Beside a Dreamswept Sea

by Hinze, Vicki

“Oh, yes. But Tate has other . . . concerns.” Ones Cally likely didn’t know existed.

  “Well.” Miss Hattie pushed at a pin coming loose from her bun. “I guess you’d best see to that, then.”

  He crooked his neck, cast her a sidelong look. “Now why would I do anything about Tate? The only reason to withdraw as his counsel would be due to a relationship with Cally—which I don’t have.”

  “Mmm, I’m sure you know best, dear.”

  Bryce went still. Not for a second did he buy her acquiescence. “When John was here, I know you heard us on the phone.”

  “I did?”

  “Yes. You heard him tell me to go to Macy’s and order myself a wife. In fact, I mentioned it to you later myself. But Macy’s doesn’t stock wives, Miss Hattie, and Seascape Inn doesn’t, either. So stop looking at me like you expect me to just pick out a woman here, go up to her and say, ‘Hey, wanna marry me and mother my kids?’ I can’t do that.”

  She cast him an innocent look, her green eyes soft and questioning. “Why not?”

  “Because.” Exasperated, he groaned. “God, Miss Hattie. If I said something like that, Cally would think I was crazy.”

  “She would?”

  “Of course she would. What woman wouldn’t? And I’d agree with her. We’re practically strangers.”

  “I see.” Miss Hattie smacked her lips. “Well, I’m sure you do indeed know best.”

  He hated it when she said that. Hated it. Mostly because he suspected she meant he didn’t know anything at all. And because he feared she was right.

  She patted her bun. “Far be it from me to tell you your own mind on the matter, dear heart—I don’t believe in interfering—but it is worth noting I never once mentioned you asking Cally Tate.”

  She hadn’t. And that, he supposed, was her point. He’d denied having any feelings for the woman, then turned right around and mentioned her and marriage in the same breath. T.J. and John had warned Bryce, but evidently not enough for it to get through his thick skull. They’d said Miss Hattie had a way of twisting things on a man until the absurd sounded logical and the impossible, plausible. He clamped his jaw. “Cally would think I was crazy. I’d think I was crazy, too.”

  Miss Hattie pulled a lacy white hankie from her pocket then dabbed at her temple. “So you’ve said.”

  There she went again. Agitated, he tugged his gray sweater closed, then buttoned the third button. “Well, don’t you agree?”

  “When nip comes to tuck, whether or not I agree doesn’t matter, hmm? It’s what you and Cally think that is of consequence.” Miss Hattie pulled a loose thread from his sweater sleeve. “But it’s clear as a cloudless day she adores your children. And after marriage to that beast, trusting a man again could take her a spell. But the children . . . Well now, they’re a different kettle of fish, I’d say.”

  Essentially the same words he’d said to Cally earlier about Seascape Inn and its magic, and it only mattering what John and Bess thought. But to pull the stunt with Cally that Miss Hattie was suggesting, a man would have to be totally without pride. Bryce would do a lot for his kids—he really would—but would it be asking too much to find them a good mother who’d also at least trust him? He didn’t expect love. Didn’t want it, either. But trust, well, that seemed essential in any relationship.

  Cally walked out of her bedroom wearing a feminine version of Bryce’s same sweater. “Oh, look,” Miss Hattie said, sounding more than pleased with herself. “You match.”

  “Miss Hattie.” He barely stifled a groan.

  “What?”

  The picture of innocence. He wasn’t buying that bit of business for a second, either. Nor was he willing to let himself even think about her nonsuggestion suggestion of him marrying Cally Tate. He didn’t really know the woman. And yet what he’d seen in the past three days he’d liked, and he had the strangest feeling that she might need the kids as much as they needed her. They interacted as if they’d known and loved each other for years. “Nothing, Miss Hattie.” He let out a resigned sigh. “Nothing at all.”

  Cally waited for him at the top of the stairs.

  “Have a care not to put too much weight on your knee, Bryce. And don’t you worry, I’ll keep a sharp watch on our Suzie.”

  “Thanks, Miss Hattie.”

  “My pleasure.” She nodded, then stared at the ceiling as if talking with someone else. “She won’t have that dream.”

  He didn’t know why, but Bryce had the strongest feeling Miss Hattie was right. Pacified, he joined Cally on the stairs.

