Chapter Twenty-Three
You’ll Do
Two days later…
I stood at the bathroom basin brushing my teeth while Sam showered wondering how I got myself in my current mess.
This was to say, Sam thinking my declaration of love meant I was moving to North Carolina and then him telling everyone I was moving to North Carolina.
And I mean everyone.
Yesterday morning, I went downstairs only to be greeted by an excited Maris who pulled my surprised, uncomprehending body in her arms and cried, “How exciting for the both of you! Setting up house!”
Yes. That was what happened. My wide eyes moved over Maris’s shoulder and I saw Sam, who had been downstairs three whole minutes longer than me, was leaning against the counter, sipping coffee and grinning at us indulgently and he’d obviously shared this news right off the bat.
Maris’s embrace was followed by Hap wrapping his arms around me, picking me up off the floor, shaking me half a dozen times and stating, “I hang down here a lot, babe, so I hope you can cook.”
I had barely recovered from these when Luci and Celeste arrived and I knew Sam had made a call, I just couldn’t fathom when, because they arrived and Luci was beside herself with glee. This was evidenced by her racing straight to me, skidding to a halt on her stylish, flat sandals, grabbing my biceps, jumping up and down and shouting, “We’re practically neighbors!”
Celeste’s response was a little less exuberant but still openly happy.
What could I do?
I went with it.
It got worse.
And how it got worse was, over coffee and Maris’s pancake breakfast, while everyone was chatting about how fabulous it was that Sam and I had moved in together (yes, past tense), Sam’s phone rang and, for once, he didn’t move out of the room to take the call.
No.
Instead, standing by me where I sat on a stool at the kitchen bar, Sam swept my hair off my neck, left his arm around my shoulders and said, “Yeah, Ford, things are still cool. All good. Listen, Kia talked with me last night and she wants you and Essie, Kyle and Gitte to come out for a visit. Can you talk to Kyle and Essie about that? Set somethin’ up?” Pause then, “Right. Whenever you want, we got plenty of room.”
Yes, he said we got plenty of room. We!
Then my lungs froze when he went on to say, “Kia’ll need to arrange to have her shit moved here. We might come out and sort it or we might need you.” Pause then, “Yeah, she’s movin’ out here.” Pause then on a grin down at me which meant my father had somehow communicated his utter joy at Sam’s statement in the three seconds Sam was silent, “Yeah, Ford, it’s all good.”
I was blinking up at him uncertain not only what to do but also what to feel.
It couldn’t be said I was against living in Sam’s fabulous beach house with Sam in North Carolina.
It also couldn’t be said I wanted to move away from my family and friends in Indiana.
What could be said was that I would have liked to discuss both of these prior to Sam announcing it to his family, my family and arranging with my father to have my stuff moved.
Shit.
For peace of mind, I decided not to focus on Sam jumping to an erroneous conclusion and then not wasting any time acting on it. Instead, I decided to focus on the fact that Sam wanted me to live with him and wasted no time acting on it.
This was harder to do when we all climbed into vehicles in order to spend the day futzing around Wilmington.
It was harder because I also spent the day taking calls from Mom, Paula, Teri, Missy, Gitte and Kyle all in throes of ecstasy that Sam and I were moving in together. They all knew about it because Dad had shared. They were bummed us moving in together meant me moving to another state but they definitely felt the upside considering that included a beach house they could visit.
In fact, during Mom’s second phone call, she informed me, “Gitte and I have it sussed, honey. How does three weeks sound for you? We’ll rent a U-Haul and bring your stuff with us.” Then before I could answer she ordered, “Don’t answer. Talk to Sam. Call back. But Kyle, Gitte and I are putting in for vacation time today.”
Shit again!
Since Maris was leaving the next day, we had a fancy night out at a posh eatery in Kingston. By the time we got home, had after dinner drinks and conversation, Luci and Celeste went back to her place, Maris upstairs and Hap prepared to crash on the couch, I was exhausted from spending so much effort hiding the fact that I was freaking out.
And I was still freaking out so much I didn’t know how to broach the subject with Sam.
But even if I did, when I hit a bed with Sam already in it, I found Sam was in a different mood. Sam felt like celebrating our future togetherness, not having a chat about it. And he didn’t talk me into participating, as such, since the way he did talk me into it didn’t have words but actions. So I participated, avidly. And our celebration lasted a long, long time.
