Walking on Sea Glass
A Sea Glass Inn Novel
Julie Carobini
Copyright © 2016 Julie Carobini
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
Dolphin Gate Books
E-book ISBN: 978-0-9862292-8-2
Cover design by Roseanna White Designs. Cover photos from Shutterstock.com and Dreamstime.com.
This story is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and events either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to any person, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. No part of this publication can be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without permission in writing from Julie Carobini.
JULIE CAROBINI writes inspirational beach romances and cozy mysteries … with a twist. Julie has received awards for writing and editing from The National League of American Pen Women and ACFW, and she is a double finalist for the ACFW Carol Award. She lives near the beach in California with her husband, Dan, and she loves traveling and hanging out with her three 20-something kids. Sign up to receive a free eBook here: www.juliecarobini.com/free-book
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Welcome to the magical Sea Glass Inn novels, where secrets are revealed and hearts are mended. Read all four in the series!:
* * *
Walking on Sea Glass (book 1)
Runaway Tide (book 2)
Windswept (book 3)
Beneath a Billion Stars (book 4)
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Epilogue
Dear Reader
Sneak Peek of Runaway Tide
Also by Julie Carobini
“To your health”
… “Love you”
Chapter 1
Even as a child, Liddy believed the sea could heal.
She remembered being seven years old, crammed into a van with cousins and a couple of stray friends. Her mother drove, while her Aunt Clarice played navigator, her round nose inches from a map. Her aunt looked up occasionally, her face a knot of concern, until the lines around her eyes brightened like a light going on and she jabbed a finger toward one of the green highway signs looming over them.
“There. Merge into that lane. Don’t miss it!”
Before that, the ride seemed to go on forever and ever, the humid air of children—the pungent aroma of boys—blanketing them all. They lived about an hour inland, but the way her mother drove intently and her aunt fussed and the air hung so heavily, you would think they were days away.
And right about the time it all became too much, it happened.
The starkness of Interstate 10 through Los Angeles, its concrete walls dingy grey, its curves hard and etched from time’s abuse, belied what lay like a pot at the end of the proverbial rainbow. That curve in the road … the black tunnel in the distance. As they barreled toward that dark and seemingly endless tunnel, a mix of wonder and surprise caught her breath. They would make their entrance, the tunnel’s windowless walls shutting out the famous Southern California sunshine, rocket around a bend, then—and this is the part she remembered so well—the darkness would open up to the vast and deep blue sea.
Funny how a stray memory like that could show up unannounced, like a sudden thunderstorm, without a hint of where or why it had come …
“Liddy?”
Liddy stared straight ahead, unmoving. She wanted to respond, but somehow couldn’t.
“Liddy?” her friend Meg called out again. “Are you okay?”
Liddy blinked hard and took in a gulp of dry heat. She slid a glance at Meg who sat in the shade beside her, fanning herself with a copy of Forbes magazine. “Sorry. I don’t know what came over me.” Liddy’s cheeks grew warmer than ever. “Guess I got lost in thought.”
Meg eyed her suspiciously. “Well, sure. It is stifling out here—even in this shade. No idea how you can stand living in the desert.”
“Were you saying something?”
Meg’s expression calmed some. “I was saying that it must be tough working and going to school again.”
Liddy shrugged, glad her moment of confusion had dissipated. It was late September, and a storm had blown through long enough to lower the temperature to a comfortable 85 degrees. “It’s not easy, but there’s so much more I want to learn, so much I didn’t appreciate when I was younger.”
“It has to be strange being back on a college campus again, though, with all those babies around.”
Liddy laughed. Those so-called babies were only a handful of years younger than her. “Well, yes, to a lot of them, twenty-five is ancient, but every once in a while when I’m eating lunch in the ‘caf,’ a group of girls will sit down with me, like I’m one of them. Total opposite of high school—thankfully.”
Meg flipped the pages of her magazine. “And how’s Shawn handling having you around campus so much? Do you have to call him Mr. Buckle—or worse, Professor B?
“Please. He’s fine with it. Although …”
“Yes?”
“Nothing. I’m just seeing Shawn’s life from a different angle now.”
Meg did that thing with her mouth, letting her tiny pucker pop open, then quickly shutting her lips together—as if suddenly thinking better of what she had intended to say.
“One student calls his cell all the time with incessant questions. She’s in his Geography class and apparently still thinks the world is flat.”
Meg looked at Liddy full force now, her fingers bookmarking a page on women in marketing. “Isn’t that kind of inappropriate? Calling Shawn like that?”
“What are you suggesting?”
Meg’s voice turned pointed. “I’m just saying that a coed should not be regularly calling a married man.”
