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Synopsis
USA Today bestselling author Debbie Mason takes another trip to Sunshine Bay in this heartwarming story about family, love after loss, and self-discovery—perfect for fans of Jill Shalvis and Jenny Hale.
Release date: June 10, 2025
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Print pages: 320
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The Sweet Life
Debbie Mason
The high-pitched wail of a phone alarm dragged attorney Sage Rosetti from her recurring nightmare—the one where she stood naked in the front of a packed courtroom as the judge ruled in favor of her client’s ex.
Over the alarm, Sage heard her assistant Brenda’s voice and realized that she had fallen asleep at her desk again.
“Trust me, Sage can sleep through almost anything. This is the third time this week she’s pulled an all-nighter,” Brenda said.
Sage didn’t think her team finding her asleep at her desk was a good look and tried opening her eyes, but apparently her body wasn’t taking orders from her brain.
“Doesn’t she have a partner or friends?” asked another woman, whose voice was almost as annoying as the alarm that had gone blessedly silent.
“No. All she does is work.”
Hey, she had friends… Family counted as friends, didn’t they? Sage managed to pry one eyelid open. Hovering by her desk were the blurred faces of Brenda and the junior lawyer who’d been assigned to Sage’s team yesterday afternoon.
“If that’s what it takes to make partner at this firm, I’d better start applying elsewhere. Work-life balance is a priority for me.”
Sage snorted at the idea of work-life balance—but she must have snorted in her head, because the two women kept talking as if she weren’t lying with her face on her keyboard, eyeballing them.
“Sage is a junior partner,” Brenda informed the newest member of their team. And given how the founding partners felt about her inability to toe the company line, she would remain so until the three octogenarians either retired or dropped dead.
“Really? I thought she’s one of the most sought-after divorce attorneys in Boston and makes the big bucks.”
“She is, and she does. It’s just that the founding partners are—”
Brenda’s intention to share their low opinion of the founding partners with a brand-new associate was the impetus Sage needed to lift her bowling-ball-heavy head off the desk. “What time is it?” she rasped, peeling the keyboard from her cheek.
“Time that you picked a new alarm for your phone. It’s been proven that the Radar alarm ringtone elevates people’s blood pressure and makes them grumpy,” Brenda said, handing Sage her cell phone with a pointed look.
Sage ignored her assistant’s insinuation that she was grumpy first thing in the morning. In her opinion, the morning didn’t officially begin until she’d consumed at least one grande Americano.
Bleary-eyed, she held the screen to her face. Nothing happened.
“You might want to fix your hair and your, uh, face. You were drooling,” Brenda added, a smile flirting with her lips.
Sage pushed to her feet, feeling every minute of the time she’d spent asleep at her desk. Her knees creaked as if she were eighty instead of thirty as she hobbled to the closet-size bathroom off her office. She might not be an equity partner, but that tiny sink, mirror, and toilet more than made up for the bonuses she missed out on.
Sage winced when she caught sight of herself in the mirror above the sink. No wonder her phone didn’t recognize her face. Her hair looked like she’d had a good time in bed with the partner she didn’t have and didn’t want, if her clients’ relationships were an example of the price you paid for love. Her smudged mascara made her look like a raccoon, and thanks to the drool, there was a streak of red lip stain dangling from the corner of her mouth to her chin. She couldn’t decide whether she looked like a rabid raccoon or the bride of Frankenstein.
As she finished up in the bathroom and washed her hands, she heard Brenda say, “Forbes, Poole, and Russell… Oh, hi, Ms. Rosetti. Carmen, of course. I’ll get Sage for you.”
Sage darted from the bathroom waving her hands and mouthing, I’m not here!
Carmen Rosetti was her grandmother. Ninety percent of the time, Sage adored her, but the other ten percent of the time, her grandmother got on her last nerve. Lately, it had been closer to twenty percent of the time.
Sage hadn’t visited her family on Sunshine Bay in months due to her heavy caseload, and there was no one who did guilt better than an Italian grandmother. Carmen knew every last one of Sage’s buttons to push, and she pushed them like a gleeful toddler.
“Sage, do you—” the junior lawyer began, her overloud voice nearly drowning out Brenda, who was in the middle of covering for Sage.
“I’m sorry, Carmen. She left the—” Her assistant sighed. “Yes, I did hear that. She just returned to the office for her phone. Here she is.”
Sorry, Brenda mouthed, handing the phone to Sage.
If the junior lawyer followed through with her plan to quit, Sage was requesting a low talker for her replacement. “You’ll have to make it quick, Nonna. I’m due in court in an hour.”
Three hours, actually, but she had to see how far she’d gotten on the briefs before she’d fallen asleep. They were due to opposing counsel this afternoon. She prayed she hadn’t hit the Delete button with her cheek.
“Work, work, work, that’s all you do. No time for your family. I’m not getting any younger, you know.”
Sage tucked the office phone between her ear and shoulder and walked to her desk. After placing her own cell phone beside the keyboard, she woke up her computer. “You’ll probably outlive us all. You’re in better shape than I am.”
