As for herself-she’d finally accepted that her life here, the life she had led for twenty years, had come to a close. She wasn’t exactly young, but she was tough as boiled octopus.

The second week in June she called Mike’s secretary and arranged to come by the house to get the rest of her things. She wanted to warn him ahead of time. She asked him to please get Rachel out of the house as a final favor to her, just for a couple of hours. Then she would go, and they would never need to talk again.

She drove the Jeep down the familiar dusty road off the highway, along the lakeside to the gate of the house. The gates were open. He was expecting her.

Her flowerbeds, in full spring bloom, sprawled with neglect. Fully half the blooms were dead and unpicked. She liked to think Rachel would love them as much as she had, and would soon have things back in order.

Sammy loped up and over her, and she spent a few minutes petting him, saying all the things he liked to hear. From her pocket, she pulled a piece of the beef jerky he loved for a treat, and she left him to eat it on the gravel path.

Mike stood in the doorway, hands in his pockets. “Hi,” he said.

“Hi.” She walked up the stairs, and he let her by. “Do you have some boxes for me?”

Florencia had stacked dozens upstairs, and dozens downstairs, along with thick stacks of paper for wrapping.

“I won’t need all these.” She planned to take only the most special things, the carved wooden box her dad left her, a blue glass paperweight that belonged to her mother. She would box the photographs up to look at someday when the poison had drained out of them and they could no longer hurt her.

She started with the upstairs. Mike stood on the landing leaning against the banister, hands still in his pockets as she moved from room to room. When she ran out of boxes, he helped her fold and tape up some more. He never objected to one single thing, although he watched her intently the whole time.

The only place she did not go was into the bedroom closet. She couldn’t stand to see Rachel’s things hanging there. She decided to ask Florencia to ship anything on to her if she had left anything important in there.

She felt very tired when the time came to start on the downstairs, but there would be less down there. Those rooms were public, and except for her desk, she didn’t think she’d find much.

“Want something to drink?” Mike asked, following her down the stairs.

She ran her hand over the railing one last time. “No, thanks. I want to finish up.” Strange. For almost the first time since she had met him, she couldn’t read the look in his eyes. He had changed. She almost wished he would complain or get angry, anything to break the tension between them.

She made short work of the desk, shoveling her paperwork into two boxes, swiftly striping them with tape. Mike helped her stack the boxes by the front door.

Giving herself a few seconds to catch her breath, she looked around one last time. Then she opened the front door and faced Mike. Wiping her hands on a piece of wrapping paper, she held out her right hand. “We had a good long run,” she said. “See you around sometime.”

He was hesitating, as if he was making up his mind about something but couldn’t spit it out. She wanted to hear it, hear him say something she could carry away that meant he understood how good a run it had really been.

So she stood there like a fool, her hand out, when she should have turned around with whatever dignity she had left, and the tension grew unbearable.

He took her hand. And then he pulled her toward him and kissed her on the lips.

She jumped back. “Just what do you think you’re doing?” she cried.

“I’m trying to kiss you, to make it better.”

“You’re making it harder!”

She started past him, but he blocked the way. “Will you listen to me?” he said. “Rachel’s gone,” he said, and suddenly he looked like the old Mike, a little shamefaced, but secretly pleased with himself.

“Don’t lie. I know she came back to you.”

“She did, and I’m a big dumb ox, but I’m not as dumb as I used to be.” He gave her a tentative grin.

“She’s not coming back?”

“I had to write her a hell of a check,” he said. “It was always business with her. And I was vain and confused, an easy mark. She’s gone, Lindy. And I-”

She shook her head. “Mike, don’t do this.”

“We could… let’s sit down here on the steps and talk.”

“After all that’s happened? I don’t think so.”

“Just give me a minute, then, and I’ll talk. Though I’m as lousy at that as I am at everything else I do without you.”

Away in the distance, Tahoe gleamed.

“Let’s dump last year in the lake,” Mike said.

Sandy brought lunch in, two salads. She set them down on Nina’s desk.

“I’m not hungry,” Nina said.

“Fine. Don’t eat,” said Sandy. “Now what?” she asked, taking the plastic lid off and pouring dressing.

“Now nothing,” said Nina.

“Is she going to pay us anything?”

“No, and I don’t even have the money to cover the office rent this month. We’re lucky the judge didn’t order Lindy to pay Mike’s attorney fees. She’s already trying to come up with thirty thousand to pay for Mike’s trial costs so that she can drop the complaint. She can’t help.”

“The landlord will carry us for a couple of months. You’ve made the Starlake Building famous. He’s got a waiting list of tenants. Here.” She handed Nina a check.

Sandy’s personal check was made out to Nina for ten thousand dollars. How she could have put together that kind of money Nina couldn’t imagine. And here she was offering it to her boss.

“You are the best,” Nina said, trying not to show her emotion. “No way. But thanks for the offer.” She handed it back.

“We’ll start fresh. Work twice as hard,” said Sandy. “You can just use that money to get us out of the crunch.” As if to illustrate this statement, she crunched thoughtfully on her crouton.

“Forget it!”

“You telling me I work for a quitter? You’ve still got a blanket to keep you warm at night, don’t you?” Sandy turned her pebble eyes directly toward Nina’s.

Nina looked back into their blackness, as if she might find in there the mysterious source of Sandy’s power. She saw only a dark-haired, round-faced, Native-American woman looking back at her, no more comprehensible than she had ever been.

And at that moment, looking at Sandy’s eyes, she felt the full cost of her gamble. She had risked Sandy’s job, Bob’s future here, their home, the work she was cut out to do in life. She had lost Paul…

Because Lindy refused to go to the bed upstairs, the one she had seen him in with Rachel, they had found their way to the boat and made up the bed in the cruiser with fresh sheets. Sunlight poured through the skylight into the cabin.

Later, they found some beer and crackers in the galley. They brought the platter up to a table on the deck, and found a spot in the sun to enjoy the lazy, warm afternoon. A few boats floated in the distance, rocking like lovers with the rhythm of the lake. Distant music drifted toward them.

“I’ll go see Riesner tomorrow,” Mike said. “Tell him to cooperate with the dismissal.”

There was no doubt in him. He sounded like a man fighting for his life. He wanted her back. But she didn’t believe in miracles. Things were far from perfect. She could never trust him as she once had. “I love you, Mike, but I won’t go on with things the way they have been.”

Mike said, “I know. So we won’t. We’ll get married on Sunday.”

There was a very long silence.

“Lindy. Marry me. Please,” Mike said urgently. “Any day you want, if Sunday’s not convenient.”

Another silence.

“Lindy?” he said, sounding very anxious.

“Oh, sure, Mike.”

“Please?”

“Why should I believe this?”