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“I know you have your reasons, and I’m not gonna pry into them,” Dolly said, rubbing Laurel’s fingers between hers as if she could somehow warm them. “But you better be sure this is what you want, because a thing like this … well, it might just push you further apart. Troubles in a marriage need sorting out, and there’s not much sorting gets done between two people miles apart from one another.”

“I … I don’t know if it’s possible to sort this out.”

“Think. I want you to think now … are you and Adam really gonna be better off on your own?”

Laurel withdrew her hand, lowering her head and pressing the heels of her palms into her temples, as if she had a headache. Dolly waited, tense, forcing herself to remain silent when she wanted to cry out, You don’t know how bad it can be, sleeping in an empty bed, night after night. You don’t know the loneliness. What could be worse than what she’d suffered in the years since Henri?

“It’s Annie,” Laurel said, so softly that at first Dolly had trouble hearing her. “She’s the one he wants. It’s always been Annie.”

Dolly felt her arms tighten with gooseflesh, but she wasn’t shocked, not really. Hadn’t she always known? “Did he tell you that?”

“No. I just know. Believe me, I’m not imagining it.”

“Are you sure?”

“I’m sure.”

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“Okay, suppose it is true. What are you going to do about it?”

Laurel lifted her head, blinking in surprise. “What do you mean? I am doing something. I asked him to leave.”

“Well, if it’s a divorce you’re looking for, then I’d say you’re on the right track. But if you think this marriage is worth fighting for, then I suggest you do something about it.”

“Like what?”

“For starters, letting me put some food in you. Then how about changing out of that awful robe into something nice? Fix your hair, put on some lipstick. A dab of perfume wouldn’t hurt, either.”

“Perfume? Oh, Aunt Dolly, I know you mean well … but lipstick and perfume aren’t going to fix what’s wrong between Joe and me.”

“I didn’t say they would. But you have to start somewhere, don’t you? And if you don’t feel good about yourself, how can you feel good about anything else?” Dolly pushed away from the table, and rose to finish making breakfast. “Now … you want jam with that toast, or just plain butter?”

“Jam, please. There’s some in the fridge.” Laurel looked as miserable as ever, but it was a start.

Minutes later, when Dolly put a plate in front of her, Laurel even managed a wan smile. Looking down at the eggs fried to crispy brown lace around the edges, and toast that was more black than brown, she said, “It looks delicious.”

Dolly felt herself blushing. Laurel was just being polite, and they both knew it. “Well, I never said I was Julia Child. But it’s nice and hot.”

“Thanks, Aunt Dolly.” Laurel touched Dolly’s hand. “Can I ask you something? About you and Henri?”

“Sure, go ahead.” She smiled, even though she didn’t feel like smiling, and nibbled at a strip of soggy bacon.

“Why didn’t the two of you ever get married?”

“Well, that’s easy enough. You know the answer yourself-how could I marry Henri when he’s already got

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a wife?” She kept her voice light, but inside her heart was thudding heavily.

“I know. But if he loved you so much, why didn’t he get a divorce?”

She sighed. “A lot of reasons, sugar.”

“Do you ever see him anymore?”

“Only once in a while. Business, mostly. Conventions, fairs, that sort of thing. We talk on the phone now and then.” It was an effort to keep smiling, but she’d been hiding her heartache for so long she was good at it.

“But you just said that people have to stay together to work things out. Why didn’t you and Henri stay together?”

For a long moment, Dolly sat still, nursing her coffee and staring out at a red squirrel cadging some seed from the bird feeder that hung from a low branch of the maple tree outside the window. How do you learn to stop missing someone, she wondered, when he’s always there-peeking out from behind every thought, crouched at the back of every smile?

“It wasn’t for lack of loving,” she said, choosing her words carefully. “Maybe we were just too far apart to begin with. I know this much-if it’d been me Henri was married to, I’d never have let him get away. Not a chance.”

“This is probably going to sound silly-I mean, I know it’s been years and years-but do you think you and he might get back together someday?”

“I think about it,” Dolly answered honestly. God, did she think about it. But wishing wasn’t going to make it so. She’d faced that long ago. “You want some more toast?”

