Sea Glass Sunrise

by Donna Kauffman

  Just as she’d always done, Hannah put aside her own fears and insecurities to do her best to keep her siblings on even ground. The hard part wasn’t keeping her own life mess to herself; it was trying not to feel guilty that she’d been a little relieved to have Fiona and Kerry not needing her ear or shoulder lately.

  Kerry had flown the family nest quite young, and for some time now had generally only needed her oldest sister for things involving international legal matters and the occasional help securing a bail bond. Fiona was the more traditional younger sibling, who turned to her big sister for help and advice on what Hannah had come to call the Big Three: job, living situation, men. Most of life’s problems fell under one of those categories, along with their occasional overseer: finances. Though, in all honesty, her sisters had generally taken care of themselves in that department. Where Kerry was concerned, Hannah tried not to think too much about how she was making that happen.

  And I’ve hit the Big Three trifecta, Hannah thought dourly, having recently divested herself of all three.

  “We’ll have time, Fi,” she told her sister, dragging her thoughts firmly back to the here and now. “Whatever it is, we’ll figure it out.”

  Fiona hugged her again. “Thanks. I knew I could count on you.” She looked up; then just as quickly as she’d fallen apart, her expression cleared and turned shrewd and observational. “Now, let’s see what we can do about your face. Then we’ll work on the dress.”

  Hannah might be the pro when it came to tackling the Life Big Three, but Fiona was the queen of the Girl Big Three: clothes, food, and makeup.

  “I think I might have maxed out even your admirable skill set,” Hannah said. Without even looking, she could feel the color settling in more deeply around her eyes as the ache settled in with it. And not the kind of color one applied with a magic makeup wand.

  “Never underestimate the power of a great foundation,” Fiona said, gently pushing her sister to sit on the delicate antique bench seat positioned at the foot of the old sleigh bed.

  Oh, the stories that sleigh bed could tell, Hannah thought. So many nights of laughter, of tears, of plotting and planning, discussing the important subjects of their lives. At least they’d seemed life-or-death at the time.

  Hannah sighed and thought how nice it would be if she could just crawl under the old quilt, curl up in a ball, and sink back into that time when figuring out how to sneak Billy John Buckley her phone number without Logan finding out, so Billy could invite her and Fiona to the Cove’s winter festival skate night with him and his younger, equally cute brother, had been the biggest crisis in their lives.

  “Let me get my bag of magic tricks,” Fiona was saying, already bustling about again.

  “If only the bridesmaids could wear veils, too, we’d be all set.” Hannah watched her sister move about and gather her things. Always most comfortable when she was doing something or creating something with her hands, that was Fi. Hannah wondered what was going on with her, what she hadn’t confided to her big sister, noticing for the first time, as she looked past the outrageous getup her sister was wearing, the tiny stress lines pinching the corners of Fi’s eyes and mouth. Here Hannah had been selfishly glad not to have to fake her way through phone conversations with her closest sib, happy and relieved knowing that at least Fi was doing well. Only clearly that wasn’t the case. Guilt made another stab.

  “Want to talk now?”

  Fi just got even busier sorting through what appeared to be a toolbox containing enough paraphernalia to make up the entire cast of Cirque du Soleil. Hannah might need all of that help and then some.

  “Let’s just focus on the rehearsal this afternoon and the celebration tonight. Fergus is so excited to be hosting the dinner afterward at the pub, it’s almost comical. God, I love him.”

  “Is that really what Alex wanted? Dinner at the pub? I mean, we all love Gus to pieces, but—”

  “Oh, they have a special bond, those two. You’ll see. It’s ridiculously sweet. He was one of the first people she met here. In fact, he was the one who initially hired her for the lighthouse project. Without telling brother dearest.”

  “Really? How did I not know that part?”

  Fi just gave her a look that said, Uh, because you have no time for a life? “Anyway, he offered and it was exactly the right thing for her. You should see him. He’s all but dancing a jig, absolutely loving being part of the big event.”

