“That’s what I said.” Devin could feel her nails digging through the soft leather. Scratching his eight hundred dollar boots. Gently, he wiggled them free and returned them to the floor. “Fortunately, Trixie had already pooh-poohed the idea.”

“Thank God.”

“Trixie-” Devin paused, waiting until Rachel looked at him “-told Mark that you’ve only gone a little crazy since I dumped you. Apparently you miss me.”

Her gaze slid away from his, then returned blazing. “Wait a minute. Who said you dumped me?”

He had the answer to his unspoken question. “Hey, don’t blame me. All I said was that we had philosophical differences. It’s not my fault if Trixie and Mark read that as “Rachel wouldn’t put out so Devin dumped her.’”

“I wouldn’t put…Mark thought…oh, this is horrible.” Her defiance spluttered and went out. “Okay, I’ll try and pull back my approach.” She started playing with a paper clip on her desk.

“Tell him the truth, Heartbreaker.”

“His parents are coming up next Friday… He’s bound to show them around campus.” Painstakingly, she pulled at the thin metal, stretching it out. “I was going to take a short leave, but we have our annual budget meeting and when it comes to lobbying for your section’s textbooks, it’s dog eat dog.”

“It’s pronounced dawg.”

She smiled but her fingers twisted the paper clip into a tortured Z. “I know I have to tell Mark before then. It’s just, well, we haven’t got the friendship I’d hoped for.”

Devin leaned forward and rescued the paper clip. “How about I invite you both to Waiheke for the weekend? Mark would jump at the offer and it would give you the chance to spend time together in a more natural way.”

“Why would you do that?”

He’d missed her, and it seemed she’d missed him, but one of them knew how to play it cool. So he told her half the truth. “We’re still friends, aren’t we?”

She gave him a crooked smile. “Friends.”

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

IT SEEMED APT, thought Rachel, as the ferry docked at Matiatia Wharf on Waiheke early Saturday morning, that Devin lived on an island. She wondered if he realized the significance. With Mark beside her, she disembarked, searching for Devin’s tall figure in the crowd.

“There’s Katherine.” Mark waved to the slight figure at the end of the pier. “Devin’s mother.” In white capris and a turquoise T-shirt with matching jewelry, Katherine waved back.

Rachel hadn’t seen her since being discovered in a compromising position with the woman’s son, and she prayed Katherine wouldn’t bring it up in front of Mark. But though her eyes twinkled as he made the introductions, Katherine said nothing about meeting her before.

“Dev asked me to pick you up,” she said. “He’s embroiled in some business calls from the States. I’m to take you to my place and he’ll meet us there in an hour.”

“He should have rung me,” said Rachel. “We could easily have caught a later ferry rather than put you to this trouble.”

“Are you crazy? I wouldn’t miss this for the world.” Really, her eyes were as wicked as her son’s. Walking between them, Katherine tucked her arms in theirs. “And I wanted to see Mark again. We had a fun dinner together last time you were here.”

As she steered them toward a small cherry-red Fiat parked by the ferry terminal, Rachel tried to work out how these two knew each other. It must have been the night of the “orgy” Devin had teased her about. She’d been such an idiot.

Demonstrating exquisite awareness of a teenage male, Katherine asked Mark to drive “us girls.” She sat in the back next to Rachel, pointing out the passing sights. The town’s trendy eateries; a view through the pohutakawas down to the harbor; workers harvesting the rows of laden vines across the hills. “That’s one of the island’s top wineries.”

Rachel tore her gaze from the back of Mark’s head-how cute, he had a cowlick-and made an appropriate response. They’d had such a lovely time on the ferry. She’d taken Devin’s advice and played it low-key, and Mark had filled the silences she’d left for him.

An anecdote on childhood seasickness. A request for advice on an assignment. And, disturbingly, a brief rant about phonies, after he’d read a newspaper article rating the trustworthiness of various professions. Librarians rated highly. Rock stars weren’t even on the list.

“We’re just coming down into my bay now.” Katherine pointed out the window, and obediently Rachel looked at the curve of shingle beach and the colorful iron roofs on the settlers’ cottages scattered against the lush green backdrop.

“It’s beautiful.” She wouldn’t think about the frightening confession that lay ahead. This weekend was only about her and Mark having fun together. There would be a happy ending with her son. And in situations where happy endings were impossible-her thoughts turned to Devin-silver linings like friendship. Unconsciously, Rachel sighed.

“We’re here,” said Katherine.

The Fiat pulled up beside a tiny faded blue cottage so cute Rachel had to resist the urge to hug it when she got out of the car. She patted the sun-warmed concrete seal balancing a birdbath on its nose. “Devin always does that, too,” commented Katherine. “Come in. Mark, you know the way.”

Inside, mullioned windowpanes gleamed, and the golden kauri floor sloped downward toward the kitchen, which had an old Aga cooker and lace curtains, and smelled of baking and lemon. Mismatched armchairs with fringed cushions lent a charm to the sunlit dining room, and somewhere Rachel could hear an old grandfather clock ponderously marking time. “I love it,” she said.

“Devin keeps trying to buy me a bigger place, but telling him I need grandchildren to fill it usually shuts him up. Earl Grey?”

“Thanks.”

Mark asked for water. “I think he’d be a good dad,” he said, accepting a piece of homemade shortbread.

“Really?” Rachel thought of Devin with Mark and the other students at her luncheon. “Well, he can be patient when he wants to,” she conceded. “And the kids would always have someone to play with.”

Katherine fixed her with a meaningful stare. “What he’s never had is the right woman.”

Rachel bit into the buttery shortbread, still warm from the oven, and diplomatically changed the subject. “Does your other son have children?”

“Zander? No. But that’s probably a good thing,” Katherine handed Mark another cookie. “He’s far too selfish to put anyone’s interests before his own.”

She caught Rachel’s blink of surprise and laughed. “I love Zander, but it would have been a lot better for his personal growth if he’d become a minister instead of a rock star. That was his original choice of career, you know. He was in the choir when he was a boy…though in hindsight I think it was less of a spiritual calling than imagining himself center stage in the pulpit.”

The wistfulness in Katherine’s voice struck a chord. “Do you see him very often?”

“No.” Katherine picked up the teapot and filled two delicate china cups. The perfumed scent of Earl Grey hung in the air. Rachel had always found it slightly melancholic, like pressed flowers in an old love letter. “But I used to say that about Devin, and now he’s living down the road. So I don’t give up hope.” She handed Rachel her tea.

Mark stood at the window, looking out to the garden. “The last of the peaches should be ripe by now. Want me to pick them while I’m here?”

“That’s so thoughtful, thank you. There’s a bucket on the back step.” Through the window, both women watched Mark cross the grass. “Sweet boy,” Katherine commented, sipping her tea. “He and Devin picked for me last time they were here, because my son gets so huffy when he finds me up the tree.

“I had a little heart trouble earlier this year,” she explained, “and he still treats me like an invalid… So, Rachel, now that we’re alone, tell me how you two are getting on.”