  She looked at his sweater, then at her own. “Hey, we match.”

  An inevitable harrumph skidded up his throat. “Yeah, I guess maybe we do.”

  The wind coming off the Atlantic chilled her skin, but Cally wasn’t cold. Her arm linked with Bryce’s, they walked side by side, and every third or fourth step, because of his limp and leaning on the cane, their sides brushed. They hadn’t talked. Just soaked in the calming night sounds of the ocean’s waves splashing against the granite cliffs. And that comfortable silence suited her just fine.

  She reveled in the feel of the crisp wind ruffling through her hair, teasing her eyelids; in the feel of Bryce curling his arm around her shoulder in a way that using her as support didn’t require. He wanted to touch her. God, but it’d been so long since she’d known a man wanted to touch her. And not knowing what to do with all the feelings that knowing conjured, she buried them.

  To the sounds of the ocean and birds chirping, they walked south on Main Street to the village. The Blue Moon Cafe was still busy, though it was after nine P.M.

  “Want to stop for a snack?” Bryce asked. “I hear Lucy Baker makes a mean blueberry pie.”

  “No, thanks—unless you need to rest your knee.”

  “It’s fine. The stiffness is working out—but don’t tell Miss Hattie she was right. There’ll be no living with the woman.”

  A smile tugged at Cally’s lips. “She seems to have an amazing knack for knowing what a person needs.”

  “Mmm, I hadn’t thought about it, but you’re right. She does.” A glint of mischief flickered in his eye.. “Maybe that’s the Seascape magic.”

  “Maybe so.” Cally refused to rise to the bait, but she saw now where his children got their mischievous streaks. She liked that about Bryce, too. And she didn’t like liking it any better than the rest of things she liked about him.

  On the stony path beside the road, they walked on past the pristine church with its stained-glass window and high steeple, then turned back toward the inn. When they neared the gravel drive, Cally held her breath, sure Bryce would turn in and their walk would be over. But he didn’t. Instead, they walked on, toward the lighthouse which sat on a jutted point its keeper, Hatch, had called Land’s End. A shame the Coast Guard had automated the lighthouses and his wasn’t operating anymore. Chiseled against the midnight sky, its dark silhouette looked lonely. Cally knew exactly how it felt. And she sensed Bryce did, too. Amazing how different their situations were and yet how much they had in common.

  “Cally.” He broke their pleasant silence. “May I ask you something?”

  The last thing she wanted was to answer questions. Especially ones from Bryce when he sounded more like an attorney than a father or a man. The father, the man, she enjoyed, but she’d had about all of attorneys she could handle. She glanced over to tell him so, but the moonlight shining softly on his face conspired with his earnest look, and her reluctance withered. “Sure.”

  “Why didn’t you want the divorce?” Bryce semigrimaced, pausing at a clump of chickweed next to a mighty oak on the edge of the sand-dusted asphalt where the street met the path to the lighthouse. “I mean, knowing Gregory was seeing Joleen—”

  Cally looked away, out to the ocean, and inwardly groaned. Salt-tinged air breezed over her skin and the sounds of the waves crashing against the shore pounded in her ears. If she told the truth, she would look like the fool she’d been. She really didn’t want to look like a
fool—not to Bryce. But she couldn’t lie to him, either. Not without again becoming Caline, and she was quickly growing more peaceful as Cally. Cally was desirable, at least a little, and she was looked at with warmth and tenderness, with smiles that touched the eyes. Caline wasn’t. “I didn’t know he was seeing Joleen.” Cally fixed her gaze on the lighthouse tower. “I had no idea.”

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you.” Leaning on her, he walked on. “I shouldn’t have brought it up.”

  “It’s okay.” She shrugged, and sidestepped an unruly juniper intruding onto the path.

  Midway on the upward slope, Bryce stopped near a clump of bayberry. The wind whistled through its winter-barren branches, and a bird cooed. Sounded like a barn owl, though he couldn’t spot it in the trees. “Upsetting you isn’t okay. Not with me.”

  So conservative. So reserved. And yet so much passion in his eyes and in his voice. Meriam had been a lucky woman. “I didn’t want the divorce because, fool that I was, I loved the man.”

