Epilogue
Carla
“What are you so antsy for?” Kellan asked, peering at me from the corner of the kitchen counter where he leaned, casually—almost rakishly, looking devilishly handsome in his South Beach uniform—plaid shorts and a cool blue dress shirt, the sleeves rolled up and unbuttoned just enough to be tempting. If Selena hadn’t been due any moment, I might have signaled him that I was in the mood for one last quickie on the balcony before handing her one of the two contracts I’d prepared before agreeing to meet.
I shrugged in reply, not quite sure myself. Peering around the loft apartment, so funky and chic, so expensively furnished and showroom ready, I felt vague feelings of unease, even unrest. “I don’t know,” I murmured noncommittally, sipping absently from my bottled water despite my throat being too dry to drink. “I guess… I guess being here brings up a lot of baggage for me.”
Kellan nodded, his eyes sympathetic, his full lips turned down in a conspiratorial frown, as if sharing my bittersweet moment. “I know what you mean, Carla,” he said, inching his hand along the countertop until it rested on top of my own. “Coming back here always feels like returning to the mountaintop, you know?”
“Exactly! I felt so content in Siesta Key, it’s so much more like home to me now, but… I can’t help but feel that same, neon energy whenever I’m back here in South Beach.”
He nodded, his eyes peering back at me appreciatively. “I feel like Siesta Key is home now, too, Carla.”
“You do?” I asked, hopefully.
He rolled his eyes. “You really have to ask me that?”
“I suppose not, Kellan. I just, I would hate to think you gave up all this…” I nodded around the spacious living room, toward the sunny balcony and, beyond, to the bright blue sky over our former adopted hometown. “For the life of a charter boat captain.”
He chuckled. “Well, I’m not a captain yet, remember? I’ve still got that test next week—”
“But once you pass that,” I interrupted, excitement over our new future getting the best of me, “you’ll be such a big help to Roy.”
He nodded humbly. “Well, that new boat’s going to be a big help to both of us.”
Now it was my turn to smile humbly. With Roy a few weeks away from getting out of rehab, he was itching to get back on the water. The old boat, Roy’s Retreat, wasn’t big enough for Roy, Kellan and Ryan plus up to half-a-dozen clients. Not only that, but despite his speedy recovery, Roy still wasn’t up to captaining the ship himself.
Fortunately, with the sale of Miami Models, I’d been able to secure a bigger, newer boat – appropriately named Roy’s Retreat II – to replace the first. Now Roy could enjoy his life’s work without the actual “work” part, regaling the clients with his stories and steering the ship toward his favorite fishing spots, all while Kellan drove and Ryan baited and strung the lines. It was the perfect solution for all involved, and one that would significantly add to Roy’s recovery – as well as grow his business.
In time, he might be able to steer the ship himself. Or, as we all hoped, he’d enjoy “active retirement” and let Kellan do the heavy lifting for a while. Either way, he’d be out of the house— and Mom’s hair. Secretly, I was looking forward to the change. Mom and I had grown closer since I’d returned home, but we still spent so much time care-giving, we had little time for relationship building. I’d be a liar if I didn’t admit I was looking forward to some “Mommy and me” time after what we’d both been through over the past few months, not to mention a few long, leisurely lunches— with frozen margaritas overlooking the beach—without having to worry about taking Roy to or from physical therapy.
Newly retired, I was looking forward to spending more time connecting with my mother and—from the sound of it—she was just as eager to reacquaint herself with her daughter. And once the joys of being a “lady who lunches” wore off, I was eager to explore other business opportunities in Siesta Key. Real estate, for one. Our experiences with Spencer Sterling, of Sterling Properties, had been less than satisfactory. I’d been thinking how much he’d left on the table by pleasing himself rather than his clients. Maybe Spencer could use a little friendly competition in town, I’d imagined—starting with my parents’ house.
Old and crumbling, it was the perfect fixer upper for a young, upwardly mobile company who might enjoy spending every weekend doing another home improvement on the cozy old beach shack. But as for Mom and Roy, well, it was time for them to upgrade to something more modern. A place where Mom wouldn’t have to bang the toaster in just the right way to get it to work and Roy wouldn’t suffer endless allergies from the weathered, warped window frames.
I was thinking a nice condo downtown, something on the first floor with handicap access, a pool and Jacuzzi to assist in Roy’s ongoing rehab and just close enough to our new place to be near in case of an emergency, but not so close they’d constantly “pop in” during one of our impromptu nooners!
I loved the convenience and “newness” of our new condo, and wanted the same for Mom and Roy. Once Kellan had completed his studies to be an official boat captain, I planned on taking a real estate course and getting my own license.
But first, business. “Speaking of selling things,” Kellan chuckled, pulling me out of my pleasant daydream, “what was all that at your lawyer’s office this morning? I thought you were just popping in for a standard lease agreement, right?”
I shrugged, blushing slightly at my spontaneous act of goodwill. “I dunno,” I murmured, toying with the two manila folders my lawyer had handed me in his office earlier that morning. “Selena has been so humble and kind on the phone this week, setting all this up,” I pointed out, referring to my former assistant’s pledge to rent out my studio loft while starting her own modeling agency from my— sorry, make that her—home office. “I thought, if she was really sincere about leaving Florida Faces and starting out on her own, I might just sell her the place outright.”
