A couple months after I’d read Lake’s letters, I had visitors. Henry was the most dependable man I knew. By having my back during my sister’s death, when my parents had tried pinning everything on me, he’d saved me, a helpless teenager, from what could’ve been a shit life. And with all the tragedy he’d encountered as a police officer, it would’ve been easy for him to send me on my way afterward. Instead, he continued to check in on me, making sure I finished high school despite my situation.

The furniture business was booming, and I didn’t trust many people to help me out, but I had a particularly important rush order and needed a hand. Having retired, Henry had been able to come up and stay at the house for a few weeks to help me get the workload under control.

This was his last night in Big Bear, so I picked up some barbeque for the occasion. Since it was the same week Young Cubs Sleepaway Camp was in session up the hill, and Gary was still the director, I invited him and his wife Lydia over for dinner.

Even though it was August, the nights in Big Bear could get chilly. I built a fire in the pit in the front yard and welcomed the closest friends I had with a cooler of beer on ice.

“You’re in a good mood,” Gary said, walking up the drive to shake my hand.

I nodded at Henry, who was prepping the grill. “Henry and I have been working around the clock the past couple weeks. Feels good to do nothing but build furniture day in and day out, but I’m also glad this project is done.”

“So business is good?” he asked.

“Too good. Any time this week you need a break from the chaos up there at camp, I can put you to work.”

Lydia hobbled up the gravel in heels, holding her purse strap to one shoulder and balancing a paper grocery bag in the other. Just like Tiffany, the woman was always wearing something akin to stilts. Always had her brown hair styled, her makeup done. No wonder they’d gotten along so well. “Do you have a website?” she asked, frowning when I shook my head. “You need one. Everyone has them these days.”

“For what?” I asked, handing Gary a Bud. “I already have more business than I can keep up with.”

“You still need one.” When she got to the grass, she gave up and set the groceries down to remove her shoes. “I know a girl who can make you one. Get you some more sales, and then you can hire yourself employees.”

Hire more people—that was what Mr. Kaplan had said when I’d spoken to him on the phone last month and told him I was barely keeping up with orders. I didn’t see how it could work, though. I built furniture because it was my passion. I used my hands to bring my visions to life, and when I finished each piece, it was no longer mine. It saw my customers through good times and bad—births, weddings, funerals, or just plain dinner each night. Not that I was exactly happy to have missed out on being a cop like I’d planned, but I could see now that it hadn’t been my path—my passion was being strong and capable enough to help people, to bring goodness to their lives, and Lake had taught me that there were lots of ways to go about that.

“I like things how they are,” I said to Lydia. “Don’t need too much else.”

An outdoor picnic table was one of the things I had yet to finish for my place. Truth was, four years on and I was still building my own house and the things in it. In the beginning, I worked mostly to push through the guilt and shame I harbored over Lake, Tiffany, and the baby. But then one night, I’d started on cupboards and remembered how Lake had designated a place in her New York kitchen just for guest dishes. She wanted people to feel special in her home. So as I’d made myself a cabinet just for nice china, it hit me just how often Lake had been on mind as I’d laid planks, carved wood, and sanded and varnished surfaces over the years. While my body labored, my mind escaped, often into Lake’s warmth. The things she’d wanted, the pieces she’d be proud to have in her home. That was why this house had taken me so fucking long.

I set up fabric folding chairs around the fire while Henry served us burgers and hot dogs. He and Gary caught up for the first time since the wedding. Once the conversation stalled, I nodded at Lydia.

“How’s Tiffany?” I asked. Gary and I had introduced the girls, but she and Tiff had remained close since the divorce.

“She’s fine. Mostly dating and working. How are you?”

“Also fine,” I said. “Working.”

“Dating?”

I took a swig of my beer. “Nah.”

“Because that girl I mentioned is very pretty—”

“Who?” I asked.

“The one who makes websites. She’s lovely and sweet and hates drama.” Lydia curled her toes in the grass, her smile warm. “I love Tiffany, you know I do, but after her, you need someone who’ll go easy on you.”

“I appreciate it, but no,” I said. Lovely and sweet and drama-free all sounded fine, but not better than Lake. “I’m good with the way things are.”

