CHAPTER ONE
At thirty-seven, Ashley Sullivan wasn’t just between gigs—she was officially a has-been. At least, that’s what Hollywood was whispering behind her back.
“The test audience,” the casting director began, her smile stretched a bit too wide, “just didn’t buy you as a rookie reporter.” Her lavender bob had a steely gray cast under the sterile glow of the ring light flickering in the corner as she flipped through Ashley’s headshot and résumé.
Ashley sat on the edge of a gray suede chair, waiting for the real punchline.
“It’s just…Miller Carlton is fifty now, and we need whoever plays opposite him to give more…ingenue vibes.” The casting director clicked her pen, wrote something on Ashley’s résumé, then set both aside as if reluctant to touch them again.
Fifty. And they wanted someone younger to play his love interest? Hollywood math at its finest.
Then came the kicker. “But we’d love to have you read for the housekeeper role. She’s quirky, motherly, fun.”
“Quirky,” Ashley knew, was code for old. “Motherly” meant no more kissing scenes. And “fun” was a death sentence.
“I’ll let you know.” Ashley nodded once, mouth dry, pretending it didn’t sting.
The fluorescent lights buzzed overhead, a low electric hum filling the silence that followed.
She slid on her oversized sunglasses to hide the sting in her eyes and exited the office with a poise that belonged on a red carpet.
She’d cried in plenty of bathrooms, but she would not give this casting clown the satisfaction.
The tears waited until she hit the car.
Once inside, she flipped down the sun visor and studied her reflection in the mirror.
Ice-blonde hair falling in soft waves past her shoulders.
Smooth skin, thanks to a month’s rent worth of lotions and potions.
Thick lashes fringing her emerald-green eyes.
Lips painted in the perfect “barely there” nude.
She looked like success. No one would guess she was pushing forty, except maybe her accountant—or her agent, who’d stopped returning calls.
She pulled out a compact and dabbed away the smudge under one eye. She couldn’t afford to look tired. Even at the grocery store, she wore tinted moisturizer and a confident smile. Because someone might recognize her. Because image was everything.
Especially when you were a struggling actress—and a single mom.
Her gaze drifted to the back seat, littered with the crumbs of Benny’s granola bar from that morning. Ten years old and already sharp as a tack. He deserved so much more than she could currently give him.
Desperation washed over her. She had a ten-year-old to raise and no job, no prospects, and no backup plan. Just a fading résumé, an LA zip code, and an overwhelming fear that she’d already peaked.
Ashley queued up her Girl Power playlist—Beyoncé, obviously—and was about to drown herself in bass and beat when her phone buzzed. She squinted at the screen. Dani. Her little sister.
She let it ring once more, debating. Family calls were rarely convenient and usually emotional. Was something wrong with Mom? Or Dad? One of their endless parade of brothers, sisters, or cousins back home in Michigan?
Still, curiosity won. She swiped to answer.
“Dani. What’s wrong?”
“Well, hello to you too, Hollywood.” Dani’s voice carried its usual mix of warmth and mischief. “I know you’re busy being fabulous and famous—”
“I’m famously unemployed,” Ashley said, letting her head fall back against the seat. “So technically, I’m wide open.”
“Well, that’s perfect. Because I need a favor. A big one.”
Ashley closed her eyes. “I’m listening.”
“It’s the summer theater festival. Remember when you were home for my wedding, we talked about needing a director this year?
We thought we’d found someone, but he bailed last minute—got offered a summer teaching gig in Ann Arbor.
We need someone who knows the ropes. There’s literally no one who knows that theater better than you. ”
Ashley gave a dry laugh. “Dani, I haven’t set foot in that theater in what, fifteen years? I live in Los Angeles. I don’t even remember where the light switches are.”
“It’s a couple of weeks of prep, then the festival.
You cut your acting teeth there. C’mon, it’ll be fun.
Nostalgic. Mom would love to see you and Benny for a nice, long visit.
She’s already planning the art projects the two of them can do.
Please, please, please, sis? We’ll throw a parade in your honor and crown you queen of the island! ”
Ashley didn’t answer. Her sister knew exactly which buttons to push.
“Oh, and there’s a stipend,” Dani added. “Not Hollywood money, but enough to buy some of those fancy red-bottom shoes you like so much. And if it goes well, there’s the possibility of a year-round job, but that probably isn’t a selling point for you.”
