LITMIR.BIZ

       Chapter Three

      Everything was happening so fast, Eliza thought as she flopped back onto her bed in a cute little boutique hotel in Jewell Rock. Unlike the neighboring town of Bend, whose popularity was rising by the second, Jewell Rock was still a national secret and therefore there wasn’t an abundance of places to choose from to stay. The few options were all high-quality, rustic, mountain-lodge-type places. Lachlan’s sister Sophie was so very friendly that she’d offered Eliza the couch in her and Annabel’s apartment for the night, but Eliza had politely declined the generous invitation.

      Once upon a time, she’d have accepted such an offer from near strangers—thought of it as an adventure—but things had changed and now she preferred to keep to herself and take new friendships slowly.

      Her cell phone beeped and despite the fact that her limbs felt heavy from exhaustion, she rolled over and reached to grab it from the bedside table. Speaking of friends...a message from Lilly, her best one, popped up on the screen.

      Just checking in. How was your day? Any news on the job yet? xx

      While part of her felt too tired for a conversation, calling was easier than typing out what would inevitably be a long message. She pressed Dial and less than two seconds later, Lilly picked up.

      “Tell me the interview was a disaster and you’re not moving halfway across the world.”

      Eliza almost smiled as she snuggled back into the pillows. That was classic Lilly—no time for greetings and a tendency for theatrics. “Oregon is not halfway across the world.”

      Lilly groaned. “Oh, no. You got the job, didn’t you?”

      “Yes. I start on Monday.”

      “Monday?” Lilly exclaimed. “How on earth are you going to come home and pack all your things and get back there in that time? Where are you going to live?”

      “I’m not coming back to New York.” She couldn’t bring herself to call it home—without Jack and Tyler, nothing felt like home anymore. “Not yet anyway. The restaurant is opening in a month, so there isn’t really time. I don’t need much. I’ll have a uniform for work and I’ll buy whatever else I need locally. And I’ve already found a place to live. It’s an apartment, only a five-minute drive from the restaurant—I might not even need a car. I’m thinking of buying a bicycle and getting fit.”

      Lord knew after all the comfort eating she’d done over the last eighteen months, it wouldn’t be a bad thing if she lost a few pounds.

      “Getting fit?” Lilly sounded horrified. She was married to a chef, wrote food reviews for a popular mommy blog and believed life was too short to waste time exercising.

      “It’s an idea,” Eliza said.

      “A crazy one if you ask me,” Lilly replied, “but moving on. Where are you living? What was Lachlan McKinnel like? Will you get free whiskey as part of the package because...in your situation, I’m not sure if that’s a good thing.”

      Lilly always asked more than one question at once.

      “Don’t worry—I’m not going to become an alcoholic,” Eliza promised. “This fresh start will be good for me, I can feel it in my bones. In answer to your other questions, I’m moving into an apartment next door to Lachlan’s twin sisters. I met one of them this afternoon and she just happened to mention the place next door was vacant. She set me up with the landlord and I checked it out this afternoon. It’s perfect, so tomorrow I’m going to buy a bed, a fridge and maybe a couch, a microwave and a TV. That should do me for starters. And as for Lachlan, I’m not sure what to think of him.”

      “Whoa. There’s a lot to unpack here. What do you mean, you’re not sure about him? Didn’t you like him?”

      Eliza pondered her response a few moments before she told her friend about Lachlan’s ex. “They’re a close-knit family,” she added. “Anyway, my opinion of him personally doesn’t matter—he’s definitely a good chef and he’s serious about making the restaurant a success. Since he’s going to be my boss and not my friend, I guess that’s the main thing.”

      “Yes, I suppose that true. But are his sisters at least nice?” Lilly asked. “Perhaps you’ll become friends with them. I don’t like to think of you all alone across the other side of the country.”

      “They seem nice. A bit younger than us, though—different zone. Sophie asked me if I wanted to join Tinder. Apparently they’ve both signed up.”

      Lilly snorted. “Tinder! Jeez, I’m so glad I met Matthew before the dating scene changed so dramatically.”

      “Mom-my!”

      Before Eliza could say anything to that, Lilly’s two-year-old daughter, Britt, hollered in the background.

      “Mom-my, I did poos in the potty.”

      Eliza felt torn between laughing and crying at the excited little voice. Jack and Britt had been born only three months apart and every milestone Britt crossed felt like a knife twisting in Eliza’s gut. She wanted to be happy for her friend but all she could think about was the fact Jack would never do any of the things Britt was doing.

      “I’ll let you go,” she said, choking up. “Tell Britt I said well done, and I’ll send you some photos of my new place tomorrow night when I’ve furnished it a little.”

      “All right, my love,” Lilly replied. “Chat soon.”

      Eliza had barely disconnected from her friend when the phone started ringing again.

      “Grammy,” she said as she answered.

      “Hello, my darling,” came her grandmother’s singsongy voice down the line. “I’ve just got in from salsa and I’m dead on my feet, but I couldn’t go to bed without checking in on my favorite granddaughter.”

      “I’m your only granddaughter.”

      “Even if I had a hundred grandchildren, you’d be my favorite,” Grammy said. “Now, tell me, did you get the job?”

      “Yes.” Eliza filled her grandmother in on her day.

      “Wow—that’s quite a jam-packed day. But tell me, is Lachlan McKinnel as good-looking in person as he is in his photos?”

      Eliza frowned. “How do you know what he looks like?” Although he’d appeared on a local TV show cooking segment, until she’d seen the advertisement for the job and searched online, she’d never heard of him and she was pretty sure her grandmother hadn’t either.

      “You don’t think I’d let my favorite granddaughter fly all the way to Tombouctou without doing a little research.” As far as Grammy was concerned, anywhere outside of Manhattan was the end of the earth. “Well, is he good-looking?”

      Something quivered low in Eliza’s belly—indicating that she wasn’t as numb as she’d thought. It was quickly followed by guilt that she could be feeling anything so frivolous. “It doesn’t matter what he looks like. What matters is that he’s passionate about food and has offered me the

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