One Last Weekend by Linda Lael Miller

Chapter One
    â€œOne last weekend,” insisted Ted Brayley, the Darbys’ longtime friend and now their divorce lawyer, facing the couple across the gleaming expanse of his cherrywood desk. “Just spend one weekend together, at the cottage, that’s all I’m asking. Then, if you still want to split the proverbial sheets, I’ll file the papers.”
    Joanna Darby sat very still, but out of the corner of her eye, she saw her soon-to-be-ex husband, Teague, shift in his leather wingback chair, a twin to her own. Distractedly, he extended a hand, not to Joanna, but to pat their golden retriever, Sammy, sitting attentively between them, on the head.
    â€œI don’t see what good that would do,” Teague said. At forty-one, he was still handsome and fit, but he was going through a major midlife crisis. He’d sold his highly successful architectural firm for an obscene profit and bought himself a very expensive sports car, and though there was no sweet young thing in the picture yet, as far as Joanna knew, it was only a matter of time. Teague was a cliché waiting to happen. “We’ve settled everything. We’re ready to go our separate ways.”
    Ted sat back, cupping his hands behind his head. “Really?” he asked, with a casual nod toward Sammy. “Who gets custody of the dog?”
    â€œI do,” Teague responded immediately.
    â€œNot in this lifetime,” Joanna protested.
    Teague looked at her in surprise. It always surprised Teague when anybody expressed an opinion different from his own; he was used to calling the shots, leading the charge, setting the course. Somewhere along the line, he’d forgotten that Joanna didn’t work for him. “ I was the one who sprang him from the pound when he was a pup,” he argued. “He’s my dog.”
    â€œWell,” Joanna answered, making an effort not to raise her voice, “ I’m the one who house-trained him and taught him not to eat sofas. I’m the one who walked him every day. I love Sammy, and I’m not about to give him up.”
    â€œJoanna,” Teague said darkly, “be reasonable.” Translation: Agree with me. You know I’m always right.
    â€œI’m tired of being reasonable,” Joanna said, examining her unmanicured fingernails. “I’m keeping the dog.”
    Teague rolled his blue eyes and, shoved a hand through his still-thick, slightly shaggy dark hair.
    A corner of Ted’s mouth quirked up in a smug little grin. They’d both known Ted since college, and they both trusted him, which was why they’d decided to let him handle the divorce. Now Joanna wondered if a stranger would have been a better choice, and Teague was probably thinking the same thing. “I guess you haven’t settled everything,” Ted said. “Sammy wouldn’t be the first dog in history to be the subject of a custody battle—but would you really want to put him through that kind of grief?”
    â€œJoint custody, then,” Teague grumbled, a muscle bunching in his cheek. “We’ll share him. My place one week, Joanna’s the next.”
    â€œOh, right,” Joanna scoffed. “I’d never see him unless you had a hot date.”
    Sammy whimpered softly, resembling a forlorn spectator at a tennis match as he turned his head from Joanna to Teague and back again. He wasn’t used to harsh tones—the Darby marriage had slowly caved in on itself, by degrees, after Teague and Joanna’s only child, Caitlin, went off to college. There had been no screaming fights, no accusations—or objects—flying back and forth. This was no War of the Roses .
    It might have been easier if it had been.
    â€œOne weekend,” Ted reiterated. He gestured toward Elliott Bay, sparkling blue-gray beyond his office windows. “You’ve got that great cottage on Firefly Island. When was the last time you went out there, just