If Bryan hadn’t left on his own, Kate would have shoved him out the door after the way he’d spoken to Lucas. She wanted to soothe the hurt from Lucas’s face with a well-placed kiss, but the anger lining his stubborn jaw stopped the thought as it materialized.

Lucas exited the room, leaving her to wonder what he was thinking. She heard him open a cabinet, remove something. The cabinet door slammed shut. Then she heard the pouring of coffee and the sound of the pot clanking back into its cubby.

Kate didn’t know whether to follow him or not. Clearly they had a lot to discuss. He must be wondering what Bryan was doing there. He must be wondering what she was going to do.

Kate checked her watch. They were due at his parents’ in an hour. How could she face them? How could she tell these people who’d become her family that she was leaving?

How can I tell Lucas I’m leaving? But then, he must know there was nothing holding her here now.

Except what had almost happened the night before.

Kate peered out the living room window. The wind wrestled with the leaves. They were already beginning to turn. Fall had arrived, and changes were in progress. The warm summer days were gone, and the cooler autumn days would usher in the frigid winter.

She’d never enjoyed winter on the island. With the winds blowing in off the ocean, it was impossible to keep a warm house. She mentally put another check in the pro column for visiting her dad in Maryland. There were many checks in the column already. Increasingly, she felt the need to escape. And soon.

Lucas’s sandals shuffled to a stop somewhere behind her. His presence pulled her shoulder muscles tight, pushed the air from her lungs.

“Did you ask him to come?” Lucas said.

Kate pivoted. “No.” She hated that he thought it. Did he think he meant nothing to her? She wouldn’t have almost made love with him if she were in love with Bryan. Surely he knew that.

Lucas took a sip of his coffee from the oversized Nantucket mug. It looked small in his hands.

Kate had to tell him what she’d decided, but getting the words out was harder than she imagined. Strange, when I planned to leave him all along. When he’d planned for her to leave all along. It shouldn’t come as any surprise now that there was no point in her staying.

Except for your feelings.

She brushed the thought away, zooming in on the logical reasons that had added checks to her pro column.

“We need to talk,” she said. It was a start. A slow one, maybe, but easing into it seemed kinder.

“Go ahead.” He held the mug in front of him, a fragile barrier between them. His feet were braced as if for a blow.