Ten Good Reasons

by Lauren Christopher

  “Well, that . . . that sounds fortuitous. Sounds like perfect timing.” Lia’s heart began racing. Maybe this was an easier solution than she thought.

  “Did you not hear the ‘messed up’ part?”

  “What do you mean, ‘messed up’? If he can sail the world, he can certainly sail in and out of the harbor. Does he know anything about marine life?”

  “Oh, yeah. Former U.S. Coast Guard. Naturalist. Environmentalist degree.”

  “What are you waiting for?” Lia scooted her hips around the bench to reach into the briefcase for her cell. “He sounds perfect. Let’s call him.”

  “Lia.” Drew grabbed her wrist. He looked up at her through the bangs that fell across his forehead. “Messed up.”

  “How messed up? You mean on drugs?”

  “No, not drugs.”

  “You mean, like, crazy?”

  Drew shrugged. “He went through a lot of tragedy over the years. He’s just kind of . . . on his own. Just stays on that boat and anchors wherever the winds take him. He rarely even talks. He won’t agree to a tourist boat, no way.”

  “Can’t you ask?”

  “He won’t agree.”

  “Drew!” Lia brought her head down to try to get him to look at her again. “You need him. You don’t have many options to keep your business alive in this most-important week, and I really need that charter. He’s family. He’ll do it for you. Just ask.”

  Drew looked away without answering. He scanned the cabin, as if searching for anything else he needed. Beads of perspiration lined his forehead.

  “Drew!” Lia couldn’t believe he wouldn’t consider this. It was an easy solution to a problem they needed to solve by Monday. Family would do anything for you, right? Granted, she sometimes missed phone calls or important gatherings with her own mom and sisters, but that was only because she worked a lot. If Giselle or Noelle or her mom really needed her, she’d be there. “I think we need to come up with a plan,” she said softly.

  “Let’s talk about it tomorrow. I need another painkiller. Douglas!” he hollered over his shoulder. He turned back toward Lia. “So how’s your boyfriend, anyway?”

  “He’s fine. But Drew, let’s discuss this. I booked some impor—”

  “Did he leave for Bora Bora?”

  “Yes, but let’s stay on task, here. I think—”

  “I thought you guys were getting serious. I can’t believe you let him go to Bora Bora without you.”

  “It’s not serious, and I don’t think ‘let’ should be a phrase in any healthy relationship . . .”

  Drew threw a grin at that—it was an argument they’d had time and time again—but then he turned and looked frantically for Douglas.

  “. . . but I think we need to come up with a plan, Drew, for who’s going to sail your boat Monday. It’s booked solid for the first three weeks, and my client wants to show up to inspect it before the big charter next week, and—”

  “Doug!” His yell had a twinge of desperation.

  “Let’s just ask your brother. It would be a simple solution, and you trust him, and—”

  “Asking my brother would not be a simple solution. In fact, the more I think about it, the more disastrous it seems. So let’s get that idea off the table. Let me think of another plan overnight, and we’ll talk tomorrow.”

  “But we’re running out of time.”

  “Give me until tomorrow. Maybe Doug and I can handle it—he can lift me up to the captain’s bridge every day.” At the sight of Douglas lunging down into the cabin, Drew gave a weak smile and began maneuvering out to the side of the dinette, his casts clunking along the deck floor.

  Doug lifted him with a loud exhale—about 240 pounds of man lifting 160—then lumbered out of the galley, staggered down the stern, and hoisted their weight back up onto the dock. The wheelchair was waiting, set with its brakes on, now with three boxes next to its wheels and the seagulls scared away. Douglas plopped Drew into the chair with a grunt. Both men were already drenched in sweat, and their faces had gone white.

  A daily lift into the captain’s bridge was out of the question.

  What were they going to do?

  Drew made eighty percent of his annual income in the six weeks of whale-watching season, including the festival weekend. He and his new girlfriend Sharon were struggling as it was, trying to launch this business, trying to make ends meet. And Sharon had a special-needs child that Drew said he didn’t help pay for, but Lia knew he did. And now these new medical bills . . .

