More Than Words

by Daphne Abbott

  After the bathroom was clean, I went to the kitchen to pull together a tray of sweet tea and Miss Ida’s favorite cookies. The August afternoon was sultry but still less humid than the last few days. Slowly the temperatures would drop, and the summer high season would end. Autumn was upon us.

  For now, I could appreciate the mums sprouting in the garden in glorious shades of red, orange, and yellow. The small vegetable garden looked like it was overflowing with produce, and the new fountain I’d given Ida for her birthday had a group of robins playing in the water. Ida’s back garden was like a little paradise oasis in a thick pine forest. Her panache for whimsy and fun made the garden a special place to visit.

  “You’re such a good girl. You’re always taking care of this old woman,” Ida said as I handed her a tall glass of tea.

  “Ida, you keep saying things like that. Is something wrong?”

  Ida tossed her paperback on the small table between their chairs and waved a dismissive hand. “No, just feeling sorry for myself. August is always a hard month for me.”

  I knew that. Twenty years ago, in August, she’d lost her husband to a heart attack. Days later, her daughter, Celia, left with the money from Bill’s life insurance. Ida often didn’t talk about Celia or the money in the years since it’d happened, but I understood her grief. Bill’s death and Celia’s betrayal had happened so suddenly she’d never been able to get closure.

  I could relate. I was dreading my second Christmas without Uncle Adam. His death from a long battle with cancer had been exhausting to all of us that loved him. Though we’d had months to prepare, I still struggled with my own closure.

  Adam was the one who had given me a stable home. Mom and I had moved in with him after she’d been kicked out of her parents’ house for being an unwed teenage mother. She’d stayed long enough to give birth to me before signing over her rights to my grandmother’s younger brother, Adam. It was the best gift she could have given me before she disappeared for ten years.

  Adam loved me in a way my mother couldn’t. He gave me an education outside of what I learned in school. He supported and protected me from the hateful stares of the bigots in town. When I was old enough, he employed me as a sales clerk at his art gallery. All my life, Adam challenged me to dream of a life outside of the reputation I’d inherited, and live for myself.

  I was rudderless without him.

  “Enough,” Ida said and clapped her hands, snapping me out of my funk. “Feeling sorry for ourselves will get us nowhere. Plus, it gets me no closer to finding out about those handsome men. Those two looked like DILFs. That’s what the kids call them, right?”

  “Ida!” I laughed, then blew out a breath that ruffled the curls of hair that clung to my forehead. “There’s not much to tell.”

  Ida’s eyes sparkled. “Nothing of note has happened in this neighborhood for years. Nothing, except for those fine-looking men showing up at your door. Now, spill.”

  I knew I could not deter Ida, so I told her the entire story of the noise in the woods and my failed rescue of a bunny. By the time I got to the part about calling Grayson a pedophile, Ida was nearly falling out of her seat as she cackled in glee.

  “So glad my mistake could tickle you,” I grumbled as I bit into another cookie.

  Ida wiped at her cheeks. “Oh Ruby, come on. Admit the whole thing is ridiculous. You’ve been living in this town since you were born. How on God’s green earth did you not realize it was a bunny?”

  “I don’t know!” I yelled and flopped back in my chair.

  I’d had a few days to replay the incident over in my head. Yet, I could not figure where I went wrong.

  “Ruby, you’re a smart girl.”

  I narrowed my eyes. “But …?”

  “But you have never been one for outdoor activities. What if it was a child? What would you do?”

  My neck felt tight, and a sudden weight hit my chest. “I had to try.”

  Ida smiled and leaned forward to cover my knee with her hand. “You may be a novice in the outdoors, but you’ve always had the biggest heart. It’s been hard on you since your uncle passed, I know.”

  The weight on my chest got heavier. “I’m doin’ fine.”

  “Don’t piss on my leg and tell me it’s raining.”

  I laughed and reached out a hand to entwine with Ida’s. “I promise, most days I’m doing okay. I miss him, but it doesn’t hurt so bad anymore. I’m just feeling a little sorry for myself.”