“What?” he asked, surprise cascading across his handsome face. “I thought you two were sworn enemies after she blindsided you and took most of your models with her to Florida Faces.”
“We were,” I murmured, avoiding his judgmental eyes. “But when she saw my listing for the condo on her Facebook page, she got in touch and we’ve been talking back and forth for the last few weeks, so…”
He covered my hand once more, squeezing it with his own. “You’re just full of surprises today, aren’t you?”
“Just wait’ll you see what I have in store for you if she doesn’t show up,” I teased, both of us leaped when the doorbell rang and he scooted to the loft, as planned, calling his first mate, Ryan, to see how he was doing without his honorary “captain” at the helm all day.
“Selena!” I announced when throwing open the door and seeing my former assistant, fit, radiant and beautiful but low key in faded jeans and a baggy, frayed sweater.
“Carla,” she said, slightly more subdued, voice low and raw. “Thanks so much for seeing me today.”
I pulled her inside, finding her arms trembling and her eyes puffy— her mascara shabby—from apparently— crying? “Of course I’ll see you,” I said, offering her a bottled water from the otherwise empty fridge. “What’s going on?”
“Nothing,” she said, in a way so dramatic it clearly meant “everything” instead. “I just, ever since leaving Florida Faces—”
“You left them for good?” I asked. “Last time we talked, that was just an idea.”
She shrugged, ignoring her water bottle on the countertop as we stood, alone, in the kitchen. “It’s been a long time coming,” she confessed, clutching the ends of the sleeves of her oversized sweater in trembling fingers. “I just, I’ve felt so bad about what I did to you, and Kellan, and… it just felt like the right time to make a new start.”
I considered Selena, once so brave and confident, even cocky, in her youth and beauty. Now she seemed, humbled, eager to start fresh… and what better way than with a new address?
“Would you still like to make it here?” I asked her, remembering how often we’d met in the Miami Models glory days to plot taking over South Beach together. It wasn’t just Selena’s betrayal that made my old loft a bittersweet memory for me now, but how wrapped up I’d been in world domination when, after all, I’d known so little about what made life worth living back then. In many ways, I realized, pulling the file folders closer to us, I wasn’t that different from Selena when I’d started Miami Models: young, cutthroat, eager to take on the world, even if that meant crushing the other guy. Now, looking at the young woman with old eyes, I realized maybe, just maybe, we both knew better.
She nodded, eyes moist once more. “I’d be honored to start my own company where you started Miami Models, Carla.”
“Good,” I said, handing her the second, amended file folder instead of the original lease agreement. “Then I’d be honored to sell it to you.”
Selena started, a look of concern on her young face. “But I can’t afford—”
“Same terms as the lease agreement,” I interrupted, opening the folder so she could see for herself. “1,200 a month, but I’ve put you on the deed as co-owners so at least you’ll be building up equity. If you decide to stay after the first year, I’ll sign it over completely and the mortgage will be yours. Fair?”
“Fair?” she squealed, embracing me in a bear hug. “No one’s ever done anything like this for me before, Carla.” Then she let me go and looked at me more thoughtfully. “No,” she said. “I take that back. You gave me a chance when no one else would, with Miami Models. And look how that turned out.”
I patted her on the shoulder. “I think we’re both a little older and wiser now, aren’t we?”
She nodded, sighing with relief as we both signed the paperwork. Afterward, sliding out the bottle of champagne he’d hidden in the crisper drawer, Kellan joined us, opening it and pouring bubbly into three plastic cups he’d brought along as well.
“To new beginnings,” he said, and we all toasted—each of us beginning something new in our own right.
“You guys look so great together,” Selena said after finishing her champagne. “And you’re really enjoying it down in Siesta Key?”
We looked at each other, nodding quietly, even proudly, before turning back to her and saying, in unison, “We really are.”
We laughed at the pat response, but there was nothing “pat” about it. We were enjoying it in Siesta Key, and selling the condo to Selena was the final step in distancing ourselves from South Beach completely. Though only a few hours from our new home, it seemed a world away as we said our goodbyes—and congratulations—to Selena, standing proudly in her new, and very own, doorway.
“That was really sweet of you,” Kellan said, holding my hand almost chastely in the elevator as we descended to the lobby level.
I shrugged, walking out onto the street and toward our car. “She did me a favor, taking the condo off my hands,” I confessed. “Now I can go home with no strings attached, you know?”
Kellan nodded, opening my door for me. Peering around the sunny streets of South Beach, at once so familiar and now so distant, he winked and said, “I like that word, ‘home’.”
“Good,” I told him, sealing the moment with a long, tender kiss that held the promise of more – so much more. “Then let’s go home, Kellan, and start the rest of our life together…”
He nodded, then shook his head. “I don’t need to take you anywhere for that, Carla,” he assured me, leaning in for another long, slow, steamy kiss. “Wherever we go, from here on out, I’ll be home as long as we’re together.” I smiled at his ability to always find just the right thing to say but knew, as he raced around the hood of the car to leap into the driver’s seat, this time, Kellan wasn’t just saying something pretty to be pretty. He meant it, as much as I did, and I knew as we headed home, no matter how long we stayed in Siesta Key, it was just a temporary stop on our lifelong adventure together…
Our home.