She didn’t have to ask “After what?” It was still painful for him to talk about. Kate wondered why he’d married her. Given the way he obviously still felt about Emily, he had to care a great deal about his parents to be willing to sacrifice a year of his life to save their marriage.

She hated to grill him, but she’d be expected to know. She set the pen on the towel and propped her head on her palm. “How did she . . . die?”

She didn’t think he was going to answer. She wasn’t even sure he’d heard her softly spoken question over the seagulls’ cries. But after a moment he sighed.

“It was my fault. Guess that’s why it’s still hard to talk about.”

What did he mean? She wanted to ask, wanted to know the details. Even though Lucas irritated her, he wasn’t the type to harm anyone. In fact, he was always helping people. In his own time, but helping them nonetheless.

“She had allergies—lots of them. The environmental ones like pollens were easily controlled with medication, so it wasn’t a big deal.” He shifted. “She’d tested allergic to peanuts as a teenager, but she’d never had a reaction. She avoided them, though, because her doctor told her to.”

Two teenagers behind them tossed a Frisbee, and it sailed over them and landed a few feet away, flicking up the sand. Lucas waited while they retrieved it.

“The week she died, I’d done the grocery shopping. I bought a bag of chips that were fried in peanut oil.” He shook his head. “Didn’t even think about checking the ingredients. I used to tease her about being overly cautious.”

Kate’s heart went out to him. Couldn’t he see it was an accident?

“I’d been at the shop working on an order I was running behind on, and when I came home . . . it was too late.”

She watched his face, the way his jaw clenched, the way his lips tightened. She wished she could console him somehow. “I’m so sorry.”

His chest rose and fell. “It was a long time ago.”

Five years wasn’t that long. He’d been married to the love of his life and now he was sitting on the beach with his counterfeit bride. She wondered how he felt about that.

He turned and opened his eyes, squinting against the glare of the sun. “So that’s my story. What’s yours?”

She appreciated his desire to change the subject. “What do you want to know?”

Lucas watched Kate turn her head until her cheek rested in her hand. She looked like a little girl, her sun-flushed cheeks bunched up against her palm. He already knew more about her than she was aware. She was twenty-eight, her favorite flowers were daisies, her birthday was November 26, and she color-coded her Day-Timer.