Sand Castle Bay

by Sherryl Woods

  He studied Emily’s thoughtful expression. “You’re really okay with this?”

  “I was just thinking that it’s sweet in a way, all those years of unrequited love finally paying off.”

  “It is reassuring, isn’t it?” Boone said. “It says the universe has a way of making things right in the end.”

  “That’s a very romantic way of looking at things,” she said, sounding surprised.

  He smiled at her reaction. “I have my moments.”

  He just couldn’t allow these crazy, romantic notions to get the better of him when it came to Emily.

  * * *

  Emily thought about Boone’s comment that night when she was sitting on the porch at Cora Jane’s, her bare feet propped up on the railing, a tall glass of sweet tea in her hand.

  “I thought I might find you out here,” Gabi said, settling into a wicker chair next to her, her own glass of tea in hand. “You were awfully quiet during dinner tonight. Everything okay?”

  “Just thinking about love and how complicated and unpredictable it is,” she admitted.

  “Ah, the easy stuff,” Gabi said with a smile.

  “Grandmother admitted earlier that she and Jerry are an item,” Emily told her.

  Gabi’s expression lit up. “Really? How’d you wrestle that news out of her?”

  “Boone and I walked in on them in the kitchen. It wasn’t exactly a compromising moment, but Grandmother looked as if we’d caught them in bed. Took a couple of nudges, but she finally spilled the truth. Boone says he thinks Jerry’s had feelings for her for years.”

  “When did Boone get to be so observant, especially when it comes to romance?”

  “The same thing I wondered,” Emily said. “I’ve been seeing a different side to him since I got back here.”

  “You sound surprised.”

  “Once upon a time, I thought I knew everything there was to know about Boone,” Emily said. “It is kind of a shock to discover all these new facets. Do you suppose they were there all along or do you think Jenny brought them out in him?”

  “Maybe he’s just matured,” Gabi said. “That can happen between the age of twenty-one and thirty-one. You’re not the same woman you were when you walked out on him, are you?”

  Emily thought about that. “Not really.”

  “How do you see the changes in yourself?” Gabi asked curiously.

  “It might make more sense for you to tell me what you see. I could probably use an outside opinion.”

  Gabi looked oddly reluctant to answer. “Do you really want to know what I think? Uncensored?”

  Her sister’s reaction startled her. “Sure. Why wouldn’t I want to hear the truth?”

  “Maybe because you’re human, just like the rest of us, and sometimes the truth hurts. Remember how you managed to upset me on the phone last week, when you were teasing me about being like Dad? It’s certainly true, but I wasn’t crazy about hearing it.”

  Emily frowned. “But we’ve been telling you that for years. Why did it suddenly strike a nerve?”

  “Because lately I’ve been starting to want more. At least I think I want more than a demanding job that I obsess about 24/7.”

  “Seriously?” Emily said, taken aback by the admission from a woman who’d been even more goal-oriented than either Samantha or Emily herself, and they were no slouches when it came to going after what they wanted.

  “Shocking, huh?”

  “Is that because of this man you’re seeing? Are you in love with him? Are you thinking about a future with him?”

  Gabi hesitated, then shook her head. “I don’t think so. I mean we could be heading in that direction, and it’s been amazing to have someone in my life who’s there at the end of the day, who understands how important my job is to me and doesn’t get all worked up if I have to stay late at the office. We get along, you know. It’s easy and comfortable.”

  “You’re not mentioning anything about passion,” Emily noted.

  Gabi flushed, but grinned. “Oh, there’s plenty of that, believe me.”

  “Sounds like a perfect match.”

  “It does, doesn’t it?” Gabi said with a sigh.

  Emily frowned at her reaction. “Then why don’t you sound happier?”

  Gabi met her gaze. “I have no idea.”

  “Then there is something holding you back,” Emily concluded. “You probably need to figure out what that is.”

  “Probably,” Gabi agreed, then shrugged. “Enough of that. You managed to steer the conversation away from you, which suggests you weren’t that anxious to hear my thoughts about how you’ve changed, after all.”

  “I should have known you wouldn’t forget. Your brain’s like one of those fancy new phones that has little reminders that pop up.”

  Gabi laughed. “A godsend, by the way. And yes, my mind is exactly like that.” She studied Emily. “So, do you want to hear what I have to say or not?”

  “Go ahead,” Emily said, oddly reluctant, but suspecting that she needed to hear whatever her sister had observed. Since it was coming from Gabi, rather than Samantha, she could take it.

  “I think you’re at a turning point in your life,” Gabi began. “A really important one. You can have this extraordinary career, fill every minute of your day with work the way I have, or you can try to find some balance.”

  “Are you sure you’re not still talking about you?” Emily asked.

  “Absolutely, but the same thing applies. Here’s where it’s different,” she said, holding Emily’s gaze. “You used to have this softness about you with Boone. You had the ambition, sure, but it was tempered by the crazy love you felt for him. You had the balance I’m talking about. Now, you’re a hundred percent focused. You’re tense, maybe even a little hard. I don’t have a doubt in my mind that someone could throw a major interior design project your way, give you an impossible deadline to meet, and you’d do it without batting an eye.”