“You keep saying that,” Lydia replied, “but we don’t believe you.”

“We?” Gary asked. “Don’t drag me into this. Although, I will agree, Heather is pretty. And I’m not just saying that to get you to meet her. She’s nice, and she’d be good for you, Manning.”

Henry and I exchanged a look. He was a simple man, who’d lived a simple life. He didn’t know about Lake, but he’d seen that I was doing work I loved, and that was good enough for now. “Sounds like you’re dragging yourself into it, Gary,” I said.

“Heather needs a good, solid man,” Lydia said. “Do it for her.”

“Wish I could,” I said. “But I just can’t.”

Henry cleared his throat. “Anyone need another beer?”

“Me,” Lydia said.

“I’ll take one,” Gary added.

I put my plate on the ground. “I’ll get them.”

I reloaded the cooler and carried it out, setting it down in the middle of the group—which had gone suspiciously quiet.

“What?” I asked, tossing Henry a beer.

He caught it and held up his hands as if to surrender.

I went to hand Gary one as well but took it back as he went to grab it. “Why do you all look guilty?”

Gary glanced between the Bud and my face, and said, “We were talking about you and Tiff. God knows we’ve heard her side of the story, but in four years, we’ve never heard yours.”

“That’s intentional. It’s nobody’s business but ours.”

“Tiffany made it our business,” Lydia said. “But we want you to talk to us about it. It’s not healthy that you’re up here all alone, taking your emotions out on helpless pieces of wood.”

“That’s not what I do.”

“She’s right, son,” Henry said.

I sat down, schooled. A couple beers weren’t enough to get me talking about my private life, even if Tiffany felt the need to. These people were my family, though. Henry had been there for me as a teen in a way nobody else had. He didn’t pester me about these things, but that didn’t mean he didn’t care. And Gary’d been like a brother to me. “You know the story,” I said. “She got pregnant, we lost the baby, and things just fell apart. We had problems before all that, and we just weren’t strong enough to take on that kind of heartbreak.” That was only part of the truth. After my time in New York, I didn’t want any woman but Lake, and I couldn’t fake it. I went back to Tiffany out of duty, but without the baby, I’d had no reason to stay.

“You make the divorce sound like it was mutual,” Gary said.

“It was, even if she won’t admit it. She wasn’t happy.” Tiffany had wanted the beautiful Newport Beach package—cute kids, shiny marriage, big house. She wanted what her parents had on the outside, even if we’d been worse off than them on the inside. Even if it meant she and I weren’t truly happy. By the end, she’d known my feelings for Lake had run deep, and though she got her barbs in, she still hadn’t been willing to confront me head on about it.

My friends knew me well, and they left it at that. At some point, night fell, but we barely noticed for all our talking and drinking. A few six-packs in, Lydia was giggling, Gary was smoking a blunt, and Henry just got more stoic, watching and listening to us. Or me, mostly. I had a feeling he had things on his mind, but he was a private man and wouldn’t want to talk about them in front of the others.

“Let’s have s’mores,” Lydia said.

I squinted at her over the top of the fire. “I don’t have the ingredients for that.”

“We brought some,” she said. “Except we need something to put the marshmallows on. Do you have any long, sterile pieces of wood, Carpenter Man?”

Living in the woods with a fire pit in my front yard, this wasn’t my first encounter with s’mores. “I think there are some in one of the drawers by the stove,” I said.

While Lydia was inside, Gary leaned toward me, nearly toppling out of his chair. “Tiffany must’ve been a tiger in the sack for you to put up with her for so long.”

I glanced at Henry, but he’d fallen asleep. I’d had Tiffany in every way imaginable except one. I had never made love to her the way I had Lake. Afterward, I’d never had the urge to demand every thought in her head, to feel her heart beat against my chest, to touch every inch of her to know she was real. I’d wanted kids, even if it was with Tiffany, but I’d never felt the deep-seated instinct to get her pregnant the way I’d wanted to with Lake. “You know me well enough that I’m not going to answer that,” I told Gary.

“Damn. I was hoping you were drunk enough.”

“Almost,” I joked. “Not quite.”

Lydia nearly skipped out of the kitchen with metal skewers in one hand, waving the Us Weekly Martina had brought over months ago in the other. “It seems our Manning has a secret indulgence.”

