Castaway Cove

by JoAnn Ross

  “Deal.”

  As they drove back to town in silence, Mac decided that the Fourth of July was looking to be a very long day.

  • • •

  As Mac and Annie were leaving the beach, they passed a white Subaru that was just arriving.

  “Is that who I think it is?” Aimee Pierson asked.

  “Looks like Midnight Mac and Ms. Shepherd, from the scrapbook store,” sixteen-year-old Matt Templeton said.

  “I’ve been hearing they’re an item.” Aimee glanced back over her shoulder at the black pickup truck. “What do you think they’re doing all the way out here?”

  Matt grinned. “Probably the same thing we’re doing.”

  “That’d be cool.” When she smiled back, Matt decided he had to be the luckiest guy on the planet. “Annie Shepherd’s really nice. She deserves to be happy.” She reached across the space between the bucket seats and took hold of his right hand, which had been resting on the knob of the gearshift. “Like us.”

  He’d nearly lost this girl due to his own stupidity, but fortunately, after he’d done some major apologizing, she’d taken him back, and now that he had his driver’s license, he no longer had to depend on her driving him around in her mom’s old Volvo.

  When his mother had first dragged him from Beverly Hills to Shelter Bay last fall, he’d hated the small town with a passion as hot as a thousand suns. Now, as he brought the birthday car his mom and new dad had bought him to a halt at the sand’s edge, Matt decided there was nowhere else on the planet he’d rather be.

  30

  Since he’d told his dad he’d be bringing dinner home, Mac stopped by Bon Temps after taking Annie back to Memories on Main. It was the slow time between the lunch and dinner crowds, so the restaurant was empty, with just Sax behind the bar, washing glasses.

  “Hey, cher. I’m glad you stopped in,” Sax said. “I was just about to call you.”

  Mac claimed a barstool. “What about?”

  “The Fourth. Do you want a beer?”

  Mac figured that after fighting back the urge to have crazy hot sex with Annie Shepherd, he could use something to cool him down. And he still had several hours before he had to go on the air.

  “Sure. Make it Double Dead Guy Ale.”

  “That bad a day?” Sax reached into the cooler, pulled out a dark bottle, popped the top, and handed it over with a frosted glass.

  “Actually sort of mixed. So, what about the Fourth?” he asked after taking a long drink of the ale straight from the bottle. Which cooled his throat, but did nothing for other vital parts of his body, which could heat up just at the thought of Annie.

  “We lost Ollie Nelson last night,” Sax said.

  “Damn. That’s a shame.” The former vet was a favorite down at the VFW, being one of the few who would actually talk about his days in the war. And not just any war. The big one. WWII. “But he was, what, ninety?”

  “Ninety-three.”

  “He looked okay when I saw him the other day.”

  “He died in his sleep.” Sax pushed a bowl of what Mac knew to be red-hot beer nuts his way. “Seems his heart just quit beating.”

  “That’s a bummer, but isn’t it the way we’d all like to go?” Mac asked as visions of that arm with the blue Cub Scout uniform sticking out of the pile of bodies in the Afghan market flashed through his mind.

  “I’d rather not go at all.” Sax dipped another glass into the sink, swirling it around in the suds. “But it sure as hell beats a lot of stuff we’ve both seen.” He rinsed the glass and dried it with a towel. “Ollie was going to ride on the parade float to represent his generation. He and your grandfather were the last Shelter Bay vets to have fought in that war.”

  “That’s a sad milestone. To be down to one. I guess there’s going to be a funeral?”

  “A memorial service. Tomorrow. One in the afternoon at Genarro’s, interment in the vets’ section of the Sea View Cemetery, then a funeral lunch/supper thing back here.”

  “I guess I’d better tell Pops. Given that they were close friends.”

  “Yeah. You wouldn’t want him hearing it from someone else. So how is Charlie these days?”

  Mac shrugged as he snagged some nuts and felt the roof of his mouth burst into flame. Knowing that Sax saved the really hot ones as a test, he refused to let on that he felt on the verge of spontaneous combustion.