Sadly, it was true, but it was also true that her grandmother at seventy-four wasn’t getting any younger.
Bringing up her calendar on the screen, Sage continued, “I’ll come this weekend. I can fit you in on Sunday from twelve to five.”
“What? You’re such a big shot now that we have to make an appointment to see you?”
Sage winced. “No, of course not. It’s just that my caseload is heavy right now, and if I don’t work on the weekend, I’ll get behind.”
Back in January, she’d represented a high-profile client whose divorce had received a lot of attention in the press, in part due to the exorbitant support payments Sage had demanded for her client, and subsequently received. The publicity from the case was the reason she’d been inundated with new clients… and made junior partner.
She glanced at her calendar, mentally moving things around. “How about I sleep over on Saturday? We can have a movie night with everyone at Zia Eva’s.” Her aunt Eva had a large oceanfront home and would happily host a family movie night. It would be nice to see everyone, Sage grudgingly admitted to herself, even if it required her to pull another all-nighter.
“Si, that’s good. We need to talk about your mother.”
Sage sighed. She was the Rosetti family’s official problem solver. “Okay. We’ll talk Saturday night. I have to go—”
“Come for a late lunch. We’ll have time to talk before the movie then. I’ll make gnocchi the way you like it.”
Sage’s stomach grumbled at the mention of food. She couldn’t remember when she last ate, and there was nothing she liked to eat more than her grandmother’s fried potato dumpling pasta with Gorgonzola cream sauce and fire-roasted tomatoes, which Carmen well knew. Her grandmother could offer master classes on the art of manipulation.
Sage could use a master class on the art of saying no, but she had been missing her family. At least she had been when she’d had a moment to think about anything besides work. She reminded herself that she loved her job, and she really did.
There was nothing more satisfying than ensuring that women were protected, financially as well as mentally, and sometimes physically, from the men who’d promised to love and cherish them but instead treated them so badly that they destroyed their confidence and stole their identity.
She’d been raised by three strong and loving single mothers who went out of their way to help other women. Sage had known from an early age that she wanted to do the same. Except she didn’t provide a shoulder to cry on or an ear to listen or free meals and babysitting services. She went after the men where it hurt most, their bank accounts.
“Okay. Ciao, Nonna. I’ll see you Sat—”
“Don’t hang up! I didn’t call to chat. I called to ask you about Alice Espinoza. She’s missing.”
Sage slowly lowered herself onto her chair. “What do you mean, she’s missing?”
“What do you mean, what do I mean? She’s missing. It says so on Facebook. No one has seen her since yesterday. You haven’t heard from her, have you? She didn’t come to the city to see you?”
As much as Sage’s mother, aunt, and grandmother had been her role models, Alice Espinoza was the reason she’d become a lawyer. Alice had begun mentoring her at sixteen, and Sage had spent the majority of her weekends and school holidays with Alice at her home and law offices on Ocean View Drive.
“I haven’t spoken to her since…” Sage racked her brain, trying to remember when they’d last talked. She was positive it had been within the past two months, but then it hit her. “… New Year’s Eve.” She briefly closed her eyes at the realization she hadn’t spoken to Alice in five months.
She’d called Sage around nine o’clock on New Year’s Eve. They’d laughed at their similar plans for the night, working at home while watching Anderson Cooper and Andy Cohen ring in the New Year. Then Alice had shared her surprising news. She was buying a lavender farm outside Sunshine Bay. She planned to relocate her law practice to the farm as well. Sage had promised to help her with the move, and Alice had texted her the date last month. Sage had meant to call her, but time had gotten away from her.
Sage grabbed her cell phone, opened it with her face, and went to Facebook. Her sister, Willow, had uploaded Facebook and Instagram onto Sage’s phone two years ago in a futile attempt to convince Sage that some people actually had lives apart from their jobs. The only reason Sage hadn’t deleted the apps was because her mother, aunt, and grandmother regularly posted videos on La Dolce Vita’s account to promote the family’s Italian restaurant. “Who posted about Alice?”
“Her assistant posted on the firm’s account, and your sister posted twenty minutes ago on Good Morning, Sunshine! Willow asked anyone who’s seen Alice recently to contact the police.” Sage’s sister hosted a morning talk show on Sunshine Bay’s local television station. Sage heard clicking, and then her grandmother said, “Sunshine Bay Police Department just posted that someone saw Alice riding her bike around sunset yesterday on Route 6A.”
Sage frowned. The route would take Alice to the farm, and Sage knew from Alice’s text last month that she had no plans to move in until the sale of her home on Ocean View Drive closed a few weeks from now. The farmhouse had needed a new roof and the plumbing and electrical systems updated.
Sage found the post and began scrolling through people’s responses to the sighting. Several mentioned seeing Alice in town earlier in the week, and then SBPD posted a photo.
At the sight of the iridescent purple bike lying in a ditch, Sage covered her mouth. “That’s Alice’s bike.”
She’d know it anywhere. Alice had been riding the same bike for as long as Sage had known her.
