by Loree Lough
He sat back a little farther and grabbed his water goblet. Did she know how unnerving that steady, direct gaze of hers could be? And how unsettling it was when she read his mind like that? He didn’t think so, because she didn’t seem the type who’d consciously make him uncomfortable.
Parker took a big swig of the water as he waited for her to finish her sentence.
“…if not for your mom. You came home because she needed you, didn’t you.”
A statement, he noticed, not a question. Nodding, he crunched an ice cube.
“That’s bad for your teeth, you know.”
He stopped chewing.
“Before I decided on marine biology as a major, I thought I might want to become a dentist, like my dad. So I spent a summer working in his office.” She wrinkled her nose and cringed. “I developed a whole new respect for him and his assistants and technicians, let me tell you! People do some very unpleasant things while those little paper bibs are clipped under their chins.”
If she wasn’t aware how unsettling her stare could be, she probably had no idea how gorgeous she was, either.
“…and picked up some cool tips,” she was saying, “one of which is—and I quote my dad—‘Crunching ice can cause tiny fissures in your tooth enamel, which can eventually lead to cavities.’ ”
Would he ever outgrow this irrational envy he felt when people talked about their fathers? “Fissures, eh?”
She nodded.
“Duly noted.” He returned the goblet to the two o’clock position beside his bread plate.
“I wonder…”
She was staring out the window now, nodding and tapping one finger on the tablecloth. And though he was fairly certain she’d been thinking out loud, he asked, “What do you wonder?”
“Why J-U-L-Y is pronounced Joo-LIE, but D-U-L-Y is DOO-lee?”
He’d half expected her wondering to lead to questions about what had happened between him and Stephanie or why he hadn’t reenlisted, so her remark stirred a surprised chuckle. “I have no idea. The English language is full of words like that.” He chuckled again and then said, “Goes a long way to explain why it wasn’t my best subject in school.”
The waiter chose that moment to deliver their meals, and when he was gone, Holly said, “So what was? Your best subject in school, I mean.”
“Science.” He almost followed it up with, “What are you all of a sudden, the Mistress of Small Talk?” But he didn’t. Instead, Parker said, “I gave some serious thought to med school.” Don’t go there, he warned himself. The reasons why he hadn’t would only put him in a foul mood, and the day was young.
“How ’bout you? What was your favorite subject?”
“Science. I was pretty much the only girl who didn’t get all creeped out about dissecting frogs and grasshoppers and cow eyes and—”
“Cow eyes?”
“Well, yeah,” she said as if he’d grown a cow eye. “How else were we supposed to learn what was inside our own eyes?”
He thumped the heel of his hand against his forehead. “Well, yeah,” he echoed. “Of course.” Then it dawned on him that she’d probably learned that in honors biology. On a whim, Parker grabbed her hand, turned it palm-up in his own, and slowly inspected every finger, every crease and crevice.
“Looking for evidence that the scalpel slipped and clumsy ol’ me carved up my own hand?”
“No.” Not the whole truth, but not a lie, either. She tucked in one corner of her mouth. Oh, to have the power, just for a minute, to read that mind of hers!
Holly plucked a curvy shrimp and dipped it into her bowl of cocktail sauce. Parker had no way of knowing what the summer might be like. Good weather or bad, plenty of volunteers for the turtle project or only a handful, one thing was certain: it wouldn’t be dull. Not as long as Holly was around.
“So what’s your favorite memory of being a soldier?”
“There was this kid…”
“Oh, Parker, he wasn’t killed, was he?”
“No, thank God.” He told her all about the boy who’d become his miniature shadow and how he’d begged Parker to take him home with him. “When my last tour of duty ended, I couldn’t find him. Probably would’ve been too much red tape involved anyway, but still…I’ve never quite forgiven myself for letting him down.”
Good grief. She wasn’t going to cry, was she? Parker didn’t know what he’d do if she did. “Hey, don’t feel sorry for me,” he quoted her, grinning.
