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Burke leaned back in his chair. “Him?”
“Gavin.”
“Oh.” Burke felt the familiar tug of grief...and shame. He cleared his throat. “Why the lighthouse?”
Aunt Lenora shrugged. “You’d have to ask her.”
Burke didn’t reply even as the conversation faded into silence. Aunt Lenora worked her way through her pancakes while Burke sipped his coffee. He had a feeling the old woman wasn’t finished, and his suspicions were confirmed a second later when she spoke up once more.
“You should talk to her.”
“Me? Why? What would I say?”
“Tell her not to worry so much about me, or the inn. Tell her it’s okay to go out, to be with other people, to be...happy again.”
Burke wasn’t exactly comfortable with this directive, but before he could formulate a response, Aunt Lenora switched topics.
“And how about you? Have you heard from Tessa?”
The reminder of his runaway bride pierced his pride. “No,” he admitted. “I haven’t.” He’d checked his phone before heading downstairs for breakfast. There had been several texts, expressing sympathy, including one from Harper, Tessa’s sister. But nothing from his fiancée. No texts of explanation. No voicemails saying she was sorry or offering an explanation. Only silence.
“Then you’ll stay.”
“Aunt Lenora, I don’t want to be an inconvenience.”
She ignored him.
“I can pay you, if it helps, since your bookings are down—”
“You can work for your keep.”
Aunt Lenora knew him too well. When he’d first come to live with her, at fourteen, he was already scarred by too many relatives who made him and Gavin feel like a burden. He didn’t appreciate handouts, couldn’t abide feeling indebted to others. By offering him the option to work for his room and board, she’d eliminated one of his strongest objections.
And he couldn’t share the other one with her.
“I don’t know,” he hedged, still trying to find a way out. “Maybe it would be better if I just left town. I mean, with Tessa here and all...”
Aunt Lenora made a face. “You cannot run forever.” Just then, Kitt reentered the kitchen, carrying a pair of fuzzy slippers. He took them to Aunt Lenora and without a word, placed them at her feet where she could easily slide her toes inside.
“Thank you, Kitt.” She patted his hand and met Burke’s gaze. “You know, there’s some drywall that needs replaced in the upstairs hallway. I think your uncle Burke planned to work on that this afternoon. Perhaps you could help him?”
The little boy’s gaze flitted to Burke, his eyes lighting with joy. There was no way he could say no to Aunt Lenora, or Kitt, now.
But he couldn’t stay forever. His conscience would never allow it.
* * *
THE BREEZE OFF the bay whipped the flag that sat next to the lighthouse. Erin listened to the fabric snapping in the wind and imagined it was Gavin, his spirit reminding her he was nearby. She wasn’t sure she believed that, but sometimes, just the thought of him watching over her was enough to get her through the day.
She shifted, settling more comfortably on the bench that offered a magnificent view of the water, and started her weekly conversation.
“So, you’ll never believe what happened yesterday. Tessa stood Burke up at their wedding.”
It had felt strange, at first, speaking aloud when she was all by herself. She refrained if there were others nearby, but she’d learned that during this particular time of the day, on Sunday mornings, the lighthouse grounds were usually pretty empty. So this had became her time, the time she spent with Gavin.
“Burke stayed at the inn last night. Aunt Lenora insisted.” Erin bit her lip, uncertain how much of her thoughts she wanted to voice aloud. “And now she’s invited him to stay for as long as he needs, until he can figure things out. I wish she hadn’t. I don’t want him living there. He’s never liked the Moontide.” She felt a ripple of guilt for such uncharitable thoughts. “I know he doesn’t have anywhere else to go, but it just seems...wrong, somehow. To have him there when you’re...not.”
She sighed and paused in her one-sided conversation to watch a seagull swoop down over the water.
She didn’t know how to express it. Or rather, didn’t want to speak aloud the real reasons Burke’s presence made her uneasy. She might have been talking to the air, but on some level, a small part of her believed Gavin could hear her. And she wasn’t willing to share her secret with him. Not yet. Perhaps not ever.
“Sometimes, I think I’m a terrible person,” she whispered into the wind. “Burke just lost the woman he loves, and now he has nowhere to live. It makes sense for him to stay at the Moontide.”
