to cook. “That’s new, isn’t it?” I asked, nodding at a stone birdbath tucked between two lilac bushes.

Otto nodded. “We bought that on our latest trip. Fits nicely there, doesn’t it?”