by Cathy Lamb
Now all I had to do was find Marco.
I went through both decks, no Marco. The ferry wasn’t crowded, so I should have been able to spot him right away. I turned around the outside deck . . . and I saw him.
Black hair. Sunglasses. Jeans and a sweatshirt. He was standing at the rail, staring out at the islands. He looked tired. His shoulders were slumped. He had lost weight.
I took a deep breath, then went to stand beside him.
“It’s a beautiful day,” I said.
“Evie.” He put his glasses on his head, his eyes hurt, wary.
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“Hi, Marco. I heard you’re going to Alaska.”
“Yes. With my brothers.”
“Gayle told me. Marco.” I closed my eyes, took a breath. I would get right to the point. “Sundance was on the boat with us when you . . . you drowned.”
“I know.”
He remembered. “And Sundance is . . .”
“I know.”
“You were waiting for me to make that connection, weren’t you?”
“Yes. And when you did, which I knew you would, I didn’t want you to feel pushed into making a decision about me.
About us.”
“I think I made that decision.”
“You have?”
“Yes.”
“And what is it?”
“Marco, if you will still have me, I would love to be with you. I love you. Every single time I’ve seen you, talked to you, I love you even more.”
He blinked rapidly, that black hair brushed by the wind, those shoulders broad, that face, tired but now hopeful, tough-guy but sweet, manly but filled with love.
“I am sorry for what I put you, and us, through. I am a messy human tornado.”
“It’s okay, Evie, it really is.”
“It’s not, but . . .”
He shook his head ruefully, smiled, a glorious smile, open and sexy. “Look, Evie. All I care about is right now. And our future. If you want to be together, that’s what I want, too. It’s what I’ve always wanted. It’s why I moved to the island. It was you, Evie. It was all about Evie. When we talked at your bookstore, when we talked through the e-mails, when we talked on the phone when I was still in Oregon, I knew I’d found my soul mate. I love you. I will always love you.”
I put my hands to my face, so relieved, then stepped in to hug him. He bent down and hugged me close, and we laughed. Our
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laughter sailed right around that white ferry boat, up into the blue sky, around the green islands, and back to us. He gave me a long kiss, sweet and passionate, and smokin’ hot.
“You’ll say yes, won’t you?” he asked.
“I’ll say yes, handsome. Indeed I will.”
I insisted he go on his Alaskan fishing trip with his brothers.
“Go,” I said. “I’ll be waiting.”
“Promise?”
“I promise.”
And I did.
I told my mother and aunts that Marco and I were dating each other because we could. They had known about the boat-drowning premonition, but now there would be no disaster on the sailboat and I could not live without the guy.
We each picked out a special, crazy hat from the hat wall, then danced around their kitchen in Rose Bloom Cottage, under the chandelier their mother bought because she believed in fairies, next to the crystals that were hung for spiritual blessings and continued happy sex lives.
“You have outlasted the premonition and now you can dance toward your future, my dear daughter,” my mother said.
“Your stars have aligned,” Aunt Camellia said. “Your hemi-spheres have come together as one, the galaxy blessing you.”
“I’ll bet he’s a tiger in bed,” Aunt Iris said. “He’ll make you roar.”
I called Jules, and she squealed and said, “I’ll make you your own custom motorcycle. It will say Evie and Marco, Love Muffins.”
“Uh, no. No dangerous motorcycle.”
She was disappointed. “I’ll paint you a picture of one!”
“I’ll take that.”
I told Johnny, Betsy, Kayla, and Tilly, and they were thrilled for me.
“Two hearts into one for our Evie,” Johnny said. “This is one of the greatest days of my life.”
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* * *
Chief Ass Burn parked outside my bookstore after work on Saturday afternoon.
“Hello, Evie.”
“Hello.” I did not stop to talk to him. I kept walking to Esmerelda. The woman with the red cowgirl hat had been right. She was a woman’s truck, and I did feel like a ball-busting woman driving it.
He followed me. “I’d like to ask you something about your mother and aunts.”
I felt cold, freezing cold, as if ice had entered my body. I turned to face him. “What about them?”
“Do you know what they do in their greenhouse?”
That ice was coming up my throat, filling it with more fear. I tried to hide it. “Yes. They grow plants and flowers.”
He chuckled. “Is that it?”
“Yes. What’s the problem?”
“Now I can’t tell you what that is, little lady. I’m the chief and we keep all investigations under cover. Plus, sometimes we need search warrants.”
I felt myself go cold. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“I think you do. But maybe we could make a deal.” His eyes traveled down my body.
“I think I’m going to throw up,” I told him. “Because any deal with you makes me feel ill.”
That comment fired his hatred straight up to the sky.
I called the assistant chief Mandy Lass, who should have been chief but wasn’t because she did not have the “correct” plumbing in our male-dominated, misogynistic police hierarchy.
“What the heck is going on?”
“I can’t tell you that the chief is getting a search warrant for your mom and aunts’ greenhouse and that he’ll probably get it soon. Like, within minutes. ”
“Thanks.” I hung up.
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* * *
“Get rid of the pot,” I shouted at my aunts and mother as soon as I got home, running into their kitchen. “Now.” I told them about Chief Ass Burn.
