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Arthur’s heart gave a fierce, agonizing thump against his ribs.
For three years, that shoulder had carried nothing heavier than architectural blueprints, corporate audit files, and the unbearable weight of an empty bed.
“Come inside, Eleanor,” Arthur said, turning toward the heavy oak door. “The floors are warm.”
He pushed the door open.
The great hall of Hawthorn Ridge was vast, twenty-foot ceilings of exposed hand-hewn chestnut beams, wide-plank white pine floors that glowed like polished amber, and a massive walk-in stone fireplace where embers of red-oak logs glowed behind heavy brass screens. The air smelled of beeswax, lemon oil, seasoned woodsmoke, and the clean, dry warmth of radiant heating pipes humming beneath the floorboards.
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Eleanor stepped across the threshold.
Her broken boots hovered an inch above the Persian silk runner in the foyer, her face pale, her hands trembling as she looked at the oil paintings of the Susquehanna valley lining the hall, the grandfather clock ticking with a slow, majestic resonance in the corner, and the sweeping mahogany staircase rising into the quiet second floor.