Lydia fisted the magazine, sending a crinkle right through Lake and Corbin. I had a secret all right, but an indulgence? I hadn’t indulged in Lake in years, not the way I wanted to. What I wouldn’t give to run her silky strands through my fingers again, to tug her hair hard enough to make her bite her plump, watermelon-flavored lip.

“Hollywood gossip, man?” Gary asked. “Really?”

“Not that.” Lydia showed him the cover and pointed to Lake.

“Aww.” Gary squinted at her photo. “Look at our girl, all famous and shit. Is that Corbin she’s with? They look happy.”

I looked into my beer bottle and repeated to myself the question that’d been running through my mind since Martina had asked it. What if she’s not?

“Have you seen the show?” Lydia asked.

It took me a moment to realize she was talking to me. “No,” I said.

“Why not?”

I’d tried once more since getting rid of my TV. I’d been at a bar in town and the fucking show had been on in the background, ten o’clock at night. Watching her on screen was like taking a screwdriver to my chest. I’d made it half an episode. When she’d gone on a date with some guy with tattoos and a bike—fine, fuck, it wasn’t some guy, his name was Sean and I’d never forget it—I’d paid my tab and high-tailed it out of there. I had no idea if he was still in the picture or if it was just Corbin. “I don’t have a TV,” I said.

Lydia flipped through the magazine. “There’s something about Lake, don’t you think, Manning?”

Gary rolled his eyes. “Lydia.”

She sat down, piling all the s’mores paraphernalia in her lap as she showed us the tribute to Lake’s dating life. “Look at those guys. They’re crazy about her. I hope she’s dating them all.”

The beer bottle slipped a little under my grip. All? Corbin was enough to deal with. I hadn’t considered she might be seeing more than one of them at a time. What right did I have to be jealous? I’d married her sister. I’d fucked women after being intimate with Lake. I thought of kneeling before Lake that first time, dawn breaking outside the window as I’d explored her. Did she remember my confessions about wanting her in the truck? Did she remember how I’d cleaned her between the legs just to fill her with myself? Did she still feel my hands around her waist after we’d fought and I’d thrown her over my shoulder?

“Say something to me you wouldn’t’ve said before.”

“Okay. On the bed so I can fuck you, Lake.”

“Say another,” she pleaded.

“I want to feel your hands on me.”

“That right there.” Lydia pointed at me, turning her head to her husband while keeping her eyes on me. “What did I tell you, Gare?”

My collar got a little tight, and I felt like I was back at camp again, the police calling me away in front of all those kids. “What?” I asked.

“You get this look when Lake’s name comes up. You always have.” Lydia held the magazine to her chest. “A look you never get about anything else in your life. Or anyone.”

I chugged the rest of my beer and tossed the empty bottle with the rest of the garbage. It didn’t surprise me that I got a look. I knew that about myself. Charles had noticed it. Tiffany, too. I was pretty sure Lake’s mom also knew.

“I always had this theory,” Lydia said. “I think you have a teeny tiny thing for Lake.”

Years ago, I would’ve taken my secret to the grave, but tonight, amongst friends, as an older and wiser man, I just shrugged. “What do you want me to say?”

“Ah-ha! So it’s true!” When she puffed up, she had to catch the bag of marshmallows before it slid off her lap. “I have a nose for these things.”

Gary looked the definition of perplexed, his eyebrows knitting as he whipped his head between Lydia and me. “How teeny is tiny?” Gary asked.

“I’m not talking about this,” I grumbled.

“Is this . . . for real?” Gary asked, drawing out the question. He was high enough to look fucked up, but I knew that wouldn’t get me out of this. I’d seen him hold his own during a political debate after smoking way more than he had tonight.

“No,” I said. “It’s not that simple . . .” I sat forward as Lydia passed me a stick with a marshmallow. I fumbled, nearly dropping it in the fire. “There’s no crush.”

“Who said anything about a crush?” Lydia asked.

I stuck the marshmallow in the fire. “You know what I meant.”

“Dude.” Gary shook his head. “You’re so flustered right now.”

“I’m not flustered.”