“Oh, my goodness,” my mother said. She put a hand on a hat wall to steady herself.
“Curse that fat man,” Aunt Camellia said, “with intestinal bugs, bacterial diseases, and a dead possum.”
I blinked at her. “Wow. Creative.”
“We must take immediate action,” Aunt Iris said. “I’ll call Yank and Bobbi and tell him and his son to have tractor trouble on the road out of town toward us.” She picked up her phone.
“That’ll give us a few minutes to get rid of the mowie wowie.”
“That is a splendid idea,” my mother said. “And I’ll call Diana and tell her to set up a road block about a half mile down Robbins Drive in case he gets around the tractors.”
“How will that help? He’s the police chief!” I said. “He can go around a road block.”
“She can use her lambs.”
“Her lambs?” Diana had tons of lambs.
“Yes. They’re obedient. She’ll let them out on the street and park her car. They won’t leave her, they love her. I’ll give her a ring.” She dialed Diana’s number and, to my amazement, Diana agreed happily, and would pile her lambs into her trailer and get things going “lickety-split,” I heard her call. “Ta la!”
“We need to burn the marijuana,” Aunt Iris said.
“That’s right,” I said. “We need it out of the greenhouse and into the fire pit.”
“We need to get rid of the evidence,” my mother said.
“Let’s move,” I said.
“No, Evie,” my mother said. “Not you. Only the three of us.”
“You must protect your innocence,” Aunt Camellia said.
“You are angelic, and you cannot step into the
problem we have brought unto ourselves, despite your loving warnings.”
“Stay here,” Aunt Iris said. “Do not get involved. We caused this, we will handle it.”
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“Give me a break,” I said, and ran for the greenhouse, my mother and aunts running behind me, no Alice in Wonderland or Dr. Seuss hats on, no time.
The marijuana burned well, even though it took us several runs back and forth to get all the pot plants out and heave them onto the fire pit. We also had to get rid of the apparatus. I had no idea there was so much stuff in there. “Mom?!” I said, aghast.
“Aunt Iris! Aunt Camellia!”
“Medicinal usage,” my mother said, holding up a finger.
“Only for our adult friends who needed relief from the pain of the world, the pain from fraying, elderly, or sick bodies that needed a way forward into peace,” Aunt Camellia said.
“Our financial goal is money toward our Antarctica trip,”
Aunt Iris said. “I want to study the migration of the animals.
The severe weather patterns—”
“Not now!” I said.
We heard that the two tractors, all of a sudden breaking down, together, on the one street out of town, worked well for a while. Chief Ass Burn was purple with fury. He waited, he yelled, and finally he drove his police car up and then back down an embankment, sirens blaring at Yank and Bobbi. His police car became stuck and, gee whiz, no one helped. He finally gunned it and got out and back on the road.
But the lambs on Robbins Drive slowed him up, too, as they were bunched together, bleating. Diana stood in front of them, her truck and trailer parked at an angle, and would not let Chief Ass Burn by. “My trailer broke down. The engine doesn’t work.
Hey! Back up! Do not hurt my lambs, Chief Ass Burn, or I will take your big butt to jail! My lambs have every right to hang around outside until I can get the engine to work on my trailer again!”
There was no engine on the trailer, but it was all Diana could think of. The sirens scared the lambs, and they eventually parted enough for the chief to drive off-road, where he became stuck again momentarily.
The pot was burned to a crisp, and all the growing parapher-
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nalia was hidden underneath the gazebo by my mother, my aunts, and me by the time he arrived. We even had time to sweep and hose the greenhouse down.
Chief Ass Burn spotted the fire pit, the smoke, and he knew.
He didn’t even need to go to the greenhouse. His face grew red and mottled.
“Chief Ass Burn,” I called out. “You look like you need a book to read. Maybe a romance.”
“I hope this will be a short visit so my temper is not triggered, Chief,” my mother said.
“Time for you to take your negativity and poor karma and leave,” Aunt Camellia said.
“You’ve got a warrant,” Aunt Iris said. “You’ve executed the warrant. You have found nothing. You must leave. My attorney is on the way for obvious legal reasons.” That was true. The family’s attorney was on a ferry and she would be here soon.
Chief Ass Burn stalked off, but not before coming over to me.
“You won’t win, Evie. You’ll regret this.”
“She had nothing to do with anything,” my mother said, her voice furious. “She lives in the carriage house and came home from work a few minutes ago.”
“That’s it. I’m not even going to pretend I believe in Zen or karma or auras,” Aunt Camellia said. “Get out.” She pointed at him, her voice raised to a yell, and Aunt Camellia never yells.
“Get off of our property now.”
“Don’t you dare threaten my niece,” Aunt Iris said. I had never heard her so angry, her voice hard and steely. “I will not tolerate it.”
“I’m watching you, all of you,” Chief Ass Burn said, then he glared at me one more time, turned on his heel, and left. Only he turned too quickly and smashed right to the ground. He swore.
“Bad words,” I said. “Please don’t swear. It offends my sensi-bilities.”
