The name left Michael’s mouth so softly that I almost thought I had imagined it. “Laura.” My fingers tightened around the brass key. Laura Bennett was a name I had heard only once, nearly twenty years earlier, when I discovered an old photograph of Frank standing beside a beautiful young woman. When I asked who she was, Frank had gone pale, taken the photograph from me, and simply said, “Some things are better left buried in the past.” I had trusted him and never asked again. Now I was learning that Laura had lived in the cottage Frank supposedly sold nineteen years ago.

Michael finally explained that Laura had been Frank’s first true love. They had been engaged, and she had been carrying his child when tragedy tore them apart. The baby was born prematurely and survived only three days. Laura blamed Frank for abandoning her during the darkest period of her life and disappeared. Years later, Frank found her again, seriously ill with a progressive neurological disease. He secretly bought the cottage and paid her expenses for nineteen years without ever telling me. “Why hide her from me?” I whispered. Michael looked at me sadly. “Because Frank knew you would try to carry her pain as your own.” Then he handed me another envelope marked, EILEEN — AFTER YOU MEET LAURA.