“I don’t.”
“Then what’s with the long face?”
“Well, okay. Maybe I do feel sorry for you. But only a little.”
Smiling, he said, “Hmpf.”
“It couldn’t have been easy, walking way from an innocent child you’d come to think of as family.”
She’d hit the nail square on the head, and it made him uneasy.
If she’d figured out that much about him after only a few hours together, what would she know when the summer ended? “Pass the salt, will you?”
She wrapped her hand around the shaker and held it like a hostage. “You’re kidding, right?”
Did that mean his meal was already salty enough, in her opinion, or that she knew she’d hit the nail square on the head?
“It isn’t pity I feel, Parker; it’s gratitude.” She sent him a sweet, lopsided smile. “I’ve never known a real-life hero before.” She slid the salt closer to his plate. “Thank you, Parker.”
Now, really, how was a guy supposed to react to a statement like that? He picked up the shaker and tilted it left and right, watching as the contents shifted like sand in an hourglass. “You’re probably right.”
One side of her mouth lifted in a comic grin. “Um, I’m right? About what?”
“The food’s plenty salty enough.”
“Nice to know that you’re reasonable and health-conscious. Not so nice to know you’re a mind reader too.”
Too? He didn’t trust himself to ask what that meant.
Yes, the summer would be a lot of things, all right, but boring would not be one of them.
Chapter Seven
Parker took Route 17 home, describing points of interest as they crossed the Ashley River Bridge. As soon as she’d accepted the assignment, Holly had read up on Charleston and its rich history, so it wasn’t difficult to feign interest in each landmark. Holly’s real interests, however, were the questions swirling in her head. Because who was this guy, anyway? She’d read up on him too, and in the hours since they’d met, she’d added “attentive son” and “affable tour guide” to what she’d learned. But his reaction to the woman in the wheelchair? Way too cool and collected, she told herself.
He reminded her a lot of her cousin, who’d served two tours in Afghanistan. Though he seemed to enjoy talking about the ways he and his pals passed time between attacks, Aaron got a far-off look in his eyes if conversation veered too near his memories of combat.
Just like Parker.
Unlike Parker, Aaron had come home unharmed—physically, anyway—to the loving, welcoming arms of his wife and kids and enormous extended family. He went right back to work and church, and except for occasional nightmares (which he was seeing a doctor about), his life was pretty much what it had been before the army.
She had a feeling none of that was true for Parker.
Holly looked over at him, relaxed and content as he maneuvered his old pickup through the streets of Folly Beach, talking about how much Charleston had changed over the years, and not necessarily all for the better.
Nodding, Holly agreed. “But clogged highways and smog and noise and, yes, even crime…that’s the price of progress for every city and town, don’t you think?”
“Maybe,” he said, thumping the steering wheel, “but that doesn’t make it right. Or easier to live with. Take the Morris Island lighthouse, for example.” He drew her attention to its silhouette visible on the horizon. “It stood out there offshore for centuries, yet most folks would be content to let the sea swallow it u
p.”
“But didn’t I read someplace that since it was added to the National Register of Historic Places, it belongs to the good people of South Carolina? Wouldn’t that qualify it for state assistance?”
“Yeah, but the amount of work that needs doing is way out of balance with what the government can do.” He shot her a half grin. “I’m impressed with the thoroughness of your research skills.”
“I might be a klutz out there,” she said, pointing through the windshield, “but I take my work very seriously. I think you’ll find I manage a modicum of decorum and grace when I’m on the job.”
“No need to ‘sell’ me. You had me at ‘Will pay for my own room and board.’ ”
“How involved are you with the lighthouse project?”
“Not very.”
“Ahh, so he’s modest, too… .”
He chuckled. “ ‘Too?’ ”
Well, if he expected her to say “Modest, intelligent, brave, and gorgeous too,” he had another think coming. “Didn’t I read someplace that you’re on the Save the Light board?”