Liddy leaned back, tilting her chin up toward the clearing sky. “I met her, actually. That’s what I meant by seeing my husband from another angle. I stopped into the library’s tutoring area and they were at a table together going over some flashcards. Shawn introduced me.”
“Good.”
“What do you mean ‘good’?”
Meg paused. “I just meant that, otherwise, she might have mistaken his attention for something … else.”
“Oh brother.”
“So what did he do? Say ‘Here’s my gorgeous wife, Liddy,’ then give you a kiss?”
Liddy paused. “Actually, he just said, ‘Kyra, this is Liddy. Liddy … Kyra.’” She winced a little at the memory. “I remember thinking that I should mention that I’m the wife, but then thought better of it. Of course, she knew who I was.”
“Hmm.”
Liddy turned, scrutinizing her friend’s face. Meg rarely held back. “What?”
“That must have bothered you.”
Liddy waved her off. “It didn’t. It’s no big deal, really.”
Meg pursed her lips again, then let them pop open with a fat sigh. She let the magazine slide from her lap and onto the paint-ch
ipped deck. “If it didn’t bother you, then you wouldn’t have mentioned it.”
Liddy frowned. She shook her head slowly before moving her gaze back to the sky. “Well, then, let’s forget I ever did.”
* * *
Thinking would come later. Beau gripped the steering wheel and sped through the night, the streets lonely, empty. Minutes before, he had pulled into the driveway of his home after another long day at the hospital, unable to recall a time when the muscles and sinew that wrapped his bones had ever ached from fatigue quite so much. He had turned off the engine, pulled the key from the ignition, and allowed the door to swing open as he gathered his briefcase, a stained coffee mug, and Anne’s favorite sweater from the passenger seat. It was green and matched her eyes.
Beau hoisted himself out of the car, careful not to drop anything, and stepped around the door intending to pop it shut with his hip. Before he could, the cell phone in his pocket rang. He froze. Fear snaked around his heart and squeezed vise-like. Anne had programmed the sound of birds chirping into his phone’s memory the first time she had to stay in the hospital. “Hear that, and you’ll know to come running,” she had kidded him.
He watched the screen light up, watched the familiar name flash across it, and listened to the odd twittering of birds against the moonless night. “Anne?”
“Beau, this is Pam.”
Not Nurse Jones or Nurse Pam. The woman on the other end was simply “Pam.” She’d been assigned to Anne’s care so often that she had become more like family. The family member who, though you hated to be the one to point this out, always seemed to hustle into the house with an assortment of unwanted baggage.
He could hear her sucking in a breath. “I’m so sorry, but you need to come back.” She paused. “Now.”
Beau’s grip tightened on the handle of that mug. His jaw clenched and something other than fear quickened his heartbeat. A sharpness like ice burned through his insides. He paused, fixated on the mug in his hands, wishing to calmly take it inside the house and set it in the sink as he had planned. In the next instant, he pitched the cool vessel to the ground, watching it shatter on impact.
For several seconds he stood in the quiet, exhaling roughly and staring at the shards that littered his driveway. He would need a broom to clean them up. Probably the push broom would be best. He kept it in the shed out back …
He lifted his chin toward the stars, allowing his breathing to slow. Heat returned to his insides. He turned toward his car, tossed his briefcase into the backseat where it had lain most of the day, dropped Anne’s sweater on top of it, and slid back into the driver’s seat.
Pulling strength from some invisible well, Beau put the car in reverse and headed back to the hospital. He continued through the black night, unable to shake a prickling of his senses. The sensation began in his gut, climbed up and through his chest, then spread web-like over his throat, strangling him. He forced himself to breathe, to focus on the road and on getting back to the hospital … before it was too late.
Chapter 2
Two Months Later
Liddy twisted the key in the lock of her rental, a condo far away from every dry and dusty trace of the home she had once shared with Shawn. Four years of marriage—two-hundred-and-eight weeks—and she found herself living alone. If someone had asked her if she had ever expected this, she would have reacted with shock. Living somewhere else, perhaps, and with a boy or a girl—or both—in tow, but never, ever this.
Moisture seeped through the bottom of the bag nestled in her free arm. She hurried inside and plunked the mess down next to the voice mail box with the message light blinking. Three messages. She hardly knew anyone in this up-and-coming beach town, but something about that blinking light made her feel less invisible.
Thank God for Meg who had recommended her for a job in a new and magical place, far away from her troubled marriage. Her best friend since childhood worked in sales and marketing for a chain of hotels, but kept her office at Sea Glass Inn, where Liddy now spent her days as a concierge.
Liddy stashed cream in the fridge and French Roast coffee beans in the cupboard. How lucky was she to have found a job and an apartment in such a short time.