So now I was standing in the bathroom, brushing my teeth, dragging.
What had been discussed yesterday were today’s plans. Sam was taking Maris to the airport by himself so they could have some alone time. I was spending the day with Celeste so she and I could have some alone time. And Hap was spending the day with Luci then heading back to Fort Bragg.
Which meant, maybe tomorrow, I could find some time to broach the subject with Sam and today I had the time to discuss the situation with my sage friend Celeste.
I hung onto this because I was thrilled to bits that I loved a Sam who loved me but I was terrified at how fast everything was happening.
I kept brushing as the shower went off and kept brushing but commenced burying the urge to wipe down the fogged mirror in order to watch Sam alight from the shower when I heard the shower door open.
Then I felt Sam’s arm lock around my waist, his lips touch my neck then move to my ear where he muttered, “Move over, baby, need the sink to shave.”
“Okay,” I muttered through foam, stepped aside and kept brushing.
Sam reached into the medicine cabinet and came out with shave cream. While he was rubbing it on, I became mesmerized with watching him because, even with all the time we spent together, I’d never seen him shave. And I’d certainly never seen him shave standing at the basin wearing only a towel around his hips.
Jeez. His jaw was very square.
Since I was mesmerized, I saw his head turn and his lips twitch before he asked, “Jesus, Kia, how long do you brush?”
Oh man.
I was such a dork!
I pulled the brush out of my mouth and covered with, “A long time.” Then I recommenced brushing.
He grinned at me and commenced shaving, muttering, “Must be why your teeth are so white.”
He was wrong. One of the first things I did when Cooter and Vanessa accidentally made me rich instead of making me dead was go to a dentist and have my teeth professionally whitened. I didn’t have ugly, yellow teeth but I found the idea of having your teeth whitened decadent. I always wanted to do it. So when I got my windfall, I did.
Deciding my work on my teeth was done and Sam might think I was a little crazy if I brushed longer and stared at him shaving like I wasn’t his girlfriend who was now apparently living with him but instead a rabid fan who was living the dream of standing in a bathroom with him, his razor and his hips encased in nothing but a towel, I pulled the brush from my mouth and garbled, “Sink.”
Sam gave me room; I spit, rinsed, put my toothbrush away and wiped my hands.
Then I muttered, “I’ll bring you a cup of coffee,” and started out of the bathroom but found myself unmoving and in Sam’s arms looking up at Sam with a shaved neck but jaws and cheeks that were still foamed. In my perpetual freak out at all that was happening, I therefore blurted, “Only you could look supremely hot with shaving cream on your face.”
Sam’s loose arms went tight as he burst out laughing.
And that was when it hit me, staring up at the man I loved who loved me, standing in his arms in his bathroom, him shaving, me about to go down and get him a cup of coffee, that not only could I do this, I wanted to.
North Carolina. Indiana. The moon. I didn’t care.
Knowing each other a month, a year, a lifetime. I didn’t care.
It wasn’t too soon.
I loved him. He loved me. And wherever we were, it didn’t matter, just as long as it was a place that had him.
Sam quit laughing, looked down at me and instantly proved that my earth-rocking decision was right by saying, “Well, baby, you look good in your little dresses and your heels, in your shorts, in your nightie but the best you ever look is in the morning when you roll outta my bed.”
See what I mean?
“Stop being sweet in the morning before I’ve had coffee,” I returned. “I don’t have the energy to demonstrate my gratitude.”
He grinned but ignored me, his face dipped closer and he went on in a low, rougher than usual but still velvet voice to finish, “Especially a morning after I fucked you hard, I fucked you long and I made you come often. Fuck, baby,” his voice went even more velvet as his gaze heated, “your eyes are dreamy, your hair’s a sexy-as-hell mess and your lips are still swollen.” He touched his mouth to mine and whispered, “Beautiful.”
Then he got shaving cream all over my face and he did this by kissing me for a really long time.
When he was done, I was breathing hard and Sam was swiping at the shaving cream on my face with his thumb when I decided my only reply could be, “I love you, Sam,” so that was what I said.
His thumb swept shaving cream across my jaw as his face got soft, his eyes went warm and he muttered, “Good.”
I grinned at him.
He grinned back.
Then he ordered, “Get me some coffee.”
“Bossy,” I murmured, he grinned again, gave me a gentle push to the door, I took his direction, nabbed a hand towel on the way and swiped at the shaving cream.