Laurel shook her head, but Dolly noticed she’d eaten most of what was on her plate. There was a smear of raspberry jam on her upper lip. Dolly reached out and dabbed it off with her napkin. As she was drawing back, Laurel captured her hand and give it a hard squeeze.

At this moment, Dolly wasn’t sorry for what she’d given up … because what she’d gotten in return made her feel so blessed-a family to love, who loved her in return.

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“I’ll clean up here while you go get yourself dressed,” she told Laurel. “And then after that, we’re going shopping.”

“Shopping?” Laurel stared at her. “What for?”

“A dress, that’s what. The prettiest evening gown in Bendel’s, for you to wear tomorrow night at the chocolate fair.”

“But, I’m not-“

“Well, of course you’re going.” Dolly cut Laurel off with a wave of her hand that set her charm bracelet tinkling. “Do you a world of good. And who knows what’ll come of it?”

Emmett, standing in a large workstation near the second-floor entrance of the Tout de Suite factory, breathed in the rich, dense aroma of chocolate. Funny thing, he thought, how a certain smell could trigger a memory. It was that way with him-one whiff of a breeze blowing in off the ocean and he’d feel a rolling deck under his boots, and the rough weave of a shrimp trawler cutting into his palms. Or driving through a field of corn at the height of summer, he’d be seventeen again, making love to Cora Bigsby under a canopy of rustling green, with the sun slatting through, warming his backside.

But years from now, when he smelled chocolate, what memory would it bring? Would he remember Annie, at one in the morning, tumbling into his bed after a long night at the factory, the scent of chocolate on her skin, her hair, her lips? Or would it bring a lump to his throat? Would it make him think of this night … of having to tell her good-bye?

Don’t, he told himself sharply. You haven’t left yet … you haven’t given her a chance to change your mind. He’d tell her about the offer he’d gotten-sales manager

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at Fountain Valley, ninety million dollars’ worth of beautifully-designed luxury houses just outside of La Jolla. An opportunity he might never see again. He’d tell her the time had come for her to fish or cut bait. He needed her. But he needed her once and for all to commit-to become his wife. Or he’d best forget about her, and move on.

He watched her now, working alongside Doug and Louise, her hair damp and spiky from the steamy heat that pervaded the factory, her hands and the front of her apron covered with chocolate. They were dipping plastic leaves into melted couverture for the tree-made entirely from chocolate-that would be the centerpiece of Tout de Suite’s display at tomorrow’s fair. The counter at which Annie stood, he saw, was covered with pans of melted chocolate, marble slabs smeared with chocolate for dipping, and metal trays on which finished leaves were drying. He watched Louise, with the back of her wrist-the only part of her hand not coated in chocolate-push her flyaway blond bangs out of her eyes, and dip again into the brown goo in front of her. When the couverture on the leaf was dry, he knew, it could be peeled off and, using a warm chocolate paste, “glued” to a branch of the tree he could see standing half assembled on a butcher-block table in the middle of the room. Four feet high, its trunk and branches carved from solid chocolate, it was more than ambitious-it was a masterpiece.

“I’ve never heard of anyone being able to make a whole tree from scratch … except maybe God,” Emmett joked, aware of a dull ache low in his belly. What can I say to convince a woman who thinks she can play God that she’d be better off with me?

“Yeah,” Annie sighed, wiping her hands on her apron. “Except God created the whole world in six days, and we’ll be lucky if we can get this display together in the next twentyfour hours. If I stopped to think about how long I’ve been at this, I’d probably pass out.”

“Maybe it’s time you did pass out,” Doug volunteered with a smirk, looking up from painting a veneer of chocolate glaze onto a branch.

Emmett shot him a grateful look. Doug, a short squat

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fellow with a thatch of dark hair and heavy eyebrows, was good for Annie-his constant ribbing keeping her from taking herself, and Tout de Suite, too seriously. Now Doug was consulting the diver’s watch strapped to his hairy wrist. “We started at six-thirty this morning, and it’s now a quarter past midnight. When do we get to turn into pumpkins?”

“Thanks so much, Douglas.” Annie shot a withering glance in his direction, a smile nonetheless tugging at her lips. “How would I ever keep track without you?”

