At just after one in the morning on Saturday, Sophie was awakened by the sound of Mark shouting.

It was a muffled, wordless shout, but the sound pierced right through Sophie’s sleeping mind. She jerked awake, breathless as she sat up in bed.

She heard another helpless, guttural sound and turned to look down at her husband, who was jerking under the covers.

Terrified, Sophie reached over to turn on the bedside lamp. In the warm light, she saw in relief that Mark was still asleep. He must have been having a nightmare.

As she watched him, though, her relief vanished quickly. He was still tossing in the bed, making those sounds that were almost like shouts. His skin was wet with a sheen of perspiration, and his expression appeared anguished.

She’d been told he might have nightmares, but he’d never had one before. Not like this, anyway. It was intense. Violent. She felt helpless, trapped, not sure of what she should do.

After a minute, her mind cleared enough to remember the information she’d been given on his return about what to expect. If she woke him up now, he might not know who she was. He might accidentally hurt her. But she didn’t want him to keep dreaming like this. It looked like he was in agony.

She jumped out of bed and turned on the television, turning the volume up loud. It was tuned to an old sitcom with canned laughter that echoed gratingly through the apartment.

Finally, Mark made a harrumphing sound and sat up straight, his eyes wide. He was clearly disoriented for a minute, staring at the television and then around the apartment until his eyes landed on her. At last, his face relaxed enough for her to be sure he knew where he was, who she was, and that he wasn’t still in the dream.

She ran to crawl into bed beside him. “Are you okay? It sounded like you were having a terrible nightmare.”

He mopped at his face with the sheet, clearly trying to pull himself together. “Yeah. Yeah.”

“I didn’t know what I should do, but I didn’t want you to keep dreaming whatever it was, so I tried to wake you up.” She reached over to take his arm, but he pulled away from her touch.

“Yeah. Thanks. Yeah. I’ll be right back.” He got up, wincing like his muscles were stiff, and he limped into the bathroom. She stared at the closed door as she heard the shower come on.

He’d been all hot and sweaty. It wasn’t strange that he’d want to take a shower. She just wanted him to talk to her too. He was suffering. She couldn’t let him suffer alone.

But there was nothing she could do if he never let her in.

She glanced down and saw that he’d nearly torn the sheet from the mattress on his side. There was a damp spot from his perspiration. Glad for something to do, she got up and changed the sheets on the bed, listening for when the shower went off.

She was just pulling the comforter up over the clean sheets when the sound of water stopped. After a minute, Mark came out with a towel wrapped around his waist. He walked over to his drawer and pulled out a clean T-shirt and a pair of old sweatpants. She watched as he dropped the towel and pulled the clothes on.

She was praying for him silently when he walked back toward the bed. He was trembling so violently she could see it, even from several feet’s distance.

“Are you okay?” she asked, pulling the covers down to invite him in.

He got back in bed, drawing the comforter up high over him. “Yeah.”

“Do you need something? I think they told me that sugar could help—do you want hot chocolate or hot tea or something?”

“No.” His teeth were practically chattering.

She didn’t care if he looked a little closed off. He was hurting, and she needed to help him. She scooted over beside him, trying to wrap her body around him.

He made a strange, helpless sound and tightened both arms around her.

It was enough.

She held him and prayed and tried not to cry as they lay together in the lit room with the television still blaring. She didn’t relax until he stopped shaking at last.

He lifted his head slightly to press a soft kiss against her hair, and he finally went back to sleep.

***

When she woke up that morning, she was back on her side of the bed, and Mark wasn’t in the bed at all.

She stretched under the covers, turning her head to see that it was almost seven-thirty. It was Saturday, so she didn’t have anywhere urgent she needed to be.

“Do you want some coffee?” Mark appeared in the doorway of the bedroom, dressed in jeans and a gray cable-knit shirt.

“Yeah. Thanks.” She smiled at him, and then she tried to smooth down her hair so it wouldn’t be so messy when he returned.

He brought her the cup of coffee, which she accepted with another smile. “How are you feeling?” she asked.

“I’m fine. Sorry for all the drama last night.”

“You don’t have to be sorry. They said that nightmares weren’t unusual after experiences like yours.” She wished he’d sit on the bed with her, but he just stood beside it, looking down on her.

