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“Did your father want you to take over the family business?”
“Yes, sure. It’s only natural that he would. But I think he always knew I was more interested in studying the living fish, not the ones caught to be eaten. And between you and me, he’s the one who inspired my interest. He was the one who taught me the names of all the fish, about their habitats and habits. He never let me keep an undersized fish and was mindful of our role as stewards of the earth and sea. When I went off to study marine biology I got some raised brows from some of the family, but he never once criticized my decision. He always encouraged me to carve out my own destiny.” He chuckled ruefully. “Though he’ll never understand why I ever wanted to leave a place as beautiful as Cherry Point. My greatest fear was that I never would.”
“But you did.”
He nodded. “Yep.”
“And now you’re back.”
“I guess it’s like what Bigger said. The tide brings us back, sooner or later.”
“Sort of like the turtles. You came back home.”
He turned his head to face her. “Sort of. Now, your turn. Where are you from?”
She shrugged nonchalantly, but inside she cringed. In the South, asking someone where they were from was asking for a family history and church affiliation. Toy didn’t have a family to brag on. She was ashamed to admit that her daddy had run off before she was born and the only siblings she had were two half brothers who were mean curs who’d as soon steal from her what little she had as say hello. One of them ended up in jail—to keep his daddy company, her mama liked to say.
No love was lost between Toy and her parents, either. Her mother and step-father had kicked her out of the trailer at seventeen when she got pregnant and never opened the door to her since. Not exactly the warm family bond that Ethan knew.
“I used to dream of traveling the world, too,” she replied, guiding her answer in a different direction. “Like you did. But I never made it farther than Holly Hill, where I was born. My parents moved to North Charleston when I started high school. My life got complicated pretty fast. Now I have my daughter, my job… So much for traveling. I have this recurring dream of a turtle swimming in the ocean, trying real hard to get home. Go figure.”
“Is your family in fishing or conservation or…?”
Toy snorted and shook her head. “Hardly.”
“Your husband?”
“My—” Her breath caught. “There is no husband,” she blurted out.
“I thought…I know you have a daughter,” he said in way of explanation.
There was an awkward silence during which Toy expected him to follow up with a question about divorce, or her being a widow. She tensed, not wanting to go into her history about Darryl and her being an unwed mother.
“So what got you interested in turtles?” he asked.
She silently blessed him for not prying. “That would be Miss Lovie, Cara’s mother. I took care of her when she was sick. She used to live in this big ol’house in Charleston but she loved the beach house. When she got sick she wanted to live there—to die there, I reckon. Anyway, she wanted a companion, so I took the job. Her real name was Olivia Rutledge, but everyone on the island called her Miss Lovie. She was the island’s first turtle lady and the dearest person you’d ever hope to meet.” She looked at her hands. “She was real good to me.”
“Is that how Little Lovie got her name?”
Toy brightened. “Yes. I called her Olivia after her, but it was my neighbor Florence’s mother, old Miranda, who gave her the nickname Little Lovie. It just stuck. It’s a big name to grow into, but I think she’ll manage it.”
He smiled. “Well, if she’s anything like her mother…”
She turned her head to look at Ethan. His dark brows gathered over narrowed eyes as he looked out at the road ahead. She could envision him steering the Miss Peggy, completely at home on the open sea. She thought of all he’d told her of his life and his travels. And looking out at the road ahead, she couldn’t help but wonder what that kind of freedom felt like.
5
That afternoon was as glorious as a promise kept.
Toy said a hurried goodbye to Ethan after they admitted Cherry Point to the Aquarium, and forgetting all but her daughter, hurried home to build a sand castle.
The beach was drenched with sunlight and overhead a cloudless sky made the ocean a dazzling blue. Memorial Day was one of the busiest beach days of the summer but the densest crowd clustered near the pier where the restaurants played music and served icy drinks. Families gathered together on a menagerie of brightly colored towels and under umbrellas. Toddlers splashed gleefully in long stretches of tidal pool while grandparents proudly stood by watching. The kite boarders preferred the gusty winds near Breach Inlet and the blue sky was dotted with arched kites, like so many wildly plumed birds.
Oh, what a sandcastle it was! Toy didn’t hurry the project but allowed Little Lovie to design however big a castle she wanted. Her daughter, she learned, could dream big. The moats were as long as Lovie was tall and at each corner they built an enormous turret, complete with sea shell decoration. There was a drawbridge across the moat and more turrets along the castle wall than Lovie knew how to count. By the time they were done, the skin under their nails was tender from digging, their shoulders were pink, and the sun was lowering in the western sky. Most of the other beachcombers had already left for home and barbecue.