Emmett, looking past her smile at her drooping shoulders and the purplish smudges under her eyes, felt a longing to rescue her somehow, scoop her up in his arms like some heart-of-gold lawman in an old Western, and carry her off into the sunset …

Wise up, he reminded himself. She won’t marry you … she won’t even move in with you… . As far as you’re concerned, bucko, the sun has done set.

Not now, Em, please can we talk about this some other time? How many times had he heard that from her? And, shoot, between her crazy schedule and his, when was there ever a good time? Just this week, he’d been holed up in a lawyer’s office for three whole days, trying to be the fair-and-square go-between on a sales contract, for a gutted brownstone, he thought would never get signed. And he’d had two closings, three evening meetings with out-of-town investors looking to buy second-class office buildings, and in between, a conference with an accountant on a tax-shelter deal.

And tonight, lonely old Haberman stretching out their dinner with coffees and double brandies, so he could pontificate on how what America and the New York realestate market needed was to have Ronald Reagan in the White House cutting taxes. What did some Georgia cracker peanut-farmer know about running a nation? All evening, Emmett had been itching to get away. He hadn’t seen Annie in days, and now, tonight, he had to talk to her.

But here, watching her knock herself out to get her

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display ready in time for tomorrow, he was having second thoughts. She looked really frazzled.

Still, he was here, so he might as well lend a hand.

“Anything I can do to help?” he asked, shrugging off his jacket.

“Yeah, stay out of our way,” quipped Louise, tossing him a smile to show she was just joking. “No, seriously, there is something you could do …” She shot a worried glance at Annie. “Get her out of here. Please. Just for an hour. Take her out and feed her. She’s been here longer than any of us, and won’t take even a five-minute coffee break.”

“Fat chance!” Annie yelled over the hum of the tempering machine as she was carrying a tray of finished leaves over to Doug. Then her foot must have caught on something, for she lurched forward, staggering, the tray nearly sliding from her grasp.

Doug caught the tray, and Annie, with a loud exhalation of breath, rocked back on her heels. Placing her hands on her hips, she glared at Louise. “If I don’t get this display finished by tomorrow and looking good enough to win first prize, I might as well take off for Tahiti … or, hell, just retire for good. Because, trust me, unless I make that deal with Felder, there may not be any excuse left for busting my buns.”

In her jeans and chocolate-smeared apron, her forehead shiny with sweat, she looked ready to collapse.

“Hell, Cobb, it is tomorrow,” Emmett pointed out. He wanted to wrap his arms around her, chocolate smudges and all, and at the same time he wanted to kick her in the butt for being so damn stubborn.

“There really isn’t that much more to do,” Doug told her. “Lou and I, we can handle the rest on our own … trust us.”

“I don’t know …” Annie was weakening, he could see, but she still resisted. “We haven’t even started on those marzipan pears.”

“Lise is coming in at the crack of dawn to do them,” Doug argued. “The dough’s all ready in the refrigerator.”

“But …”

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“Either you go … or we go on strike,” Louise threatened.

“You wouldn’t!” Annie gasped.

“Try me,” Louise replied, her usually pixieish face now plainly in earnest.

Then Emmett, surprising himself almost as much as her, grabbed Annie around the waist, lifting her off her feet and hoisting her over his shoulder. For a fairly tall woman, she felt surprisingly light; it was like hefting a dayold calf.

“Em … stop it … put me down!” He felt her weakly struggling to free herself as he carried her toward the door.

“Sorry, Miss Kitty, but it’s for your own good,” he drawled, clumping his way around counters, carts, stacked boards of cooled ganache. Glancing back over his shoulder, he saw Louise gaping at them.

“Em, I mean it, you’re really pissing me off. This … this … is ridiculous! I won’t be carried out of here like a sack of potatoes! Put me down! I mean it! I have to …” Annie stopped struggling, and started to giggle. “God, if Hy Felder were to walk in right now …”

“Screw ‘im.” He rounded a bank of free-standing metal shelving stacked with shipping cartons. Reaching the door, Emmett tried to kick it open … but his boot only clunked hollowly against the metal. The door didn’t budge. Why was it that in Westerns little things like turning doorknobs never seemed to enter the picture?