It took several shaky attempts before Sage got the bottom drawer of her desk unlocked. Once she did, she grabbed her purse, tossed her cell phone inside the oversize leather bag, and shot from the chair. It wasn’t until she was halfway out the door that she remembered she had to be in court.
Looking as panicked as Sage felt, Brenda waved her off. “Go. We’ve got this. We’ll ask for a postponement.”
“But the briefs. I—”
“I’ll call you if there’s a problem, but I’m sure they’re fine. Now go, and let us know if… when you find Alice,” Brenda corrected herself, biting her bottom lip as she glanced at one of the photos on Sage’s desk. It was of Alice and Sage on the day Sage had received her JD degree from Harvard.
“Are you sure? I haven’t had a chance to review anything with…” She couldn’t remember the junior lawyer’s name. Sage hadn’t been a part of the hiring process, even though she’d asked to be.
The one and only female senior partner at the firm, and the lawyer who’d hired Sage, had recently retired. She’d been an old friend of Alice’s. She would have made sure Sage had been involved in the hiring process. She’d always had her back.
“That’s why you have me. Now get out of here. Wait!” Brenda called.
Sage stopped and turned, sighing when Brenda motioned to the phone still clutched in Sage’s hand. She brought it to her ear. “Nonna, I’ll see you in a couple of hours. Call me with updates, okay?”
“Si, si, you drive carefully. Try not to worry. I’m sure Alice is fine,” her grandmother said before disconnecting.
Carmen didn’t sound like she believed that Alice was fine any more than Sage did.
“I’m about a mile out,” Sage told her sister, who’d called with the latest update.
In the time it had taken Sage to get from downtown Boston to the outskirts of her hometown, SBPD had begun organizing a search party. They were doing a grid search from the farm to where Alice’s bike had been located. They had at least five miles to cover.
The police were working on the theory that a driver, blinded by the setting sun, had accidentally hit Alice, panicked, and left the scene. They surmised that Alice had been hurt and wandered away from the accident site, either in search of help or in a state of confusion.
“Sorry! I’m going to join another search team with my sister,” Willow called to someone.
“No, you go with them, Will. I want to talk to the police and the search coordinator. I’ll catch up with you.”
“Are you sure? You and Alice are so close. I don’t want you searching for her with a bunch of strangers. What if—”
“Don’t.” She cut off her sister before she could voice Sage’s own fears. “Alice probably went for a walk on one of the trails at the farm with her earbuds in, completely unaware of the fuss she’s caused. She’ll be mortified when she finds out.”
Instead of turning right toward the ocean, Sage headed left.
She had a general idea how to get to the farm. When she was younger, she’d accompany her mom to pick lavender every summer. Her mom was the crunchy granola type—low maintenance, into yoga, all-natural products, and reducing her carbon footprint. Sage wouldn’t have been surprised if her mom bought the farm, but she’d been shocked Alice had. “I’m going to the farm.”
“Sage, I don’t think that’s… Fine. We’ll meet you there,” her sister said, and began calling out the names of the Rosetti family and the Monroes, Willow’s newfound family.
It sounded like everyone had turned out, including Sage’s aunt Cami, who’d been estranged from the family for more than two decades. Last summer, they’d discovered she was Willow’s biological mother. It didn’t matter to Sage. Willow would always be her sister, even if she was technically her cousin.
The traffic was heavier than Sage expected as she got closer to the turnoff to the farm. Then she saw why. There were several police cars and emergency vehicles parked on the side of the road. She slowed her silver BMW and pulled off onto the gravel shoulder, noting a line of vehicles behind her doing the same.
Her stomach dropped when two German shepherds and their handlers walked over to the group of law enforcement officers. Somehow, seeing the search-and-rescue dogs hit harder than seeing the photo of Alice’s bike in the ditch. It made it more real. Alice really was missing.
With every intention of joining the search, Sage reached over the red leather seat for a pair of white sneakers. She kept them in her car on the off chance she’d have time to get in a walk on her lunch hour. They’d never been worn.
She slipped off her sensible heels and then opened the car door. A warm breeze carrying the sweet scent of lavender filled the car. The day promised to be hot for late May. It was ten thirty and already seventy-two degrees without a cloud in the bright-blue sky.
She took off the cream linen blazer with the black tuxedo side stripes that she wore over a black etched floral blouse and a black skirt, laying it on the passenger seat before slipping on her sneakers. As she got out of the car and shut the door, locking it with the app on her phone, a man caught her attention.
He had his back to her, talking to a group of first responders. They seemed to be paying close attention to whatever he was saying. She didn’t think he was law enforcement, though. He wore a white T-shirt, faded jeans, and a pair of scuffed brown leather motorcycle boots. This didn’t rule out that he worked at SBPD, but she knew most of the members of the small force and didn’t recall anyone with his longish, copper-streaked brown hair. Nor had there been anyone as tall or as muscularly built as this man the last time she’d been at the station to bail out her mother. Sage would have noticed him.