Then I got myself a cup of coffee and took one up to my man.
I went back downstairs because I’d seen Maris on the deck with Memphis so I took my coffee out to join her.
Memphis bounced to me, yapping.
Maris turned to me, smiled and called, “Good morning.”
“Morning,” I called back and asked, “You want time alone or are you good with company?”
“Live alone, honey, so company.”
I joined her, sitting in a chair already pulled up next to hers. Memphis joined us by jumping in my lap. I moved my feet to the railing of the deck, my fabulous robe dropped open to expose my legs and Memphis settled in a curl in her Momma’s lap so I could sip my coffee.
“Got shaving cream on your face,” Maris muttered, her sweet velvet voice vibrating with amusement.
Shit!
I swiped at my face, asking, “Where?”
“Right cheek,” she answered, still sounding amused.
I moved my fingers there, encountered Sam’s shave cream and wiped it away. Then I rubbed my fingers together to get rid of it. Then I started petting my dog.
“That robe sure is pretty,” Maris noted.
“Thanks. Luci has one like it and I admired hers so she took me to the place in Como that sells them.”
“They’d be hit at my shop but exporting is a pain in the behind. Tried it a couple of times, had to up the prices because of duty, stuff sat on the rails forever, even in Malibu.”
Knowing the cost of this robe, add duty, even in Malibu, I could imagine.
“Hap’s out running, by the way,” she continued.
“Okay,” I replied and took another sip then told her, “Sam’s had a shower and he’s shaving. He’ll probably be down in a second.”
“Right then I don’t have much time.”
Oh no.
Surprise attack.
I blinked at the ocean then turned my head to her, mentally bracing, wondering what was to come.
She didn’t tear her eyes from the beach and she didn’t waste any time.
“You’re not a mother yet, honey, and even if you were, I don’t know if you can imagine but I worried…” She trailed off, kept her eyes glued to the beach then went on in a quiet voice, “I so worried about my Sammy.”
I wasn’t sure where this was going. What I was sure of was that I was dying to know just as much as I feared finding out.
“Maris –” I started and that was when her eyes came to me, they were shimmering with tears so I shut up.
“He had his fun, I know this. He’s a man, he would. I also know this because it was up in my face all the time. Magazines, even TV. Those women…” She shook her head. “None of them…” She pressed her lips together then looked back at the beach. “After… well, later… well, until a few days ago, I despaired. They… women… it seemed…” She was struggling, she pulled in breath and looked back at me. “It seemed impossible he’d find one even worthwhile much less…” she pressed her lips together then finished on a whispered, “you.”
Oh God!
Now I felt my eyes shimmering with tears, my body warm all over and not from the early, summer North Carolina sun and I whispered back, “Maris.”
“You love Sammy.”
I nodded.
“No, honey,” she leaned into me, “you love Sammy.”
“Yes, Maris, I know exactly what you mean,” I told her quietly and I did. I knew what she was saying. I didn’t love Sampson Cooper. I loved her Sammy.
This time, she nodded.
Then she said quietly back, “You know I know what was done to you.”
“I know,” I replied.
“He’ll never hurt you, Kia.”
I smiled through my wavering tears. “I know.”
“I cannot tell you how pleased I am he found you but, meeting you, now I can say I’m pleased you found my Sammy too.”
I moved my coffee cup to my other hand, reached out and grabbed hers. Then I held on tight.
Then I shared, “I can say that too.” I grinned. “Boy, can I say that.”
She gently twisted her hand from mine, leaned into me and placed it on my cheek, saying softly, “We share more than Sammy, honey. I know all about walking right through hell, years of it and suddenly finding yourself on the other side. Glad it gets to be me who greets you there. But more, I’m glad I can say I raised a man who would take your hand and lead the way.”
All right, she was killing me.
I clenched my teeth, sucked in breath and just managed to stop myself from bursting into tears.
Then I muttered, “Jeez, Maris, between your son being sweet and you being sweeter and me not even having a full cup of coffee, if you two don’t stop, I’ll be a wreck and never be able to face the day.”
She chuckled quietly then remarked, “There are worse things.”
She was right about that.
“Definitely,” I whispered.
She smiled at me. Then she studied me. Then she patted my cheek once, dropped her hand and turned back to the view of the beach.
“Do me a favor,” she whispered.
“Anything,” I whispered back.