  Hannah smiled, her heart bumping a little harder inside her chest. “Then you’re right, it’s the perfect thing. I’m glad she’s connected so well to Gus—to the whole town, to hear Barb tell it. She’s made her own place here, and not just via Logan. That’s a really good thing.”

  “They’re great together. She doesn’t take any of his stuff and he’s like this complete idiot around her. So it’s enormous amounts of fun.” Fiona’s eyes sparkled with the shine of happy tears. “I love seeing him like this.”

  Hannah tipped her head back and willed her eyes to dry. “Okay, no more sappy wedding talk. We’ll need to strap Kleenex boxes around our waists at this rate. And it’s making my face hurt.”

  “Well, it’s killing me, so only seems fair.”

  Hannah tipped her head forward again and narrowed her gaze at her now innocently smiling sister. “If it wasn’t for your crazy makeup skills—”

  Fiona snickered. “Remember when Kerry was what, like twelve, and pissed off that Logan wouldn’t let her wear makeup to school, so she decided to practice her burgeoning eyeliner skills on our dead-to-the-world brother?”

  No one slept as hard and heavy as Logan had when he was younger. The giggle burst forth from Hannah at the long-ago memory, and she didn’t care about the pain, even as she put a hand over her bruised and banged-up lip.

  “Oh my God, and Logan got a call to go help Jessica’s dad on his fishing boat, at like, what, four the next morning? And never looked in the mirror?” They both fell into gales of laughter.

  “I’m surprised she lived to see high school,” Fiona gasped.

  “I’m still surprised she lives to see her next birthday. Ow,” Hannah said, holding her face as giggles snorted out.

  “Serves you right,” came a voice from the doorway. “Sitting here dissing my good name when we have a perfectly good brother to roast over the coals.”

  “Kerry!” Both Fiona and Hannah shouted at the same time and scrambled up to gather her into a tight group hug.

  Kerry McCrae was average height and build, but with the finely sculpted body of an athlete. And that’s where any resemblance to being a civilized human being ended. Fiona and Logan had wild, amber-colored eyes, and Hannah had stormy blue ones, but all three of them had thick, dark, almost black hair, of varying lengths and textures. Logan’s was relentlessly rumpled, Hannah’s sleek and shiny, Fiona’s a wild mass of corkscrew curls that drove her insane. So no one knew, exactly, how it was that Kerry had somehow popped out with wild red curls and green eyes so bright and sparkling, they put emeralds to shame.

  Fergus had often teased her that she was but an unruly forest sprite the wee folk had left as a babe under the magic oak tree that had grown up through the middle of Eula March’s antique store in town. Kerry had been a very impressionable ten-year-old when Fergus had come over from Ireland and into their lives. She’d loved his stories and had taken that one particularly to heart. An unruly forest sprite, indeed.

  Having just recently turned thirty, she still looked every bit of the role. Her hair was wildly out of control, with random braids flying out here and there and odd bits of who knew what tied to this strand or that. Her latest grand life adventure had been living in Australia and New Zealand, so her skin was brown as an island native’s, which made her brilliant emerald eyes shine somehow mystically from her angular and beautiful face. She hugged them back with a fierceness that made Hannah feel as if her heart could explode with the joy she was feeling.

  “Look out, Blueberry, the McCrae sisters are back!” Fiona sang, as
they all bounced up and down.

  “And we’re having a wedding!” Kerry crowed, then led them in some kind of aboriginal-style dance that, when the typically more staid and proper Hannah gave herself completely over to it—including the bit Kerry called “tribal twerking”—had them all collapsing on the big, sleigh bed in peals of laughter.

  God, it was so good to be home.

  Chapter Five

  Calder paused on the sidewalk and looked up at the towering oak tree. There was nothing particularly special about the tree itself, except for the fact that it was growing straight up through the interior of a small antique store, and right out through the roof. MOSSYCUP ANTIQUES, the oval sign read. The background was navy blue, the store name in raised white script, and the oak tree—a mossycup oak, he presumed—was in beautifully rendered gold relief in the background. “Founded: At the Beginning,” he murmured, reading aloud the small line of script under the store name. Hmm. The beginning of what?