But he did have an air of confident authority about him, she thought as she crossed the road. The group started to disperse, and she hung back as he talked with one of the handlers, waiting to introduce herself. Then she saw him holding Alice’s favorite blue plaid flannel shirt. “Where the hell did you get that?”
When the man turned his familiar cool-blue gaze on Sage, she staggered back two steps. He reached out to steady her, his warm hand and strong fingers closing around her forearm.
“Give us a minute,” Jake said to the dog’s handler.
The dark-haired woman nodded while giving Sage a sympathetic smile.
It was the sympathy in the woman’s expression that shook Sage from her shock. “I don’t need a minute,” she said, pulling her arm free.
Jake had always been bossy, as well as so ridiculously hot that being in the same room with him had left her tongue-tied and made her toes curl even though she’d pretty much despised the guy growing up. He’d been Sunshine Bay’s resident bad boy: cool, popular, and always in trouble. If it hadn’t been for Alice taking him under her wing when he was in tenth grade, he would have wound up in jail.
Her eyes narrowed on his too-handsome face. “What are you doing here?” As far as she knew, he didn’t live in Sunshine Bay and hadn’t visited in years.
It wasn’t as if she kept tabs on him. Alice sometimes shared updates on his life, whether Sage wanted to hear them or not. He’d enlisted in the military not long after high school. He was married and lived in San Diego. Every winter, Alice took off a week to visit him there. His family, the Walkers, lived in Sunshine Bay. But they were bad news and the reason Alice had taken Jake into her home all those years ago.
Sage crossed her arms when he simply looked at her with an eyebrow raised. “What are you doing with Alice’s jacket?” A hint of accusation had slid into her voice, unintentionally, of course.
He’d heard it too, she surmised when he gave his head a slight irritated shake and said, “You haven’t changed, have you?”
She didn’t cower under the weight of his intimidating stare. He’d have to do a lot better than that if he thought to unnerve her. She’d dealt with men far scarier than Jake Walker in the past five years. Men who were used to things going their way—men with the means to hire unsavory characters to do their dirty work otherwise—and not once had she backed down or given in to their threats.
One of the search coordinators began calling out instructions to the volunteers, waving them forward. They moved toward a trail leading up the hill and into the woods.
The dark-haired woman approached, offering them both an apologetic smile. “We’re going to head out.”
“Right.” Jake handed Alice’s jacket to the woman. “I’ll catch up with you,” he said, offering his thanks before returning his attention to Sage.
Sage’s grip tightened on her cell phone as she watched the woman hold the plaid flannel to the dogs’ noses. She focused on the sound of Jake’s voice, willing the weakness from her knees.
“I got in late last night and stayed at the inn. Alice and I had planned to meet up at the farmhouse this morning. She wanted me to get rid of a waterbed for her and to give her a hand organizing her office. When she didn’t show at the farm or answer her cell phone, I went to the house. She wasn’t there, so I called Kendra. Her assistant,” he added at Sage’s blank stare. “She couldn’t reach Alice either. We walked through the house and the farmhouse, but there was no sign of her, and no sign she’d been in either place all night.”
“What about Max?” Max was Alice’s beloved Maine coon cat. He was a beautiful black tabby measuring four feet long with a tail like a raccoon, and he hated Sage. Alice thought it was hilarious. According to her, Max loved everyone, especially Jake.
“Max was at the house. He hadn’t been fed.”
“You can’t go to the worst-case scenario just because of that, Jake. The police could be wrong.”
He nodded. “I don’t buy their theory that Alice was hit by a car, but she did take a fall, and she was hurt.”
“How do you know she wasn’t hit by a car?” Why was she being defensive? Alice not being hit by a car was the best-case scenario, and she’d just said the police could be wrong.
“Because I was the one who sent the photo of the bike to SBPD. The damage isn’t consistent with being struck by a car. It looked like she’d veered into oncoming traffic and lost control of the bike and ended up in the ditch. Tire marks indicated a car had swerved, braking hard to avoid her.”
She couldn’t bear the thought of Alice out there alone and hurt, which was probably why she asked, again with a defensive edge in her voice, “How can you be sure she’s hurt? Maybe—”
Jake cut her off with a frustrated sigh. They’d fallen back into their old patterns. She’d get defensive and snippy with him, and he’d get frustrated and annoyed with her.
“I had a chance to look around before anyone compromised the scene. Alice was… She’s hurt, okay. She had to have been lying there for at least a couple of hours. The grass was still flattened, and from the blood splatter… Anyway, it looked to me like she sustained a head injury. If I’m right, she didn’t regain consciousness until well after dark. It would explain why no one saw her on the road.”
“Or stopped to help her,” Sage murmured, turning her head. She sniffed, swiping a finger under her lashes to catch a wayward tear, grateful when Jake let the action pass without commenting on her inability to keep her emotions in check. “What about her cell phone?”
“I didn’t find it at the farm or the house, and it wasn’t at the scene.” He held up his own. “I’ve being calling her every fifteen minutes. SBPD put in a request with her provider to trace her phone, but it could take hours… if her cell’s even on.” He glanced at the trail. “I need to join the search party. Will you be okay on your own?”
