“I want to thank you again for agreeing to this…meeting.” He was about to say more when their wine arrived. Jory taste tested her glass, pronouncing it good. He agreed, and the sommelier beamed with pride.

Suggesting they decide on what they wanted to eat, Turner opened his menu as the waitress arrived. For some reason, he got the impression that Jory was not the type to order the most expensive thing on the menu. But just in case, he gave her carte blanche. “Sky’s the limit.”

Turner heard a buzzing in the back of his head when he heard the woman order the shrimp alfredo. Inside, a little voice was urging, No. She doesn’t like the shrimp. Go with the chicken. Order the chicken alfredo.

“No. Wait. Make that the chicken alfredo.”

He could barely breathe.

“And you, sir?” the waitress pressed.

“I’ll have the chicken parmesan.”

“What kind of dressing do you like on your salads?”

His whole body seemed to focus on the woman across from him. Would she…

Please. Please. Please, he silently begged. Please don’t order what he was nearly one hundred percent certain she would? Or please do, if only to continue to confirm something that was happening but shouldn’t?

“I’ll take Italian dressing.”

It felt like all the air in the room had been sucked out. It was impossible. Everything—the wine, the food, and even the salad dressing—was exactly what Megan would have ordered.

Was it all coincidence? Could Mosher have known and given a heads up to this woman? Or was Megan…

Jory appeared to be mesmerized by her glass of wine, and he wondered what she was thinking. He cleared his throat to get her attention. “Are you all right?”

She smiled at him, but he saw no feeling behind it. “Yes. Of course.”

“You look like you’ve had some kind of major revelation,” he noted with a nervous chuckle. “I hope you’re not having second thoughts about this meeting.”

“Oh! No! No, I’m not. I was just thinking of…something else.”

It was beginning to be too much. He couldn’t continue to sit there and stare at this woman, knowing that behind her eyes his wife lay comatose yet awake in her hospice bed. Observing. Listening. And soon to be tasting the very meal he and she had been having the night he proposed to her.

He sipped his wine again to give him time to gather up his courage. “Jory, I hope you don’t think me too out of line for asking this, but…may I hold your hand?”

Funny, but she didn’t seem reticent. “Hold? My hand?”

“So Megan can feel my touch.”

Her eyes widened in shock, and he immediately backed off. “N-never mind. Forget I asked. I have no business—”

“Yes.”

He stared at her in relief and surprise when she reached across the table to him.

“Yes. You can touch my hand. And Megan? Remember what it was like to hold hands with your husband?”

Damn him, but he couldn’t hold back the tears.