Ashley’s gaze flicked to the LOW ACCOUNT BALANCE alert glowing red on her phone. Her stomach turned.
“Maybe you could pray about it?” Dani’s voice softened. “Just…ask God what He thinks.”
Ashley snorted. Pray about it. As if God was taking requests from washed-up actresses sitting in parking lots in Studio City. “Dani, I can’t even get a callback. You think I’m getting divine intervention?”
“I’m serious.”
“Me too. I’m pretty sure my prayers get blocked by LA smog.”
Dani didn’t laugh. “There’s no smog here on Jonathon Island. That fresh air would do wonders for Benny’s asthma. And it would do you some good too, Ash. We could really use you.”
Jonathon Island. The name alone pulled at something deep in her chest. The place where tourists came for fudge and ferry rides, where bicycles outnumbered cars because there were no cars.
Just cobblestone streets, horses clip-clopping past weathered storefronts, and a view of Lake Huron that could stop you mid-sentence.
It was quaint, yes, but also complicated. Too many memories on every corner.
“You know how hard it is for me to be there. Even when I was there for your wedding, all I could think about was Mom and Dad’s marriage imploding in front of everyone, then the fire at the hotel.
The shattered pieces of our family’s image are scattered across the beaches there, and I hate having to face the gossip and the judgment.
” She’d bolted from that island when she was twenty-four, chasing a life with red carpets and big-city lights.
And now here she was—broke, bruised, and circling back to where it’d all begun.
The edge in Dani’s voice dissipated, its sharpness worn down by years of knowing exactly where Ashley’s hurt lived.
“Ash, I was there too, remember? I stayed right here through all the whispers, the sideways glances, the way people acted like our family drama was some kind of beachside soap opera. You’re not wrong.
People talked. But they’ve moved on. It’s time you do too. ”
Ashley stared out the windshield at the palm trees. Her stomach twisted again, but this time, it wasn’t about the unpaid bills or the stale granola bar crumbs.
Her son needed more than a mom who made things look good.
He needed stability. And she needed something that reminded her she had value beyond her fading headshot.
Despite Dani’s suggestion that a long-term position at the Jonathon Island Center for the Arts wouldn’t be a selling point for Ashley, the idea of job security appealed to her.
“I’ll think about it,” she said, voice low.
But even as she said it, she knew. She was already mentally packing their bags.
“Well, think fast. We need you on island in two weeks, if possible. Oh, and to sweeten the pot a little, did you know that Dad is spending the summer here? He’s staying in the renovated part of the Grand. He can take Benny fishing and teach him to sail.”
Their dad, Daniel Sullivan, hadn’t lived on Jonathon Island in years.
He visited occasionally, but he spent most of his time at his hotel in Florida.
Ashley couldn’t imagine what might have prompted him to spend his whole summer at the scene of his biggest heartbreak and humiliation.
And she didn’t have time to think about it now.
“Listen, sis. I have to go pick Benny up at camp. I’ll think about it and let you know tomorrow, okay? Love you! Bye!” Ashley ended the call and peeled out of the parking lot toward her son’s school, a twenty-minute drive if the traffic was in her favor.
Two blocks later, she hit the first brake lights, a crimson river of SUVs, delivery trucks, and posh convertibles taunting her as it stretched toward the horizon.
Of course.
She drummed her fingers against the steering wheel, jaw clenched, the low whine of an ambulance siren punctuated by car horns confirming what she already knew—this was going to be a crawl.
Rather than let the combination of disappointment from her interview and frustration from the traffic sink her into depression, she turned up the volume and let the music buoy her emotions.
Hollywood might not want or need her, but Jonathon Island did, and that was something.
Wasn’t it? Could she take a summer running a small-town theater festival and use it to refuel her career?
Ashley was nothing if not resourceful. She could take a thrift shop find and make it runway ready.
Actresses reinvented themselves all the time.
She turned the possibilities over in her head as her Lexus crawled along the congested LA roads.
By the time she pulled into the pickup line at Camp Imagination Station, the sun was already casting long shadows over Griffith Park.
She’d decided somewhere between the jammed freeway exit and the second time her phone rerouted her.
Now to convince Benny that it was a good plan.