  And man, Lia hadn’t even told him the part about the first two clients she’d booked for Monday and Tuesday—she didn’t want to make him feel guiltier than he already did, or cause more worry to spike with his pain. In addition to the client she’d booked for the Vampiress, she’d found two potential investors for Drew, which he’d said he really needed. And both were showing up this week. If they showed up to a boat that was inoperable . . . well, not only would they run from investing in such a thing, but Lia’s reputation would be shot.

  She gathered her shoes from the blue-cushioned bench seat and tugged at her rolling briefcase. Douglas lumbered back on board to secure the cabin door.

  “Douglas, wait.” She jerked her case back toward the galley. “Tell me about his brother,” she whispered. “Could he operate this thing?”

  Douglas gave her a sympathetic glance, but then his allegiance shifted back toward the dock. “His brother’s trouble, sunshine.”

  “We need someone, Douglas. Full tours start Monday.”

  “Can’t you refund them?”

  “For six weeks?” Her whisper rose to a panic. “These are really important clients. And Drew’s already spent half that money, I imagine. And the other half is probably going to new bills after this accident.”

  Douglas’s silence told her she’d probably guessed correctly.

  “Where does his brother live?” she pressed.

  Douglas fiddled with the lock. When his silence lengthened, Lia let her shoulders fall. He wasn’t going to answer. She turned away from his weathered hands.

  “Slip ninety-two,” Douglas finally mumbled under his breath.

  “What?” She turned her head slightly. Drew was staring at them.

  “Guest slip. Ninety-two. Far north end,” Douglas said without moving his lips.

  He turned into the sunlight, heading back toward the stern, and Lia followed. As they stepped back ashore under Drew’s watchful gaze, Drew shot them both a suspicious look.

  But Lia was going to have to betray him.

  Drew wasn’t thinking clearly, and she was going to have to make this right.

  For him.

  For her.

  For this promotion.

  And for about five other relationships she couldn’t seem to get right lately.

  * * *

  Guest slip ninety-two was nearly at the end of the marina. Dusk fell in light purple, and a lamp sputtered as she passed. There were no liveaboards allowed at this end and, with a cool February night that threatened rain, there weren’t many people out, even on a Saturday. Lavender-colored water lapped against the empty boats that lay still and quiet at day’s end, all packed together like sleeping sardines.

  Lia glanced again at the piece of paper where she’d written the number, pulling it back from the breeze that tried to curl it, then slid it into the pocket of her skirt along with the dock key Douglas had slipped her. She concentrated on not getting her heels caught in the weathered wooden planks.

  When she reached slip ninety-two, she pushed her wind-strewn hair out of her face and peered around the deck. It was a small sailboat, about a twenty-footer, dark and closed up for the night. The sails were covered, the ties set, the cabin lights off.

  “Hello?” she called anyway.

  Nothing.

  Her footsteps sounded ob
noxious in the otherwise-peaceful night as she headed down the side dock along the boat’s port side.

  “Hello?” she tried again. “Drew’s brother?”

  Dang. She didn’t even know his name. Her heels rang out as she wandered farther. The only other sound was the familiar creaking of the boat’s wood against water, and one rope hanging off a mast that clanged lightly as the boat pitched and slightly rolled. The sailboat didn’t have the gleaming OCD-ness of Drew’s catamaran, but it was neat, the teak floors swept, the sails covered, the ropes in perfect twists. A jacket and an empty bucket sat on a glossy teak deck bench.

  “Hello? Mr. Betancourt?”

  A slight shiver ran through her. Maybe she’d rushed into this. She should have asked more questions—at least his name, and maybe more information about what, exactly, “messed up” meant. As an image began to take shape in her head—ex-military, maybe posttraumatic, older, bigger, bearded, crazy, loner—the light on the dock snapped and buzzed. She turned on her heel and her pulse picked up. She wasn’t one to scare easily, but this probably wasn’t one of her brightest moves.

