“Oh, there will be arguing, too,” she said. “Fights, even. Big families—big control issues. They’re very opinionated, very strong, very nosy. There is always lots of laughter, lots of yelling.”

“I’d love to do this,” Grace said. “But I’ll be honest, I’ve never done a wedding this big or this far away. The people I worked for before coming here to open the shop are in Portland. I know they could do it...”

“Get them to help you, if you want,” Peyton said. “I only want two things from you—flowers and to see you dance at my wedding. I hope a lot of people from Thunder Point will be there.”

Grace gave the situation some thought. There were many different ways this could be accomplished. She could order the flowers and even make the bouquets and arrangements and drive up with them—the van was refrigerated in back. Or, she could transport the flowers and make them into bouquets and arrangements once there. Or, she could have Ross and Mamie order the flowers and she could go up a day early, visit with them and make up the flowers in their shop. They’d be thrilled. She ran over all these possibilities with Peyton and Peyton left the final decision in her hands.

“And now, what can I do for you?” Peyton asked.

“Oh. That.” Grace cleared her throat. “A checkup, I guess. I haven’t had one in a while, like too long. Oh, don’t make that face—it’s only been a few years!”

Peyton’s black eyes grew huge. “A few years?”

Grace leaned toward her a little. “I’ve had lots of physicals over the years, all with good results, but only a couple of those exams. But now it seems I need to be on the pill.”

“Ah,” Peyton said. “Gotcha.”

“Your first thirty-year-old virgin?” Grace asked with a smirk, though she was not thirty yet.

“No,” Peyton said, laughing. “I’m very happy to oblige.” She glanced at her watch. “Can you come down to the clinic this afternoon at around two? That’s a really slow time. Scott will be at the hospital and I can arrange with Devon to get you in right away so we don’t take too much of your time. But I’m going to want to do a blood panel to make sure everything is in order.”

Grace hadn’t been exaggerating—she’d had a ton of physicals. A competitive skater had to be in peak condition, couldn’t risk anemia or vitamin deficiency or, God forbid, some lurking condition like a heart or kidney problem. But this was different.

“I can do that. Two o’clock.”

Nine

Although they didn’t talk about it, Grace realized that she and Troy were having a standoff. She wanted to hear some words of love before she told him the whole story of her life and he wanted the story of her life before there could be words of love. She might be very vulnerable to the promise of first love, but she wasn’t an idiot.

She had kept her appointment with Peyton.

When Grace had visited Peyton and asked her about birth control pills, she told her they’d only been using condoms for protection. “I’m not worried about it,” she said. “But Troy is getting a little nervous about depending only on that when the pill is safer.”

“Perfectly understandable. Are your periods regular?” Peyton asked.

“No, unfortunately. I’m pretty sure I’m due any day now. Seems like it’s been a while.”

“Well, let’s do a physical exam and blood work and then I’ll give you a prescription for birth control pills. You can start taking them the first day of your period, but stick with your other protection until two weeks on the pill. I’ll also give you a pregnancy test to take home just in case that cycle doesn’t arrive—you can check to be sure you’re not pregnant.”

Troy hadn’t even asked her about it. She decided she was going to tell him everything about her past before his friends visited on the weekend. If there was anything about her he no longer liked, he could just sleep on his own couch while they were in town.

She put the morning mail on her desk, went about her work, put together a few floral arrangements for Justin to deliver later. She went upstairs to fix a sandwich for lunch, then cleaned up the shop, made a list of flower orders for the week and visited with customers. It was late afternoon and Justin had already picked up his deliveries before she went through the mail. She leafed through the usual ads and bills, then came across a letter. Her name and address were typed on the envelope and she expected an offer of cheap insurance or something similar. But inside was one folded slip of paper. She opened it and read what was typed across the page.

“I dream of you every night. B.”

She stared at it, mouth open. Her hands began to shake. She looked over her shoulder left, then right. Her breath came in short gasps. She locked the back door. She wanted to go upstairs and lock her loft, but she was afraid to go outside. She grabbed her cell phone and then spoke aloud, to calm herself. “Stop. Stop. You’re alone here. He’s not here.”

But she checked every nook and cranny, in the cooler, the office, even under the desk. She looked into the alley and saw nothing unusual. She didn’t know who to call. Not her mother, who would only say I told you so. Not Mamie and Ross in Portland—what could they do? She finally speed-dialed Mikhail’s cell phone. She had no idea where he might be; he could be anywhere in the world. She usually got his voice mail and was constructing the message she’d leave him when he answered in Russian.

“Mikhail, he found me! I just got a letter. It says what he used to say, that he dreams of me every night. It’s Bruno! Oh, God.”

“Sons of bitches!” he barked into the phone.

“It’s not addressed to Izzy. It’s addressed to Grace Dillon. Here at the shop. Where I live.”

“But he is in hospital,” Mikhail said. “I will call them now. Then I call you. Stay where you are,” he instructed as though she’d leave the phone if she left the room.

“Thank you. I couldn’t make myself call them.”

The first note had come when she was twelve, just a little girl, but her parents hadn’t shared it with her. At twelve she was already a skater with enormous promise and a winner in her age category. Her parents screened everything that came near her, but she saw one of the notes lying on her father’s desk a year later. She got a little excited at first—someone loved her? Dreamed of her? But her mother said, “Don’t be ridiculous! It’s another nutcase! We reported him to the police.”