  He’d noticed the eccentric little place on his way into town the day before—it was hard to miss—and decided he’d stop in on his way in that morning to talk to Owen Hartley, owner of Hartley’s Hardware and the new mayor of Blueberry Cove. More importantly to Calder, he was apparently the town historian as well.

  Calder’s meeting with Winstock had been pushed back from dinner the previous evening to a late lunch today, midafternoon, so he’d headed back home to the farm the evening before, right after leaving the police station. His thoughts drifted, as they’d done with a little too much regularity, to Hannah McCrae. He found himself wondering what her story was, even knowing it didn’t matter. Couldn’t matter. She was in Blueberry for a wedding, then would go back to Virginia. At least that’s what he assumed, given her little Audi had Virginia plates. Driving in that morning, he’d wondered how her injuries had fared, what her face looked like now, how she was holding up under what was likely a crush of last-minute wedding details.

  Recalling her sister Fiona’s getup the day before, he smiled. Yeah, he didn’t even want to know what all was going on with that. Just as well he was out of her particular orbit. Now if he could just stop thinking about her.

  Switching mental gears, curious to see how the roof construction was configured around the oak tree, he reached for the door and noticed the long brass handles were actually flamingoes shaped as . . . He bent down for a closer look. “Croquet mallets?” The whole town was certifiable. He was thinking maybe his branch of the family had escaped the Cove to save their sanity when the door swung open and he had to jerk back to keep from being smacked directly in the face with a flamingo mallet.

  “It’s okay, Eula,” the woman was saying as she backed out of the shop, a moderately sized leather-strapped oak steamer trunk cradled in her arms. “I’ve got it. I just—ooph!”

  Calder hadn’t been able to both straighten and move out of her path at the same time, so had opted for not getting his face clobbered. His arms came around her as he fully righted himself, his hands covering hers as he kept the steamer trunk from pitching to the sidewalk. He just managed to catch the door on the toe of his boot before it hit her in the elbow. “I’ve got you,” Calder said, bracing her in the shelter of his body until they were steady.

  She turned her head to see who had her, causing him to duck back in order to keep the lace-covered brim of the little hat she was wearing from clipping him across the cheek.

  “You.” She said it like an accusation.

  He would have known those stormy, dark blue eyes anywhere. He was grinning before he thought better of it. “Every day.”

  She started to turn, but he tightened his hold for a moment.

  “Mr. Blue—”

  “Calder. And, just—wait,” he instructed. “Don’t pull. Something on your dress is caught in my, uh . . . belt buckle.” It was only because he was a whisper away from her face that he saw her cheeks flush a little. It would otherwise have been almost impossible to tell, since she had enough makeup troweled on to rival a wax museum mannequin. He guessed it was to cover the damage from going one-on-one with the air bag and losing. “I’d ask what on earth it is you’re wearing, but it’s probably best you don’t explain. Hold on.” He shifted, trying to free himself from the white lace edging the voluminous layers of purple satin that made up the wide skirt of the antebellum ensemble she had on.

  “I’ve got the trunk,” she said tightly, sucking in her breath when he inadvertently brushed against the curve of her backside, though how he’d managed that kind of contact through all the fabric between them was beyond him. “Just, get unstuck,” she said, sounding more than a little breathless.

  His body wasn’t remotely concerned with figuring out how it had made contact with the softly rounded curve of her backside; it was too busy enjoying the aftereffects of such contact. What are you, fifteen? Copping a feel? “Trying,” he managed, knowing if he didn’t free himself quickly it was only going to get more embarrassing for both of them.

  “Please,” she said, sounding strained now. “Rip it if you have to, it’s not like it could possibly hurt the dress.”