But his presence is a reminder of my guilt.
She cleared her throat and fell silent as she noticed an older couple shuffling along the brick path that wrapped around the lighthouse. They were both hunched over slightly, their arms threaded tightly together as they moved along.
Her heart ached. That was supposed to have been her and Gavin, growing old together, spending Sunday mornings walking beside the lighthouse. That had been the plan. There had never been any question that Findlay Roads was where they’d make their home after Gavin was finished with the army. It was here that they both had found peace after years of moving around the country—her as a military brat before her mom had settled her in Findlay Roads while she was still in the middle of high school and Gavin being shuffled between family members after his parents’ death. They’d wanted to raise Kitt there, to have him know the stability and relationships they had missed as a child.
So much for that, Erin thought bitterly. All because one person had one drink too many and decided he wasn’t too drunk to drive. It was no consolation that the man responsible for taking Gavin’s life was serving a five-year prison sentence for vehicular homicide.
Erin didn’t want revenge for what had happened. She wanted Gavin back. And nothing in the world could make up for the ocean of tears she’d cried nor the sadness that still resided in her son’s eyes.
“It should be you,” she spoke aloud, now that the older couple had moved beyond earshot. “It should be you, living at the Moontide. Not Burke.”
But deep down she wondered if this was fate’s way of punishing her for the past.
* * *
BURKE USED A utility knife to cut carefully into the drywall surrounding the crack Aunt Lenora had pointed out in one of the upstairs bedrooms. He felt Kitt at his side, though the little boy didn’t say a word. But he huddled close, and Burke sensed the child’s gaze fastened on his movements. He finished cutting and pulled away the drywall paper to begin chipping at the compound underneath. Kitt leaned in so close that Burke could feel the little boy’s breath on his chin.
“You want to give it a try?”
Kitt jerked back in surprise at being addressed.
“It’s not hard,” Burke assured. “Watch.” He demonstrated how to use a drywall knife to scrape off any loose debris then held the handle toward Kitt.
The little boy took it and edged in closer, tongue tucked between his lips, as he awkwardly tackled the repair Burke had started. His attempts to scrape the loose compound free resulted in a few more nicks to the wall.
“Here, like this.” Burke took the smaller hand in his and helped guide the blade along the wall, loosening a spray of debris.
“There you go.” He removed his hand and let Kitt have another try.
The little boy moved slower this time but with more precision and after another minute, Burke moved away to get the drywall compound for the next step in the process. By the time he sat back down on the bedroom floor, Kitt had done a decent job of clearing the surface.
“Not bad,” he declared. “Maybe we should go into business. Daniels and Daniels Drywalling. It has a nice ring to it.”
Kitt didn’t say anything, but the grin he flashed was the biggest Burke had seen yet from his nephew.
Burke continued the repairs and made short work of applying compound and sanding down the wall.
“There we go. All that’s left is to paint.”
“How’d you learn to do that?” It was the first Kitt had spoken since they’d come upstairs together.
He shrugged in response. “I don’t know. I just picked it up somewhere, I guess.” He cocked his head. “Did you ever help your dad around the house?”
Kitt didn’t respond but lowered his head. Burke winced. Kitt had only been four years old when Gavin had died. Not old enough to have participated in too many projects around the inn. And given how Gavin had been deployed in the army for months at a time only reminded Burke just how much Kitt had been shortchanged in his relationship with his father.
“I probably picked it up from your dad, actually. He was always good at this kind of thing.”
Kitt’s head lifted. He followed Burke as they moved into the hall, where Aunt Lenora had mentioned there was another crack that needed to be repaired.
“He could fix anything,” Burke went on. “He was like the resident handyman here at the inn when we were teens.” Burke paused, remembering. “Actually, I’d forgotten that. Your dad and I both had chores when we lived here. I usually had to mow the lawn and rake leaves in the fall. But Gavin, he got all the repair jobs because he was so good at it. I mean, this house is old. So things were always breaking, and Gavin would fix them right up.”
“How old?”