“Yeah…”
“And that you offer excursions on your boat in the silent auctions that raise funds for the project?”
And there it was again, that arresting grin. “Wow. I’m almost afraid to ask what else you know about me!”
She knew that he was willing to fight for things he believed in and people he cared about. It explained why he wanted to see the lighthouse out there on the horizon last for centuries more. So how could a guy with that much caring in his makeup so quickly forget the woman in the wheelchair?
Parker maneuvered onto East Ashley. “So that woman and her son,” Holly said, laughing, “wasn’t that the weirdest thing?”
Brows high on his forehead, he made a tiny O of his mouth. “Strictly a case of mistaken identity.”
Three minutes, tops, she guessed, before they arrived at Coastal Cottage.
“Not a half-bad English accent, boss!” She laughed, even as she wondered if he’d stay awhile or hurry off to his own place farther up the beach. “So how far is your house from the B&B?”
“I could throw a stone from my place and it’d land on Maude’s roof.” He shrugged. “If I had a better arm, that is, and any aim at all.” Parker chuckled. “With my luck, I’d break a window.” He looked over at her. “You want to see it?”
“Well, sure, if there’s time.”
“Why wouldn’t there be? Ain’t like I have a wife and kids waiting for me there.”
Was that an edge of regret she heard in his voice, or wishful thinking? “I thought maybe you’d need to change your mom’s bandages or something.”
“Nope. She oughta be good to go until she sees her surgeon next week. Unless she lets that goofy habit of hers mess things up. Again.”
“Goofy habit?” she asked as he passed the cottage.
“We could call her Cricket, if we wanted to, the way she rubs her feet together when she’s asleep. Never would have known that little tid-bit if she hadn’t decided to get both feet operated on at the same time.”
“So it was an option? She could have done one foot and then the other?”
“Yeah, but she was afraid she might never have the other one done after the first surgery. And to be honest, I can see her point.”
“Because of your leg, you mean.”
“And my thigh, and my shoulder, and—” His truck wheels crunched over the pulverized shells that paved his driveway. “Home sweet home,” he said, nodding toward the house. “C’mon. I’ll show you around.”
The house wasn’t anything like the others she’d seen since coming to town. The simple white two-story boasted black shutters and a brick walk and porch, reminding her more of a simple Midwestern farmhouse than a pastel-and-gingerbread island cottage. “It’s beautiful,” she said, meaning it.
“Should’ve seen it when I bought it.” He opened the wide oak door and led Holly into a sunny foyer. “It sat empty for about fifteen years, so the gulls and spiders were none too happy to be evicted. Would you believe I even found evidence that a horse had been in here?”
“Hard to believe it was once a wildlife habitat.” She followed him into the kitchen, where the cabinets glowed with a gleaming coat of white enamel. “You’ve done an amazing job.”
Parker opened the French doors and stepped onto a screened-in porch.
Holly crossed the painted-wood floor. “There was a screen door exactly like this at my grandmother’s house.” She plucked the spring that kept it from slamming then tapped the hook that dangled across from its matching eye. “Oh, the memories it conjures! In and out, out and in, with the spring squealing and the door slamming…” Laughing, she added, leaning on the jamb, “I daresay that door was responsible for half my scoldings as a kid.”
“Careful there,” he said. “If you take a tumble down the steps you’ll land in sand, but you’ll still have taken a tumble down the steps.”
Holly turned to see which steps he was referring to…
…and lost her balance.
If not for Parker’s quick reaction, she’d have found out firsthand what a tumble down the steps felt like.
“You okay?” he said, one hand gripping her upper arm and the other pressed to the small of her waist.
“Yeah,” she said, nodding. “Thanks.”
“I declare, I think I’m gonna start calling you T.M.”
“For ‘Trips Much’?”
“Trouble Magnet.”
Holly might have laughed—if she hadn’t noticed him wince as he stepped back. Had he pulled a muscle, lurching forward that way to catch her? “Are you all right?”