“I told you before. I never had that sort of a trauma. I was just imprisoned.”

“Well, that had to be traumatic enough.” She really wished he’d stopped minimizing what he’d been through. “What was your dream about?”

“I don’t remember.”

She was sure he was lying to her. “Everyone said it would help to talk about it.”

“I’m getting kind of tired of hearing what everyone told you. I’m not a lab rat or something.”

She gasped. “Why would you think you were lab rat? They were just worried about you and wanted me to be prepared.”

He bit off whatever he’d been going to say. Instead, he just muttered, “I know.”

“Do you?” she asked, as gently as she could. “Because it doesn’t seem like you want me or anyone else to help you.”

“I’ve had counseling up the wazoo,” he bit out. “I might have the occasional nightmare. It doesn’t mean I’m falling apart.”

“I’m not saying you’re falling apart. Just that everyone needs a little help.” She got out of bed, determined to do what she was sure was the right thing, no matter how little he wanted to hear it. She reached into a drawer of her nightstand and pulled out a folder. “They gave me all these resources here—and some are counselors in the area. Maybe we should give one of them a call.”

“Damn it, Sophie, it was just a nightmare.”

She swallowed at the angry note in his voice, but she didn’t let it intimidate her. “It’s not about the nightmare. I just think it would do both of us good—to get a little extra help.”

“So now you need help too—help in putting up with me?”

She made a frustrated sound. “Mark, don’t twist my words. You know they said you might need more than just a month of counseling. You went through a lot. It doesn’t mean you’re weak or helpless. It just means you’re human. It’s silly to act like you’re invulnerable when we both know you’re not.”

“I thought I was doing all right.” His tone was different now—slightly insecure. He was searching her face, and she wasn’t sure what he was looking for. “Overall, I thought I was doing all right.”

“Of course, you’re doing all right. But you’re having nightmares, and you still don’t want to open up with me, and you don’t even want to think about getting back to your job or doing anything at all. Don’t you think some extra help might be…might be helpful?”

Mark stared at her for a long time. Then finally he said, “Maybe. I’ll think about it.”

She was about to respond, glad to have the conversation over, but he turned around and walked out of the room.

***

That afternoon, Sophie was still worried about Mark.

He was acting normal again—at least, what had passed for normal since he’d returned—but she could sense something brewing inside him. And something different was brewing inside her.

She desperately needed to talk to someone, but she wasn’t sure who she should call. If she talked to anyone in Willow Park, they would be sympathetic and understanding, but they wouldn’t be able to give her very good advice, since they didn’t know Mark very well themselves.

The only person who knew Mark as well as Sophie did was John, but she never called John up out of the blue. She didn’t know where in the world he was right now. It might be the middle of the night for him. He might be incredibly busy. She might be the last person he wanted to talk to right now.

But she was desperate. She had to talk to someone, so she made herself dial his number and wait as it rang.

“Hello?” It was John’s voice, surprised and a little gravelly. “Hello, Sophie?”

“Yeah. Yeah, it’s me. Sorry to bother you.”

“Is everything all right? Is Mark—”

“He’s fine,” she said quickly, responding to the immediate urgency of his voice. “He’s fine. It’s not an emergency or anything. I’m sorry to worry you.”

“No, it’s okay. You can call any time.”

She swallowed, telling herself there was no reason to feel nervous about calling her brother-in-law. “Do you have a few minutes to talk?”

“Sure. I was just about to turn in for the night, so it’s a good time. What’s going on? How are you doing?”

It was nice that he asked about her, and it gave her the opening she needed. “I’m okay, for the most part. I’m just worried about Mark. I feel like I’ve hit some sort of brick wall. And I didn’t know who else to talk to about it. Just tell me if it’s awkward for you or you’d rather not—”

“No, I’m glad you called. I’ve been worried about him too. Every time I think he’s making progress, something will happen, and he’ll kind of close down again.”

She was so relieved to hear him express exactly what she’d been experiencing with Mark that she gave a soft little sob. “Yeah. Yeah, that’s what happens. I think it’s me. I think I’m doing it. But I don’t know what I’m doing, and I don’t know how to do better.”

“It’s not you, sweetheart. I’m sure you’re not doing anything wrong.”

