Chapter Four – Rachel
Rachel threw herself back into the rest of the shift, only it took more effort than usual to stay inside it.
Menus straightened. Candles checked. Bookings confirmed.
A note was added to table four when Elliott spotted she had missed a couple’s request for the corner table.
A brief thanks from her. A brief nod from him. Nothing more than that.
It should have helped that he kept his distance.
Instead, somehow, it only made her more aware of him.
She noticed when he crossed the room with a crate in his arms. Not because he drew attention to himself, but because he didn’t. He stepped in where he was needed, moved when someone had to pass, listened when spoken to, and worked as if he had always belonged there.
And then, not long before the end of her shift, he was gone.
No announcement. No grand goodbye. Just one moment there, talking to Caleb, and the next gone, leaving her with the faint sense of something missing.
Rachel hated how quickly she felt it.
The girls leaving had left its own small ache behind them, but this was different. Sharper. Harder to explain away. As if some restless part of her had been aware of him every minute he was in the room and did not know what to do with his absence now that he had gone.
That was part of the problem, too.
He hadn’t pushed for attention, even though she had felt him watching her. Hadn’t tried to impress her with stories of his travels.
It would almost have been easier if he had. If he had forced himself into her world, she could have dismissed him as not the kind of man for her.
But the way he had respected her boundaries, the way he had spoken to the girls, left her feeling the opposite.
As if he were exactly the kind of man for her.
By the time the shift finally thinned enough for her to leave, Rachel felt wrung out.
She collected her coat from the back hall, checked Tessa’s message to say the girls had eaten, and stood for a moment with her hand on her bag.
Going home should have felt like relief.
Instead, it felt as though she was carrying the whole problem with her.
Home was a three-bedroom rental on the edge of Bear Creek, with a small patch of garden and windows that caught what was left of the evening light.
Rachel had filled it slowly over the past few months with secondhand furniture, library books, bright blankets, and the small, ordinary things that made a place feel lived-in.
A row of shoes by the door. Drawings on the fridge. Her key dish on the hall table.
The kitchen light was on when she opened the door.
Mrs. Harmon looked up from the table, where Lucy was bent over a spelling sheet with fierce concentration. “There you are, love,” she said. “Tessa dropped them off not long ago. They’ve eaten. There’s a plate in the oven for you, and she left one of her little notes on the side.”
“I did my spellings,” Lucy announced without looking up. “Mostly.”
Aria was sitting at the far end of the table with a book open in front of her, curled into the corner as if she had been perfectly content there for some time. She looked up when Rachel came in, then tucked a finger into the page to keep her place.
“Thank you,” Rachel said, setting down her bag. “I appreciate you coming over. The extra hours help with the bills.”
Mrs. Harmon waved that aside as she reached for her cardigan and handbag. “It’s a pleasure. They make me smile. And I spend far too much time on my own, so never be afraid to ask.”
Rachel bent to kiss the top of Lucy’s head, then crossed to Aria and kissed her forehead too.
“How was the rest of your afternoon?” she asked.
“Good,” Aria said.
Lucy looked up then, pencil still in her hand. “We did homework.”
Mrs. Harmon smiled. “And there was very little complaining, for once.”
“That’s because I liked my homework today,” Lucy said.
Aria turned a page. “You still complained quite a lot first.”
Rachel laughed softly. “That sounds more believable.”
Mrs. Harmon smiled at all three of them. “Night, then.”
“Night,” Rachel said. “And thank you.”
“Night,” the girls chorused.
When the door shut behind her, the house settled into its usual evening sounds. The tick of the kitchen clock. Lucy’s pencil scratching across the paper. Aria turning a page. The faint hum of the oven warming the plate Tessa had left for her.
Usually, that was enough to settle Rachel, too.
Tonight it wasn’t.
She found Tessa’s note propped beside the bread bin, written on the back of an old shopping list.
They ate well. Lucy had seconds. Heat yours up and sit down for five minutes. I left you a bottle of wine in the fridge. Enjoy. x
Rachel smiled despite herself. The wine would be most welcome tonight of all nights. But after the girls had gone to bed.