She pressed the flashing red light on her answering machine.
“This is Dr. Grayson’s office calling to let you know we can fit you in next Friday at 2 p.m. Please call us back to confirm.”
Another thing to be thankful for: a doctor who came recommended, and who could see her on short notice. She glanced at the calendar and made a mental reminder to confirm the appointment. Maybe the doc would finally have some answers for her.
Beep.
“Hey Lid, it’s Trace.”
She wrinkled her nose at the nickname that one of her new coworkers had picked up on after Meg had lapsed into using it on occasion.
“It’s a real yawn around here today—occupancy’s way down—so I’m gonna leave early. Will leave you some notes under the volcano.”
After less than two weeks on the job, Liddy had learned about Trace’s obsession with garage sale “must haves.” A ceramic volcano had made the list.
“Oh, before I go,” she said, lowering her voice, “have you seen anything weird going on in the restaurant? There’s some … talk. Anyway, let me know. ’K, bye.”
Okay, then.
Beep.
“Liddy, it’s Shawn.”
She frowned.
“… I found your skis and boots in the shed. Look, it’s no big deal to me, but if you want me to get rid of them for you, I can do that. Call me.”
Strange. Liddy’s soon-to-be ex-husband had not cared to call when she did the lonely work of dividing a home. Or bothered to tell her when one of her credit cards showed up at the house—their house. She’d found that out on her own when she learned he had charged it up to its limit. Meg had nearly booked a one-way ticket to the desert when she’d heard. “I’m going over there to key that loser’s car now!” her friend had proclaimed. Liddy had stopped her, of course, but not without thinking about it for longer than she should have. Odd that now, when Shawn had found something of potential value that Liddy had left behind, he decided to call.
She grabbed the towel that lay on the kitchen counter and began wiping down the spotless surface. She circled the cloth over and over and over the smooth granite surface, each stroke stemming the tide brewing behind her eyes. How had it come to this? In a matter of minutes, she replayed the last few months of their marriage in her mind, carefully sifting the clumps of memory that exposed themselves to her scrutiny.
The more she thought about it, the more she worked that towel over the shiny surface, and the duller her thoughts became. Shawn probably figured that he would get points for mentioning it, that she would then ask him to do the work of selling her things—and that the proceeds would make it into his bank account. The reality of that thought settled inside her gut, reigniting her already tender emotions, the ones that threatened to hurl her into the abyss of depression every time they surfaced.
Stop being so melodramatic.
Shawn had left her. His girlfriend—an eighteen-year-old college student—was pregnant. And with this knowledge in hand, she had moved hundreds of miles away from them. (So he couldn’t ask her to babysit, for example.) She shook her head. Didn’t Shawn know that with their divorce pending, and his life already being reshaped by his choices, that her future and how she lived it was off-limits?
With a sad little groan, she pitched the overworked towel into the kitchen sink. Then she reached across the counter, and like a leg reacting to the sharp tap of a plessor on the fleshy part of the knee, Liddy punched “delete.”
* * *
Beau climbed the steps toward home. Anne had been gone more than a month already, and though he had been back at work for almost a week, the evenings were the hardest. Work hadn’t helped him forget his loss, but it had kept his mind occupied with something other than his grief.
He stepped into the foyer, wi
nced at the echo of his own footsteps, and bent to scoop up the mail spread across the tile. Arms loaded, he wandered into the kitchen to dump his briefcase and mail, then grabbed a Corona from the fridge. He stood in the center of the small room and drank it, the fizz going down like a cold burn.
He spied the highlighter-yellow flyer in the pile and plucked it from the bunch, scanning it for details. Single Mingle. His head rocked back and a gasp escaped from his lungs. He stared at the ceiling, wondering just whose sick idea it was to invite him to the church’s singles group … already.
The phone rang and he straightened, cracking his back in two places. He reached to answer it, but not before crumpling the neon flyer into a wad and pitching it into the garbage. “Yeah?”
“Rough day?”
Beau sighed and shook his head in the empty room. “Hey, Taylor.”
“Well?”
“Well, what? It is … what it is.”
“What’s that—Shakespeare?”
Taylor’s wit brought a smile—albeit a small one—to Beau’s face. First one he’d experienced all day. “You know what I mean.”
“Maybe I do and maybe I don’t. See? I can quote literature too.”
“Right.”
“Is that a smile I’m hearing?”
“You can’t hear a smile.”
“You can if you have super powers like mine.”
Beau smiled widely this time. Taylor and his wife, Ginny, had been by his side for months, ever since Anne entered the hospital for the last time. He was a goofball with a heart. Isn’t that what Anne had called him? He stepped out of his loafers and sank onto the couch. “Why are you bothering me again?”
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