“I am. Not on purpose, but I always seem to trigger the shutdowns. I don’t know why. Does he talk to you about it?”

“He talks to me almost every day, and sometimes he’ll open up. But, when he’s in a certain mood, he won’t talk to me about anything that goes deep. I really don’t think he can talk to anyone. It’s not that he wants to shut us out. It’s that he’s trying so hard to deal with all the shit he’s been through.”

She sniffed, her heart aching for her husband. “I know he is. Things were going really well. I thought we’d had…we’d had a breakthrough earlier this week.”

“I think you did. He’s sounded so…so hopeful this week.”

“But then last night he had a nightmare. It was…it was terrible. I tried to help, but he just closed down again this morning, after he was feeling better.”

“Yeah, he sounded really out of it this morning. I wondered what was going on.”

“He seemed to need me last night. I felt like I was helping him. I don’t understand why he—”

“Of course, he needed you. That’s why he closed down this morning. He doesn’t want to be weak and helpless—particularly around you.”

“But I’m his wife! I don’t care if he’s—”

“I know you don’t care. But he cares. He wants to be strong and healthy and have it all together for you.”

“But it’s ridiculous for him to expect himself to get better so quickly, after what he’s been through.”

“Of course it’s ridiculous,” John said gently. “But we think and believe and act on ridiculous ideas all the time. That’s part of what it means to be human.”

She let out a sigh, thinking through what he’d just said. The words rang true, but they didn’t give her the answer she needed. “So what am I supposed to do? I can’t act like he’s got it all together when he’s still struggling with a lot. He won’t even go to counseling.”

“Yeah, that’s another symptom of the same lie he’s telling himself. It’s normal, Sophie. I see it all the time. He’s just got to get to the point where he can admit to himself that he can’t pull himself together on his own. He’ll get there. He really has gotten a lot better over the last month.”

“I know he has. He’s amazing. I don’t know how anyone could do better than he’s done.”

“A lot of that is thanks to you,” John said.

“I don’t think so. I think I’ve mostly just messed things up.”

“No, you haven’t. You’ve been incredible. Mark knows it too. He talks about you all the time.”

“He…he does?”

“Of course, he does. He’s crazy in love with you. He can’t stop himself from talking about you.”

The words were light—almost amused—but they were balm to Sophie’s soul. She swallowed over a lump in her throat. “Really?”

“You’ve got to already know that. He’s been a goner since the first time he met you. But I really think he loves you more now than he did before, if that’s possible.”

“Really?” she asked again, rather raspily.

“Oh, yeah. You’re pretty incredible. If someone as clueless and out of touch as I am can see it, you better believe that Mark sees it. He’s trying to show you. I know he’s been trying to show you. I know it’s hard, but I hope you’ll…”

“I’ll what?”

“You’ll keep being patient with him. He’s trying. Don’t give up on him yet.”

She gasped. “I’m not going to give up on him!”

There was a pause on the other end of the line. Then John said, “Good.”

Neither one of them said anything for several seconds. Then Sophie followed the line of her thoughts and asked, “Has he talked to you about…about what he went through over there?”

“A little. Not much.”

“He won’t talk to me about it much either. The first time he did was…was earlier this week, when I thought we had a breakthrough. He even brought it up himself.”

“If he brought it up, then it was definitely a breakthrough. You should be happy about that.”

“I was. I am. They told me not to push him too hard—that it might backfire—but it’s so hard…not to know. You don’t think he was…he was…he says he wasn’t tortured or anything.”

“I don’t think he was. As far as I can tell, what really traumatized him most was what he heard or saw, not what directly happened to him. I don’t think there’s a dark secret he’s holding back from us—one that will finally be revealed and fix everything. That’s not usually how it works. He may never want to talk to us about the details. A lot of people live like that their whole lives, and it’s not the end of the world. People cope in different ways.”

“Yeah,” Sophie agreed, strangely relieved by John’s words, by the idea that she wasn’t responsible for dragging some secret memory out of her husband. “That makes sense. He’s really been doing well, overall, I think.”

“Of course, he has. I’d have drunk myself into a stupor, if I was in his shoes. I know I would have.”