  But then . . . a flicker of light in the cabin.

  She turned nervously.

  The cabin door creaked and a man’s shadow emerged, buttoning a shirt as the tails flapped in the night wind, as if trying to get away from him.

  He twisted his shoulders to clear the cabin door and stepped slowly toward her while the boat pitched, moving across the deck with all the assurance of a man who is used to the sea.

  He was bigger than Drew—nearly half a foot taller, and broader in the shoulders. He had the same dark hair, but his was much too long, and he swiped at it as he looked up at her on the dock. Although his face was in shadow, she could see a week’s worth of facial hair darkening his jaw. His dead, gray eyes narrowed as he studied her and finished the last two buttons. “Whadoyouwant?” His voice was like gravel.

  “I’m um . . . a friend of Drew’s.”

  His eyes made a quick sweep of her—not out of interest, seemingly, but in the way you’d assess a dirty floor, deciding how much work it was going to be to deal with.

  While he continued to wait—probably for a better answer—Lia fumbled with her purse. “I um . . .” For some reason, she checked the piece of paper again. Ninety-two, right? But certainly this was him. She could see a vague family resemblence in the straight, narrow nose, the hard-edged jaw, the dark eyebrows. Though this man’s brows seemed much more sinister than Drew’s, pulled into a deep V beneath a lined forehead as he waited for her to say something.

  “I uh . . . I came for Drew. He needs . . . um . . . Well, he needs a favor.”

  The boat creaked and rolled under the man’s spread legs, his knees giving way in the slightest movement to make him as sturdy as the mast.

  “Doesn’t seem like Drew would send you to tell me that.”

  Lia licked her lips. He had her there. She tried to give him one of her friendliest smiles—they usually worked on everyone—but he seemed unfazed. He narrowed his eyes and waited.

  “I um . . . well, yes, that’s true. You’re absolutely right about that.” She laughed just a little, flashed another smile. Normally men didn’t make her nervous. She’d learned a long time ago that an optimistic attitude, a great smile, and a positive view on the world could do wonders and get her almost anything she wanted, with men or women. Or hide anything she wanted.

  But this man seemed too robotic to care.

  “He’s uh . . . well, you know about the motorcycle accident, right?”

  Nothing.

  “Well, after his accident, he’s a little stuck. He’s got whale-watching season right ahead of him, and he needs to run his business. This is his season. It’s the biggest season. I mean, from February to April, it’s—”

  “I know when whale-watching season is.”

  “Yes, of course. Then you know. It’s huge. And he’s booked every single day for the next four weeks, and I could easily book the additional two, and—”

  “You’re booking him?”

  “Well, I help, yes.”

  He didn’t seem to like that for some reason, but he gave a slight shift on his leg that somehow indicated she should go on.

  “So I’m . . . I’m just so worried for him, and he needs a captain, since the accident and everything, and he just needs someone who can sail his cat, and who knows about whales, and who can take on the business for him for just a few weeks, and—”

  “Sounds like this is your problem, not his.”

  “Oh, no, it’s his.”

  Well, too. But Lia’s own personal problems didn’t need to be part of this discussion. “He’s . . . the money . . . you know. This is the majority of his income. And medical expenses now. He’s . . . He’s in trouble, Mr. Betancourt.”

  He scanned her again—some kind of assessment—and blinked a slow blink of a man unimpressed. “I’m not your guy.”

  “What do you mean?”

  He turned and started back into the galley.

  Lia found herself stumbling toward him across the dock, although she didn’t know where she intended to go or what she intended to do once she got there. “Wait, Mr. Betancourt. You can’t help?” She couldn’t control the incredulousness in her voice.

  “No.” His deep voice gave the word a feeling of cement. He wandered toward the jacket and snatched it up.

  “But . . . you . . . you have to.”

  “No.” He turned back, giving her high heels a strange glance. “I don’t.”