  “Why doesn’t that sound very complimentary when you say it?” Emily grumbled.

  “Oh, it is complimentary, if that’s all you want out of life. Me, I’d like to see you truly happy again, laughing the way you used to with Boone, sneaking off to be with him in the middle of the night. I’m not sure I’m explaining this right, but there was a lightness about you then, a rightness, if you will. You were a complete woman.”

  “Are you suggesting I can’t be complete without a man in my life?” Emily asked, indignation stirring.

  “Absolutely not. But you—Emily Castle—can’t be complete without the kind of deep-down happiness you had with Boone. Maybe you can find that in your work eventually. I don’t know. But I’m not seeing it now.” She shrugged. “Not any more than I’ve found it in mine, and, believe me, no one is more stunned by that than I am.”

  Emily let her sister’s words sink in. Gabi had been right, they did hurt, but there was an undeniable ring of truth in them. She hadn’t been happy, not a hundred percent carefree and deliriously happy, in a very long time. How had she not noticed that? How had she missed that all the successes in the world, all the demands for her talents didn’t add up to real fulfillment? The jobs she took on were challenging, but not ultimately rewarding, at least not in the way she thought maybe work should be.

  Gabi reached over and put a hand atop hers. “You’re not furious with me, are you?”

  “How could I be? You were just calling it like you see it.”

  “I could be wrong,” Gabi said, clearly hoping to take the sting out of her words.

  Emily shook her head. “You’re not wrong,” she admitted. “I wish you were. Unfortunately I have no idea how to change things. It’s not as if I can snap my fingers and have a whole new life.”

  Gabi smiled at her. “You sure about that? Maybe you just have to s
nap them when the right person is in the vicinity.”

  “Meaning Boone?”

  “Meaning Boone,” Gabi confirmed.

  “You still think he’s the right man for me or that I’m the right woman for him, even after the way I hurt him, even after everything he’s been through?”

  “Doesn’t matter what I think. Or what Grandmother and Samantha think—and they’re both on the same page, by the way. It only matters what you think.”

  “And Boone,” Emily said. “He has a pretty big say, and he’s not all that happy with me.”

  “You can hardly blame him,” Gabi said.

  “Hardly,” Emily agreed. “But that would make it an uphill battle.”

  “The Emily I grew up with wouldn’t be daunted by that.”

  “But the Emily you knew doesn’t exist anymore. Didn’t you just get through making that point?”

  “Oh, I think she’s still in there,” Gabi said. “You just have to want to find her. You just have to remember what it felt like to fight for a relationship the way you’ve learned to fight for bigger and bigger jobs.”

  “And Boone? Do you think the man who was once head-over-heels in love with me still exists?”

  “Oh, hon, anyone who sees the two of you in the same room knows he still exists. The sparks are hot enough to burn the whole town down. He’s just fighting it with everything in him.”

  “He’s probably wise to fight it,” Emily said bleakly. “What if, when push comes to shove, I can’t give up my career and wind up leaving again?”

  “Then that would make you an idiot,” Gabi said. “I don’t think you’re going to lose anything. Rather, you have everything to gain.” She squeezed Emily’s hand. “And the sister I know and love is not an idiot. Deep down, she knows that.”

  Emily wished she had as much faith in herself as Gabi had, because if she were to follow her sister’s advice, there was an awful lot at stake—for her, for Boone and for B.J. B.J. was a critical part of the equation, after all. She and Boone were adults. They could handle whatever happened. But it would be selfish and wrong to put B.J.’s emotions at risk, especially if she weren’t a hundred percent certain of what she wanted.

  And wasn’t that exactly what Boone had been telling her all along?

  8

  “You’re leaving?” Cora Jane stared at Emily in shock. “Now, when there’s still work to be done? I thought you’d be staying at least a couple of weeks.”

  “I’d intended to,” Emily said, trying not to meet Gabi’s dismayed gaze as she tried to explain to her Grandmother. “But this job in Los Angeles is at a critical stage. The client is incredibly demanding and she’s about to have a breakdown because things aren’t finished. I need to check in personally to soothe her ruffled feathers. And my client in Aspen needs to take a look at the plans I have for his ski lodge and sign off on those. This seemed like a good time, since things here are under control for the most part.”

  “Is this because you didn’t get your way about renovations?” Cora Jane asked.

  Gabi shook her head, clearly not buying her excuses for a minute. “No, Grandmother, this is really about what Emily and I discussed last night.” She gave Emily a penetrating look. “Isn’t it?”

  “And what was that?” Cora Jane demanded. “Did you two argue?”

  “No, not at all,” Emily insisted, her comment directed at Cora Jane, but her gaze on Gabi, silently pleading with her not to say any more.

  “I told her she ought to reach out to Boone, that she needed to find a way to make him a part of her future,” Gabi said, giving her a defiant look. “And she obviously got scared, so her answer is to run.”

  “I’m not running because of what you said, or because of Boone,” Emily retorted. “I have jobs to do. I’ve been neglecting them. I’ll be gone a few days at most, and then I’ll come back.”

  Cora Jane looked relieved. “So this is just a quick trip?”