“Make him happy.”
I sighed.
Then I promised, “You got it.”
That was when she sighed and we both fell silent. Thirty seconds later, Memphis yapped, leaped off my lap and bounced to the door. Maris and I looked through our seats and watched Sam approach.
When he arrived, he kissed my upturned lips; I smelled his aftershave and got even warmer. Then he shifted and kissed his mother’s upturned cheek. Then he bent down and lifted up Memphis who tried to kiss his exposed neck. As usual, he managed to avoid this but Memphis didn’t mind since she was snuggled to his wide chest with one arm and Sam was scratching her neck with his other hand.
“You ‘bout ready to go?” Sam asked his Mom.
“All packed, honey,” she told him then looked at me. “You sure you don’t want to join us for breakfast?”
I shook my head. “Thank you but this is Maris and Sammy time.”
Her face got soft, her eyes got warm, I saw that look on another face that day and I smiled into it as she smiled at me and replied, “Thank you, honey.”
It was then I suspected my face got soft and eyes got warm.
Sam handed me Memphis and told his Mom, “I’ll go up and get your bag.” His eyes came to me. “Be back around two thirty, baby. But if traffic’s bad, closer to three.”
I nodded.
He bent and touched his mouth to mine again, this time with his hand at my jaw. He finished the lip touch with his fingers doing a light, sweet jaw sweep then turned and strode back into the house.
Maris alighted, I put my coffee cup on the arm of my chair and Memphis and I came up with her. Then Memphis and I hugged her.
But it was only me who said, “I’m so glad you came. Travel safe and let us know when you get home.”
Memphis yapped her farewell.
“Will do, Kia,” Maris replied, gave me another hug, Memphis a few head pats then she followed her son into the house.
I looked from the door down to the beach to see Hap and his muscles jogging up to the walkway. I also saw a couple of female walkers watching him go. They were at a distance but even at a distance I could tell both of them were hotties. And lastly, I saw Hap was oblivious.
Yeesh. If he didn’t pay attention, he’d never find his fine piece of ass.
I decided while drinking more coffee and making Hap breakfast, my next item on the morning’s agenda was informing him of this fact.
Then I nabbed my coffee cup and turned to walk into…
I stopped.
I studied the house.
Then I smiled huge and walked into my home.
* * * * *
Twenty minutes later…
“So they were hot?” Hap, showered, shaved, sitting at the bar and shoveling in a huge bite of my scrambled eggs, asked after the girls I told him were checking him out at the beach.
“Did you not notice them at all?” I asked back.
He swallowed and grinned at me. “Babe, I’m the hunter not the hunted.”
I’d heard that before, kind of.
So standing at the other side of the bar to him, I rolled my eyes then rolled them back and surmised aloud, “You’re the cat; you want a mouse.”
“Word,” he replied and I stifled a giggle.
“Word?” I asked through my self-suffocation.
“Yeah,” he took a huge bite of buttered toast then said through a full mouth, “word.”
“Does anyone say that anymore?” I asked.
“I just did,” Hap answered.
I was about to tell him he was a goof when I saw movement on the deck, my eyes went there and I felt them get wide when I watched Skip stomping across the deck to the door.
Uh-oh.
“Uh… Hap, we have company,” I announced, beginning to move toward the door that I saw Skip was not going to knock on.
No.
He was coming right in.
Then he came right in and I was halfway across the living area when he stopped, sent daggers from his eyes at Hap, declared, “You do not exist,” then his eyes sliced to me. “What’s this I hear, you movin’ in with Sam?”
What?
“Uh –” I started.
“Luci called me,” he shared.
There you go.
“Well –” I started again.
“Know about your windfall, so you got money. Still, Sam’s got a fuckload more money than you.”
I guessed this was true. Though I had no clue why he’d come to Sam’s and barge right in to inform me of that fact.
“Yes, that’s –” I tried and failed again.
“Known each other, what, a month? Who the fuck moves in together after a month?” Skip demanded to know.
“It’s been more than a month,” I informed him.
“Yeah?” he asked belligerently. “How much more?”
I paused to calculate it which was a mistake.
“Skip, dude, this is hardly your –” Hap started, Skip’s eyes cut to him and he clipped, “I said, you do not exist.”
Oh man.
“Skip,” I called his attention back to me but that was as far as I got.
“This is a gold diggin’ operation, you fail, you answer to me.”