After a rowdy day, the beach seemed very quiet, save for a few stragglers like them. Sandpipers returned to skitter along the shoreline and an unleashed dog trotted home. Their castle was done. Little Lovie ran off to the sea to wash the sand off her hands in the quiet surf. The tide was far out and the wet beach was gunmetal gray. It created a striking contrast to the pink streaks at the horizon. Toy hung back by the castle to watch her daughter at the waterline. Lovie gingerly dipped her toes in, testing the water, then treaded carefully a few inches into the lapping waves, stopping ankle deep. Her blond hair caught the last light of this precious day and it was like watching the sun spill over her shoulders as she bent to swish her hands in the waves.
Toy watched her daughter and all the yearnings for travel and adventure she’d felt listening to Ethan dissipated like the foam along the shore. Her own journey in life had brought her to this moment and she felt a sudden longing to capture it forever.
On the other side of the island, the Eco-tour’s tour boat was casting off for the sunset cruise. Cara stood on the dock and watched as Brett guided the big boat slowly back from the dock. The water churned loudly under the power of the engines, then eased forward toward the Intracoastal waterway. Every seat was filled with couples of all ages eager for a romantic cruise. While collecting the ticket money, Cara had overheard furtive whispers from couples worried that the sky was still so light that they wouldn’t see a sunset. She assured them that the sun would indeed set, as it did every night, and the voyage was timed so that they would get the most breathtaking and romantic view possible.
Cara leaned against the wood railing to watch her husband at the helm of the long boat. Brett stood wide legged, his hands on the wheel. As the speed picked up, the water churned white wakes at the boat’s sides, spraying droplets of water into the air. The wind tugged at the tips of his tawny hair escaping under his dark green baseball cap. His chin cut a strong silhouette against the sky while the tails of the blue chambray shirt, worn open over his T-shirt, flapped behind him like a flag.
As if he could sense her standing there, he turned his head toward the dock. Brett lifted his hand in a wave.
In that brief signal Cara understood at some profound level that his blue eyes had registered her standing there and his lips curved in a half smile. She knew, too, that his brief wave signaled his love and his intent to return home—to her—at the voyage’s end. Cara swallowed deeply, moved that she understood all that in a quick flip of the hand.
She lifted her arm and returned the wave, feeling the connection. Then he turned and focused on the water ahead. She dropped her hand slowly, missing him as he disappeared from view, sensing how empty her life would be without him.
They’d been married for five years. Sometimes it seemed like five days, sometimes like five decades. In those five years they’d journeyed from the early days of naive and explosive passion to a deeper love derived from commitment, understanding and finally acceptance of each other’s best and worst qualities.
Theirs had been a tempestuous love affair. When people thought of them, they usually compared them to apples and oranges—or Scarlett and Rhett. No two people could be more opposite. She’d loved the city life, the pace of her job as an advertising executive, the quick decisions and the thrill of the deal. Brett was a lowcountry boy in love with the salt marsh, the winding creeks and all the wildlife treasures that were hidden there. His pace was leisurely and his temper slow to ignite. But once he dug his heels deep in the pluff mud, he wouldn’t budge an inch. This was in sharp contrast to Cara’s quick, mercurial mind.
She might say that she married Brett against her better judgment, except that every instinct in her body had screamed that he was the one. Brett Beauchamps was the only man who had ever stood up to her, who continually surprised her, challenged her—and yes, loved her. Love had never come easily for Cara.
She turned and walked slowly down the dock. She’d never envisioned her life the way it had turned out. When she was young, she’d dreamed of escaping the South forever, and all the expectations of her deeply rooted, South of Broad family. She grew up in an era learning the limits a woman could achieve outside the home and always desiring to surpass them. Everything she’d ever wanted was somewhere off, far from Charleston in cities where people moved fast, where the accent was harsh, and where a woman living alone was accepted as a norm, not viewed as someone to be pitied. Times had changed a lot since then, but back when she was a long limbed, skinny, dark eyed teen, all traffic traveled to points north.
Cara locked the door of the small wooden shed that housed the Eco-tour ticket office and walked past flashy, expensive fishing boats and across the open gravel parking lot to her car. The night was so quiet she heard only the gravel crunching beneath her feet, the dull thud of boats knocking against the dock, and the laughing cry of a gull.
She laughed back. What a hoot her life turned out to be. She had left her executive job in Chicago, her condo overlooking Lake Michigan, her beautiful wool suits and fine leather shoes to be the wife of a boat captain struggling to make ends meet on the Isle of Palms. Wouldn’t her mother have just loved the way things ended up?
