She rolled her eyes. “Oh, God, I knew this was a mistake,” she said but cracked a bit of a smile, and he noticed that it was just starting to snow again, a few flakes drifting from gray skies and catching in her hair.

“What’s a mistake?”

“Coming back, but since I am here . . .” She squared her shoulders. “I’ve been thinking.”

“Always good.”

“Yeah, well. I’ve been thinking a lot. I decided I owe you an apology. I got your texts—”

“And didn’t respond.”

“Right. And I didn’t pick up your calls, because I just wasn’t ready. I had a lot of things to work out . . . because of Megan and . . . well, everything that happened, but when I finally got my head together, I thought I should say I’m sorry for leaving as I did. I only stuck around long enough to be stitched up and to hear that you were out of the woods—going to be okay. And I didn’t want to call or text. Not after everything that had happened. Even when you contacted me. Didn’t seem right somehow. Didn’t seem personal enough.”

He eyed her. “So you drove all the way from Seattle?”

“Yeah.” She was nodding.

“You don’t owe me an—”

“Just let me do this, okay?” she said and gathered herself. “I blamed you for everything, from messing up my life, to messing up Megan’s and somehow being involved in her disappearance. I just . . . I just wanted to make you out as the bad guy, and I did.”

He waited.

“Then, you know, I came here, and I found out differently, but I just couldn’t believe it. I didn’t want to believe that you weren’t involved. I needed you to be the bad guy, and I thought you needed to know that I was . . . I was wrong about you.” She cleared her throat. “I was wrong.”

“I think that makes two of us.” His jaw slid to the side, and he glanced over at the dog for a second. “I wasn’t exactly a white knight, or even a knight at all.” He couldn’t begin to explain all the guilt he’d suffered. He rubbed the back of his neck and, for once in his life, was tongue-tied around a woman. This woman.

A breeze skittered through the yard, and a few brittle leaves, left over from last autumn’s shedding, danced and swirled.

From the corner of his eye, he spotted Ralph, who had been sleeping up in the office, hurrying down the stairs. The shepherd bounded out of the building to circle the tree and whine as if he could scare up a nonexistent squirrel in its bare branches.

Rebecca’s gaze followed the dog’s path, then returned to James. “Okay, well, I just thought you should know.” She jangled the keys in her pocket.

“You’re leaving?”