  “Aren’t we a pair?” Ida said. She squeezed my hand and brushed her papery lips over my knuckles. “Feeling sorry for ourselves like a pair of old crones.”

  I laughed, just as she’d intended. The hot prick of shame receded, and the weight lifted. This was why I put up with Ida’s meddling. She had the uncanny knack of making me feel better in a short amount of time.

  “It looked like that man was interested in making you feel better.”

  This time my laugh was self-deprecating. “I think we need to get your eyes checked again, Ida. That man barely knows I’m alive.”

  “How could you think that? How many men would fix a stranger’s car? I also find it interesting that you let him do it instead of calling Graham at the garage.”

  I had to admit when Grayson offered to look at my car for free, I’d been a little suspicious of his motivations. People didn’t really offer to help me. Like ever. I’d worried that he’d expect something in return—something I didn’t want to give.

  But despite what I’d called him in the woods, I had no reason to believe he was anything other than a friendly person. He’d made no insinuations about my body or a quid pro quo. Best of all, he’d promised not to charge me anything.

  The mechanic in town was a friend. He serviced Betty for me all the time, but I knew his rates. I couldn’t afford the hundred dollars just to open the hood right now. I’d just used my life savings to buy my trailer three months ago, so my budget was tight as I saved for improvements. Betty needed to last me at least another year without major repairs. Otherwise, I’d go into debt.

  “Maybe he just likes to help people in need.”

  “Mmm-hmm.”

  “What?” I rolled my head against the back of the wicker chair and glared. “You got something more to say?”

  “Yes.” Ida sat forward in her chair. “But I think it’s time you walk back over to your house and rest. I hate you working so late at night. It’d be worse if you were walking around that store like a zombie.”

  Ida was up to something. I’d known her long enough to sense the subterfuge, but I couldn’t figure out what exactly she was hiding. Lucky for her, it was time for me to rest before my shift. I needed at least six hours of sleep, and I was already cutting it close.

  I picked up the tea tray and put our dishes in the sink before heading through the woods toward my little trailer at the edge of the park. Ida’s words about Gray looking at me with interest tumbled and tossed around my brain like dice in a cup. This was exactly the wishful thinking I’d been trying to avoid.

  This crush would not do. It was childish and illogical and not worth my time.

  I would not fantasize about Grayson Archer anymore.

  I would not.

  Chapter 9

  Gray

  The weather was gorgeous for a Friday in late August. Locals and tourists alike had come out in droves to enjoy the lake. With Hunter still out on his “vacation,” I’d had to take both his shift and my own for the day. While Lucy helped the other employees with the rentals, I was busy running the pumps and the tiny snack shack. By noon, we had every boat, jet ski, and kayak we owned on the water.

  It felt good to see the business thriving after a lot of long nights worrying over spreadsheets. I’d gotten my business degree with the intention of opening a bar in the Keys, but the Catfish Lake Marina was a good alternative. Being here meant I got to
help the Masons out of their financial troubles, which was important to me. I cared about Jeff, Melanie, and Lucy like they were my own blood. Helping them soothed my guilt and shame over the accident that took Jonah’s life.

  “Gray!”

  I looked up from filling the latest customer’s tank. Lucy was jogging down the hill from the marina office, looking agitated. Again. The customer was waiting, and I didn’t have time to stop. I gave her a head tilt to acknowledge she’d called my name and went back to pumping the gas.

  The thirty-odd lakes surrounding Eagle Creek were the area’s claim to fame. It was unlike any place I’d lived. The lakes were like hidden gems in the center of the dense forests, and very unlike the marsh waters of Texas and Florida. Hunter and I both had visited the Creek many times with Jonah and even after his death. As I questioned my ability to stay, I knew it’d found a special place in my heart. “This thing’s been ringing all morning,” Lucy said and waved my phone at me.