  He scanned the deck again, seemingly to see if anything else needed to be crushed in his fist the way the jacket was. “If Drew wants to talk to me, tell him to come tomorrow. But I have a hard time believing he sent you.”

  He lumbered across the deck, and the brass rails of the galley door glinted as the door slammed shut.

  Stunned, Lia closed her mouth, her protest swallowed.

  The dock light flickered again behind her with a loud pop, sending her into an embarrassing jump, then began an ominous hum and flutter. She glared at it, trying to figure out what to do as darkness fell. She’d thought she’d be able to simply solve this problem, but apparently she was losing her touch.

  Not that this guy was an ideal solution. Drew was right. He’d be a nightmare with the guests, especially the Vampiress’s client, looking more like he was going to slit their throats and steal their bounty than tell them the gentle breaching habits of blue and gray whales.

  But at least he was a start.

  As the lamp began its death hum, she glanced down the long dock toward the main part of the marina. She only had one minute left of any kind of light at all, then she’d have to find her way back in a sliver of moonlight, which was being shadowed now by black-tinged rain clouds.

  With one last glance at the now-darkened cabin, closed up apparently to fool the harbormaster into thinking there were no liveaboards there, she headed back along the dark, narrow planks.

  For the second time that day, and about the fifth time that week, she felt like a complete and utter failure.

  CHAPTER

  Two

  Sunday morning, Lia leaped out of bed at six. She had a lot of work to do.

  She cleaned the desk area in her bedroom, pushing aside the three garish bridesmaid dresses that hung near the closet—she couldn’t believe she had three weddings this year, and all three of them in blue, which was not her favorite color to wear. Her oldest sister Giselle was the first, with a wedding in July, followed by two girlfriends who were getting married in August and September.

  Lia was really happy for Giselle—she was marrying one of Lia’s best buddies, pro surfer Fin Hensen, and Lia was thrilled for both of them. But her sisters and mom thought Lia was purposely avoiding the wedding plans. She hadn’t helped pick out the bridesmaid dress. She hadn’t gone to the florist to see the ce
nterpieces. She didn’t go out the night the three of them—Noelle, Giselle, and their mom—and their dates went to see the DJ. She overheard her mom and Noelle whispering one night in her mom’s kitchen that she might be jealous, which bothered her more than anything. Nothing could be further from the truth. She just worked a lot. Couldn’t they understand that?

  Lia cleared a space at the antique desk in her bedroom, pushing aside her Eiffel Tower lamp and the ring dish that looked like a French postcard, then fired up her laptop while she headed to the kitchen to brew the strongest pot of coffee she knew how. Her cat Missy slinked a figure eight around her pajama pant legs, waiting for her own breakfast.

  “Let’s eat then get to work, Miss,” she said, lifting the calico.

  Like every morning, Lia sipped her coffee while staring at the framed crayon drawings her six-year-old niece, Coco, had colored for her. Giselle and Coco had lived in Lia’s apartment until they were ready to move in with Fin and, during that time, Coco had decorated the whole place with crayon drawings. The three still hanging in the kitchen were of cats and zebras, and the four in the living room were of sunflowers and tire swings.

  When Coco and Giselle had moved out, Lia thought it would feel wonderful to get her space back again so she could work in peace. But, the truth was, she missed her sister and niece terribly. The very same week they left, Lia went to the rescue center and found Missy.

  By ten o’clock and four cups of coffee later, still in her pajamas, Lia had scoured all the seafaring want ads online and placed twelve calls to the Sandy Cove marina to see if any of the shop owners or the sportfishing place knew of anyone looking for a job. The prospects were bleak. Anyone who knew this business had his own boat or crew ready to go for the season. Lia clicked off her phone with frustration. She might have to go back to Drew’s brother.

  She sighed. To do that, of course, she’d have to go through Drew—admit that she’d gone behind his back, then ask him to go down to the marina and beg his brother himself. Neither seemed like a happy ending. But she was losing time. And getting desperate. She took a deep breath and dialed.