Maybe Beth was. Maybe she was in love with Skylar and he with her. That thought brought on an epiphany—I didn’t care. I didn’t care if Skylar loved Beth or vice versa. Maybe I was simply numb. The anger and hurt that I felt reading Beth’s text message had faded into the blinding snowstorm. The greatest emotion I felt to thoughts related to the end of my engagement was relief.

Van was near. I felt the warmth of him on my back. Without touching me, he sent energy from him to me. I spun in place, my sight coming to his wide chest. Looking up, I swallowed and spoke, “I’ve spent my life following other people’s plans.”

“Are you rescinding your answer?”

I nodded. “I am. This is too fast. I don’t know what I was thinking. Perhaps I wasn’t. I need time to be me.”

His large hands came to my shoulders. Though I felt his power, his touch was gentle and reassuring. His tone and tenor ricocheted through my body. “You can be you, Julia. From the small glimpse you gave me the other night, I can’t imagine wanting you to be anyone else.”

I smiled a sad smile as I tried to explain. “What you saw the other night” —I shrugged in his grasp— “I don’t know if that was me or who that was. Being with you in the privacy of our snow globe let me be...someone I’ve never been. That’s the thing, Van. I don’t know for sure who I am. That’s why I came up here to Ashland. I envisioned the person who listed the job to be an old man with war stories he wanted compiled.”

Van smiled. “I’m not that old.”

That made me smile too. “Considering that I envisioned gray hair, wrinkles, and a frail stature, you, Mr. Sherman, are about as far from what I imagined as I could get.”

“Are you disappointed?”

I shook my head. “Not in the least. The thing is, I thought that by coming here I would get time to evaluate my life and my decisions as I listened to the old war stories and wrote.”

I turned back to the window, captivated by the sun’s sparkles on the blanket of white snow.

Somehow this man, who I barely knew, understood more about my recent feelings and actions than anyone. I spoke without looking at Van. “I know that some people will think that my walking away from my commitment to Skylar is impulsive—it wasn’t. Problems within my relationship with him had been building since the moment I’d accepted his proposal or even before.”

Van stayed near, not speaking as my thoughts ran around my mind.