“Hmm?” Burke asked distractedly as he searched for the crack Aunt Lenora had mentioned. He found it relatively easily. She, or perhaps Erin, had positioned a small table in front of the worst part to hide it. But it was still visible if you stood a few feet back. He put down the drywall tools and lifted the table out of the way.
“How old is the Moontide?” Kitt asked.
“Oh, way old. From before the 1800s. It was built several years after the end of the Revolutionary War, I think. I remember once this guy came to stay here for a weekend, and he kept talking at breakfast about the archeology of houses like this, how they survived attacks during the War of 1812 and stuff, when the British were trying to take the Bay.”
Burke turned and caught Kitt’s befuddled expression. He grinned.
“Let me put it this way. This inn has been standing for well over two hundred years.”
Kitt’s eyes grew round at this number. “Two hundred years?” he breathed.
“Yep.”
Burke examined the six-inch gash in the wall, wondering how it had happened and then decided it didn’t matter. Aunt Lenora had grumbled often enough about how the more careless guests at the inn treated the house. People didn’t worry about damages when they’d be gone by the end of the week. Although, with a house as old as the Moontide, repairs had to be expected. A building didn’t get to be around this long without its fair share of aches and pains.
“It looks like this one is going to take some work. You want to help me cut out the wall?”
What little boy didn’t like the chance to do a little demolition?
But Kitt hesitated.
“You’re going to cut the wall?”
Burke laughed. “In this case, it’s okay. It’s kind of like...we have to make this part—” he pointed at the crack “—worse before we can make it better.”
He tugged the utility knife free of his pocket and handed it to Kitt.
“You want to take a shot at it?”
Kitt stared at his hand for a long moment before reaching for the handle.
Burke squatted down next to him and pointed two inches left of the wall’s gash.
“We’re going to start here.” He held Kitt’s hand steady and helped him press into the wall.
And then he heard Erin’s voice, shrill and sharp.
“What do you think you’re doing?”
CHAPTER FOUR (#ud202ade5-d063-59e8-b4a5-985d137fa226)
ERIN FELT HER cheeks warm with anger at the sight of her six-year-old son holding a utility knife in his tiny hands. The sound of her voice caused Kitt to let go of the plastic handle and pull back, leaving the incriminating object in Burke’s hand.
“Hey,” Burke greeted her, his tone belying his confused expression. “What’s up?”
“What’s up?” She experienced another swell of ire and moved forward to pluck the utility knife from Burke’s hand, careful to avoid the sharp end. Belatedly, she realized it had a safety mechanism that prevented the blade from remaining out. It was securely sheathed beneath a plastic guard. “Oh.”
“Oh?”
She was not about to let this offense go. “What do you think you’re doing, giving a knife to a child?”
Burke blinked, his lips parting in surprise. “I was right here. Nothing was going to happen.”
“He’s six years old, Burke. You can’t let him play with a knife.”
“He wasn’t playing,” Burke defended. “We were patching drywall.”
Erin’s lips pursed. This was why it was a bad idea for Burke to live at the inn. He just didn’t understand. He hadn’t been around kids enough. He didn’t know what was acceptable and what wasn’t. He wasn’t Kitt’s father—
She drew this thought up short. Of course Burke wasn’t Kitt’s father. But he was his uncle. And in truth, Erin couldn’t remember the last time she’d seen Kitt interact with anyone the way he’d been interacting with Burke a moment ago. Some of her anger deflated.
Some. But not all.
“You have to be more responsible, Burke. If you plan to live here—”
“Whoa. Hold on.” Burke held up a hand. “This is temporary, Erin. I’m not planning to stay here long. Just until I can figure out what’s next.”
These words should have relieved her. But she experienced a pang of disappointment instead.
Kitt stood to his feet then, turned and hurried away, his tiny footfalls echoing through the upstairs hall as he headed downstairs. She sighed.
“What did I say?” Burke asked, confusion evident in his tone.
Erin didn’t answer. She wasn’t sure what Kitt’s abrupt departure meant. Maybe her and Burke’s disagreement had bothered him. He wasn’t used to hearing Erin raise her voice. He rarely gave her reason to.
“I should talk to him,” she said and headed toward the stairs.
“Erin, wait.”
She halted, her heartbeat picking up speed as Burke came up behind her.