“Me too,” she admitted, surprised to realize that tears were streaming down her face. She sniffed and said, “Sorry. I try not to cry all the time.”

John laughed. “Are you serious?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, why wouldn’t you cry? After what you’ve been going through, anyone would be crying all time.”

“It’s Mark who’s gone through it. Not me.”

“Don’t be silly, sweetheart. Of course, you’re going through it too.”

***

Gabe and Lydia Alexander lived in a big, beautifully restored Victorian in one of the best neighborhoods in Willow Park.

Sophie didn’t know Gabe very well, but he had evidently made a bundle of money in business, although he’d mostly given up his role in his company to be co-director of a business-center ministry in India. A lot of his work was fundraising and administration, which he was able to do from the States, so he and Lydia were planning to stay in Willow Park through the spring. Gabe was big and handsome and had a laidback smile, and he and Lydia threw a very good Christmas party.

Sophie had been excited about going. She’d gone to a few Christmas parties in Willow Park last year, but she’d always had to go by herself. She’d been looking forward to going this year with her husband. She was so proud of him. He was so smart and strong and resilient and funny—even if he wasn’t as light-hearted as he used to be. People always liked Mark, and she wanted all of her friends in town to know how amazing he was.

After the incident this morning, she’d been afraid he would pull out of going, but he didn’t. They were back to acting polite with each other, and she didn’t know if that was progress since this morning or not. She felt encouraged after her conversation with John, but she still wished she knew what to do to get through to Mark.

Trying to be hopeful and get into a holiday spirit, she dressed in a pretty green dress and sparkly jewelry. She’d bought Mark a dark red dress shirt that looked really good on him, and he wore it with a pair of black trousers.

She was feeling better after they arrived, like they were a normal couple, like any of the other couples who were gradually filling up the large ground floor of the Alexanders’ house. Mark was chatting with Micah Duncan, who had flipped this house and was showing Mark some of the custom woodwork in the kitchen, while Sophie was helping Lydia pour out drinks.

Sophie couldn’t help but occasionally glance over toward Mark, to make sure he was still having a good time. This was the first time he’d met Micah, but he seemed to like him. A lot. Maybe more than any of the other men he’d met in town so far.

Evidently, she didn’t hide her discreet observation well enough, because Lydia turned to peer over toward the men. “Are you afraid he’s going to sneak out and run away?” she asked, at finding the source of Sophie’s distraction.

Sophie knew Lydia well enough to understand that the direct question wasn’t intended to be rude. “No. No. Sorry. He just doesn’t know that many people in town yet. I wanted to make sure he had someone to talk to.”

“He and Micah seem to be getting along pretty well,” Lydia said. “Micah gets along with everyone, and Mark seems to be pretty friendly. Everyone who knows him so far likes him. At least, that’s what they tell me.”

“Oh, good, I’m glad to hear it,” Sophie said, a little embarrassed that her worry was obvious and that people were evidently talking about her and Mark. “He’s good with people.”

Mark had always been good with people before. It was only since he’d returned that he’d withdrawn, and that was hardly surprising.

“How are you adjusting to being back from India?” Sophie asked, wanting to change the subject and also genuinely interested.

“It’s mostly good,” Lydia said with a wide smile. She was lovely and always seemed to glow with authenticity and genuine interest in other people. “I love this town, and I love this house, and I love being back with my whole family. But it’s a strange transition. I see so much that’s so…so hard, in the work I do. Sometimes I feel almost guilty for being so comfortable here.”

Sophie thought about that. “Wow. Yeah. I guess I can see that.”

“But I feel like this is home,” Lydia said, smiling as her eyes rested on her husband, who was in some sort of deep discussion with his daughter, Ellie, and Abigail and Thomas’s daughter, Mia. Both girls were dressed up in pretty Christmas dresses. “And there’s nowhere like it in the world.”

“Yeah. It’s strange, since I haven’t lived here very long, but this feels like home to me too.” Sophie looked around the room, filled with people she knew. She didn’t like everyone she could see, but she liked a lot of them, and some she even loved.

“You think you’ll stay?”

Sophie shook her head. “I don’t know. It’s really up to Mark.”

“What’s up to Mark?” The male voice surprised her, as did the arm that wrapped around her waist. Mark tilted his head down to see her face. To anyone else, he probably looked like an adoring husband, but she felt like he was still miles away from her.

