Page 2 of Bluebell Promises

Her eyes slid to the right, where she caught Juliet dancing with another very handsome man. The way they looked at each other told Wren everything she needed to know. After Juliet had come home last summer—broke and divorced and with an angry daughter who hated Bluebell Cove—she’d fallen in love. But wait. Wasn’t that man Theo? Theo Maddox? Theo had been Juliet’s best friend back in middle school and high school, maybe even before that. They’d always been at home, watching DVDs, and Wren had always begged to hang out with them. Their other best friend, Cassie, had died when she was eighteen, the night of prom. Wren shivered. The onslaught of memories felt violent.

But maybe because Juliet was the closest to her in age, or maybe because it felt like, prior to her return to Bluebell, Juliet had traveled the farthest and “made it,” sort of, as an actress and later a fashion designer of sorts, Wren felt that Juliet would understand her plight. Wren didn’t want to be seen by absolutely everyone. She barely wanted to explain herself. She wanted to get into Ivy’s place, collapse on the bed that had been her bed back in high school, and sleep for twelve, maybe thirteen days. After that, maybe she’d know what to do.

But already, Sophie had made it over to Celia, and she was waving her arms and pointing over at Wren. Wren stood stock-still on the back porch, her ears buzzing with the rock music. She remembered how, earlier, when she’d been sick on the plane, a flight attendant had asked her if she needed anything, and Wren had burst into tears. The flight attendant hadn’t known what to do, so she’d come back with a seltzer water and told Wren to “take care.”

Celia whipped her head around, following Sophie’s pointer finger to where Wren stood, overseeing the party. Her mouth formed a round O. And just as she called out, just as she waved her arm and said, “Wren, you’re here! Come on! Join the party!” Wren felt her knees buckle. She felt the weight of her jet lag and all those miles she’d traveled to get home. And before she could make up her mind about running toward or away from her three sisters, her heart ricocheted in her chest, and Wren collapsed on the porch. She fell like a rag doll, clipping the edge of her forehead against one of the pillars that supported the Eco-Lodge.

All Wren knew was darkness. Maybe it was a relief.

2

Three Months Earlier

Wren received the assignment in May: Santorini, nature and travel photography, sunsets, black sand beaches, glowing waves, and beautiful people. She was in Thailand at the time, but a return to Europe for the summer sounded like a blast, so she booked her flight right away.

Goodbye, Thai food. Goodbye, motorbikes. Goodbye, the loneliness she’d felt on that tropical island, drinking mango smoothies and tanning herself to a golden brown.

The Santorini assignment was from her longtime editor and sometimes friend, Max, who worked for a travel magazine. Four years ago, he’d discovered Wren’s photographs on social media and written her out of the blue, asking if she might want to work on commission. Since then, Max had been instrumental in securing most of Wren’s yearly photography wages. It meant she could continue to travel from place to place, highlighting some of the world’s most beautiful spots and gorgeous people. She adored her career. She adored her freedom.

On the flight from Bangkok to Athens, where she would take a ferry to Santorini, Wren looked over her most recent photographs: elephants in Thailand, food markets in Hong Kong, and monkeys in Sri Lanka. Throughout the past year or so of travels, she’d ramped up her work considerably, selling more photographs than ever while also monitoring her Graves’ diagnosis. The schedule had demanded a tricky balance. But, she reasoned, the diagnosis and the fear around it had only instructed her to live more and say yes to all that life offered rather than to hold back and stay in one place, like her sisters.

When she landed in Athens, she went through customs, where an officer asked, “When was the last time you were in the United States?”

She wanted to laugh at that even though she knew it was inappropriate. “I’ve been away for more than a year, I think,” she said.

The officer raised her eyebrows and stamped her passport. Although Wren knew that she could only be in Europe for ninety days without a visa, she was ready to make the most of this time. After that, who knew what life had in store? Maybe she’d go back to Asia. Maybe she’d head to South America and wait out the winter months, dancing tango and photographing jungles. The world was hers.

Wren had perfectly arranged the times of the flight landing and the ferry taking off. When she reached the port, she boarded the ferry immediately and grabbed a seat on the top deck. The balmy seventy-five degrees felt fresh and breezy after so long in Thailand. Abandoning her backpack briefly, she went to the little onboard kiosk and grabbed herself a Greek beer called Mythos. She cracked it open and tipped it into her mouth. She was celebrating.

But that joie de vivre didn’t last long. The ferry from Athens to Santorini was eight hours, which meant that Wren’s jet lag crept up on her and then crashed in, making her droopy-eyed and exhausted by the time they docked at the port. To make matters worse, Santorini’s port was at the base of what was basically a steep cliff. Getting to the top was not a task for the faint of heart. But because she traveled only with a backpack rather than a rolly suitcase, she told herself to buck up and not pay someone to carry her bag for her—not even someone with a bag-laden donkey—and get to the top. When she reached it, she felt euphoric, but her legs shook beneath her. She needed to find her hotel, get something to eat, and collapse.

Tomorrow would be a big day of photographing if she could get out of bed.

Wren’s hotel was in the town of Oia. Walking through the whitewashed alleyways while concurrently gazing down at the glinting ocean beneath the most beautiful sunset she’d ever seen gave her the impression that she’d died and gone to heaven. The town felt like an impossibility, like it shouldn’t have been built so high up, like humans should have abandoned it long ago, or like some kind of natural disaster should have destroyed it. Thank goodness nothing like that had happened.

But there was a sense, here, that it wouldn’t last forever, that she was privileged to see it before it disappeared. She thought of Atlantis, that lost city that had supposedly plunged into the sea.

Her hotel was tucked away in an alley. It wasn’t the cheapest, but it wasn't the most expensive in the area, which meant her view from the window in her room was the little parking lot outside. At check-in, the wife of the husband-wife team entered her name into the computer, while Wren willed her to speed up. The woman’s husband stomped in, speaking a fast, crazy-sounding Greek, and his wife stopped talking and answered back, as if they were fighting about something. Wren had been two when her mother died, but she’d heard from her sisters that her mother and father (who’d also run an inn together back in Bluebell Cove) had fought like this, too. She wondered if they’d fought in front of the customers.

All Wren wanted was the key to her room! All she wanted was some dinner! Couldn’t they resolve this problem later, at home?

But then, a man in his late thirties stormed down the stairs. He scowled, as though he wanted to yell at the two older people who were squabbling. But instead, he fixed his face into a smile and looked at Wren. “Can I help you with something?”

Wren blinked at him. His English was perfect. After traveling for so long, it was invigorating to see such a strong and handsome Greek man, a man who felt grounded and looked muscular with hair that was rich and curly and textured. Almost immediately, she told herself to stop thinking of him like that. She knew it was wrong to objectify anyone. But still! Look at this man!

“I’m here to check in,” she said.

The man clapped his hands at the married couple, who promptly stopped arguing. Both threw up their hands and left the lobby, maybe escaping to wherever they could argue.

“Sorry about them,” the man said, getting in front of the computer. “They’re my parents, and I love them, but I don’t always know if they should have gone into hospitality. They aren’t that great with people.”

Wren laughed. “We have that in common. My dad could be a difficult man when he wanted to be. He owned his own inn, too.”

The Greek man raised his eyebrows and stopped typing. “Your family has a hotel?”

“We do,” Wren said. “My parents are gone, but my older sisters take care of it these days. They transformed it into an Eco-Lodge.”

“An Eco-Lodge.” The man said the words as though they were beautiful and unfathomable. “That’s really something. But you got out of working there? I suppose it's because you have siblings to take it on. You’re lucky.”