  Bryce moved to face her, then stopped under an ancient oak. The tip of his cane sank into the pebbly sand and grains sprayed over the toe of his loafer, tapping against the leather. “I don’t think loving a man is foolish. Especially not when that man is your husband.”

  Bitterness? Is that what she’d heard in his voice? Why would Bryce sound bitter? “When that man’s Gregory Tate, loving him is worse than foolish. It’s a recipe for self-destruction.”

  Bryce touched her face, his fingers cool, his eyes tender. “There had to be some good in him. If there wasn’t, you’d never have fallen in love with him..”

  “You don’t understand.” She didn’t understand herself. No. No, that wasn’t true. She understood. She only wished she didn’t.

  Bryce rubbed his thumb along her cheek. “Explain it to me then, so I do understand.”

  She couldn’t meet his eyes. She wanted to, tried to, but she just couldn’t do it. Instead, she focused on his tie. “I loved Gregory from the moment I saw him. His parents said it was lust, but it wasn’t. I truly fell in love with him at first sight. He was so . . . perfect. Everything I wanted in a man. And, as hard as it is to believe now, then he loved me, too.”

  “I’m sure he did.”

  Bryce’s of-course tone had her smiling. He had a way of making her feel lovable. Not that she was, or ever could be again. But the fleeting feeling was nice. “Gregory was a med student then. We couldn’t wait to get married, to be together.”

  “His family opposed.”

  “Boy, did they.” She shrugged off a memory of the ugly scene. The accusations of her using pregnancy to trap their son. She’d explained she wasn’t pregnant, but it hadn’t mattered. Only time had proven her truthful on the issue. Considering the way things had turned out, with them unable to have a child, divorced, Gregory remarried, it all seemed rather unimportant anymore. Yet it still hurt. So much . . . still hurt.

  “But you married anyway. And you were happy.”

  “For a while.” She let out a humorless laugh. “I guess I should be grateful it lasted as long as it did.”

  “But you’re not.”

  Too perceptive! “No. No, I’m not.”

  “What happened to you two?” Bryce shifted his weight and winced.

  His knee clearly was aching. He hadn’t wanted their walk to end either and, pleased by that, Cally clasped his arm, then sat down on the dew-damp ground. Even in his knife-creased dress slacks, he sank to the earth beside her, and she smiled again. “Everything was great. Gregory’s parents cut him off financially because he’d defied them and married me, so I quit college and worked designing window displays for a couple of department stores. Money was tight, but we got by.”

  “So you put him through med school.”

  “And his residency. And helped him repay school loans and set up his office. At times I thought we’d be in debt forever.” She plucked at a blade of brown, dead grass, then threaded it between her forefinger and thumb. It crackled. “I’m one of those unfashionable women who never wanted a career, Bryce. I only wanted a family.” To be the sunshine of my home. “So we postponed my dream to get Gregory’s. When he went into practice, then it was to be my turn.” She let out a self-deprecating laugh. “We were going to have lots of babies and a comfortable home, and live happily ever after.”

  Bryce’s expression turned serious. “But you never got your dream.”

  “We had to pay off the school loans, then the office setup loans, then save a nest egg. Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. But I finally got part of my dream—the home part.” She lifted a pointed finger. “The trouble started when I mentioned the babies part.” The wind caught a wisp of her hair, tangled it. She pushed it away from her face. “I wanted them then, and Gregory didn’t. He’d worked so hard for so long, he wanted some free time first.”

  “So your dream had to wait—again.”

  She nodded. “At first he just put me off. Then he got irritated if I brought up the subject. For a long time, I avoided talking about kids because I couldn’t take the upset it caused. Then I got irritated and, finally, I insisted.” A shaft of pain arrowed through her chest, and her voice softened. “That’s when we found out Gregory couldn’t have kids.”

  “Did you still love him, then?”

  What an odd question. “Of course.” A raccoon scampered across the path then ducked under a clump of bayberry. Cally grunted. “It was hard to accept that we’d remain childless, and I’d be lying if I denied it. But I worked through it, Bryce. I really did. And I accepted that part of my dream just wasn’t meant to be.”

  He sandwiched her hand in his, his fingers strong, yet gentle. “What about adoption?”