She didn’t miss the way his gaze moved over her face, looking for any hint of weakness. She lifted her chin. “I’m fine,” she. . .
Over the alarm, Sage heard her assistant Brenda’s voice and realized that she had fallen asleep at her desk again.
“Trust me, Sage can sleep through almost anything. This is the third time this week she’s pulled an all-nighter,” Brenda said.
Sage didn’t think her team finding her asleep at her desk was a good look and tried opening her eyes, but apparently her body wasn’t taking orders from her brain.
“Doesn’t she have a partner or friends?” asked another woman, whose voice was almost as annoying as the alarm that had gone blessedly silent.
“No. All she does is work.”
Hey, she had friends… Family counted as friends, didn’t they? Sage managed to pry one eyelid open. Hovering by her desk were the blurred faces of Brenda and the junior lawyer who’d been assigned to Sage’s team yesterday afternoon.
“If that’s what it takes to make partner at this firm, I’d better start applying elsewhere. Work-life balance is a priority for me.”
Sage snorted at the idea of work-life balance—but she must have snorted in her head, because the two women kept talking as if she weren’t lying with her face on her keyboard, eyeballing them.
“Sage is a junior partner,” Brenda informed the newest member of their team. And given how the founding partners felt about her inability to toe the company line, she would remain so until the three octogenarians either retired or dropped dead.
“Really? I thought she’s one of the most sought-after divorce attorneys in Boston and makes the big bucks.”
“She is, and she does. It’s just that the founding partners are—”
Brenda’s intention to share their low opinion of the founding partners with a brand-new associate was the impetus Sage needed to lift her bowling-ball-heavy head off the desk. “What time is it?” she rasped, peeling the keyboard from her cheek.
“Time that you picked a new alarm for your phone. It’s been proven that the Radar alarm ringtone elevates people’s blood pressure and makes them grumpy,” Brenda said, handing Sage her cell phone with a pointed look.
Sage ignored her assistant’s insinuation that she was grumpy first thing in the morning. In her opinion, the morning didn’t officially begin until she’d consumed at least one grande Americano.
Bleary-eyed, she held the screen to her face. Nothing happened.
“You might want to fix your hair and your, uh, face. You were drooling,” Brenda added, a smile flirting with her lips.
Sage pushed to her feet, feeling every minute of the time she’d spent asleep at her desk. Her knees creaked as if she were eighty instead of thirty as she hobbled to the closet-size bathroom off her office. She might not be an equity partner, but that tiny sink, mirror, and toilet more than made up for the bonuses she missed out on.
Sage winced when she caught sight of herself in the mirror above the sink. No wonder her phone didn’t recognize her face. Her hair looked like she’d had a good time in bed with the partner she didn’t have and didn’t want, if her clients’ relationships were an example of the price you paid for love. Her smudged mascara made her look like a raccoon, and thanks to the drool, there was a streak of red lip stain dangling from the corner of her mouth to her chin. She couldn’t decide whether she looked like a rabid raccoon or the bride of Frankenstein.
As she finished up in the bathroom and washed her hands, she heard Brenda say, “Forbes, Poole, and Russell… Oh, hi, Ms. Rosetti. Carmen, of course. I’ll get Sage for you.”
Sage darted from the bathroom waving her hands and mouthing, I’m not here!
Carmen Rosetti was her grandmother. Ninety percent of the time, Sage adored her, but the other ten percent of the time, her grandmother got on her last nerve. Lately, it had been closer to twenty percent of the time.
Sage hadn’t visited her family on Sunshine Bay in months due to her heavy caseload, and there was no one who did guilt better than an Italian grandmother. Carmen knew every last one of Sage’s buttons to push, and she pushed them like a gleeful toddler.
“Sage, do you—” the junior lawyer began, her overloud voice nearly drowning out Brenda, who was in the middle of covering for Sage.
“I’m sorry, Carmen. She left the—” Her assistant sighed. “Yes, I did hear that. She just returned to the office for her phone. Here she is.”
Sorry, Brenda mouthed, handing the phone to Sage.
If the junior lawyer followed through with her plan to quit, Sage was requesting a low talker for her replacement. “You’ll have to make it quick, Nonna. I’m due in court in an hour.”
Three hours, actually, but she had to see how far she’d gotten on the briefs before she’d fallen asleep. They were due to opposing counsel this afternoon. She prayed she hadn’t hit the Delete button with her cheek.
“Work, work, work, that’s all you do. No time for your family. I’m not getting any younger, you know.”
Sage tucked the office phone between her ear and shoulder and walked to her desk. After placing her own cell phone beside the keyboard, she woke up her computer. “You’ll probably outlive us all. You’re in better shape than I am.”
Sadly, it was true, but it was also true that her grandmother at seventy-four wasn’t getting any younger.
Bringing up her calendar on the screen, Sage continued, “I’ll come this weekend. I can fit you in on Sunday from twelve to five.”