“Whether you stay in Willow Park or not,” Lydia replied, evidently not worried at all that it wasn’t a conversation he was supposed to have heard.

Mark looked from Lydia’s face to Sophie’s. “You better start from the beginning.”

“Sophie was just saying that she loved Willow Park and thought about it as home,” Lydia explained, handing out glasses of wine and punch to the very large Harris clan, which included a mother, a father, a grandmother, and five children. When she’d welcomed them all and passed out the drinks, she returned to the conversation, finishing, “So I asked her if you all were planning to stay here, and she said it was up to you.”

“It’s not just up to me,” Mark murmured.

“I know,” Sophie said quickly, making sure he understood the full context for her comment. “But a lot will depend on your job. If he takes the job the station has in mind for him, we might end up in New York.”

“Oh, wow,” Lydia said with wide eyes. She was about to continue, when a wine spill across the room caught her attention. She grabbed a roll of paper towels and ran over to help clean it up.

Mark and Sophie looked at each other for a moment, and she couldn’t tell if he was still feeling as defensive as he had this morning.

But surely a simple conversation about where they might live wouldn’t make him defensive.

“Did I hear you might move to New York?” Micah asked. He’d been standing near a plate of cookies, digging in, but he stepped closer to them as he spoke, his blue eyes interested.

Sophie didn’t know Micah very well, but it was impossible not to like him. “It’s just a possibility.”

“I’d hate to live in the big city,” Micah said, taking the last bite of a cookie.

Mark’s arm was still around Sophie’s waist, but he felt stiffer than he had before. “Yeah. I’m not sure that’s what we’ll end up doing.”

“You all should stay here.” Micah twitched his eyebrows. “I could use Mark on the church volleyball team.”

Mark smiled. “You might be sorry you had that suggestion. I might be tall, but that’s about my only skill in volleyball.”

“Tall is better than nothing. Right now, we’re not getting anywhere, since Daniel insists he stay on the team, and he can’t serve the ball to save his life.”

Sophie laughed, glad that the topic had been lightened. She actually would love for Mark to be on the church volleyball team. He wasn’t the best player ever, but he wasn’t that bad, and he would probably really enjoy it.

She wanted him to have friends again. She wanted him to have someone more than his brother to talk to. She wanted him to be part of a community, as much as she wanted to be close to him herself.

Things were getting better, but he still was holding himself back—from everyone, and not just her. He could make casual conversation with the best of them, but he still wasn’t putting down roots.

But maybe he knew they wouldn’t be ending up here for the long run. Maybe the reason was as simple as that.

Maybe he was wondering if he would even stay with her.

She couldn’t believe she’d even had that thought, and she hurriedly pushed it out of her mind.

“So you think you might stay in Willow Park?” Micah asked, leaning against the quartz countertop that his crew had installed last year, before Gabe and Lydia had bought the house. “What would you do here?”

“I don’t know,” Mark said. He felt tense again, although he still hadn’t pulled his arm away from her.

She reached out to put a hand on his belly, some sort of instinctive claim of possession…or maybe comfort. “It’s hard to work for a news channel in Willow Park, you know.”

“Yeah, I guess so.”

“You should talk to Milton Bucket,” Gabe said. He’d ended his conversation with the girls and had strolled over in their direction, evidently overhearing the last few comments.

“Who?” Sophie said. She’d never heard that name before. As small as Willow Park was, there were still hundreds of people here she didn’t know.

“Milton Bucket. He owns The Ledger.”

The Ledger was the local newspaper, mostly serving a few counties in the mountains of North Carolina around Willow Park. “Surely, they’re not looking to hire someone new for the staff,” Sophie said. “Aren’t all local papers struggling?”

“They have a pretty established audience,” Gabe said. “There are still a lot of people in these parts who want to hold an old-fashioned newspaper in their hands. But, yeah, he’s been seeing the same changes that other papers are. He wants to rebrand and build a real web presence, but he was complaining that there’s no professional journalists in the area.” He was smiling in a casual way, as if he weren’t just saying something that felt like a gift from heaven to Sophie. “You’d be really good at that, with your experience. Hold on.”

