I had thought about leaving town, staying in North Carolina or maybe even finding a job in New York. But Palm Beach had been my fantasy. I had dreamed a big dream, and I had gotten it. And I only had one rung left to climb on the ladder. Nanette would go to New York like she had always said, and I would be editor in chief. I would be the boss, the one with the big corner office. I would have made it. I could see it that morning on the drive from the airport straight to the office.

I could see it, that is, until I walked into the building. I was prepared for a bit of chaos since I had missed Monday. I rarely took a day off, and I generally never unplugged for even an hour. But yesterday I had needed it. I had needed to reassess who I was and what I was doing. I had needed some clarity and calm to decide if I could really help Parker in his quest to expand his family.

I had decided, thank goodness, that it was a ridiculous notion. I mean, sure, yeah, I had been a little bit curious lately about what it would be like to carry a baby, to bring life into the world. And, yes, it would be a nice thing to do. Maybe. Or maybe the whole idea was totally misguided and I was just contributing to the chaos. Either way, back in Palm Beach I had realized that it was utterly absurd. Parker could choose to ruin his life, but he wasn’t going to take me down with him—not that he was trying to, of course.

While I felt relieved, my decision also shone a light on the fact that this job was all I had.

As I walked into the Clematis building that morning, I could actually feel the way the energy had changed before I even got to my office. Usually when I arrived, people were sitting in their cubicles, writing, on the phone. There was an electric hum. Today, people were walking around, out of their desks, seemingly frantic.

I was confused. Finally, I stopped Philip, grabbing his sport-coat-clad arm. Philip was one of the coolest people I knew. The product of an Irish mother and an Italian father who had met, in true American dream style, on the day they’d become citizens, he had his father’s athleticism, his mother’s eyes, and a sense of what would make a layout come to life that I’d never seen before. That was evident from the day I first interviewed him. He had played pro soccer for two years before realizing that graphic design was his true love. “What is going on?” I whispered.

He engulfed me in a hug. His familiar scent soothed me. “Sheree and I are so sorry.”

Philip and Sheree were one of the most perfect couples I had ever known in real life and two of my very best friends. They were both fun and free and rode the line between responsible and irresponsible absolutely perfectly. They threw the best parties in town—meaning the most fun. In Palm Beach you had to clarify because, to a lot of people, the “best” meant the stuffiest and most overdone. Philip had invited Thad and me over for dinner his first week at Clematis and Sheree and I had spent five hours drinking wine and divulging our entire life histories to each other. It hasn’t happened to me often in my adult life, but sometimes you meet someone, and you just know you’re going to be friends forever. That’s what had happened with us. Philip and Sheree had even come to Cape Carolina for the Summer Splash and Fish—the town’s biggest celebration of the season—a few years ago.