She chuckled at the thought, then sighed, missing her mother terribly, wishing she had lived to see her daughter happy at last, wanting to drive over to the beach house for a spot of tea with her and a quick chat. She would have told her mother that the only ingredient missing in her romantic saga was a child. She knew how much Brett wanted a baby and she felt a deeply rooted guilt that she, somehow, had let him down.
“Please, God, let this baby come,” she whispered.
The car seat burned her thighs as she climbed into the compact sedan. The humidity and heat were so thick she could barely breathe. She quickly started the engine and rolled down the windows, welcoming the offshore breezes that whisked in. She didn’t wait for the air-conditioning to cool things down. It had been a hectic day and she wanted to feel the cool water of a shower down her back. She guided the car around ruts in the lot, turned onto Waterway Boulevard and headed home.
A short while later she pulled off at the small, pink stucco house on Hamlin Creek that she called home. A sporty, blue BMW convertible blocked her entry into the garage. She cut the engine and checked the plates. She didn’t recognize the sexy car but the license plate showed the orange peach of Georgia.
It could only be one person. She scrambled from the car and trotted along their winding front path, digging for her house keys. Just as she reached the door, however, it swung open. Standing before her was her best friend in all the world, Emmi Baker Peterson, arms wide and her flame colored hair a fiery wreath around her grinning face.
“Surprise!”
“Emmi!” she screamed, throwing her arms wide.
They squealed in unison like little girls as they threw arms around each other. Cara closed her eyes and instantly she was thirteen again and it was the beginning of summer and she and Emmi were arriving at Isle of Palms with their families for a whole, glorious season! Emmi’s beach house was only a few blocks up the road, but both families lived the rest of the year in homes on the mainland.
They’d discovered each other early one summer morning while collecting sea shells near Breach Inlet. They couldn’t have been more than seven or eight years old. Emmi was searching for an angel’s wings shell and Cara had one in her bucket. Cara coveted an especially bright orange whelk in Emmi’s bucket. That morning they’d traded shells—and they’d been trading secrets every since.
Cara leaned back, her hands still holding tight to her best friend.
“Emmi, there’s nothing left of you to hug!” she exclaimed, blinking as she took in the dramatic changes. Emmi’s body was long and lean and wrapped in tight, bleached jeans and a pink, form-fitting T-shirt. When she’d left Isle of Palms two summers ago, Emmi had been broad in the beam, all plump curves and full breasts. Looking at her, Cara guessed she’d lost over fifty pounds. And that wasn’t all. Her short red hair was now as long as it had been in college, cut in layers that fell past her shoulders and highlighted with bold streaks of gold.
“You look incredible,” Cara said, eyes popping. “So…sexy. Girlfriend, just how much weight did you lose?”
With a saucy shake of her head, Emmi placed her pink tipped fingers on her hips. “Sixty-three pounds,” she announced. Then, her wide mouth stretched across her tanned face. “Can you believe it?”
Cara’s mouth dropped open in a silent gasp. “Sixty-three pounds… Unbelievable.”
“Ain’t it, though.” Emmi laughed in a way that indicated she was damned pleased with herself. “Divorce turned out to be the wonder weight loss program. Who knew? When you think about it, I really lost about two hundred and fifty pounds of dead weight. What a relief.”
Cara shook her head. “I’m all amazement. And extremely jealous. In fact, I’ve decided to cast off our friendship of years and to hate you instead. It’s just too inconsiderate of you to come home looking so good. You make the rest of us—meaning me—look like old crones.” She skewered her eyes. “You look like you lost about ten years, too.”
Her smiled hardened. “I lost twenty-five years.” Then just as quickly her face lit up again. “And I aim to make up for lost time.” She winked and clicked her fingers. “There isn’t a single man safe in the South today!”
It was a sassy gesture, even feisty, and though Emmi smiled her signature wide grin, Cara noted that the smile was not reflected in her eyes.
“Well, before you get too crazy,” she said, “I’m desperate for a cool shower and a glass of white chilled wine. You pour while I shower. Then you can bring me up to speed.”
Cara entered the tiled foyer of her compact house and dumped her purse on the small wooden table and her keys in a small sweetgrass basket. Over the years she’d carted out of the house Brett’s old, battered furniture and sporting goods and decorated their home in the cool, pale blue tones she loved. Each piece of furniture was carefully chosen and the dark wood and glass were polished. She noticed a glass vase filled with white roses on the table and cast a glance of thanks to her friend. “Thank you, darling, I love them.”
“No biggie.” Emmi lifted a wine glass. It was nearly empty. “I hope you don’t mind. I already helped myself. It was a long drive from Atlanta with my car packed to the brim. It’s stuffed with every whatnot in this world I hold dear, including a goldfish.”