  “He has good days and bad.” He took another, longer drink of the ale, ignoring Sax’s cocky, satisfied look. “He seems better with Emma. I swear his short-term memory goes up on the scale when he’s talking with her.”

  “Interesting. Then again, little girls have a way of making everything seem better. Speaking of which . . .”

  Mac saw this coming as Sax put down the towel, reached into his pocket, and pulled out an iPhone.

  “We had Grace’s six-month photos taken last week. I still can’t believe she’s mine.”

  He turned the screen toward Mac, showing off the photo of the six-month-old baby, her head covered with a red fuzz a few shades lighter than Kara’s strawberry blond. Her eyes were enormous, seeming to take up much of her small face, and, while they were blue, rather than Kara’s green, he saw her mother’s serious nature in them. In contrast, her toothless grin was as wide as a slice of summer moon.

  “She’s really beautiful, Sax,” he said honestly. She looked like a baby angel in a dress he figured had been purchased for the milestone occasion. There were so many white ruffles, her round little head, dimpled arms, and chubby legs appeared to be emerging from a cloud.

  “Just like her mother. She started sitting up on her own the day before the shoot,” Sax said, sounding as proud as if he’d just eliminated the last of the Taliban, single-handedly with his Super SEAL powers

  “That’s impressive.” Mac had no idea how old Emma had been when she’d first sat up. He wondered if he would spend the rest of his life trying to make up for those lost years, and decided he probably would.

  “Yeah. That’s what Kara and I thought. Here’s another one of her with Mikey.” Michael Sean Concannon had been born the same day, during a rare ice storm.

  Mikey’s father, Ethan, was an organic farmer and his mother, Phoebe, who’d escaped an abusive first husband, had worked as a sous chef at Lavender Hill Farm restaurant before becoming a mother. According to the Shelter Bay gossip line, she was planning to return to the restaurant part-time when the season began slowing down after Labor Day.

  The baby boy was wearing a blue shirt with a bright red Elmo on the front, tiny blue jeans, and white high-tops. Instead of looking at the camera, he was staring at baby Grace, seated beside him, with a glazed-eye look of bemused wonderment.

  “Poor kid’s already a goner.” Mac wondered if he looked at Annie that same way and figured he probably did.

  Sax laughed. “Yeah. Although they won’t admit it straight out, I suspect Kara and Phoebe are already planning their wedding.”

  He flipped to another photo, which showed Kara, looking soft and pretty in a flowered watercolor dress that was a distinct contrast to the starched khaki sheriff’s uniform she wore to work every day. Yet another photo showed the family together: baby Grace and Kara, Sax, and Trey, Kara’s son whom Sax had adopted. They could have appeared on a poster for the perfect family.

  “You are one damn lucky son of a bitch,” Mac said.

  “I tell myself that every day,” Sax agreed. “I wasn’t as bad off as some guys when I got out of the military, but I had my share of ghosts.”

  “I think everyone does.”

  “Yeah, but mine talked and followed me around all the time. And razzed me, just like when they were alive and we were all part of the unit. It was weird, but also kind of cool in a way.”

  “Like they weren’t really gone. “

  “Exactly.” Sax shoved the phone back into his poc
ket and returned to washing glasses. “But once Kara and I got together, really together, not just the sex part, but the connection I’d always felt for her, they took off. And now, when I dream, I dream of her. And Trey and Grace.”

  “Lucky.” Although he would never deny Sax his happiness, Mac found himself envying the former SEAL.

  “You bet your ass. . . . So,” Sax said, “getting to why I was going to call you—somehow I managed to get myself put on the VFW’s parade committee.”

  “Maybe because you’re the only recipient of the Navy Cross in Shelter Bay?”

  “You know how I feel about that,” Sax muttered. “I’ve learned not to see that damn sign outside town, but there are days when I forget and look at it and find myself wishing a tsunami would just wash the sucker away.

  “Anyway, the Korean War guys are going to be on a float, along with some disabled vets from more-recent wars. Ollie was going to be with them, but now he can’t. So I was wondering if you think your grandfather would be up to representing the Greatest Generation.”