  “Definitely,” Emily assured her, though only to get the two of them off her back.

  “Unless she can dream up another half-dozen excuses for not coming back,” Gabi said, her gaze on Emily unrelenting.

  “You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Emily said, annoyed that her sister obviously knew her too well. She had been considering ways to stay away and avoid all the complications that were clearly looming on the horizon. “Now, I need to run if I’m going to get over to Raleigh to catch my flight this afternoon.”

  “How do you intend to get there?” Gabi inquired smugly. “You don’t have a car.”

  “Samantha told me I could drive her rental over there and turn it in. I’ll get another rental when I come back. After all, you have your car here and Grandmother has hers. The rental’s barely been out of the driveway.”

  Samantha walked into the kitchen just then and evidently sensed the tension as she gazed around the table. “Did I do something wrong? Should I not let her take the car?”

  “You’ve just made it easier for her to run away,” Gabi said in disgust. “Not your fault, of course. She probably would have hitchhiked if there hadn’t been an alternative.”

  Gabi stood up and walked out of the kitchen.

  “Why’s she so upset?” Samantha asked.

  “She thinks I’m running out because I’m scared,” Emily said.

  Samantha shrugged. “Of course you are. It’s what you do.”

  Emily regarded her sister with dismay. As usual, Samantha’s accusation carried a weight that Gabi’s did not. “I do not,” she said defensively.

  “That’s what you did ten years ago, isn’t it?” Samantha persisted. “I was already in New York, but it was pretty plain to all of us you got scared by the intensity of your feelings for Boone and took off.”

  “I left because I wanted a career somewhere else,” Emily retorted impatiently.

  “Anywhere Boone didn’t happen to be,” Samantha said. She looked at Cora Jane. “Am I right?”

  “Seemed that way to me,” Cora Jane confirmed.

  “And look how well that turned out,” Samantha added. “Surprise, surprise, he took you at your word and moved on, leaving you hurt and confused and bitter.”

  “You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Emily said. “And I don’t have time to sit around arguing with you. Samantha, where are the car keys?”

  Her sister tossed them to her. “The rental papers are in the glove compartment.”

  “Thanks,” Emily said tersely.

  She leaned down to give Samantha a hug, then dropped a kiss on her grandmother’s forehead. “Love you. See you soon.”

  “I’d better, missy, or I’ll send someone after you,” Cora Jane warned. “I didn’t raise you to be a coward. Neither did your parents.”

  “I am not a coward,” Emily said, but she could tell she was wasting her breath. Neither of them believed she was leaving because of work. Heck, she wasn’t entirely convinced of it herself. She’d made the decision impulsively last night because, well, to be honest, she had gotten scared. Sophia’s latest panic attack had given her the perfect excuse. Now she had to follow through or look like an indecisive idiot in front of her family and anyone else who might be the least bit interested.

  * * *

  Boone managed to keep B.J. away from Castle’s until after lunch, but only by bribing him with a handheld game he’d been wanting for months. He could already tell he’d made a mistake. Just as he’d feared, B.J. hadn’t put it down for a single second all morning.

  As they pulled into the Castle’s lot, Boone held out his hand. “Turn it over,” he commanded.

  “But you gave it to me,” B.J. complained. “And I want to show Ms. Cora Jane and Emily.”

  “You can show them another time. For now, we need to put it away. We’ll decide later ho
w long you can play with it each day.”

  “But that’s not fair,” B.J. argued. “You said it was mine.”

  “It is yours, but there are limits, just like the ones we have for TV.”

  B.J. gave him a sour look, but he handed over the game, then jumped out of the truck and went running inside the restaurant. Apparently he’d already forgotten how he wound up with those stitches in his arm, Boone thought, watching him with a sigh.

  He followed B.J. more slowly, stopping to talk to Tommy about the roof repairs and how soon he’d be able to get to the work in his restaurant.

  “I’ll finish up here tomorrow morning at the latest,” Tommy assured him. “I’ll have the crew at your place after lunch.”

  “That’ll work,” Boone said. “And the bill for Cora Jane’s roof? See that I get it.”

  Tommy looked uneasy. “Boone, she’ll have a fit. You know she will.”

  “Just tell her you haven’t had time to get to it.”

  “You want me to put her off?” Tommy asked incredulously. “It’ll take about two days for her to get suspicious.”

  “Only one, more than likely,” Boone conceded. “I owe her. I want to do this for her. If she puts it on her insurance claim, heaven knows what it will do to her rates. This is better. I’ll battle it out with her. You won’t be caught in the middle.”

  “If she starts lecturing me about my lax business practices for not billing her or, worse, calls my mother to complain about them, I swear to you that I will spill the beans,” Tommy warned him. “I do not want to be on Cora Jane’s bad side. Nor do I want my mother sticking her nose into my business. She’s been itching to take over the accounting, and this would give her the perfect excuse.”

  Boone laughed. “Not to worry. I’ll take the heat.” He gave Tommy an amused look. The man was successful, thirty-seven, six foot four and, despite that, obviously still scared of his mother, who was admittedly something of a force to be reckoned with. “I won’t let you get in trouble with your mama, either,” he consoled Tommy.