Chapter 4 - The Blue HouseMarguerite was waiting at a breakfast place three streets from the cottage, her suitcase beside the table. She looked exhausted. But not terrified. That mattered.

She hugged me, then said, "I don't even know if Desmond did anything wrong."

I sat across from her. "Start with why you left."

She wrapped both hands around her coffee. "The first day was wonderful." They'd cooked dinner, walked the beach, Desmond opened a bottle of wine and told her he hadn't laughed that much in years.

The next day he started talking about Christmas — asked whether she'd rather spend it at his house or hers. "I thought he was making conversation," she said.

Then he drove her through a coastal neighborhood. "He pointed at this little blue house," she said.

"What did he say?"

"'Something like that would be perfect for us next season.'"

"For us?"

"Exactly."

She'd laughed. Desmond hadn't. That evening, when a restaurant server asked if they were visiting, he smiled and said, "My girlfriend just needs a little convincing to stay longer."

Marguerite stared into her coffee. "I'd known him less than a week, Natalie."

"What did you say?"

"Nothing."

"Why?"

"Because everyone around us smiled."

The next morning, Desmond started looking at rental listings — asked whether she preferred two bedrooms or three, suggested she could eventually sell her house since keeping two homes "didn't make sense."

My eyebrows went up. "He said eventually?"

"He said he was thinking ahead."

"And you?"

"I started thinking about getting on a plane."

That night, Marguerite told him she wanted to spend the rest of the trip at a hotel. Desmond didn't yell. He didn't threaten her. He simply refused to accept her reason as a reason. "He asked why I was sabotaging something good," she said. "He reminded me how lonely I'd told him I was." She wiped beneath one eye. "Then he said fear was making me run away."

"Marguerite."

"What if he's right?"

"Do you want to stay with him?"

She went quiet. "No."

"Then that's enough."

She stared at me. I repeated it. "Changing your mind is enough."

Her mouth trembled. "I couldn't call Owen."

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"Because he'd say he knew it."

She nodded. That was when I finally understood why she'd called me. She didn't need me to rescue her from Desmond. She needed someone who wouldn't turn her decision to leave into proof that she'd been foolish for staying.