Oh my God!
Cantankerous character was one thing but rude and offensive was another.
“Skip,” Hap growled, leaving his seat. “That was out of line. What the fuck?”
Skip looked back at Hap and asked, “What’d I say?”
“Your crab shack, your rules,” Hap shot back. “But right now, like it or not, you’re standin’ in Kia’s house. I exist here and I’m tellin’ you to stand the fuck down.”
Skip assumed a battle stance which was to say hands up in fists, one foot behind the other, body turned to Hap and he invited, “Make me.”
Seriously?
I moved in between them saying, “Skip, Hap, really. There’s no –”
I didn’t finish. This was because I saw more movement on the deck and that movement was Celeste running, yes, running toward the door.
I was picking her up and wasn’t supposed to be at Luci’s place for another hour and a half. I didn’t even know how she got there since Luci was driving her everywhere and Celeste didn’t have a car. It was my understanding that Luci lived in a beach house down from Sam’s but it was a trek, at least a mile of beach and more if you took the winding coastal road.
What I did know was her running and the look on her face when she got inside did not bode happy tidings.
Memphis felt it instantly and yapped.
“Celeste –” I started but she cut me off.
“Luci’s disappeared.”
My chest depressed.
“What?” Hap asked and Celeste looked to him.
“This morning, she said she was going for a walk on the beach. That was three hours ago. She hasn’t come back. I’ve been up and down the beach. No sign and no one I asked has seen her.” Her eyes came to me. “I called you four times. You didn’t answer. I found the keys to her car and came here.”
My phone was upstairs in my purse in the bedroom.
Shit!
“She take her phone with her?” Hap asked, on the move to his bag which was sitting in a corner of the living room.
Celeste shook her head. “Left it on the kitchen counter.”
“Oh God,” I whispered.
“What’s goin’ on?” Skip asked, looking around the lot of us, eyes stopping on Celeste. “And who’re you?”
“I’m –” Celeste started but I bolted into action.
Darting toward the front door, my eyes on Hap who was pulling his cell out of the jeans he wore the night before, I said, “Gordo.”
“Yeah,” Hap said to me.
“Gordo what?” Skip put in.
I ignored him, shoved my feet into the flip-flops I left by the front door and asked Hap, “Where would she go?”
He pressed his lips together and shook his head, flipping open his phone. “This isn’t my place, babe. I come down. I crash at Sam or Luci’s. I hang but I don’t know their gigs.”
I turned to Skip. “Where would she go?”
“What in the sam hill is goin’ on?” Skip fired back.
“Luci’s not good,” I told him.
“Sam, Hap,” Hap said into his phone.
“Tell me somethin’ I don’t know,” Skip said to me.
“Celeste is here. Says Luci went for a walk three hours ago, didn’t come back,” Hap kept talking into his phone.
“Luci’s more not good than the normal not good, Skip, we have to find her,” I said to Skip, watched his leathery face pale and I finished, “Fast.”
“Would she go to his grave?” Celeste asked quietly.
“He’s buried in Arlington,” Skip muttered.
“Well that’s out,” I whispered and my eyes went to Hap.
“Right, we’re there,” Hap said into his phone, flipped it shut and looked at me even as he started striding to the front door. “Sam says Luci and Gordo used to spend time in Ruler Bay. It was their spot.”
“Let’s go,” I replied.
“Kia, ma belle, you’re in your robe,” Celeste reminded me.
“I’m covered,” I murmured, following Hap out the door.
“Darling, it’ll only take –” Celeste’s voice followed me, I stopped, Skip almost ran into me but my eyes went straight to Celeste.
“I’m fine. Let’s go,” I stated then turned and rushed behind Hap.
“Coastal road, Hap, Kia’s with me, Frenchie’s with you,” Skip ordered as we all rushed down the walkway.
“Sam’s on his way,” Hap said to the walkway, not even looking back as his legs moved with wide strides down to the drive.
We hit the vehicles, Celeste moving directly to the passenger side of Sam’s SUV, me going straight to the passenger side of a decrepit pickup in which Skip was already at the wheel. I was still swinging in when Skip turned the ignition and was still closing my door when he started reversing with scary speed, narrowly missing Luci’s Corvette in the drive. He cut the wheel severely when he hit road and my body swayed nearly to the seat. He righted the truck, took off, I righted myself and clicked my seatbelt in place.
