Shaking off the past, Flora paused at the end of the street clutching flowers and a bottle of homemade lemonade. Jack had said his daughter was making dinner, and Flora figured lemonade went with pretty much everything.

Not that she knew much about teenagers but she was impressed that Izzy was doing the cooking.

Had his wife been a good cook? Had she taught her daughter? Flora imagined her carefully selecting menus, and spending hours providing her children with balanced, healthy meals.

She braced herself against the ripple of insecurity that threatened to shake her optimism.

Jack wasn’t going to be measuring her against his wife, and neither were his children.

It had been less than a fifteen-minute subway ride from her apartment, but it felt like a million miles. This was Brooklyn’s most historic neighborhood, with wide, leafy streets and mesmerizing views of the Manhattan skyline across the East River. Now, in spring, blossom filled the sky with fragrant clouds, showering the cobbled streets with soft petals.

Checking the directions on her phone, she moved to one side to avoid a young girl on a scooter and smiled at the young mother who was running behind her, trying to keep up. It seemed like a family neighborhood, and considerably more upmarket than the area where she lived. On her way here, she’d walked past a couple of bistros and a boutique. She imagined living somewhere like this, picking up a bag of peaches on her way home, exchanging a laugh and a joke with a street vendor.

Even the names of the streets were charming. She’d passed Cranberry Street, Pineapple Street and Orange Street. People who lived here got their five a day just by walking around, she thought. Even the air felt fresher than it did in the center of Manhattan. The streets outside her apartment mostly smelled of garbage.

She was ten minutes early. Did that matter?

Nerves were jumping around in the pit of her belly, but she always felt that way before seeing Jack.

A man striding past gave her a wide berth and she realized it was because she was smiling at nothing in particular.

Feeling positive, she walked up the steps and rang the bell.

One day, she promised herself, she was going to have a proper front door of her own. Maybe flanked by olive trees, or pots filled with trailing plants.

Jack opened the door. He was wearing jeans, and his shirt was open at the neck. His feet were bare and there was a hint of shadow on his jaw. Here in his own domain, he seemed younger and more relaxed.