He'd walk-somewhere-call, breathe, and when this nagging stiffness, this endless aching played out, he'd just text her-better to text-and tell her not to come.

But first he'd take her advice, go down to the beach, take a picture of Bluff House. And maybe he'd wheedle some information out of his grandmother about Abra Walsh.

He was still a lawyer. He ought to be able to finesse some answers out of a witness already biased in his favor.

As he followed the path he'd cut down through the patio, he glanced back and saw Abra in his bedroom window. She waved.

He lifted his hand, turned away again.

She had the kind of fascinating face that made a man want to look twice.

So he very deliberately kept his gaze straight ahead.

CHAPTER Four

HE ENJOYED THE WALK ON THE SNOWY BEACH MORE THAN he'd antic.i.p.ated. The winter-white sun blasted down, bounced off the sea, the snow, sent them both sparkling. Others had walked before him, so he followed the paths they'd cut down to the wet and chilly strip of sand the sweep of waves had uncovered.

Sh.o.r.e birds landed on the verge to strut or scurry, leaving their shallow stamps imprinted before water foamed over and erased them. They called, cried, chattered, made him remember the advance of spring despite the winterscape around him.

He followed a trio of what he thought might be some sort of tern, stopped, took a couple more pictures and sent them home. Walking on, he checked the time, calculated the schedule back in Boston before he tried his parents' house line.

"And what are you up to?"

"Gran." He hadn't expected her to answer. "I'm taking a walk on Whiskey Beach. We've got a couple feet of snow. It looks a lot like it did that Christmas back when I was, I don't know, about twelve?"

"You and your cousins and the Grady boys built a snow castle on the beach. And you took my good red cashmere scarf and used it as a flag."

"I forgot that part. The flag part."

"I didn't."

"How are you?"

"Coming along. Annoyed with people who won't let me take two steps without that d.a.m.n walker. I'll do fine with a cane."

As he'd had an e-mail from his mother detailing the battle of the walker, he'd come prepared. "It's smarter to be careful, and not risk another fall. You've always been smart."

"That roundabout won't work with me, Eli Andrew Landon."

"You haven't always been smart?"

He made her laugh, considered it a small victory. "I have, and intend to continue. My brain's working just fine, thank you, even if it can't pull out how I fell in the first place. I don't even remember getting out of bed. But no matter. I'm healing, and I will be done with this old-lady-invalid walker. What about you?"

"I'm doing okay. Writing every day, and making what seems like real progress on the book. I feel good about that. And it's good to be here. Gran, I want to thank you again for-"

"Don't." Her voice held the hard edge of New England granite. "Bluff House is as much yours as mine. It's family. You know there's firewood in the shed, but if you need more you talk to Digby Pierce. His number's in my book, in the desk in the little office, and in the far right drawer in the kitchen. Abra has it if you can't find it."

"Okay. No problem."

"Are you eating properly, Eli? I don't want to see skin and bones the next time I lay eyes on you."

"I just had pancakes."

"Ah! Did you go into Cafe Beach in the village?"

"No ... actually, Abra made them. Listen, about that-"

"She's a good girl." Hester rolled right over him. "A fine cook, too. If you have any questions or run into any problems, you just ask her. If she doesn't have the answer, she'll find it. She's a smart girl, and a very pretty one, as I hope you noticed unless you've gone blind as well as skinny."

He felt a warning tingle at the back of his neck. "Gran, you're not trying to fix me up with her, are you?"

"Why would I have to do something like that? Can't you think for yourself? When have I ever interfered in your love life, Eli?"

"Okay, you're right. I apologize. It's just ... You know her a lot better than I do. I don't want her to feel obliged to cook for me, and I don't seem to be able to get that across to her."

"Did you eat the pancakes?"

"Yes, but-"

"Because you felt obliged to?"

"Point taken."

"Over and above that, Abra does what she likes, I can promise you. That's something I admire about her. She enjoys life and lives it. You could use a bit of that."

That warning tingle resounded. "But you're not trying to fix me up?"

"I trust you to know your own mind, heart and physical needs."

"Okay, let's move on from there. Or move laterally from there. I don't want to offend your friend, especially when she's doing my laundry. So, as I said, you know her best. How do I, diplomatically, convince her I don't want or need a ma.s.sage?"

"She offered you a ma.s.sage?"

"Yes, ma'am. Or she informed me she'd be back at five-thirty with her table. My 'No, thanks' didn't make a dent."

"You're in for a treat. That girl has magic hands. Before she started giving me weekly ma.s.sages, and talking me into doing yoga, I lived with lower back pain, and an ache right between my shoulder blades. Old age, I decided, and accepted. Until Abra."

He realized he'd walked farther than he intended when he spotted the steps leading up to the village. The few seconds it took him to shift direction, decide to go up, gave Hester an opening.

"You're a bundle of stress, boy. Do you think I can't hear it in your voice? Your life went to h.e.l.l in a handbasket, and that's not right. It's not fair. Life too often isn't either. So it's what we do about it. What you've got to do now is the same as everybody's telling me I have to do. Get healthy, get strong, get back on your feet. I don't like hearing it either, but that doesn't mean it's not the simple truth."

"And a ma.s.sage from your pancake-making neighbor's the answer?"