Moonlight Becomes You Read Free Page A

Being a photographer is a lot more practical, and in all honesty I guess I’m pretty good. I’ve got some excellent clients. Now what about you, Nuala?”
    â€œNo. Let’s finish with you,” the older woman interrupted. “You live in New York. You’ve got a job you like. You’ve stuck to developing what is a natural talent. You’re just as pretty as I knew you’d be. You were thirty-two your last birthday. What about a love interest or significant other or whatever you young people call it these days?”
    Maggie felt the familiar wrench as she said flatly, “I was married for three years. His name was Paul, and he graduated from the Air Force Academy. He had just been selected for the NASA program when he was killed on a training flight. That was five years ago. It’s a shock I guess I may never get over. Anyway, it’s still hard to talk about him.”
    â€œOh, Maggie.”
    There was a world of understanding in Nuala’s voice. Maggie remembered that her stepmother had been a widow when she married her father.
    Shaking her head, Nuala murmured, “Why do things like that have to happen?” Then her tone brightened. “Shall we order?”
    Over dinner they caught up on twenty-two years. After the divorce from Maggie’s father, Nuala had moved to New York, then visited Newport, where she met Timothy Moore—someone she actually had dated when she was still a teenager—and married him. “My third and last husband,” she said, “and absolutely wonderful. Tim died last year, and do I ever miss him! He wasn’t one of the wealthy Moores, but I have a sweet house in a wonderful section of Newport, and an adequate income, and of course I’m still dabbling at painting. So I’m all right.”
    But Maggie saw a brief flicker of uncertainty cross Nuala’s face and realized in that moment that without the brisk, cheerful expression, Nuala looked every day of her age.
    â€œReally all right, Nuala?” she asked quietly. “You seem . . . worried.”
    â€œOh, yes, I’m fine. It’s just . . . Well, you see, I turned seventy-five last month. Years ago, someone told me that when you get into your sixties, you start to say good-bye to your friends, or they say good-bye to you, but that when you hit your seventies, it happens all the time. Believe me,it’s true. I’ve lost a number of good friends lately, and each loss hurts a little more than the last. It’s getting to be a bit lonely in Newport, but there’s a wonderful residence—I hate the word nursing home—and I’m thinking of going to live there soon. The kind of apartment I want there has just become available.”
    Then, as the waiter poured espresso, she said urgently, “Maggie, come visit me, please. It’s only a three-hour drive from New York.”
    â€œI’d love to,” Maggie responded.
    â€œYou mean it?”
    â€œAbsolutely. Now that I’ve found you, I’m not going to let you get away again. Besides, it’s always been in the back of my mind to go to Newport. I understand it’s a photographer’s paradise. As a matter of fact—”
    She was about to tell Nuala that as of next week she had cleared her calendar to allow time to take a much-needed vacation when she heard someone say, “I thought I’d find you here.”
    Startled, Maggie looked up. Standing over them were Liam and his cousin Earl Bateman. “You ran out on me,” Liam said reprovingly.
    Earl bent down to kiss Nuala. “You’re in hot water for spiriting away his date. How do you two know each other?”
    â€œIt’s a long story.” Nuala smiled. “Earl lives in Newport, too,” she explained to Maggie. “He teaches anthropology at Hutchinson College in Providence.”
    I was right about the scholarly look, Maggie thought.
    Liam pulled a chair from a