The Wanderer
She stared down at their entwined fingers and thought, Wow, I’m a little slow. It took her going out with someone else to bring him to life, to get him to touch her. “He’s a very nice guy. We’re about the same age. And yes, I had a good time.” If you consider listening to someone talk about his peerless deceased wife for three hours fun, she thought.
But she’d realized Scott really needed to do that. She was his first date in years, after all. And the first step was unloading all that stuff. At first she enjoyed their conversation—he wasn’t grieving so much as remembering the perfect woman. And then he hooked her—it was therapy, and she was the therapist. She asked him all the right questions, he poured out his answers, and at the end of the evening she was tired and he acted like a man who’d just put down a fifty-pound weight.
“Think you might go out with him again?” Mac asked.
She gave a nod. “We’re going to try sushi next Saturday night. I’ve never had sushi, never eaten with chopsticks. Could be interesting.”
“You surprise me—sushi. I can’t even think about eating raw fish.”
“I’m going to try it. He says it’s fun. Now really, what’s up with you? I can’t believe you’ve just been busy.”
“Believe it. But there has been some local stuff to take care of. Cooper, for example. He’s leaving tomorrow to go visit his family in New Mexico and I’m going to help Rawley babysit the construction crew working on that old bait shop. You should see it, Gina—it already looks like a new place. The new septic system is in, plumbing is repaired and old Coop has his fifth wheel all hooked up to sewage, water and electric. Now he doesn’t have to wrestle that big old toy hauler up the hill to go dump and reload water. And he’s looking for work.”
“What does that mean?”
“He’s said all along that he’ll settle up Ben’s business, but then he has to get back to work. I imagine it means leaving Thunder Point.”
“Gee,” she said, feeling a little sad. “What about Sarah?” she asked.
“I don’t know, Gina. I don’t know what their arrangement is. You’d probably know more about that than me. Don’t you girls talk?”
“Maybe not enough,” she said quietly.
Eighteen
Mac was not in charge of the investigation surrounding the battery domestic at the Morrisons’ or the possible homicide of Ben Bailey, but he knew what was happening. He was allowed to observe interviews and look at evidence in the closed case. At the time Ben Bailey died, neither the Morrison family nor Jag Morrison and his teenage friends were even on the radar. And Ben’s injuries were consistent with a fall. There was even a mark where he theoretically hit his head on the wooden stair rail.
The investigation was proving interesting, but nothing had led to a new conclusion yet. Since Cooper was leaving town to visit family, Mac borrowed Ben’s old laptop.
“I didn’t find anything or I would’ve told you.”
“I know, but I want to take a look, if you don’t mind. And if it’s okay, I’d like to borrow that Rhino of yours.”
Cooper lifted one brow in question.
“Just want to see how it handles on the beach, if you don’t mind.”
“Thinking of getting one?”
“It’s possible,” he said with a shrug, although that was the furthest thing from his mind. What really occupied him these days was Gina dating their newest resident, the doctor. Mac had no reason to dislike Scott Grant, except the thought of Gina spending time with him and kissing him really did a number on his head. He couldn’t be mad, though. It was his own damn fault.
The one great thing about winter in Oregon was that sunset was early. After dinner on Sunday, he asked Lou if she’d be home for the rest of the evening.
“Yes,” she said. “Where are you going?”
He struggled with what to say. In the end, he just said, “Bunco.”
“Ah,” she said. “Finally.”
He drove out to Coop’s, loaded a couple of things in the Rhino, revved it up and took it back across the deserted beach, straight to Gina’s house. Ashley answered the door.
“Hey, Ash,” he said. “Can your mother come out and play?”
“Mom!” she yelled. “It’s Mac.”
Gina came to the door with a look of confusion on her face. Clearly he was the last person she expected. Maybe last night’s sushi date was so successful she was expecting the doctor. “You busy?” he asked.
“Well, that’s a matter of opinion. I was ironing.”
“Can you take a break? Go for a ride?” He turned, throwing an arm toward the Rhino, which looked like a baby Jeep.
“Mac, did you buy an ATV?”
“Nah, it’s Cooper’s. I have to say, it’s pretty slick. It’s kind of cold, though. Grab a jacket and I’ll give you a little demo ride.” She didn’t move right away. She just stared at him for a long moment. Behind her there was the noise of family—the TV, Carrie talking to Ashley, the clinking around of dishes being loaded into the dishwasher. He could smell some kind of good meal. Having a cook in the house must be nice, he thought. “Come on, Gina. The moon is huge.”
She still looked a little confused, but she reached for a jacket and hollered into the house that she was going out for a while. Then she went with him, bundled up and fastened her seat belt for the ride. He took her down the street and across the beach. There was no one out there tonight, which Mac found odd. A moon like this tended to draw people, but it was Sunday night and work started early.
“Oh, God,” she said as they traveled across the beach, looking at the moon. “It’s as beautiful as I’ve ever seen it.”
