Page 113 of The Sugar Maple Inn

She slammed on the brakes. “ZACH!”

Her son yanked open the back door and threw his scooter in. “I heard you shouting about Reese. I’m coming. You might need this scooter.”

“Zach, you have homework—”

“MOM. I’m not missing this. Someone needs to film it for TikTok.”

“Absolutely not—”

“Too late, I’m in. GO!”

Grace hit the gas, the Subaru coughing to life like it was being personally offended by the request to move quickly. They made it half a block before she saw Sophie running down the sidewalk, waving her arms.

Grace stopped. Sophie yanked open the back door and squeezed in next to Zach as Zach placed his scooter on the floor.

“Abbey called me,” Sophie panted. “Said she could see from her apartment that you were doing something mental. Obviously I’m coming.”

“There’s no room!”

“There’s always room for true love!” Sophie was already wedged in, seat belt clicking. “Besides, you’ll need backup. What if he says no? What if he’s already moved on? What if—”

“SOPHIE.”

“Right, sorry. Positive thoughts only.”

Grace started the car again. “Mom, you’re doing forty in a fifty zone,” Zach said.

“This car can’t go faster than forty!”

“Yes it can!” Mabel said. “You just have to believe in her!”

Grace pressed harder on the gas. The Subaru shuddered, groaned, then lurched forward with surprising force. They careened through Solace Springs, past the lake, past everyone and everything Grace had ever known, heading for the highway.

“How much time do we have?” Grace asked.

Caleb checked his phone. “Thirty minutes.”

“We’re twenty-five minutes away,” Sophie said. “If there’s no traffic.”

“There’s ALWAYS traffic near Boeing Field!” Mabel said.

“POSITIVE THOUGHTS, PEOPLE!”

The Subaru rattled on to the highway, every piece of it protesting the speed. The check engine light flickered on. Something under the hood made a sound like a cat being strangled. Autumn leaves that had been stuck in the door frame went flying out the windows.

“Come on, baby,” Grace whispered to the car. “Just get me there. Please.”

As if in response, the Subaru gave one more violent shudder and then smoothed out, hitting sixty like she’d been saving it for just this moment.

Twenty minutes later, they screeched into Boeing Field’s private aviation terminal. Grace abandoned the car in what was probably not a parking spot. Definitely not a parking spot, actually, given the security guard already heading their way—and ran.

Her mother, Caleb, Sophie, and Zach were right behind her.

“Gate C!” Sophie yelled. “There!”

Grace burst through the doors into the private terminal. It was all glass and steel and quiet wealth, the kind of place where people didn’t run or shout or arrive in twenty-year-old Subarus covered in leaves.

And there, across the tarmac, was the helicopter.