“Your marshmallow is in flames,” he pointed out, laughing too loudly.

I blew it out, but the thing was nearly black.

“Was it like that at camp? Did you have a thing for her then?” Gary asked. “You dirty bastard. Flirting with one of the counselors.”

I was sweating. The beer made my thoughts hazy. I ran a hand through my hair and checked to make sure Henry was still asleep. Luckily he was, because he didn’t need to hear this. He was a cop, and a good family man. “It’s not like that,” I said. “I wasn’t . . . I didn’t . . .” Except I was, and I did. I couldn’t deny it, because I couldn’t lie to them. I’d gotten way too close to the line with Lake when I was supposed to be the adult.

“Dude, relax,” Gary said. “She was a sixteen-year-old hot blonde. You think I never flirted with one of the junior counselors?”

I expected Lydia to smack him, but she just rolled her eyes. “You creepy old man.”

“What?” Gary said. “I’m just human. You have any idea what I was up to at sixteen?”

“Spare us,” I said.

“I would’ve put my dick in anyone that let me, but nobody did. Lydia, on the other hand, slept with a college professor.”

I raised my eyebrows at her and teased, “Did he at least give you an ‘A’?”

“She was in high school!” Gary added.

“I told you that in confidence.” Lydia threw a marshmallow at him, then looked at me. “My girlfriends and I had fake IDs and daddy issues. It was bound to happen.”

“You weren’t eighteen?” I asked.

“Seventeen. He was late-twenties.” She stuck her tongue out at Gary. “To this day, it was the best screw of my life.”

Gary grabbed the arm of her chair and pulled her over in the grass. “Lies.”

She wrinkled her nose, then leaned in for a kiss. “Okay, fine. Maybe second best.”

I didn’t know what to think. Lydia didn’t seem fucked up. In fact, her easy intimacy with Gary was making me even more nostalgic than usual. Sometimes I’d sit out here alone and remember those nights at camp. Watching Lake across the campfire. Teaching her the constellations. Walking around the grounds with her in the kind of silence you could only find in the mountains.

The truck, the lake, the stars.

I missed holding Lake in my arms as much as I missed being inside her and kissing her. It occurred to me that I was Lake’s college professor. Someone else would tease her about me the way Gary did about Lydia’s shameful secret.

“You ever see the officers who arrested you out here?” Henry asked.

I hadn’t noticed him wake up, and I wondered how long he’d been listening. I knew Lydia and Gary’s PDA would make him uncomfortable, so I shifted over to answer him. “I’ve spotted one while I was in town,” I said. “But it’s old news. I doubt he’d even recognize me.”

“He might,” Lydia said. “You’re not a forgettable man.”

“When it comes to that whole thing, I wish I were.”

“Remember how you thought Bucky was involved?” Gary said. “He got fired for going through campers’ stuff, so maybe you were right.”

“Who’s Bucky?” Henry asked.

“Camp chef who had it out for Manning for no reason,” Gary said. “Weird guy.”

“He had a thing for Tiffany,” I said. “That was the reason.”

“You think?” Gary asked.

“I know.” I stretched my legs out in front of me. When it came to my dad or Maddy or Lake, I had a problem moving on from the past, but that wasn’t the case with Tiffany. When our marriage ended, that’d been it. I didn’t rehash what went wrong or how badly either of us had fucked up. Neither of us had known our last fight would be just that, but it’d been bad enough that I wouldn’t forget it. Tiffany had wanted to hurt me, and if I was honest, I’d encouraged her. I’d already checked out of the marriage, and I’d needed her to realize it was over, so I’d taken all her anger in stride.

“Bucky hit on Tiffany several times that week we were up here. She told me.”

“I doubt he was the only one,” Gary said. “I mean, she’s not my type, but those kids and their hormones . . .”

“Bucky wasn’t a kid,” I reminded him. “He was just a thirty-something creep batting outside his league. Maybe the lack of oxygen up here got to him or something, but Tiff told me he tried to kiss her the same night I was arrested.”

“How?” Gary asked. “Bucky was with us. We were all drinking around the fire long after Tiffany and the underage counselors had gone to bed.”

“She came looking for me right as I was leaving on the alcohol run but she ran into Bucky instead. He tried to kiss her, and when she shot him down, he told her I’d gone out to the bars to meet women.”