“Yeah, really lights up the place. As it rises, it’s going to lose all its punch, but we have a little while to enjoy it.” He stopped the Rhino in the middle of the beach, right beside the campfire he’d set up on his way to pick her up. She sat in the Rhino and watched as he lit the fire; having a Duraflame made it easy.
Then he went to the back of the ATV and pulled out a couple of aluminum-and-mesh beach chairs and a blanket, setting them up so they could look at the bay and the moon over the fire. He put the chairs close, then motioned for her to get out of the Rhino. She went to one of the chairs.
“You really thought this through.”
“Not the setting so much. When I saw the moon last night, you were having sushi with the doctor.” He pulled two bottles of beer from the back and held them up.
“It’s surprisingly good, sushi. Very chichi. But I’m not too adventurous. Scott will eat anything, even if it appears to wiggle.” She took a beer. “Thanks.”
He sat down in the beach chair next to her, opened both their beers and took a bolstering slug of his. “About Scott,” he began. “How much do you like him?”
“I like him very much,” she said. “He seems to be a terrific guy.”
“Hmm. Like him a lot, huh?”
“I said I did. Now what’s this about?”
He spread the blanket over them. “I can admit it...that kind of threw me, you going on dates. We’ve been sitting next to each other at high school football games, basketball games, hockey games, baseball games for years. I never thought you were interested in anyone.”
“Oh, didn’t you?” she asked.
“We even kissed once.”
“Twice,” she said. “And the next day you pronounced it a very bad idea. And said that it shouldn’t happen again.”
“Yeah, well, I’ve never been accused of being smooth.”
“How’d you get some high school cheerleader knocked up if you didn’t have some moves?” she asked with laughter in her voice.
“Ah, hell, I think she had all the moves. I was just a horny dumb ox who couldn’t think at all. Which is why I really wanted to think where you were concerned.” He turned to look at her. “I had a plan, Gina. I thought once our girls got closer to college, we’d probably start seeing each other as more than just neighbors.”
“Really?” she asked. She took a sip of her beer. “I didn’t get the memo.”
He laughed at her. “I don’t want to get in the way of anything you feel serious about, but if I’m not too late...”
“What? If you’re not too late, what?”
“I don’t want you with another man, Gina.” He pulled her a little closer. “You’re not just a friend and neighbor to me. I’ve had really strong feelings for you for years. I was just afraid of acting. If I let you down, I’d never forgive myself.”
“Let me down, how?”
“Wow,” he said, running a hand over his head. “I think you’re going to be good at this counseling shit. If we were in a real relationship, a man/woman relationship, while our girls are best friends and if I somehow screwed it up—if it didn’t work out, if there was fighting and crying and a nasty, painful breakup, if the girls’ friendship was hurt...” He lifted her chin to look into her pretty eyes. “I didn’t want to start anything I couldn’t control, couldn’t see to the end. I couldn’t stand the idea of you being unhappy with me.”
“The way Cee Jay was unhappy with you?”
“Well...yes.” He shook his head. “She was unhappy from day one. She thought marriage was going to be some fairy tale. She thought it would make everything in her life work out, finally. But I was a scared kid, working day and night to keep us in out of the rain. And she was pregnant half the time, sick as a dog. There wasn’t anything fun about it, it was horrible. And it was misery for just over six years. Then she left. Gina, I can’t watch another woman go through that, and all because of me.”
She couldn’t help it, she laughed at him, but softly, and she touched his cheek tenderly. “You’re a very sweet man and I adore you, but you’re not afraid of letting me down. You’re afraid you’ll let yourself love me and I’ll leave you.”
His eyes grew round for a second. “I am?”
She nodded. “If you stop and think for two seconds, you know how I feel about you and how you feel about me. We’ve been best friends for years. But, Mac, I am goddamn sick and tired of being just your friend. And I’m tired of being alone. If I have to move on—”
He let out a heavy breath and put both his arms around her. “Me, too, Gina. Me, too. Moving on isn’t what I have in mind. It’s more like moving forward.”
“If you kiss me and hold me and tempt me and then tell me it’s all a mistake one more time, I’m going to grab that little pistol you think no one knows you carry on your ankle and just put you out of your misery. Am I clear?”
He laughed. “I might be better off.” He leaned toward her and carefully kissed her, hanging on to his beer. “It’s going to be dicey, you know.”
“What?”
“Having a relationship. When was the last time you were alone with a man? Really alone?”
“I don’t know,” she said, snuggling into him. “It might be fun. Like being teenagers again. Sneaking around. Looking for a place to get alone. Sex in scary places.”
He leaned back and, with a facetious grin, said, “Sex?”
She whacked him on the arm. “Seriously, tell me right now if there’s no sex involved in this proposition, because I’ll be the one backing out. I can’t remember when I last had sex. It’s been a long time. I might not remember how.”
“Ooh,” he said, shifting in his seat a little. “I’d suggest a reentry program right here, right now, but people have all these cell phones taking pictures. That’s all I need.”