Quinn handed Jenny a bottle of wine. “Thanks for having me.”

“We’re so glad you could join us. How are you enjoying the island so far?”

“It’s beautiful, but a little quiet for my liking.”

“Wait until summer,” Paul said. “You won’t believe it’s the same place.”

“That’s what everyone tells me,” Quinn said. “But how do you not go nuts out here in the winter?”

“Oh, we find ways to keep ourselves entertained,” Paul said, smiling at Hope.

Her entire face turned bright red as she swatted him. “Knock it off.”

“I see how it is,” Quinn said, using his thumb to point to Jared and Lizzie, “living with these two. They ‘disappear’ frequently.”

“We do not!” Lizzie said.

“Um, yeah, we do, babe,” Jared replied, earning a glare from his wife.

“On that note,” Jenny said, “let’s eat.”

Slim held a chair at the dining room table for Erin, who was far more subdued than usual. He reached for her hand and gave it a squeeze.

She sent him a grateful smile, but he sensed she was unsettled. He couldn’t wait to be alone with her again later when he’d try to get her to talk about it.

Erin felt foolish for allowing such a simple thing to send her reeling, but witnessing Jenny’s joyful celebration with Hope had felt like a punch to the gut. Jenny was to have been her sister, and while Erin was truly happy for Hope and Paul—and Alex and Jenny by extension—the incident was just another reminder of what’d been lost.

And now she could feel herself falling into the black hole of despair that struck at the oddest of times, like today when she’d been having a really great day with people she adored. All it took was one sentence, one comment, one second to change the dynamic for her.

She ought to be used to it by now, having suffered through frequent mini-crises since Toby died, but she was never prepared for the darkness to swoop in to remind her that while her life and Jenny’s had somehow moved forward, Toby was gone forever.

Slim’s hand wrapped around hers was a comfort until he was forced to release her to take the serving dish that Paul passed to him.

Jenny served a delicious meal of tenderloin, red bliss potatoes, asparagus, mixed vegetables and freshly baked bread, but Erin couldn’t get anything past the lump in her throat. She dabbed at her lips and mumbled an “excuse me” before she got up and went to the bathroom in the hallway to try to get herself together.

The last thing she wanted was to ruin Jenny’s first Christmas with her new husband and family with reminders about a past they’d both sooner forget than dwell on, especially on a holiday.