“Tell me what more than the normal not good is,” Skip ordered on a bark.
“She loves Sam, she likes me, she wants us together and even meddled a little to make that so. Still, Sam and I getting tight, Luci seeing it, Celeste thinks it’s making what she lost, already a constant reminder, more intense. She says Luci has dark moments where she can’t hide her despair. And Luci told me herself that one day everything is great and the next everything can turn black. So she already wasn’t good, Skip, but now she’s more than normally not good.”
He took a hair raising turn out to the main road then gunned it as I turned to look at him.
“You know her,” I said softly. “Will she do anything crazy?”
“Never seen a love like that, not in my life,” Skip replied, my stomach clenched and my heart started hurting.
Still.
“That’s not an answer, Skip,” I whispered.
His eyes flicked to me and the old pickup increased speed.
Then, to the windshield, he whispered back, “Yep.”
That was what I was afraid he was going to say.
“Shit, shit, fuck,” I hissed. Then I asked, “What’s Ruler Bay?”
“Can walk it from Gordo and Luci’s place but it’s a ways. On foot, takin’ your time, maybe half an hour. Thing is, you gotta climb some rocks and then descend into it. Got a trail, it’s not treacherous but enough so it’s pretty private. Gordo was home, he ran it nearly every day. He loved it there. Took Luci there all the time. She loved it there too. Far’s I know, she hasn’t been back, not since he died.”
“Is this the only place they’d go?”
“Fuck if I know. Served ‘em fries and crab sandwiches. Got drunk with ‘em. They didn’t whisper their secrets to me.”
“What I’m saying is, maybe we should diversify our search,” I explained.
“And what I’ll say is, if anyone knows where she’d go, it’s Sam. First, he and Gordo were like brothers. Nope, strike that, what they had was bigger than blood. Sam stepped in with her when Gordo bit it and when I say that I mean big time. They were close before, Sam and Luci, but now they’re really friggin’ close. Anyone knows where she’d go, it’s Sam. So that’s where we’re goin’.”
“Right,” I whispered my thoughts on Luci and his words.
What they had was bigger than blood.
Two brothers Sam lost.
Two.
Shit!
I fell silent.
Skip drove like a demon.
Finally, Skip said, “Nothin’ there.”
I craned my neck and scanned the coastline, asking, “Can you see the bay?”
“No, woman, what I’m tellin’ you is, Sam and Luci are thick as thieves but not that way. Not the way he was with you at the Shack. Fact is, ‘fore you, he never brought a woman to the Shack.”
Oh wow.
That was news.
My eyes shot to him. “Really?”
“Just don’t get fool shit in your head ‘bout them. That’s all I’m sayin’.” He jerked his chin to something and stated, “There’s the bay.”
I looked back to the coastline to see a short outcropping of rock. It wasn’t tall and it was covered with green. You could see the trail running from a small parking lot-slash-pit stop on the road.
Skip swung in as I undid my seatbelt. He barely came to a halt before my door was open and I was out.
“Shit woman!” Skip shouted but I took off toward the trailhead, my robe flying out behind me.
About a minute later, I was thinking it was time to join Sam in some kind of workout regime because I had a stitch in my side.
Two minutes after that, I was thanking my lucky stars that the trail was relatively well-used and definitely well-maintained for I was traversing it easily even on flip-flops.
Thirty seconds after that, I was heading down and I could see the bay.
Luci was sitting in the sand, knees cocked, elbows to knees, jaw in hands, eyes to the water, the waves rolling toward the shore licking her ankles.
I kept going flat out.
I was across the beach and five feet away from her when her head jerked to me as her body jumped, she looked up and her mouth dropped open.
Then she asked, “Kia, cara mia, what on earth are you doing here?” Her gazed moved down to my middle then back up and she finished, “In your robe?”
I stopped abruptly, sucked in breath and told her, “You’ve been gone for three hours. Everyone is worried sick.”
She blinked up at me and queried, “Has it been three hours?”
“Yes, Luci!” I cried. “Celeste is freaking out. We all are.”
Her eyes moved beyond me and her brows drew together. “Is that Skip?”
“Yes, it’s Skip. He was at the house being cantankerous when Celeste showed freaking out.”
“Woman! What the hell!” Skip yelled when he arrived.
She gracefully stood saying, “I’m so sorry, I lost track of time.”
“For three hours?” I asked and she looked back at me.