“She never mentioned that,” Lydia said.

That was because what Bucky had actually told Tiffany was that he’d seen her sister, Lake, getting into the truck in a skimpy outfit. Tiffany had confessed to me that she’d been more worried than angry until she’d realized that skimpy outfit had come from her suitcase. It’d clicked for Tiffany in that moment—Lake didn’t just have a harmless crush. She’d been actively trying to seduce me away from Tiffany.

Henry scratched under his nose, looking tired. I figured it was definitely past his bedtime, but he was a detective at heart and instantly read between the lines. “Those two got something to do with your arrest?” he asked.

“Not really.” That last fight, Tiffany had needed to be pushed. On top of everything else we were dealing with, as soon as she’d admitted her involvement, she’d known we were over. “You know how Tiffany is. She was hurt that I’d left, but instead of dealing with it like a normal person, she lashed out. Bucky took her to the dining hall and they called the station to report a drunk driver on the highway. They gave him the description of Vern’s truck.”

Tiffany had wanted both me and Lake to get caught red-handed, but she’d never stopped to consider the kind of trouble we’d get in. For all she knew, Lake and I were having sex, which would’ve been a noble thing to put a stop to—if I didn’t know Tiffany’s reasons weren’t exactly selfless.

“You passed the sobriety test, though,” Henry pointed out.

“Yeah, but that cop was looking for me. If he hadn’t found me on the side of the road and called it in, the police might’ve believed I’d gone right back to camp from the bar. Instead, they were able to place me at the bar, then driving around the neighborhood, and then nothing until almost two hours later, when I was pulled over.” All this was making me crave another beer, but I was already buzzed, and I had to be up early to make a big delivery in Los Angeles. I rubbed my jaw. “Nobody knew where I was from around eleven to one in the morning. Plenty of time for a robbery.”

“If not for Tiffany’s phone call, your chances of getting off would’ve been better,” Lydia said. “It’s almost like she set things in motion.”

If only Lydia understood how true that was. All of our actions over the years had changed the courses of our lives, but it was no more true than with Tiffany and me.

When the beer was gone and the moon was high, we stood and stumbled into the house. Gary and Lydia hadn’t planned to spend the night, but I had plenty of space, so I set them up in a guest room.

Once I left them, I found Henry in the kitchen, picking up. “Leave it,” I told him. “I’ll get it in the morning.”

He wiped his hands on a dishrag and looked around the kitchen. “I could use a cigar. You?”

I was exhausted from the beer, a long day in my workshop, and the time of night, but Henry definitely had something on his mind. He only spoke when he had something to say, so I’d listen. “Sure.”

Henry didn’t smoke, but since he’d been here, we’d taken to having a cigar out front some nights. I sat on a crate on the porch while Henry stood with his back against the railing and clipped two cigars. He nodded at the porch swing. “That’s new since I was last here.”

“It’s not much. Only took me a couple days.”

Some of the pieces, I hadn’t planned to make. The bench had been the result of a custom order. I’d made a crib and rocking chair for a young couple expecting their first child. The night I’d finished, I’d sat and stared at the pieces in a rare moment of pride. A woman would feed her baby in that rocking chair, put him to sleep in a crib I’d made. Not a day went by that I didn’t wonder about the child Tiffany had miscarried. She’d gone in for a doctor’s appointment, and they’d been unable to detect a heartbeat. Apparently, the baby had died weeks earlier, but it’d felt sudden. One day we were having a baby, and the next we’d lost a boy.

The same night I’d finished my customer’s nursery furniture, I’d kept building, and the result was the porch swing.

“You really put a lot of work into this place,” Henry said, passing me the lighter. “Ever consider selling it?”

“You think I should sell?” I asked.

“Not right for such a nice place to sit here empty. Unless, of course, you had other plans for it.”

I toasted the cigar, looking around the house. It meant everything to me, this place, and Henry knew it. I’d built all this with my bare hands. I’d labored over every detail from laying the foundation to installing the toilets. I’d chosen Big Bear for the space, the privacy, and if I was honest, because there was no better place to see the stars each night. “You know my plans,” I said. “You’ve spent the last three weeks here.”