“What? You’re such a big shot now that we have to make an appointment to see you?”
Sage winced. “No, of course not. It’s just that my caseload is heavy right now, and if I don’t work on the weekend, I’ll get behind.”
Back in January, she’d represented a high-profile client whose divorce had received a lot of attention in the press, in part due to the exorbitant support payments Sage had demanded for her client, and subsequently received. The publicity from the case was the reason she’d been inundated with new clients… and made junior partner.
She glanced at her calendar, mentally moving things around. “How about I sleep over on Saturday? We can have a movie night with everyone at Zia Eva’s.” Her aunt Eva had a large oceanfront home and would happily host a family movie night. It would be nice to see everyone, Sage grudgingly admitted to herself, even if it required her to pull another all-nighter.
“Si, that’s good. We need to talk about your mother.”
Sage sighed. She was the Rosetti family’s official problem solver. “Okay. We’ll talk Saturday night. I have to go—”
“Come for a late lunch. We’ll have time to talk before the movie then. I’ll make gnocchi the way you like it.”
Sage’s stomach grumbled at the mention of food. She couldn’t remember when she last ate, and there was nothing she liked to eat more than her grandmother’s fried potato dumpling pasta with Gorgonzola cream sauce and fire-roasted tomatoes, which Carmen well knew. Her grandmother could offer master classes on the art of manipulation.
Sage could use a master class on the art of saying no, but she had been missing her family. At least she had been when she’d had a moment to think about anything besides work. She reminded herself that she loved her job, and she really did.
There was nothing more satisfying than ensuring that women were protected, financially as well as mentally, and sometimes physically, from the men who’d promised to love and cherish them but instead treated them so badly that they destroyed their confidence and stole their identity.
She’d been raised by three strong and loving single mothers who went out of their way to help other women. Sage had known from an early age that she wanted to do the same. Except she didn’t provide a shoulder to cry on or an ear to listen or free meals and babysitting services. She went after the men where it hurt most, their bank accounts.
“Okay. Ciao, Nonna. I’ll see you Sat—”
“Don’t hang up! I didn’t call to chat. I called to ask you about Alice Espinoza. She’s missing.”
Sage slowly lowered herself onto her chair. “What do you mean, she’s missing?”
“What do you mean, what do I mean? She’s missing. It says so on Facebook. No one has seen her since yesterday. You haven’t heard from her, have you? She didn’t come to the city to see you?”
As much as Sage’s mother, aunt, and grandmother had been her role models, Alice Espinoza was the reason she’d become a lawyer. Alice had begun mentoring her at sixteen, and Sage had spent the majority of her weekends and school holidays with Alice at her home and law offices on Ocean View Drive.
“I haven’t spoken to her since…” Sage racked her brain, trying to remember when they’d last talked. She was positive it had been within the past two months, but then it hit her. “… New Year’s Eve.” She briefly closed her eyes at the realization she hadn’t spoken to Alice in five months.
She’d called Sage around nine o’clock on New Year’s Eve. They’d laughed at their similar plans for the night, working at home while watching Anderson Cooper and Andy Cohen ring in the New Year. Then Alice had shared her surprising news. She was buying a lavender farm outside Sunshine Bay. She planned to relocate her law practice to the farm as well. Sage had promised to help her with the move, and Alice had texted her the date last month. Sage had meant to call her, but time had gotten away from her.
Sage grabbed her cell phone, opened it with her face, and went to Facebook. Her sister, Willow, had uploaded Facebook and Instagram onto Sage’s phone two years ago in a futile attempt to convince Sage that some people actually had lives apart from their jobs. The only reason Sage hadn’t deleted the apps was because her mother, aunt, and grandmother regularly posted videos on La Dolce Vita’s account to promote the family’s Italian restaurant. “Who posted about Alice?”
“Her assistant posted on the firm’s account, and your sister posted twenty minutes ago on Good Morning, Sunshine! Willow asked anyone who’s seen Alice recently to contact the police.” Sage’s sister hosted a morning talk show on Sunshine Bay’s local television station. Sage heard clicking, and then her grandmother said, “Sunshine Bay Police Department just posted that someone saw Alice riding her bike around sunset yesterday on Route 6A.”
Sage frowned. The route would take Alice to the farm, and Sage knew from Alice’s text last month that she had no plans to move in until the sale of her home on Ocean View Drive closed a few weeks from now. The farmhouse had needed a new roof and the plumbing and electrical systems updated.
Sage found the post and began scrolling through people’s responses to the sighting. Several mentioned seeing Alice in town earlier in the week, and then SBPD posted a photo.
At the sight of the iridescent purple bike lying in a ditch, Sage covered her mouth. “That’s Alice’s bike.”
She’d know it anywhere. Alice had been riding the same bike for as long as Sage had known her.
It took several shaky attempts before Sage got the bottom drawer of her desk unlocked. Once she did, she grabbed her purse, tossed her cell phone inside the oversize leather bag, and shot from the chair. It wasn’t until she was halfway out the door that she remembered she had to be in court.