Mark was listening. Sophie was sure he was listening. And she suddenly felt a surge of intense hope, like this was the answer to her prayers about their future.

Gabe took a few steps over and opened a drawer under the counter that looked like it was a multi-purpose junk drawer. After a minute, he found what he was looking for. A business card.

He handed it to Mark. “Give him a call if you want. It might be kind of boring, compared to your other options, but at least you could stay in Willow Park.” His eyes went over their shoulders, evidently seeing someone who had just walked in the door. “Excuse me. I’ve got to say hello.”

Gabe walked away, leaving Sophie breathless and trying not to shake with excitement.

“There you go,” Micah said with a grin. “That’s what we call Providence around here. We might win a volleyball game next season after all.”

Sophie laughed, as she was supposed to, but Mark didn’t respond in any way.

To smooth over the loose ends, Sophie said, “We’ll have to do some thinking about things. At least we have options, though.”

An older couple walked over then to say hello. Sophie recognized them as Micah and Daniel’s parents. The conversation turned to small talk, and eventually Sophie and Mark wandered away, toward the fireplace in the living room where a huge tree was set up.

“It’s not as pretty as our tree,” Sophie murmured.

“It’s not as fat, anyway.”

“We discussed this. It’s just big-boned.”

Mark chuckled and pulled her toward him in a soft hug.

Sophie’s chest relaxed at the obvious affection. He felt close to her again. This morning hadn’t ruined everything.

“So what do you think?” she asked softly, looking up at him, her hands still on his chest.

“About what?”

“You know what. About talking to the guy at The Ledger.”

“I don’t know.”

“Do you think you’ll give him a call?”

“I might.”

She tried to hide the frustration that surged up at his reticence. There was no reason for her to be impatient with him. “It won’t hurt to talk to him. Would that…would that even be something you’d want to do.”

“I have no idea what I want to do.”

“I know. I get it. But it’s going to be Christmas in another week, and then it will be New Year’s, and then we’ll be into next year, and Roger and the station are going to want a decision from you. You can’t hang around doing nothing forever.”

He stiffened slightly, and she realized her mistake.

“I’m sorry,” she said in a rush, her hands clenching in his shirt. “I didn’t mean to make it sound like that. I know you need time to recover and get…get back into life. But I really think it will be easier for you once you get back into work. You’re not the kind of guy who is happy doing nothing.”

He closed his eyes. “I know. I just don’t know what I can do anymore.”

“You can do anything. You can do anything you want.”

“What if I want to do what I did before?”

She swallowed over a coil of intense fear at the idea of him going back to the Middle East, back to where it had been so dangerous for him before. But all she said was, “If…if you do, then we can talk about it. Is that…is that what you want?”

“I just want to be who I was before.”

Of course, he wanted that. She wanted to be who she’d been before too—happy, laughing, helpless, so completely innocent. She wrapped her arms around his neck. “I know, Mark. I want that too.”

He didn’t reply at all, but maybe he just didn’t have the chance. Someone called out, “The mistletoe is over there,” and Sophie looked over and saw Abigail grinning at her.

Sophie smiled back, feeling a little embarrassed, although she and Mark had not really been having a romantic moment.

She wasn’t sure exactly what kind of moment it was.

They went over to talk to Abigail and Thomas, and Mark was his friendly, natural self. It was like their discussion near the Christmas tree hadn’t even taken place.

She should be glad he was having a good time and getting to know other people. She wanted that. But it felt like something very important—their future, his career, the way he kept pushing away any support she tried to offer him—had just been swept under the rug.

She remembered, shortly after he’d returned, when they’d been standing in the park in D.C. and he’d asked her to help him be his old self. Maybe he couldn’t have what he really wanted, but he could still have something. She was still determined to help him, whether he wanted her help or not. If he wasn’t yet ready to live life without some nudging, then she would continue nudging him gently. Mark needed a job—a job he could pour himself into, a job he could genuinely enjoy. Tomorrow, she would give Roger a call and encourage him to call Mark up and feel him out some more, to see if he was planning to take the position with the station he’d been offered.

He had two decent possibilities, and she was sure he could find more options if he would just take some initiative. She couldn’t slack off on helping him, just because she was getting tired and discouraged. This was too important.

