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Mark and Gray said at the same time.
    Mark really needed Rob to lay off Andie. They hadn’t thrown punches in years, but one more crack, and now might be a good time to renew an old hobby.
    Mark had never thought of Andie the way Rob did. It’d only been Rob’s snotty opinion that she wasn’t good enough.
    Though that had been one of the arguments he and Andie often had.
    He couldn’t help who his family was or what their history had been. And he couldn’t help that some people — not his family — looked down their noses at those who hadn’t been born into the same kind of lineage. But Mark’s home life had never been anything but normal. His father worked hard, his mother took care of his brothers and him, and everyone had eaten dinner together most nights. His dad’s occasional business dinners and his mother’s charity events sometimes interfered, but they’d all made it a priority to be home by seven as many nights as possible. Even when the boys had been teenagers.
    Mark had never understood why Andie had seen his family as anything different from hers or why she’d worried she wasn’t good enough. Of course, he also hadn’t realized until the end that she’d wanted to be a part of what she saw as “better,” as opposed to just wanting to be a part of him.
    “Maybe you two need to go at it while you’re here,” Rob tossed out. “Get her out of your system once and for all. Nothing wrong with dallying with her — she’s got a great bod. Just don’t tie yourself to her and life will be good.”
    Mark stared at the man he’d known since elementary school. “You’re an ass, Rob.” Gray nodded in agreement. But Mark was no better because he’d been thinking the same thing. Why not an affair to get her out of his system? Walking away sure hadn’t done it.
    “Yeah, but an ass with the right kind of wife.” Rob’s smile was more smirk.
    They’d been best friends for years. They’d gone to Harvard Law together. Their fathers had been childhood friends. But they’d drifted apart since Rob had been in Chicago. Hearing the words coming out of Rob’s mouth now, Mark wondered what had held them together for so long.
    Or had Rob simply changed that much over the years?
    A sickening thought rolled through Mark’s gut. Had he once been like that himself? Surely not.
    But if so … maybe Andie’s long-ago argument had held water. Had he treated her like she was beneath him?
    No. He pulled in a breath, refusing to believe he’d ever been that much of a jerk. “Give it a break,” he said. He was tired of this conversation, especially since they’d had it more than once back when he’d been dating Andie. “There’s nothing wrong with her and never has been.”
    He rose and tossed down a tip then headed for the walkway that led to the beach. He was done socializing for the evening. And he wasn’t even going to delve into what had put him in such a foul mood — even before Rob had sat down.
    Mark stopped at the end of the boardwalk and lowered to the top step. He didn’t care about sand on the backside of his chinos, but he wasn’t fond of the idea of going farther and risking ruining the loafers he’d picked up in Italy the year before.
    The sun was just thinking about setting on the west side of the island as he gazed out over the early evening horizon. He could see what Andie always loved about the beach. It was calming. Relaxing.
    And Turtle Island was apparently her place of solace.
    Andie had only hinted at that fact when they’d been together — telling him very little about her home life in Kentucky, and briefly mentioning her times with Ginny — but after the tongue-lashing he’d gotten from her aunt, and then finding out that Andie had been on the island all this time, he had to assume that to be the case. This was her oasis. He was just glad she had one.
    “Not much of a coincidence you ending up here, is it?”
    Mark glanced up to find one of the women he’d just been