Looking as panicked as Sage felt, Brenda waved her off. “Go. We’ve got this. We’ll ask for a postponement.”
“But the briefs. I—”
“I’ll call you if there’s a problem, but I’m sure they’re fine. Now go, and let us know if… when you find Alice,” Brenda corrected herself, biting her bottom lip as she glanced at one of the photos on Sage’s desk. It was of Alice and Sage on the day Sage had received her JD degree from Harvard.
“Are you sure? I haven’t had a chance to review anything with…” She couldn’t remember the junior lawyer’s name. Sage hadn’t been a part of the hiring process, even though she’d asked to be.
The one and only female senior partner at the firm, and the lawyer who’d hired Sage, had recently retired. She’d been an old friend of Alice’s. She would have made sure Sage had been involved in the hiring process. She’d always had her back.
“That’s why you have me. Now get out of here. Wait!” Brenda called.
Sage stopped and turned, sighing when Brenda motioned to the phone still clutched in Sage’s hand. She brought it to her ear. “Nonna, I’ll see you in a couple of hours. Call me with updates, okay?”
“Si, si, you drive carefully. Try not to worry. I’m sure Alice is fine,” her grandmother said before disconnecting.
Carmen didn’t sound like she believed that Alice was fine any more than Sage did.
“I’m about a mile out,” Sage told her sister, who’d called with the latest update.
In the time it had taken Sage to get from downtown Boston to the outskirts of her hometown, SBPD had begun organizing a search party. They were doing a grid search from the farm to where Alice’s bike had been located. They had at least five miles to cover.
The police were working on the theory that a driver, blinded by the setting sun, had accidentally hit Alice, panicked, and left the scene. They surmised that Alice had been hurt and wandered away from the accident site, either in search of help or in a state of confusion.
“Sorry! I’m going to join another search team with my sister,” Willow called to someone.
“No, you go with them, Will. I want to talk to the police and the search coordinator. I’ll catch up with you.”
“Are you sure? You and Alice are so close. I don’t want you searching for her with a bunch of strangers. What if—”
“Don’t.” She cut off her sister before she could voice Sage’s own fears. “Alice probably went for a walk on one of the trails at the farm with her earbuds in, completely unaware of the fuss she’s caused. She’ll be mortified when she finds out.”
Instead of turning right toward the ocean, Sage headed left.
She had a general idea how to get to the farm. When she was younger, she’d accompany her mom to pick lavender every summer. Her mom was the crunchy granola type—low maintenance, into yoga, all-natural products, and reducing her carbon footprint. Sage wouldn’t have been surprised if her mom bought the farm, but she’d been shocked Alice had. “I’m going to the farm.”
“Sage, I don’t think that’s… Fine. We’ll meet you there,” her sister said, and began calling out the names of the Rosetti family and the Monroes, Willow’s newfound family.
It sounded like everyone had turned out, including Sage’s aunt Cami, who’d been estranged from the family for more than two decades. Last summer, they’d discovered she was Willow’s biological mother. It didn’t matter to Sage. Willow would always be her sister, even if she was technically her cousin.
The traffic was heavier than Sage expected as she got closer to the turnoff to the farm. Then she saw why. There were several police cars and emergency vehicles parked on the side of the road. She slowed her silver BMW and pulled off onto the gravel shoulder, noting a line of vehicles behind her doing the same.
Her stomach dropped when two German shepherds and their handlers walked over to the group of law enforcement officers. Somehow, seeing the search-and-rescue dogs hit harder than seeing the photo of Alice’s bike in the ditch. It made it more real. Alice really was missing.
With every intention of joining the search, Sage reached over the red leather seat for a pair of white sneakers. She kept them in her car on the off chance she’d have time to get in a walk on her lunch hour. They’d never been worn.
She slipped off her sensible heels and then opened the car door. A warm breeze carrying the sweet scent of lavender filled the car. The day promised to be hot for late May. It was ten thirty and already seventy-two degrees without a cloud in the bright-blue sky.
She took off the cream linen blazer with the black tuxedo side stripes that she wore over a black etched floral blouse and a black skirt, laying it on the passenger seat before slipping on her sneakers. As she got out of the car and shut the door, locking it with the app on her phone, a man caught her attention.
He had his back to her, talking to a group of first responders. They seemed to be paying close attention to whatever he was saying. She didn’t think he was law enforcement, though. He wore a white T-shirt, faded jeans, and a pair of scuffed brown leather motorcycle boots. This didn’t rule out that he worked at SBPD, but she knew most of the members of the small force and didn’t recall anyone with his longish, copper-streaked brown hair. Nor had there been anyone as tall or as muscularly built as this man the last time she’d been at the station to bail out her mother. Sage would have noticed him.
But he did have an air of confident authority about him, she thought as she crossed the road. The group started to disperse, and she hung back as he talked with one of the handlers, waiting to introduce herself. Then she saw him holding Alice’s favorite blue plaid flannel shirt. “Where the hell did you get that?”