“I’m not talking about your business. I see all the detail in the woodwork you’ve done,” Henry said. “I see how painstakingly you’ve built this home, throwing out anything that wasn’t perfect. It’s true what they said about Lake.”

I looked up at him, thinking I’d misheard, until it hit me that he hadn’t been asleep earlier after all. “You were awake for all that,” I said.

“Yeah, but it wasn’t news to me.” He exhaled a satisfying cloud of white smoke. “That crush, it ain’t teeny tiny, is it? I saw the way you looked at her at your wedding. You wanted it to be her.”

I let his words sink in. Lake had asked me what Henry was thinking at the altar, and now I understood better. Nobody who knew either Lake or myself had been able to ignore the connection between us, not even a man who’d been in our presence for a day. “Yeah,” I said. “Yeah, I did want that.”

“You’ve built a house for a family you don’t have, because you only want it with her. You built this house for Lake.”

I pinched my cigar with all fingers. It wasn’t a shocking realization, really, but I hadn’t had the guts to put it to myself that bluntly. Though Lake had been physically far away for a while, I’d kept her close during all of this. There was insurmountable evidence, though. It was an ugly but unsurprising truth—I’d spent my days building my bird a nest without knowing if she’d ever give me a chance to show it to her. And it wasn’t just for Lake—it was for us.

“Guess I don’t have to ask if you still love her as much now as you did back then,” Henry said.

“More.” I had to laugh at how sad it was. “So much more.”

“So why hasn’t she seen it?”

“It’s not that simple,” I said. “There’s a history there. No way to explain it, really.”

“Try.” When I just looked at him, he said, “Go on, kid. Explain it to me.”

“Where do I start? I’ve hurt her. More than once.” I opened my hands. “The last time was four years ago. She and I decided to give it a shot the same week Tiffany found out she was pregnant. Then after the miscarriage and divorce, I needed time to feel like a man again. When I go back to her, it has to be as the best possible version of myself, ready to give her the best possible life.”

Henry squinted in the direction of the dying campfire, then around the property. “So what’s left?”

He was asking what else needed to be done before I offered Lake everything we both deserved? Would it ever be enough? I scratched my jaw, my beard growing in. I’d been so busy lately, I’d hardly had time to shave. “You’ve got eyes,” I said. “Part of the house is still under construction. The attic needs to be completely reorganized, not to mention I haven’t really furnished the smaller rooms the way I want to. Plus, I want to build that stable in the backyard—”

“What for? You don’t ride.”

“That’s because I don’t have anywhere to put horses,” I said, which was a ridiculous lie. Really, I just wanted an excuse to have Lake between my legs again—if that was what Lake wanted, too—and there was plenty of space here for horseback riding. I had enough acreage for all kinds of animals, and wasn’t that part of what had drawn me to Big Bear? The openness, nature, the opposite of an eight-by-six cell? The ease with which I could read the constellations each night like a good book?

Only one person could grasp why those things were important. The one who hadn’t been able to see the stars at all in New York, and who might need them to light her way sometimes. The woman who deserved all the bells and whistles of a fancy kitchen just to make killer sandwiches. So, for fuck’s sake, yeah, maybe all this was for Lake, and that was all the more reason it had to be perfect before I brought her here.

“It’ll get there,” I said to Henry. “As a man, as a builder, I will get everything as it should be. These pieces take time because they’re meant to survive a lifetime.”

“Son, I know that. Who do you think you’re talking to? But a good amount of time’s passed since the divorce.” He chuckled a little. “Probably not enough. I doubt there’s an appropriate amount of time to wait to move in on your ex-wife’s sister. But what happens if you wait too long?”

Henry was most likely referring to someone else swooping in, but that wasn’t where my mind went first. I thought back to the morning of the terrorist attacks in New York, waking up to see the Twin Towers on fire—and the gut-bursting feeling that Lake was thousands of miles away from me. Logically, I knew she had no reason to be anywhere near the Financial District, but having just moved to wide-open Big Bear, I’d felt helpless. I was dialing Lake’s number before I’d even gotten a grasp on the morning news. I’d been too panicked to worry about the fact that someone else had picked up her phone, but it had set in quickly. Lake and I had spent five beautiful days in her New York, and now, at nine in the morning, another man was waking her up to hand her the phone. As soon as I’d heard she was safe, I’d hung up.

