That’s why, on a particularly dismal Tuesday in February when Molly was working at her favorite coffee shop on Grand Street, pointlessly dissecting Needs for the trillionth time, she didn’t mind it when a tall, good-looking man in slacks and a navy overcoat approached her table. His thick hair was dark and neatly combed, his complexion pale—the physical opposite of Jake, she noted, except for his height. The café was packed; he gestured to the seat across from hers and asked if it was taken. Molly shook her head.
He sat down and unpacked his briefcase, but not before extending a strong, sturdy hand, chilled from the cold outside.
“I’m Hunter,” he said, his voice kind. His brown eyes were disarming, and strangely familiar.
Chapter Twenty-four
Molly
July 2022
Molly’s phone vibrates on the counter, teetering across the kitchen island like a beetle on its back. She’s busy scrambling eggs for Stella and lets the call go to voicemail.
“But do you really think we can get an Elsa cake and an Elsa pi?ata, Mommy?”
Stella has been asking questions about her upcoming Frozen-themed birthday party for weeks. No, months.
“I think anything is possible, Stell.” Molly touches the end of her daughter’s button nose. “You’ll just have to wait and see.”
Stella drops her chin into her hand, a wistful sheen blooming in her eyes. She’s such a little dreamer. Molly hopes that will never change.
She slides the plate of eggs and buttered toast in front of Stella and picks up her phone.
One missed call from a number she recognizes instantly, and not just because of the North Carolina area code. She memorized Jake’s number years ago. Molly’s heart bounces in her chest. Did he know hers by heart, too? Or did he still have it saved in his phone? Or get it from Sabrina? There’s no voicemail. Why did he just call her?
Hunter trots down the stairs, and Molly flips her phone facedown on the counter. He gives her a quick kiss, and she inhales the familiar menthol smell of his aftershave. His eyes move over her with concern.
“How are you feeling?” he whispers so Stella doesn’t hear. It’s the day after Molly and Hunter’s latest embryo transfer, their sixth to date. The last embryo left from this round.
“Fine. Nervous. A little tired.”
“Just take it easy today, okay?” He gives her shoulder a gentle squeeze and turns to Stella. “Ready to go, squirt?”
Molly adjusts his tie. “She needs to have a few more bites.”
“I need to have a few more bites,” Stella repeats.
“Eat up, then. Dad’s gonna be late for his meeting.”
After they leave—Hunter always drops Stella at camp on his way to work—Molly stares at her phone for an indeterminate amount of time. She doesn’t think she can bring herself to call Jake back, so she puts in her AirPods—the noise-canceling ones Hunter got her last Christmas—and blasts Laura Branigan while she cleans the kitchen. She brushes crumbs into the sink and sponges down the pans and Windexes the marble counters until they sparkle.
Gloria, you’re always on the run now.
Her mother loves Laura Branigan. She used to blast the cassette on road trips and sing every word at the top of her lungs, Molly and Andrew in the back seat. The music reminds Molly of being young and free. Not a care in the world.
When the kitchen is gleaming, Molly returns to her phone. She pauses Spotify and calls Nina, who picks up on the second ring.
“Sorry, I know you’re at work.”
“It’s fine. I have my own office since I got promoted, remember?”
“Right. Nina Vasquez, director of publicity.”
“That’s me.”
“Proud of you.”
“Thanks, babe. So what’s up?” The sound of her best friend’s voice is like a tonic. Molly pictures Nina sitting behind her desk at the PR firm where she works, her long, chocolate hair swept back while she sips her coffee.
“Jake just called me.” Molly sinks down onto one of the rattan counter stools, the ones from Serena & Lily that Hunter hates. He says they’re overpriced and unoriginal, very keeping-up-with-the-Joneses. He isn’t exactly wrong.
“He called you?” Her friend’s shock is affirming. Molly has already filled in Nina and Everly on everything going on—that Jake is Sabrina’s husband, that the four of them had dinner at Jake’s mansion in Flynn Cove, that she cried in front of him on the Fourth of July. The fact that Molly’s very normal, steady life had transformed overnight.