When the man turned his familiar cool-blue gaze on Sage, she staggered back two steps. He reached out to steady her, his warm hand and strong fingers closing around her forearm.
“Give us a minute,” Jake said to the dog’s handler.
The dark-haired woman nodded while giving Sage a sympathetic smile.
It was the sympathy in the woman’s expression that shook Sage from her shock. “I don’t need a minute,” she said, pulling her arm free.
Jake had always been bossy, as well as so ridiculously hot that being in the same room with him had left her tongue-tied and made her toes curl even though she’d pretty much despised the guy growing up. He’d been Sunshine Bay’s resident bad boy: cool, popular, and always in trouble. If it hadn’t been for Alice taking him under her wing when he was in tenth grade, he would have wound up in jail.
Her eyes narrowed on his too-handsome face. “What are you doing here?” As far as she knew, he didn’t live in Sunshine Bay and hadn’t visited in years.
It wasn’t as if she kept tabs on him. Alice sometimes shared updates on his life, whether Sage wanted to hear them or not. He’d enlisted in the military not long after high school. He was married and lived in San Diego. Every winter, Alice took off a week to visit him there. His family, the Walkers, lived in Sunshine Bay. But they were bad news and the reason Alice had taken Jake into her home all those years ago.
Sage crossed her arms when he simply looked at her with an eyebrow raised. “What are you doing with Alice’s jacket?” A hint of accusation had slid into her voice, unintentionally, of course.
He’d heard it too, she surmised when he gave his head a slight irritated shake and said, “You haven’t changed, have you?”
She didn’t cower under the weight of his intimidating stare. He’d have to do a lot better than that if he thought to unnerve her. She’d dealt with men far scarier than Jake Walker in the past five years. Men who were used to things going their way—men with the means to hire unsavory characters to do their dirty work otherwise—and not once had she backed down or given in to their threats.
One of the search coordinators began calling out instructions to the volunteers, waving them forward. They moved toward a trail leading up the hill and into the woods.
The dark-haired woman approached, offering them both an apologetic smile. “We’re going to head out.”
“Right.” Jake handed Alice’s jacket to the woman. “I’ll catch up with you,” he said, offering his thanks before returning his attention to Sage.
Sage’s grip tightened on her cell phone as she watched the woman hold the plaid flannel to the dogs’ noses. She focused on the sound of Jake’s voice, willing the weakness from her knees.
“I got in late last night and stayed at the inn. Alice and I had planned to meet up at the farmhouse this morning. She wanted me to get rid of a waterbed for her and to give her a hand organizing her office. When she didn’t show at the farm or answer her cell phone, I went to the house. She wasn’t there, so I called Kendra. Her assistant,” he added at Sage’s blank stare. “She couldn’t reach Alice either. We walked through the house and the farmhouse, but there was no sign of her, and no sign she’d been in either place all night.”
“What about Max?” Max was Alice’s beloved Maine coon cat. He was a beautiful black tabby measuring four feet long with a tail like a raccoon, and he hated Sage. Alice thought it was hilarious. According to her, Max loved everyone, especially Jake.
“Max was at the house. He hadn’t been fed.”
“You can’t go to the worst-case scenario just because of that, Jake. The police could be wrong.”
He nodded. “I don’t buy their theory that Alice was hit by a car, but she did take a fall, and she was hurt.”
“How do you know she wasn’t hit by a car?” Why was she being defensive? Alice not being hit by a car was the best-case scenario, and she’d just said the police could be wrong.
“Because I was the one who sent the photo of the bike to SBPD. The damage isn’t consistent with being struck by a car. It looked like she’d veered into oncoming traffic and lost control of the bike and ended up in the ditch. Tire marks indicated a car had swerved, braking hard to avoid her.”
She couldn’t bear the thought of Alice out there alone and hurt, which was probably why she asked, again with a defensive edge in her voice, “How can you be sure she’s hurt? Maybe—”
Jake cut her off with a frustrated sigh. They’d fallen back into their old patterns. She’d get defensive and snippy with him, and he’d get frustrated and annoyed with her.
“I had a chance to look around before anyone compromised the scene. Alice was… She’s hurt, okay. She had to have been lying there for at least a couple of hours. The grass was still flattened, and from the blood splatter… Anyway, it looked to me like she sustained a head injury. If I’m right, she didn’t regain consciousness until well after dark. It would explain why no one saw her on the road.”
“Or stopped to help her,” Sage murmured, turning her head. She sniffed, swiping a finger under her lashes to catch a wayward tear, grateful when Jake let the action pass without commenting on her inability to keep her emotions in check. “What about her cell phone?”
“I didn’t find it at the farm or the house, and it wasn’t at the scene.” He held up his own. “I’ve being calling her every fifteen minutes. SBPD put in a request with her provider to trace her phone, but it could take hours… if her cell’s even on.” He glanced at the trail. “I need to join the search party. Will you be okay on your own?”
She didn’t miss the way his gaze moved over her face, looking for any hint of weakness. She lifted her chin. “I’m fine,” she. . .
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