“I hear you,” I said. I wasn’t sure how I’d bring myself to go to Lake after all I’d put her through, but there wasn’t any other way. I couldn’t build her a home and never tell her. I couldn’t not love her. “The day the house is finished, I’ll go to her,” I said. “That day, I’ll bring her home.”

“Huh.” Henry nodded to himself. “I was wondering about that career choice of hers, thought maybe it didn’t seem right, but guess I was wrong. Maybe she needs all that extravagance to be happy, just like her sister.”

“She doesn’t,” I said quickly. Lake only needed me, the way I needed her, too.

“Then quit wasting fucking time, Manning. I’m willing to bet Lake would rather be here now, helping you turn this into a home, instead of losing another few years until you finally decide it’s good enough. Isn’t it good enough for her now?”

I shuffled my feet on the porch. Lake had never made me feel like what I could offer her wasn’t enough. All that had come from inside me, I knew that. “I don’t know,” I said honestly. “I don’t know if it’s enough.”

“You’re afraid. I get it. Love my wife, and I get scared sometimes, too. Something might happen to her, or she’ll wake up one day and realize she can do better.” He shrugged. “Hasn’t happened yet, though, and we’ve had a pretty good life together.”

Was I afraid? There was no question. I’d better have a damn good reason to ask Lake for another chance after her trust in me had splintered over the years. If I showed her all this, and she didn’t want it, I needed to know I’d done everything I could. This was my last shot. Fucking it up wasn’t an option. “I’ve run out of chances,” I said. “Our timing is shit. I can’t try to get her back and fail again—everything has to be right. I need to get this right.”

“You run out of chances when you’re in the ground, understand? There some reason you wouldn’t fight for her until the end?”

I looked over the top of the railing at the fire pit, where embers glowed orange. No reason I could think of. I’d tried to make it work with someone I hadn’t loved, with someone who hadn’t inspired in me the kind of passion that scared me, and I’d failed miserably. It was Lake or nobody. “No.”

“You’re a grown man, son. Fear’s not a good enough excuse anymore.”

Was the house enough as it was? Was I? Henry thought so. Lake thought so. I could give Lake what she’d been asking for since the beginning—us. Not knowing if she still wanted that made everything in my body hurt, but I couldn’t let that stop me if she did want it. “Yeah,” was all I said.

“Yeah,” Henry agreed.

When we’d smoked down our cigars and gone back inside, I started to turn out the lights in the kitchen.

Henry stopped and turned around in the doorway. “You never really had a fair shot at the family thing,” he said. “Everything that happened with Madison and your parents messing you over, it’s tragic, Manning. Really unfortunate. And then the miscarriage. It really breaks my heart.”

My throat got dry enough to make me cough into my fist. Henry had lived all that with me. He didn’t need to acknowledge it, but hearing it from him struck something deep in me. I could comprehend now, as an older man, that a lot of that stuff had happened to me—not because I’d done something wrong. If I’d lost a son years ago when I’d constantly blamed myself for things out of my control, I wasn’t sure I’d have recovered. “I know.”

“You deserve a family, and you shouldn’t have to wait anymore.”

I couldn’t answer him for the lump in my throat. My last contact with my dad had been the letters I’d received in jail a decade earlier. Henry was the only person looking out for me. I didn’t have to tell him he was my family, so I just nodded.

“I want to see you as a husband and a father as much as I want my own kid’s happiness. Stop punishing yourself, and stop punishing Lake. You go be the man she needs, you hear?”

Between Lake’s age and my marriage and prison and losing a son and Corbin—there’d been a lot in our way, but Henry was right; it’d stolen the spotlight for too long. Our timing had never been right, so why not now? I looked up at the roof I’d built to put over Lake’s head, at the dining chairs I’d constructed out of reclaimed wood from this very forest where I’d fallen in love with her, and at the countertop I’d sanded and smoothed until it was just the perfect height for Lake to sit and have me stand between her legs. And I finally made the decision.

I wouldn’t wait any longer to find Lake and bring her home.