  “Sorry, Luce,” I said and took the phone from her manicured hand. “I rarely get calls, so I thought it’d be safer up there.”

  Lucy tossed her head to the side, her blonde bob swinging around her head dramatically. “I told you, Gray. I’m not your secretary.”

  “And I told you I was sorry,” I said and narrowed my eyes at her. “Thanks for bringing it down. I won’t leave it there from now on.”

  “See that you don’t.”

  Before I could scold my employee for acting subordinate, she spun on her ridiculously high wedge sandals and stalked back toward the office. The building housed the rental office, showroom, and a bait shop slash convenience store. Lucy liked to think of it as her little kingdom. That was probably why I spent my time in the maintenance shop or docks.

  Once again, I wondered if I had been foolish to keep Lucy on staff after we purchased the marina from her parents. She struggled the most with the transition. Perhaps because her role had changed to most during the transition. While the finances were precarious, Hunter and I had instituted a rule that Lucy was no longer allowed a final say on financial matters. Hunter and I had given her slack for months, but her attitude was becoming harder and harder to excuse.

  The phone rang again, and I welcomed the interruption. It hurt my gut to think of firing Jonah’s sister so soon after losing her family’s business to outsiders. Even if her attitude forced my hand, it felt like a betrayal to my buddy’s memory to even consider it.

  The name on the screen surprised me since I hadn’t entered it myself. But I was a curious kinda guy, so I answered the call. “Miss Ida?”

  “Oh! Thank the Lord, Grayson! Don’t you ever pick up your phone?”

  I ignored that jibe. “How did you get your number on my cell?”

  “No time for that, boy-o. I need backup ASAP.” Her voice sounded agitated, and I heard a commotion in the background that sounded like screams and … water?

  “Ida, are you okay?” I asked.

  “No, I’m not okay. Why do you think I’ve been calling you for an hour straight?”

  “Okay, okay,” I soothed. “What’s going on?”

  “I’m at Ruby’s trailer, and the damn thing’s flooding.”

  My skin prickled at the mention of Ruby. I hadn’t seen her since the previous weekend, and I’d been desperately trying to find a reason to run into her again. Was my luck finally turning with this call?

  “Are you and Ruby okay?”

  “Ruby’s working,” Ida said, raising her voice over the noise in the background. “I’m here watching her sisters for her, and the damn little devils have been running me ragged.”

  There was a crash. Then the sounds of breaking glass, and then the line died.

  “Ida?”

  I pulled the phone away from my face. The screen had gone black.

  Heart in my throat, I unlocked the phone and pulled up her number from the list of recent calls. The phone just rang and rang and rang.

  “Fuck,” I groaned and pocketed the device.

  I jogged up the hill to the office and yelled to Lucy I was leaving, and she had to cover the pumps. Before she could argue, I was out the door running for my truck. The urgency in Ida’s voice was my biggest concern. I turned the key in the ignition and gunned it out of the gravel parking lot, spraying rocks and dust across the lot.

  By the time I reached Ruby’s trailer, I had a fine sheen of sweat all over my body. Every sense I’d honed after years in the Army and private security was on high alert, especially because I had no idea what I was walking into. I came to a screeching stop at the curb in front of the trailer and left the truck running just in case someone needed the hospital. Everything outside the house looked the same as it had days ago. I prayed the inside would not be worse.

  “Ida!” I called as I ran up the flower-lined porch steps.

  Just as my foot hit the porch, the front door popped open, and a frazzled Ida filled the doorway. “Finally!” she cried.

  “What the hell is going on?”

  “Don’t you use that tone of voice with me, Grayson Archer. I’ve been calling you for hours. I should be mad at you.” The look and her tone made me feel only ten years old.

  “Ida—”

  She stepped to the side and waved me into the house. “Hurry up. Get inside before they escape.”

  Dumfounded, I followed her into the trailer’s living room. The place looked like it’d been tossed. “Shit, Ida. Were you robbed?”

