Free Mating for Life by Marissa Stapley Page A

though.” Ilsa tended to talk to the children as though they were adults. She didn’t know how else to be with them. “I’m sorry about your chocolate bar, Xavier. We’ll get you another one.”
    Eventually she felt her heart rate return to normal. The restaurant was in sight. The woman, Myra, was out near the dock, watching Jesse ready the boat for the short journey to the island.
    â€œWe saw a bear out on the road,” she said to Myra.
    â€œOh, yes, there are a few around this year. Most of themhave cubs, but there’s one lonely she-bear who seems to wander up and down the road a lot. I hope she stays out of trouble. Some of the hunters up here . . .” Myra shook her head and didn’t finish her sentence.
    â€œHow do you know it’s a she-bear?” Ilsa asked.
    Myra shrugged. “I just know. Something about her.”
    â€œI thought that, too.” Ilsa looked into the woman’s eyes again. They were intelligent, blue, pale. The sadness was still there.
    Jesse motioned for them to get in the boat. Myra lifted a small life jacket, a life jacket for a child. It looked new. “Need this?”
    â€œNo, we have our own, thanks.”
    As the boat pulled away, Ilsa scanned the tree line, looking for signs of the she-bear. She saw a moving shadow and squinted: it was Myra, walking into the woods alone.
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    Liane was sitting on the dock when Ilsa, Ani, and Xavier arrived. She put down her book and stood to wave. Ilsa was surprised to see a kayak— the kayak—tethered to the dock. Soon the boat bumped against the other side of the dock and Jesse jumped out to secure it, almost immediately starting to unload the bags. Ilsa thanked him and gave him a tip, then hoisted each child onto the dock before stepping onto it herself. She hugged Liane. It felt like a long time had passed since she had seen her sister. Ilsa hadn’t visited Toronto that year, and Liane had only been to Rye once, at Christmas. Ilsa looked at her sister and wondered what was different about her. She was wearing an old bathing suit of Ilsa’s and it looked great, the black a perfect contrast to her pale and delicately freckled shoulders. “You look good,” Ilsa said.
    â€œOh. I . . . forgot my suit,” Liane said, and Ilsa waved ahand.
    â€œYou can have it.”
    Liane leaned down and kissed Ani’s nose, which Ani wrinkled affectionately. “Hi, Peanut,” she said, pinching one of her cheeks gently. That was when Ilsa saw it, glittering in the sun. A diamond ring. She leaned down to fiddle with a bag, then stood up and stretched her arms overhead. Liane was now kissing Xavier and tousling his curls. Glint, glint, glint, went the ring.
    â€œWhat a glorious day,” Ilsa said. “I’m so glad we finally made it, and didn’t get eaten by a bear in the process.” She started telling Liane about the bear sighting rather than asking her about the ring, which was what any normal sister would have done. That Ilsa wasn’t immediately in rapture over her sister’s apparently impending marriage to Adam, whom Ilsa disdained for a number of reasons, was no surprise. It’s just that what she had felt when she’d spotted the engagement ring on her sister’s finger was something akin to jealousy. Of whom? Adam, maybe. Or some nameless friend of Liane’s who had received this news first, had perhaps even gotten a phone call asking for advice—“What should I say?” Liane would have asked, because the decision would have been too momentous for Liane not to look for external help. But then again, who did that? Ilsa had been proposed to enough times to know there wasn’t generally enough time to make a phone call.
    Even in jail, they offer you a phone call.
    Ilsa finished the story about the bear, and Ani stood beside her and nodded, solemn. “I thought it was a tiger,” she