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longer than she had didn’t look any different rising up on either side of the washboard dirt, their canopy of leafy branches providing the same dappled shade it had provided for decades of summer mornings. It was only when she passed the gatehouse and noted the evidence of decay that had faded its weathered shingles that Lexi saw the passage of time that had lapsed between this visit and her last, and with the proof came the memories. She’d collected mail with Hudson there, left notes for him there, even sought shelter there in a downpour while he’d changed a flat on his father’s sports car.
    But it wasn’t until she’d turned down the last stretch of dirt and the driveway began to widen that Lexi found herself truly pulled back in time. It was the smell, she decided as she parked and climbed out of her car. A fruity sweetness to the air that she always swore she could never detect anywhere else on the Cape, a magical blend of tide and the gardenia blossoms that Florence Moss had insisted on carting up from North Carolina and planting summer after summer, even though the poor things rarely survived the coastal winters. Lexi scanned the side of the house and saw a pair of bushes in bloom, their flowers a flawless white against the dingy grayed shingles, and she smiled. How ironic, she thought. It seemed Florence’s flowers had finally taken to the property, ultimately far more so than Florence.
    Her gaze rose to the house, lifting slowly as if she weren’t sure she wanted to take it in all at once. Not that it was even possible to see it all in one view; that was how massive it was. Still, her eyes managed to capture enough that she felt an unexpected charge of disappointment as she scanned the enormous gables, the curving eyebrow dormers, the chimneys that rose up like two stone skyscrapers, then down to the porch that stretched nearly the full length of the house, as wide and danceable as a ballroom. It saddened her, more so than she would have imagined, to find the cottage so weathered-looking. But it was more than the drooping facade, the parched cedar shingles, the deep green trim that was peeling and faded, the untended lawn. In all the years she’d visited this spot of earth, she’d never known it to be so quiet. It seemed unnatural, as if some law of the universe would require motion on the property at all times: an idling car, a burst of music, the cacophony of screen doors thrown open in unison, the thump of bare feet rushing out, dragging towels and scraping the steps with the metal ends of beach umbrellas.
    And voices! Cries of victory or defeat over a badminton game. Then, when the sun slid down a satin sky and the lawn burned pink and violet, the tangle of party tones blended with the chorus of a string quartet. Bow ties and champagne toasts. Slipped shoulder straps. Heels abandoned in a patch of sea grass. Magic. From her very first visit, despite her every intention to resist its seduction, Lexi had been spellbound. Just like those gardenias, night or day, life had seemed forever in bloom here. Until, of course, the moment it wilted.
    “Alexandra?”
    She turned and saw Cooper Moss coming toward her in jeans and a white-collared shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. She had wondered whether she’d recognize him, whether her memory of him had held up. It had. His hair, though still cut close to his scalp, had darkened from sun-bleached blond to sueded brown. His limbs, still long and lean, moved with the grace and confidence of age.
    He extended his hand and she took it, finding his grip warm and tight. “It’s good to see you,” he said. “I really appreciate your coming down on such short notice.”
    “Of course,” Lexi said. “I’m just glad it’s finally getting on the registry.”
    “Me too. I couldn’t believe it when I heard my father never made that happen. It’s sad, really,” Cooper said, squinting up at the cottage. “All those years everyone took such good care