  “Gregory refused to discuss any alternatives.” Alternatives would occur to Bryce. Her chest went tight. But they hadn’t occurred to Gregory. How long had he stayed at the hospital the first time she mentioned adoption? Three days, or four?

  Did it matter now? She looked up through a spruce’s wind-ruffled branches. “He wanted our children, or no children. When I pushed and insisted my wants should count, too, I became the ‘lousy, demanding, and ungrateful wife.’ ”

  “I can’t imagine that,” Bryce said.

  “Bless you for sounding as if you mean that.”

  “I do mean it. You thanked me and asked for help with your luggage. That rules out demanding and ungrateful.”

  “Ah, but I excelled at lousy.” She tossed down the grass blade, lifted a stone, then rubbed it between her forefinger and thumb. The grit of sand clinging to it felt good. Soothing.

  “’Fraid not. Lousy women don’t protect. And you protected Jeremy from the battleaxe.”

  “The battleaxe?” A little laugh escaped her throat. “Ah, the estimable Mrs. Wiggins.”

  He bumped his cane with his knee; steadied it against the rough bark of the tree. “You don’t like her.”

  “Truthfully?” Clouds scudded across the sky and the moonlight softened, then again grew bright.

  He nodded. “Always.”

  Cally liked the sound of that—and added honesty to the list of things she didn’t like liking about him. “The battleaxe grates at my nerves.”

  “Mine, too.”

  “Then why don’t you fire her?”

  “I can’t make myself do it. Meriam hired her. We both worked long, weird hours—I still do. Mrs. Wiggins isn’t the greatest nanny in the world, but she is the only constant in my kids’ lives.”

  Again putting the children’s needs above his own desires. And Meriam’s wishes, too. Another of his traits went on her list, and a stream of jealousy so fierce she feared she’d drown in it rushed through Cally’s chest. Even though she’d been dead for two years, Meriam’s wishes were given more consideration by Bryce than Gregory had given Cally’s wishes with her alive. And if that didn’t prove she’d been a lousy wife, she didn’t know what would.

  “Besides,” Bryce went on, “I’m not a very good parent, Cally.”

&n
bsp; “You’re a wonderful parent.”

  “No, I’m not. I swear I try, but I just screw up left and right.” He grunted and stared into the night sky. “Once, Jeremy spilled milk on the kitchen floor and used the garden hose to clean it up.”

  She smiled. “Very creative.”

  “He flooded the kitchen.” Bryce laced his fingers with hers. “I put him in the corner, then cleaned up the mess. Afterward, I took a phone call, checked my e-mail, puttered in the yard. Suzie comes outside—it’d been a good hour—and says, ‘Daddy, aren’t you ever going to let Jeremy out of the corner?’” Bryce’s expression twisted. “I forgot him, Cally. I actually forgot him there.”

  “And I’m sure you felt awful about it.”

  “Of course I did, but that’s not the point. I forgot my son. That’s the point.”

  “Hmm, how did Jeremy react?”

  “I went inside and said, if he could behave, then he could get out of the corner. He looks up at me with these big eyes and tells me, ‘I think I’d better just stay here a while.’”

  She laughed from the heart out, pressed her forehead against Bryce’s shoulder.

  He tensed, unsure if it was at the intimacy of feeling her breasts brush against his arm or at her laughing. The latter more comfortable than the former, he frowned at her. “How can you find this funny?”

  “It’s hilarious.” She reared, lifted her gaze to his, her eyes twinkling. “The angel knew he’d get into trouble again, so figured he might as well just stay put.” She patted at his sleeve, then smoothed her hand down it, elbow to wrist, her laughter lingering in her eyes. “Oh, he’s special, Bryce. Really special.”

  “He is. But you’re missing my point.”

  “Am I?” She cupped his chin in her hand. “You got preoccupied and forgot. Do you honestly think you’re the only parent in the world to do that, Bryce Richards? If so, you’re not only a stuffed shirt, but very arrogant.”

  “Parents aren’t allowed arrogance. Or pride.” God, but he loved the feel of her hand on his beard. He’d confess the darkest secrets in his soul for a moment more of feeling her touch. He’d even let her get away with calling him a stuffed shirt, which he wasn’t, of course.