“I…” she looked to the ocean then her eyes came again to me. “Yes,” she whispered. “For three hours.”
I studied her face, I did not at all like what I saw so I said, “Skip, give us a minute.”
“Hell with that, I –”
My eyes sliced to him and I ordered firmly, “Skip, give us a minute.”
Skip scowled at me. Then he scowled at Luci. Then he turned and stomped down the beach toward the trail Hap was running down with Celeste following him some distance behind.
I turned back to Luci and got closer. “Are you okay?”
Her head tilted to the side, her mouth curled into a small smile but her face suffused with sorrow. The jig was up, the shutters thrown open. No hiding. All of it there for me to see.
And it hurt to witness.
She whispered her answer, “No.”
“Luci,” I whispered back, moving even closer, my hand reaching out and taking hers.
Her fingers curled tight on mine but she looked to the sea and kept whispering. “I remember. I remember what it was like to fall in love.”
I kept silent but my heart squeezed because there it was. Watching Sam and I was torture for our Luci.
“Like it was yesterday,” she went on softly. “Funny how you can fall so hard but it doesn’t hurt. You’d do it again. You’d do it again and again and again. You’d do it forever.”
I held her hand and held my peace.
“I thought we had forever,” she whispered to the sea.
I swallowed back tears and kept my focus on Luci.
She kept talking quietly. “We used to make love here. In the sand.”
Oh God.
God, God, God.
“At night, Travis would wake me up and we’d walk in the moonlight holding hands. No words. Just holding hands. He’d bring me here and make love to me in the sand, under the stars. Then he’d hold me and we’d whisper to each other about nothing. Then we’d walk back, silent, holding hands. I never slept so well. Those times, after we got home, I slept so well, Kia, safe in the arms of the man who loved me like that. Loved me so much he wanted nothing more than to walk holding hands in the moonlight to beauty, create beauty with me, then take me home and hold me while I slept.”
I squeezed her hand, inched closer and whispered, “Honey.”
Her eyes came to me and her sultry, gorgeous voice was dead when she said, “I’m never going to have that again.”
“Oh, Luci, sweetie, you don’t know.”
“Not with Travis.”
Well, she was right about that.
“I’m so sorry,” I whispered because, honestly, there was nothing else to say and seriously, I was.
“I am too,” she whispered back, her eyes locked on mine and I watched them get bright as I watched her lip start to quiver, mine reciprocated and she kept whispering. “I am too. I am very, very sorry, Kia.”
I saw it and moved right into it when it happened. The sob tearing out of her throat, I wrapped my arms around her and she shoved her face in my neck, her body jerking against mine, wracked with tears.
I held her close, stroked her hair and said not a word as her tears wet my skin, so many of them they started to slide down my chest and wet my robe. Hearing them, feeling them, I struggled holding back my own. But she needed strength and understanding and I needed to give it to her.
Still, I couldn’t stop it, one escaped to slide down my cheek.
“I want that back,” she whispered against my neck.
“I’m sorry, sweetie, you can’t have it back,” I told her gently.
“I know. I know I can’t have it back with Travis. But I want it back.”
I wasn’t following.
She explained, pushing closer, shoving her face deeper in my neck, she said so quietly I barely heard her over the rushing waves, “I have to let Travis go so I can find it again.”
I closed my eyes and held her tighter.
There it was. Thank you, God, there it was.
She got there herself.
Thank. You. God.
“Yes, Luci, honey, that’s what you need to do,” I whispered.
She nodded but said no more nor did she move.
Not until I felt a presence right before I felt a hand on the small of my back. I twisted my neck and tipped back my head to see Sam standing there. I nodded to him then shifted Luci into his arms. She looked up at him in surprise then her face crumbled again and she did a face plant in his shirt. Sam’s arms went visibly tighter.
I leaned in and kissed the side of her head. Then I reached up and briefly cupped Sam’s jaw. I smiled sadly into his intense eyes then dropped my hand and moved away.
I walked down the beach, the wind beating my insanely expensive robe against my body. Celeste, Hap, Maris and Skip were standing at the trailhead. I stopped at their huddle.
“She’s worked it through on her own,” I announced. “She’s letting him go.”
Hap closed his eyes and dropped his head. Maris pressed her lips together and turned her face away. Celeste gave me a melancholy smile.
Skip looked me in the eyes and announced, “You’ll do.”