The Light Over London(16)

Cara smiled. “To the moon.”

Gran squeezed her hand. “And back.”



Gran’s evasion nagged at Cara during the entire ten-minute drive home from Widcote Manor. While she could understand why the fight weighed on Gran, she needed to know what it had to do with Gran’s military service. Just like another family deserved to know the story of the woman whose diary was tucked away safe in the back seat of her car.

She was so caught up in her thoughts that she barely registered the white moving van parked in front of the house next to her little thatched cottage on Elm Road until she was nearly to her drive.

“Oh, you can’t be serious,” she muttered, pressing the brakes. The van was half blocking her drive, making it impossible for her to park on the already-packed street.

She killed the ignition and climbed out of the car. Her keys jangled against her granddad’s dog tags she kept on her key ring as she tucked them into her purse. The van’s doors stood open, showing off to the street two stacks of boxes, a dark green armchair, and a bed frame that leaned in parts against the vehicle’s metal wall. She walked around to the cab and called out, “Hello!”

Somewhere nearby a dog barked sharply, but no one appeared in the wide-open front door of the cottage that had been vacant when she’d left that morning.

Sucking in a breath, she steeled herself to do something completely at odds with the particular brand of British politeness her mother had bred into her. She let herself through the little wood garden gate, walked up the path, and stuck her head into a complete stranger’s home.

“Hello,” she called again.

In the twilight of the autumn night, the entryway blazed with light from a pair of glass sconces. An old-fashioned hatstand with carved hooks stood haphazardly in the middle of the entryway next to a rolled-up rug. Piled up in a corner sat a stack of boxes with “Books” written on them in bold, black marker. An oil portrait of a woman with shingled hair wearing a black bias-cut dress and swathed in a gauzy white shawl was propped against a wall.

Interwar period. Maybe British. I like her dress.

“Is anyone here? I’m afraid the van’s blocking my drive,” she called.

There was a great crash somewhere nearby and a clatter of nails on hardwood. She stepped back hard into the door handle with a yelp as a lanky red Irish setter burst into the entryway and leaped up on her, planting one paw on each of her shoulders and sending the contents of her bag scattering to the floor.

She gave a little laugh as the dog’s long tongue slurped at her neck, nudging up under her chin in an aggressive display of affection.

“You’re quite the handful, aren’t you?” she asked as she tried to ease the dog back down.

A pounding of a pair of feet against the wood floor sounded through the house, and a man with sandy-colored hair flew around the same door the dog had sprung from.

“Rufus, come here!” The man lunged, but Rufus danced behind Cara’s legs.

“It’s all right,” said Cara, stooping to scoop up her wallet and a lipstick.

Rufus barked his approval as he looked out from behind her legs.

The man grimaced and pushed a pair of black-rimmed glasses up on his nose. “He’s hopeless, I’m afraid. He’s already failed obedience school once.”

“What did he do?” she asked.

“It’s what he didn’t do. The trainer called him ‘unmotivated by food,’ which is ridiculous because he sits and stares at me all through dinner.” The man shot her a concerned look. “Are you sure you’re really all right?”

Her back ached a little where she’d collided with the doorknob, but she didn’t want to make a fuss. “I am. I’m sorry to intrude while you’re moving, but—”

A door opened and a beautiful woman with a long blond ponytail swept in wielding a leash. In one smooth move, she snapped it onto Rufus’s collar and straightened, graceful as a ballerina.

“Meeting the neighbors already?” the woman asked.

“I think so.” The man dusted his hands on a pair of faded jeans that looked like they’d seen better days and grinned. “I’m Liam McGown. This is my sister, Leah.” He laughed as Cara raised a brow. “We don’t know what our parents were thinking either.”

“They’ve never been able to keep our names straight,” said Leah, as she stuck her hand out.

Cara shook Leah’s hand, strangely relieved to find out that the pair were not a couple. Not that she cared.

“Cara Hargraves. I live at number thirty-three,” she said.

Liam grasped her hand with both of his as though meeting her was the greatest honor. “A pleasure to meet you.”

When they’d been living in the big house in Chiswick, while Simon was out playing endless games of tennis, Cara had had a habit of spending lazy summer days lounging on a cushioned chaise in her backyard, a stack of romantic books at hand. In nearly every one, the author described the moment of first contact between the hero and heroine as something electric. Tingling skin. Lightning bolts of awareness.

It surprised her, then, that when Liam enveloped her little hand in both of his it was hardly electric. Instead, an awareness of him slid through her like fresh honey dripping from a comb. His touch wrapped around her, soothing her, and for the first time since filing for divorce she had the mad temptation to curl her body against a man’s chest just for the comfort of it.