  “I wish,” she muttered and shuffled to a pale blue Lay-Z-Boy in the corner. “At least insurance would cover the damage if that were the case.”

  Books and magazines laid on the ground pulled from the shelves with the spines cracked and pages exposed. Scrabble tiles, playing cards, and dice covered the coffee table, along with a massive bowl of potato chips and two plastic drinking glasses filled with a bright red liquid.

  Kids.

  I could spot the tiny fingerprints on the windows, and a naked Barbie laid abandoned on the couch. I had nephews back in Texas, so I could spot a playdate gone wrong from a mile away. I nudged a pile of clothes out of the way—the fabric stained with the same red liquid from the tumblers.

  “Babysitting gone wrong?” I asked.

  “They’re usually not a problem. I watch them for Ruby all the time, but they’re wild today. Like I’ve never seen before.”

  “Where are they now?” I asked.

  “In the spare room. They’re supposed to be napping. But after all the sugar in the Kool-Aid, I couldn’t get them down. So, I bribed them with my tablet and some kid’s show instead.”

  I grinned. “Sometimes you have to pick your battles.”

  “Don’t I know it,” grumbled Ida. “I’m feeling my age right now.”

  “Wait. The kids are Ruby’s sisters, right?” Ida nodded. “Why not call their mom and have her pick them up?”

  “Ruby’s mom, Pearl, is at home. She’s sleeping before her shift which is why Ruby has them today. But then Ruby got called in when the store was short-staffed. She tried their usual babysitter, but that woman’s got five kids of her own, and two of them are sick. So, I’m stuck with these two until Ruby’s done at the store. Just so you know, Ruby and Pearl do the best they can. Britnee and Rayleigh have what they need because they work hard. But it’s difficult in a small town like this.”

  My skin heated, and I ducked my head, feeling ashamed of the way I must have sounded. “I swear I wasn’t judging.”

  “I didn’t think you were. Maybe I just want you to know how it is for my girl, Ruby.”

  I nodded and looked around the room. “You said it was flooding in here?”

  “In the bathroom,” Ida replied and moved like she was going to get up.

  I waved my hand at her. “Stay there. I’ll check it out and see what I can do.”

  Ida smiled up at me, looking so tin
y in the massive recliner. “Thank you, Grayson. You’re such a good boy.”

  I flushed at the praise. I wanted Ida to like me because she was so important to Ruby. “Don’t sing my praises yet.”

  “I don’t know many men that would drop everything to help a woman out. That says a lot about the kind of man you are.”

  Chapter 10

  Ruby

  I was a zombie at the end of my shift. Mr. Lammond had called me in after I’d already done my normal overnight shift. Stupidly, I’d agreed because the overtime money was good. But the inconvenience of calling Ida in to watch the kids and the toll the extra hours with no sleep took on my body didn’t feel like such a good idea anymore.

  But I wasn’t in a place to turn down extra cash.

  The second shift had gone okay until a group of twenty college-aged kids came into the store. They were drunk or high or both, and at first, their ramblings were funny, but when some got agitated because we didn’t carry a specific type of bottled water, the humor was quickly gone from the situation. When the guy started yelling and throwing stuff, I got nervous for me and my co-workers’ safety. The cops were called, and statements were taken. By the time the group left, my co-workers and I were exhausted.

  Sometimes I really fucking hated living in a tourist town.

  When I got to my trailer, there was a familiar massive truck blocking my spot. “What the fuck?” I muttered to myself as I stared at the back end of Gray’s truck.

  Gray’s parking job left me no room for Betty, so I had to park about a block away at the visitor’s spots and hoof it to my trailer. I didn’t care how gorgeous he was, the man was getting a piece of my mind as soon as I walked in the door.

  The weight of the grocery bags made my fingertips tingle, so I hurried my steps as much as possible. I cursed myself for not leaving them at the trailer before I parked. I had a ton of extra groceries for the casseroles I’d be making tomorrow for the older residents in the park. I should have known the extra weight would make my arms numb in seconds.