“I’m going to miss that pot,” Aunt Camellia said as the chief left our property with the sirens on and lights flashing.
“Oh, pish,” my mother said. “You hardly ever even smoked it.”
“I know. But it made me feel adventurous.”
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“Adventurous?” Aunt Iris said. “How about we go and plan that Antarctica expedition if you want adventure?”
“It’s a porpoise, packed ice, and pot vacation!” my mother said. “What a blast.”
That night my mother and aunts changed their mind about Antarctica.
They had done some thinking.
Jules’s DNA test said that she had Bantu, Mali, and Senegalese in her blood.
They determined it wasn’t from their father. His lineage, Norwegian and English, from family lore and letters, and DNA test, backed that up. It wasn’t from Jules’s and my father. His lineage, English and Scottish, from family lore and letters, and DNA test, backed that up, too.
So the Bantu/Mali/Senegalese most probably had to be from their mother’s side. We thought about Grandma, Grandma who wore wings and believed in fairies, who created a magical garden that protected her, and who jumped off a cliff, arms outstretched. She said she was from France and Greece. There was no French or Greek by lore or letter or DNA test in Jules.
Grandma had olive skin.
Thick black hair.
Very dark eyes.
“She was passing, wasn’t she?” Aunt Iris said
“I think she was,” my mother said.
“Sad, in this country that she felt she had to pass to live a life,” Aunt Camellia said. “That she knew it would be easier for her if she did.”
“She was born in 1910 in Mississippi,” my mother said. “I think we know why she lied.”
“I may have lied, too,” Aunt Iris said.
“Yes,” we all agreed. We might have. And that was incredibly sad.
We sat in that for a while, thinking of Grandma Lucy, whom I had only known through my mother and aunts and her winding, lush, magnificent garden. She wasn’t mentally well, but she
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was filled with love. Obviously one of her parents was white or part white, or both were part white . . . who knew what violence occurred throughout her ancestral line to make it so.
“We should go to Africa,” Aunt Iris said. “Back to our roots.
It makes the most sense. It’s logical.”
“You are so smart, Iris,” Aunt Camellia said. “Your brain is a blessing.”
“That is brilliant,” my mother said.
And they put Antarctica and penguins and studying climate change and the history of Antarctica’s land mass aside and began planning a trip to Africa and what hats they would bring.
The Book Babes were reading about a woman who created collages with paint, tiny tree branches, miniature trinkets, fabric, feather, sea glass, and other cool things.
They decided to make their own collages. Their tables were filled with canvasses, paints, fabrics, feathers, sequins, branches, buttons, beads, tiny treasures, et cetera, that they had all brought.
Their canvases were soon filled with color (except for the woman who was going through menopause who made her cool, modern portrait all in black). They invited me to make a collage, and I did. I made our garden. I used scraps of fabric in different colors and layered petals, leaves, and tree bark one on top of another. I added the ocean in the background, the bridge, the secret garden, the lily pond and my blue carriage house.
It was, we all decided, the best book club ever.
“We need to start having Art Night for Babes here, is that all right with you, Evie? Don’t worry, we’ll clean up!”
“It is if you let everyone join.” They agreed. Art Night For Babes was popular instantly. I had twenty women the first night.
I sold orange chiffon cake and rum cake and two tea specials: Ma
ndarin Orange Spice and Lemon Nutmeg.
More people in, more books, cake, and tea sold!
Chief Ass Burn was removed from his post, his badge taken away.
Mandy Lass became the temporary chief.
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Chief Allroy came back, soon retired, Mandy became our official police chief, and peace reigned again on San Orcanita Island.
When Marco came to my home after his Alaskan fishing trip, I greeted him exactly how a good fisherman’s lady should greet her man: in red lingerie and heels.
He smiled and reeled me in.
We made my bed rock the waves that night.
I woke up wrapped around Marco, my head on his chest. He was still sleeping, the sun barely over the horizon. Butch and Cassidy were with us, as were two cats.
I smiled.
There were not many men who would allow dogs and cats to sleep in the same bed. But I knew that Marco let his four behe-moth dogs sleep in his bedroom, so we were a dog/cat friendly couple.
“I love you, Evie,” he had said, right before we went to sleep.
“I will always love you.”
“I will always love you, too, Marco,” I told him, then I cried because I am a happy mess and he held me close, and even tough guy got teary-eyed, and then we laughed, in joy, at us.
Marco and me.
Us.
C h a p t e r 3 7
The day of Jules and Mack’s wedding was bright and warm and clear, like a colorful island postcard. White rays of sunlight shone on the ocean waves, the other islands green bits of paradise in the distance. The purple wisteria blooms had died back on the gazebo, but we filled it with yellow, pink, and purple roses and purple ribbons that floated on the wind.
Jules had been on the island for a week, and she, my mother, aunts, and I had been working nonstop to make sure all was ready.
Betsy, Johnny, Tilly, and Kayla came. They were thrilled to be invited. The four of them helped all day to get the lush, creative flower centerpieces made with the black leather ribbons and the tables set with white linens, silver flatware, and candles. They all hugged me again, tearful. We had been e-mailing and texting and calling, and I was getting to know them.