  “I don’t know.” Mac rubbed his chin as he gave it some thought. “Some days, absolutely. Others . . .” He shrugged. “Hell, like I said, I don’t know.”

  “Why don’t you ask him?” Sax suggested. “And we’ll leave it up in the air. If he’s feeling good on the Fourth and you think he could handle it—the benches will all have seat belts, or we could work out a deal with a wheelchair—”

  “Pops wouldn’t use the chair. It’s hard enough to get him into it when he’s at Still Waters. His pride wouldn’t let him use it in public.”

  “Okay. But there will definitely be seat belts. And we could put arms on either side of where he’s sitting. Just for extra stability.”

  “Sounds good. Emma would be over the moon to have him take part. I’ll drop by Still Waters in the morning and see what he has to say about it.”

  Something belatedly occurred to Mac. “The parade’s early in the day, right?”

  “At eleven. Before the noon basket raffle,” Sax confirmed.

  “Good. Because he can’t handle fireworks.”

  Sax shrugged. “Been there. There are times they still get to me. But you don’t have to worry. I’ll have Kara and the mayor put a joint notice in the Sentinel that for respect of our vets, no one should set off even small firecrackers during the parade.” Privately shot-off firecrackers were illegal in Oregon, but it wasn’t always possible to keep them out of people’s hands on holidays.

  “Sounds good. I’ll ask him.” Mac polished off the beer. “I need some takeout.”

  “And here I thought you’d come to tell me all about your hot date with Sandy from Shelter Bay.”

  When Mac flipped him off, Sax just laughed and took his order.

  31

  “Sedona called,” Kim told Annie as soon as she returned to the store. “She said to call her back when you got a chance.”

  “Okay. Thanks.” She was grateful the other woman hadn’t mentioned that she’d been gone an hour past that negotiated forty-five minutes.

  Fortunately, business was brisk, which kept her from being able to think about Mac until closing. After saying good night to Kim and turning the OPEN sign to CLOSED, she picked up the phone.

  “I know we both had a big lunch, but what would you say to stopping by the Sea Mist for a drink on the patio before going home?”

  “You’re on,” Sedona said. “After my lunch, I’m in serious need of alcohol.” She paused. “And you need to talk.”

  “I think I’m in trouble.”

  “I’ll call Maddy and Charity,” Sedona said. “Unfortunately, I don’t know if Kara could get a sitter at the last minute.”

  Although Annie liked Kara Douchett, that was just as well. As confused as she was, she wasn’t sure she could take looking at the baby photos the proud new mother would be bound to show off.

  “It’d take time to fill her in,” she said. “But since Maddy was there, too, it’d be good to get another opinion.”

  “She’ll come,” Sedona said without hesitation. “See you there in fifteen minutes.”

  And wasn’t that the kind of friendship she’d moved to Shelter Bay for? Annie asked herself as she drove the two blocks down to the harborfront restaurant, where Sedona, organized as always, had already reserved them a table on the water.

  Sedona arrived right on the dot, Maddy and Charity Tiernan two minutes later.

  “I hope I didn’t take you away from preparing for your dinner service,” Annie said to Maddy.

  “Not at all. Although Kyle isn’t as good a sous chef as Phoebe, she’ll keep things running smoothly while I’m gone. It’s also a good test, because I don’t want to be working all the time, which is partly why I decided to stay here in Shelter Bay after things fell apart in New York.

  “I’m thinking of moving Phoebe into a general manager position once she’s back full-time, which would allow Kyle to move into her slot.”

  Kyle was another successful graduate of Haven House, having landed in town from Massachusetts, the same way Phoebe had, through an underground railroad of women who, in many cases, were willing to risk breaking the law to save women from abuse.

  Having lived in abusive situations herself as a child, Annie also volunteered at the shelter, helping its residents create scrapbooks depicting their progress from victims to self-sufficient, confident women. Those same women paid it forward by creating greeting cards for various volunteer organizations like Operation Write Home, Cards for Soldiers, and Cards for Hospitalized Kids.