She laughed, then coughed as wine went down the wrong way. “I’m fine,” she rasped, waving Cara away. “I choked just remembering that trip. Thank the Lord I survived. On the highway I was fine, but every time I had to stop, the water in the damn fish tank went splish splashing all over the backseat. It’s a miracle that fish made it here alive!” She pointed to a three gallon Aquarium now sitting on Cara’s kitchen counter. “Meet Nemo.”
Cara saw a fairly large goldfish with beautiful fins doing a dead man’s float at the top of the tank. “Good God, Emmi, I think it’s dead!”
Emmi went to the tank and tapped it. The fish jolted to life and swam madly in circles. “Nemo, it’s not nice to scare the guests,” she said. Then to Cara, “Can he stay here for a couple of days? I think he really will die if he has to go back into that car.”
“Sure, why not? Speaking of cars, that’s a sporty one in the driveway.”
“Like it?”
“What’s not to like?”
“Exactly.” Her green eyes glittered over the rim of her glass. “I traded my clunky old SUV in for a convertible. I’m done with station wagons, SUVs, big cars in general. No more schlepping kids and garden supplies around. This is the new me.” She tossed her hair back again, a new gesture she’d picked up.
“Is it?” Cara looked at her friend through narrowed eyes. Emmi was slender and sexy, yes. But there was something off-putting about her aggressive youthfulness that she couldn’t put her finger on.
“You’re looking at me funny,” Emmi said. “Sort of like the way you looked at me when I got my hair done for the prom. Remember?”
Cara burst out a laugh. Only Emmi could stir up memories that deeply stored. “How can I forget it? It was two feet of copper curls held together with a hundred bobby pins and two cans of hairspray.”
Emmi threw back her head and laughed. “It was that high! I thought I was going to fall over with the weight of it. At five feet seven inches, plus heels and hair, I towered over Tom.”
“My God, what were we thinking?”
“I was thinking I looked beautiful. Tom thought I did, anyway.” Her smile slipped but she caught herself and shrugged. “At least he told me he did. That was probably a lie. Like all the other lies he told me.”
Cara sensed a dangerous turn in emotions. “He wasn’t lying,” she hurried to respond. “You did look beautiful. And you look beautiful now.”
Emmi lifted her chin and straightened, but the wine was beginning to affect her balance. “You bet I do. I look great. Tom was an idiot for letting me go.”
“A first class loser.”
“A cheating, lying, loser.”
Too much wine, too little to eat. Cara went to the fridge to scrounge for cheese and crackers.
“Listen, sugar. Why don’t you help yourself to some of this cheese while I freshen up. I’ll be back in a flash.”
In the shower she tilted her head back and let the cool water sluice away the day of selling tour tickets, answering the phone, and hopping on jet skis to help stranded tourists who stalled in the waterway. She was utterly exhausted, slightly sunburned and parched. She relished the idea of cuddling up with her best friend for a long chat over a chilled glass of wine. She emerged in minutes wearing a white terry robe and a white towel wrapped around her hair. She found Emmi curled on the couch like a sleek tabby cat. Her eyes were a telltale red, as though she’d been crying. On the coffee table was a new bottle of wine, uncorked, with two glasses. When she spotted Cara coming into the room, she forced a smile and held out a goblet of wine for her.
“Emmi, how long have you been here?” she asked, concerned.
“An hour at least. Maybe two.”
Cara curled her legs under her as she sat beside Emmi on the sofa. Emmi was clearly one sheet to the wind. This was another change in her friend. Emmi had never been much of a drinker. Tom used to tease her about being a “cheap date.”
“Did you eat any cheese?”
Emmi shook her head. “Not hungry, thanks.”
“If you don’t mind, I’m starving.” She reached for a chunk of Brie, put it on a cracker and hungrily devoured it.
“So tell me what’s going on with you,” Emmi asked. “How are things in the wild world of ecotourism? Anything new with the infertility tests?”
“Same old, same old,” she replied evasively.
“Which means…” Emmi prompted.
“Which means nothing much right now. We’re in a holding pattern till the doctors advise us what to do next.”
“Don’t stay in that holding pattern too long. Your biological clock is ticking.”
“Ticking? It’s positively unwound! A baby now would be a miracle.”
“Not with the miracles of modern science. Lots of women have babies late in life.”
Cara sighed, silently sending off a prayer that what Emmi said was true. She reached for another cracker, busying her hands with spreading the brie.
“You okay with this?” Emmi asked gently. “You still want a baby, don’t you?”
“More than ever. It’s just…”
“Just what?”
Cara couldn’t put on a false front any longer to her best friend. She set down the cheese, fighting back tears she was determined not to shed.