  “True.” He made sure she had hold of the trunk and shifted them both back a step so he could release the door. It swung closed in front of her as he straightened his stance and reached down between them to untangle the intricate scrap of lace from where it had somehow completely woven its every tiny strand in and around the prong of his belt buckle, as if they’d done some kind of slow bump and grind. He tried not to brush his fingertips over her surprisingly curvy backside any more than he had to. Stop thinking about bumping. And grinding. He tugged a bit harder than he’d meant to and jerked her right up against his—Jesus, Blue, just rip the fucking thing, will you?

  “Hold still,” he ground out, when she shifted against him. She might have groaned a little, or maybe that was just his own private fantasy. “There,” he said a second later. “Got it.”

  She turned around so fast they almost bumped chins and he had to grab the trunk to keep it from effectively cornering him right in the balls.

  “Sorry!” she said. Realizing what she’d almost done, she reached for the trunk, but he kept his hold on it. “I can take it now. You don’t have to—”

  “Just . . . I got it. Okay?” He closed his eyes for a brief moment, willing his body to calm right the hell down. Then, when that didn’t work, he just thought, Fuck it all, and lowered the trunk so it blocked her view of him from belt to mid-thigh. Seriously, go get laid or something. Because this is just sad, man.

  She must have seen something on his face, in his expression, because her face went from pink to red, and she stammered when she spoke. “Oh—right. Okay. Fine. Just . . . right. No problem.”

  Oh, she was a problem, all right. He still liked that he flustered her, liked it way too much. He was finally able to take in her full regalia and could only shake his head. Rather than comment, he looked back at her face. Her hair had been pulled back into some intricately woven, sleek bun all tucked in at the nape of her neck, but her features were still partly hidden by the dipping brim of the plum satin froufrou hat she had perched on the side of her head and the dark netting attached to the brim, which swept over her forehead and down across half of her left cheek. As a way to minimize anyone’s view of her bandaged nose and banged-up face, it worked pretty well, but that bit of genius was mitigated by the fact that the getup itself would draw twice as much attention to her in the first place.

  “Interesting disguise,” he said. “How’s the nose?”

  With her hands now free, she lifted one to briefly shadow the exposed part of her face, then let it drop back to her side, appearing a bit annoyed with herself for caring what she looked like to him. Which, he discovered, he liked as well. A lot.

  “The doctor says I’ll keep it,” she said. “But the lip is touch and go.”

  He grinned, surprised by the dry humor, and found his gaze drawn to that bruised and banged-up lower lip. He had the strongest urge to lean in . . .
and soothe it with his tongue.

  “Well, you do have two of those, so there’s that.”

  “True, but having only one fully functional makes that whole whistling thing a bit of a challenge.”

  His grin widened. She gave every appearance of being a tall, elegant, cool sip of very expensive gin, yet her wit was sharp, very down to earth, and . . . well, earthy. Interesting. Very . . . very interesting. “Yes,” he said. “How would Bogey have ever landed Bacall if he couldn’t put his lips together”—his gaze dropped to her mouth—“and blow?”

  He watched her throat work and her pupils expand, and knew he shouldn’t feel that little punch of triumph in his gut. And, okay, maybe a bit lower as well. Yeah, maybe he shouldn’t go there at all.

  “Old film buff?” she asked, pulling herself together and managing to look down her bandaged nose at him all at the same time.

  “Classics never go out of style.” And she was that, he thought. A classic. He took in her getup once again. “So, where are you off to in your, uh, Sunday finest? On this sunny Thursday morning.”

  She looked down, but rather than appear embarrassed, she smoothed her hand down the exceedingly shiny and very purple skirt, which spread outward over an untold number of what appeared to be white lace petticoats, at least from what he could see in the opening that split down the front of the skirt. Then she lifted a hand to carefully straighten her bonnet, and looked him straight in the eye with a small smile that could only be described as saccharine sweet. “Actually,” she said, her voice a syrupy drawl, “why, I was just running a few errands in town before dashing off to save Tara.”

  He barked out a laugh. Now who was charming whom? “Why, Miss Scarlett, flash one of those smiles, and I do believe you could save Tara and the entire Confederacy, even this deep into Yankee territory.”