  “If I had someone like your Lucas at home, I sure wouldn’t want to be at work all the time,” Annie said.

  They chatted a bit about the upcoming Fourth of July festivities, including Charity’s plan to bring some adoptable cats and dogs from her shelter to her festival booth, and then, once their glasses of wine and appetizer had been delivered, Maddy, the most outspoken of the three, said, “Well?”

  “I kissed him.”

  “We already know about that,” Sedona said, waving away the admission as she plucked a clam strip from the tower in the center of the table. “It’s all over town that you were making out with him behind a paper display.”

  “It was a pen display. And we weren’t making out. He merely kissed me. On a crazy dare.”

  “You dared him to kiss you?” Charity asked, looking pleased at that idea.

  “What can I say? He makes me crazy,” Annie muttered.

  “Well, whatever. It’s old news,” Maddy said. “We’re here for the juicy parts.”

  Annie leaned forward, lowering her voice in an attempt to keep any more of her personal life from becoming grist for the Shelter Bay gossip mill. “We went to the beach. To this private spot he knows.”

  The other women burst out laughing, drawing some attention from the surrounding tables.

  “You’ve been there,” Annie guessed.

  “One of the advantages of being connected to the Douchetts,” Maddy said. “The summer after I graduated from high school, Lucas and I went there a lot.”

  “And Gabe took me there for the Crab Shack’s butter-roasted Dungeness crab picnic package,” Charity said. “As good as it was, halfway through the meal, I just wanted to pour that melted butter all over him and lick it off.”

  “I know the feeling,” Annie said. “But in my case, it was crème fraiche.”

  “That works, too,” Maddy agreed. Her reminiscent smile was that of a cat who’d just finished a bowl of very rich cream.

  “I don’t miss the roller-coaster emotions that come with a relationship, but I do miss sex,” Sedona said on a sigh.

  “Me, too,” Annie admitted. “I hadn’t realized how much until Mac kissed me. I think if he’d decided to make a move, right then and there, I wouldn’t have been able to think of a single reason why not.”

  “I
still can’t think of a reason,” Sedona said.

  “Maybe if it were just the two of us. But there’s his daughter to think about,” Annie said.

  “Well, surely you’re not going to be going at it like sex-crazed monkeys on the couch while she’s watching Dora the Explorer,” Maddy said.

  “Of course not.”

  “It’s not as easy having sex with kids around,” Charity admitted. “But Gabe and I have three, and trust me, we certainly manage it.”

  “Which is obvious. After all this time together, you two still have that newlywed glow,” Maddy said.

  “So do you and Lucas,” Charity said.

  The chef dimpled at that. “Well, we had a lot of years of catching up to do.”

  “How’s that going?” Sedona asked.

  The smile widened. “We’re still working on it.”

  “You two are just making this worse,” Annie complained. “I’m trying to convince myself that sex is overrated.”

  “Good luck with that,” Sedona said dryly as Annie took a long gulp of the crisp, dry Chardonnay. “I thought we’d agreed that we were going to jump back into the dating pond.”

  “And how’s that going for you?” Annie threw Sedona’s own words back at her.

  Sedona shrugged. “Not all that well, since instead of a prince, I definitely ended up with a frog today. But at least I hold out hope. If you decide you don’t want Midnight Mac, I might give the guy a shot.”

  “That’s the trouble.” Annie sighed heavily and although she wasn’t really hungry, she was in need of something fried, and began chewing on a breaded clam strip. “I do want him.”

  “Then go for it,” Maddy advised. “You know what they say . . . you snooze, you lose.”

  “Ha.” Annie took another clam strip from the stack and dipped it into the accompanying tartar sauce. “You’re a fine one to be talking about making the moves. I’ve heard all about how Lucas got you to marry him. You weren’t exactly the one pushing for the relationship.”

  “There’s a good reason for that,” Maddy argued. “Not only was I just coming off a public breakup, but Lucas and I had a history.”