Frowning, he harrumphed. “I’m fine.”
Why did she get the feeling he wanted to tack on “…no thanks to you…”?
“Let me show you my pride and joy,” he said instead. Brushing past her, he held the door open, and once she’d planted both feet in the soft white sand, he wasted no time turning the corner of the house. “The beginnings of my garden,” he added when she caught up to him.
Nodding, she stood on the ocean side of the knee-high fence he’d installed around it. Stay where you are, you klutz, before you trample all his seedlings. She pointed at the colorful markers that stood at the head of every tidy row. “Did you paint all those signs yourself?”
He nodded too and poked the one that said ZUCCHINI with the toe of his shoe. “Serves as my artistic release.”
“Oh?”
“Let me take you to my studio,” he said in a terrible French accent, “where I will show you my etchings.”
Laughing, she fell into step beside him. “How long before you’re picking beans and tomatoes?”
“Oh, months for that stuff, but the spring onions and leaf lettuce will be ripe for the pickin’ soon.” He opened the porch door again and, as she climbed the steps, said, “Maybe I’ll have you over one evening for steaks on the grill and a big ol’ salad.”
“Sounds lovely.” But why the maybe? she wondered as this time he led her past the front parlor.
“This is my sunroom-slash-studio,” he said, stepping inside.
The right and left walls were made up of floor-to-ceiling shelves, while dead center, straight ahead, were two sets of French doors that led out to a stone terrace.
“If I could, this is where I’d spend all my spare time.”
Holly did a slow half turn, taking in leather-bound books, faded seashells, and tarnished brass ships’ clocks that decorated the shelves. She liked the simple Shaker furnishings that stood on a slate-blue braided rug. Liked the stone fireplace too. “Does it work?”
“Sure does.”
As she completed her turn, Holly noticed three easels holding canvases of varying sizes and stages of completion. Bending at the waist, she read the signature in the lower right-hand corner of the biggest one. “You did these?”
“Uh-huh.”
“They’re beautiful. Why, at first glance, they almost look like photographs
.” She commented on all the detail in the sea grasses and the waves, in the feathers on the gulls’ backs and the clouds in the sky. “You could sell these!” She shook her head and started counting on her fingers. “Carpentry, gardening, painting…is there anything you aren’t good at?”
“I’m not too good at responding to compliments.” Then, with a nod, he indicated the paintings. “There are thousands just like them all up and down the East Coast. Thousands more on the West Coast, I’d bet.” He shrugged.
“I disagree. I lived in Ocean City, Maryland, remember, so I saw things like this all up and down the boardwalk. Some were really beautiful, but I have to be honest,” she said, tracing the contours of a dune, “none were anywhere near as beautiful as these.”
She received another shrug, and then he said, “So I guess I should get you back to Maude’s place. Opal has probably talked her ears off by now. And anyway, it’s almost suppertime.”
Holly wanted to see the rest, wanted to drink in every rug and knickknack and all the polished floors in between. But he’d already made it to the front porch, where he stood waiting for her to catch up.
“Your mom’s guests are on their own for everything but breakfast, though, right?”
“What’s that,” he said, grinning as she slid into the front seat of the pickup, “a ‘buy me supper’ hint?”
“No! Of course not! I was just thinking that, maybe on the way to the cottage, we could stop and get subs…or a pizza.”
His laughter filled the cab as he fired up the truck’s engine. “I guess you didn’t notice on the way over here that the only thing between here and Maude’s place is sand. And reeds. And more sand.”
“I didn’t mean literally on the way. I just meant, you know, we could—”
“Holly…”
“What?”
“Do you make a habit of that?”
“Of what?”
“Of defending yourself. Of explaining everything.”
“Do I do that?”
“A lot.”
“Gosh. I had no idea.”
He only shrugged.
“Well,” she said on the heels of a sigh, “I guess when you’re as clumsy as I am, explaining and defending sort of becomes second nature.”