She wanted the best for him, and it was her job to help him get there.

Tomorrow, after she talked to Roger, she would see if she could get Mark to call Milton Bucket as well.

***

On Monday morning, when Sophie headed down to the bookstore, Mark was lying on the couch reading. She asked him if he wanted to come to the bookstore too, but he didn’t.

The store was actually quite busy during the morning and early afternoon, since a lot of people came in to buy Christmas presents. But there was a lull around four o’clock, and she used it to call Roger.

He was as friendly and sympathetic as ever, and he promised to call Mark right away and give him a little gentle pressure about deciding about the job.

Then she pulled out the slip of paper she’d written Milton Bucket’s phone number on that morning, having found the business card still in Mark’s trouser pocket.

She looked at it a long time.

Then she decided it wouldn’t be fair to do anything without giving Mark a chance first, so she called up Mark instead.

“Hey,” he said, sounding relaxed, almost sleepy.

“Hey. What are you doing?”

“Just reading.”

“If you wanted to do something today, we can use a trip to the store. We’re out of paper towels and garbage bags, and we’re getting low on laundry detergent.”

“Okay. I can go. When will you be home?”

“Not until six, so you’d have plenty of time if you want to go before then. You could go to the—”

“I know where to go.” He sounded a little abrupt.

She blinked, wondering why he was crabby about such an innocuous conversation. But she brushed it away in order to get to the real point of her call. “Okay. Good. You didn’t get the chance to call Milton Bucket, did you?”

He was silent for longer than was normal in a phone conversation. “No.”

“Oh. Okay. It might just be good to know if it’s even a possibility. Just to size it up. Not to make any decisions.”

“I understand that.”

She bit her lip and waited a few beats to control her impatience. “Okay. Good. Do you think you’ll call him, then?”

“I’m thinking about it.”

“Okay. I was just checking.” She sounded overly bright and overly casual, but it was the best she could do.

This wasn’t good for him. This sitting around, procrastinating on starting life wasn’t good for him.

And he wouldn’t even talk to her about it for real.

Trying to think of something entirely different to talk about, she said, “You know, I’ve been thinking about Evergreen Farms, where we got our Christmas tree.”

“What about it?” Mark sounded curious, rather than cool, which was an improvement.

Encouraged, Sophie said, “There’s an inn there, you know. I was wondering if we should go up there for a couple of days after Christmas. It looked really nice, and Wendy said it was a great place to go and recharge.”

“Well, she owns it, doesn’t she, so she’d have reason to say something like that.”

“Yeah, but I really liked the place. I liked Wendy. It might be nice for us to get away for a little while. Do you not want to?”

“Sure. Why not?”

She frowned. “Well, that doesn’t sound very enthusiastic. If you don’t want to go, you could just say so.”

“I just said it was fine.”

“But I want you to want to go too. I don’t want everything to have to be my idea, and you just go along for the ride.” She hadn’t meant to say so much, and she immediately regretted the thoughtless words. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—”

“I guess it never occurred to you that I don’t want to be just along for the ride either.”

“I know you don’t.” She wanted to bite her tongue off for saying something that he would interpret as a complaint about his behavior lately. Hadn’t John told her a few days ago that Mark didn’t want to feel weak and helpless around her? “I didn’t mean you were. I just didn’t want to do a trip that you weren’t excited about.”

He was silent for a long time on the phone, and she had no idea what he was thinking. Whether he was angry or upset or defensive or sick of putting up with her.

She’d always thought she was good with people, but she’d done nothing but bumble around and make mistakes with Mark, ever since he got back. And now she was so, so tired of trying to do the right thing, of always being strong for him.

“I love you,” she said, out of the blue, desperately wanting for him to know it was true.

There was a brief hesitation before Mark said, “I know you do.”

“I just want to help.”

“I know you do. I’ll talk to you later.”

When she hung up, she stared down at the phone number on the slip of paper again.

Then she made up her mind. She might be tired. She might be utterly exhausted and on the verge of falling apart. But she was going to help Mark anyway.

She dialed the number. When a man’s voice picked up, she introduced herself and said that Gabe Alexander had given them his business card and recommended they call.

Her husband was a world-class journalist, and he was looking into different job options in the area.