“Mom?” Lucy said as Rachel fetched a loaf of bread and set it down on the counter.
Rachel turned. “Hmm?”
Lucy had stopped writing and was watching her now. “Is Elliott your friend?”
Heat rose into Rachel’s cheeks, and she turned away to open the drawer for the bread knife.
“I only met him today,” she said after a moment. “He’s been away, remember.”
Lucy frowned. “I know that. But is he your friend?”
Rachel cut a thick slice of bread, then went to the fridge for the butter. “I suppose, since we’re friends with the rest of his family.”
“He’s nice,” Lucy said. “He told us about fermented fish.”
Aria looked up from her book. “You asked him about fermented fish.”
“I know, but he still answered,” Lucy said, as if that proved the point. Then she tilted her head. “Will he be there tomorrow?”
Rachel fetched her dinner from the oven and sat down, though she had suddenly lost interest in eating. “I don’t know.”
“But maybe. Since he is a Thornberg and it is the Thornberg Restaurant,” Lucy said. “Only I’d like to ask him more about where he’s been and the food he’s eaten.”
“Okay, but don’t pester him. If he’s busy doing something else, don’t bombard him with questions,” Rachel said.
Aria closed her book over one finger and looked at Rachel properly. “He seemed to like answering our questions today.”
Rachel looked at her.
It was not only what Aria had said. It was the way she said it, quietly, as if she had mulled it over in her head.
“Yes,” Rachel said after a moment. “He did.”
Lucy went back to her spellings, coloring in the bubble letters of one word while she talked. “He said getting lost can help you find good food.”
“That does not sound like the most sensible way to find good food,” Rachel said, though she could hear the smile in her own voice.
“It does if you’re in Thailand,” Lucy said.
As Rachel picked up her fork and started eating, she realized it had already started. Elliott was already part of their lives, even after one afternoon.
Later, after the girls had both had baths, Rachel sat on the edge of Lucy’s bed with the storybook open across her lap. Lucy, pink-cheeked and sleepy now, curled under the blanket with her favorite toy clutched to her chest while Rachel read the last few pages.
When she closed the book, Lucy blinked up at her and asked, “If he’s there tomorrow, can I ask him about elephants?”
Rachel smoothed her hair back from her forehead. “Sleep now, sweetheart.”
“But if he is…”
“Sleep,” Rachel said, gentler this time. “I love you.”
Lucy sighed, but the sigh already sounded half-asleep. “Okay. Love you too.”
Rachel kissed her forehead, switched off the lamp, and pulled the door almost closed behind her.
Aria was still awake when Rachel looked in on her. She was sitting cross-legged against the pillows with her book open again, her hair still slightly damp from her bath.
“You’re meant to be sleeping,” Rachel whispered.
“In a minute,” Aria replied. “I only have a couple of pages left.”
Rachel leaned against the doorframe.
Aria kept her eyes on the page when she asked, “Does Elliott live in Bear Creek?”
Such a small question.
Rachel folded her arms lightly across herself. “I think he has a cabin somewhere. Eleanor has been tending his garden and looking after the place while he’s been away.”
Aria nodded as if that was all she had wanted to know, then turned the page.
Rachel stood there a moment longer. “Sleep as soon as you finish your book. I love you.”
“Love you too,” Aria replied without looking up.
Downstairs, she moved through the rest of the evening on habit. Lunch boxes prepped, coffee ready for the morning, school shoes by the door, kitchen cleaned and ready for a new day.
That was what had held them together.
Not luck. Not hope. Routine. Repetition. The comfort of knowing what came next.
And that was why this frightened her so much.
Not Elliott himself.
How quickly he had slipped into their world. A question at the table. A name at bedtime. Lucy was already talking as though tomorrow might include him. Aria noticing things Rachel would rather she didn’t.
Rachel went to the fridge and took out the bottle of wine Tessa had left for her. Thornberg Vineyard, of course.
As she poured herself a glass, she realized that Elliott Thornberg was part of their lives, whether she wanted him to be or not.
All she could do was set boundaries and hope he would respect them.