Josh hesitated, then asked, “D’Arcy, how old are you?”

Which meant he wondered too. Would that make everything far too complicated for him? “The right age to be Jess’s granddaughter,” was all she said.

She felt his finger touch her under the chin and lift up her face so he could see her properly. “Go back to Australia tomorrow like you’d planned to. Talk to your mother. And…”

And it was nice knowing you. She closed her eyes against the sound of his next words.

“And perhaps I’ll see you next month,” he finished.

Perhaps. Which meant it might not all work out. But then again it might.

The things we do for might and for hope, Jess had said. D’Arcy had just been truly honest about the things that mattered for the very first time and, in return, she’d received a shard of hope. It was worth the discomfort and trepidation it had cost.

PART ELEVEN

Dan

Thirty-one

NEW YORK, 1946

The hallways of a newspaper office were always busy and noisy but Dan didn’t hear any of it. The clack-clack-clack of typewriters; the shrill peal of telephones; the shouts as somebody received a tip-off and jammed their hat on their head and their notebook and pencil in their pocket before charging out into the streets, a newshound on the trail of a story; it was all muted compared to the battlefield. Here, the sounds were steady, unpunctuated by mortar explosions or screams or white phosphorus. Nobody dropped down dead beside him or lost their legs or spilled their intestines onto the ground. Everyone was alive and unhurt at the end of each day.

Dan kept the radio in his office turned up so loud that everyone who came in to see him complained about it. But he couldn’t tell them why he was afraid of silence. Jess would know. He could tell her. Except he hadn’t a damn clue where she was.

He’d been to see her editor at Vogue, who was equally mystified. “I haven’t seen her for months,” Belinda had said. “Do you want to offer her a job? I’m afraid you’ll have to duel it out with me. I’m still hoping she’ll return to adorning my pages with her face and her smile.”

Dan flinched, knowing how Jess would feel about being asked to model again after everything she’d done over in Europe.

“She was looking for something more serious,” Belinda continued. “The kind of job I imagine a newspaper like yours would be able to provide.”

He knew Bel was fishing, wanting to know why he’d come looking for Jess but he had no intention of telling her. “Can I leave my card? Please ask her to call me if you speak to her.” His card. Like Jess was a business acquaintance. God, it almost destroyed him handing over that piece of paper to Bel. At least he knew she’d been in New York, which was something.

He’d also tried to speak to Martha, but she was doing a very good job of avoiding him. Too good. She knew something, and she obviously had no intention of telling him.