“Oh . . . well . . . that’s good.”
“There’s a summer camp for kids who want to work with the sea turtle nests. They help monitor the sites, keep track of the incubation days, maintain spreadsheets, watch for depressions in the sand that might indicate a nest is getting ready to hatch. If they’re lucky, they get to be there for a hatching or two, count hatchlings, chase the foxes away, and that kind of thing. Might be something he’d enjoy. You never know what will ignite an interest in a kid. I could send some information home with him, if you like.”
“Sure . . . okay.” I wasn’t used to teachers coming to me about the kids, bad or good. Usually Zoey kept a lid on things for both her and J.T., so there wasn’t any need for teachers to call home. Zoey’s excuses were nothing new —I’d used them all myself, years ago. Oh, my mom has to work. . . . She’s out of town —she said to tell you she’s sorry she missed open house night. . . . She’s down in the bed. Her back gives her trouble. . . .
It crossed my mind that this was a new place, a new start. Things didn’t have to be the way they were before. I wanted the kids to have a home life they didn’t have to hide from everyone. I wanted to know what they were doing in school.
“That’d be nice. Thank you.” Then I was sorry I said yes. What if J.T. got all excited about some summer camp? I couldn’t pay for that kind of thing. “You know, on second thought, it might be better if you didn’t. I’m not sure where we’ll be by summer. I hate to get his hopes up.” Sooner or later, something would happen with Iola’s place, and we’d have to move out. I’d be lucky if the kids could even finish the school year on Hatteras, much less be around for summer camp.
It hit me full force now, how much of this plan of mine depended on luck. I was making promises I probably couldn’t keep. I’d told the kids we were staying here. This was it. Our new place.
The science teacher’s brown eyes studied me, narrowing. He had nice eyes —a warm honey-tea color, framed with lashes that were surprisingly dark for someone with a redheaded complexion. “The opposite of getting your hopes up is not harboring any,” he said softly, and I had the uncomfortable sense that he’d read my mind. For a moment, I couldn’t do anything but look into his eyes and wonder how much he knew.
A white bucket in the back of his truck rattled on its own, and I jumped.
“The prisoners.” Winking sideways at me, he nodded toward the bucket, offering me a look.
My curiosity was piqued, and aside from that, I was glad to be off the topic of hopes and summer camp. “What’ve you got in there?”
“Take a gander.” Reaching into the bed of the truck, he hooked his fingers over the edge of the bucket and dragged it closer, but I couldn’t see the bottom.
I inched in, leaning over my crossed arms, the grocery bag dangling against my elbow. I caught the faint scent of sand and seawater.
Paul shook the bucket a little, and something squirmed inside. I jerked back again, and he chuckled. I knew he was messing with me. “Hold it still,” I squealed.
“What?” He sounded like a little boy in the school yard, hiding something in his fists and saying, Betcha can’t guess what I’ve got behind my ba-ack. “You don’t trust me?”
“Depends on what’s in that bucket. If that’s a snake or something, I’m outta here. You live in Texas awhile, you learn to hate snakes with a passion. The first time you step out the door and find a rattlesnake sunning, you’re cured of the good-snake-bad-snake myth.”
“No, ma’am, this is dinner.”
“Well, that leaves out snakes, I guess.”
I set the grocery bag on the tailgate and the two of us leaned closer, our shoulders brushing. “Not necessarily,” he joked, finally tipping the bucket far enough that I could see crabs in the bottom, four of them.
“Oh, man,” I breathed. I remembered going crabbing with Pap-pap and Meemaw. We helped Pap-pap tie chicken necks to lengths of twine, then tossed the bait in the cove and drove little metal stakes into the ground. Gina and I built drip castles on shore and chased ghost crabs while we waited.
There was a small hoop-shaped crab net lying in the bed of Paul’s truck. I reached for it without even thinking to ask. “My pap-pap had one of these. We used to drive down a road someplace around Kill Devil Hills. . . . I can’t remember exactly where that was.”
An image flashed through my mind: Pap-pap’s weathered, sun-spotted hands pushing bait into a green mesh bag and tying it in the center of the homemade net. But they’ll just climb out, I’d protested, and he’d smiled at me.
You watch, sis. I remembered his face now —every detail of it. Over the years, I’d let it go, let him go, and Meemaw. It was too painful to remember how good those times were, how peaceful and sweet. How much I wanted Pap-pap and Meemaw to be able to keep Gina and me forever. How angry I was when my mama made sure they couldn’t.
“I can’t remember how it works.” I was talking to myself more than Paul now, the whisper a drift of breeze from the past.
Paul let the bucket rest. “And here I had you pegged for a landlubber.” His fingers settled over mine, and he moved one of my hands to the center of the net, then gripped the lines on either side of the rim. “Like this.” He pulled, and the frame bent at the hinges, folding into a half-moon shape, trapping my hand inside, the metal closing loosely over my wrist. “There. You’re caught.”
A truck turned in to the parking lot, the rumble of the diesel engine echoing off the weathered wood and concrete block of Bink’s store. Something in the sound of it —the grinding of the knobby tires or the soft groan of a leaf spring —caught my attention, plucking a familiar thread. I looked up, and I knew who it was even before the shadow of Bink’s roadside sign blocked out the glare that hid the driver.
Ross.
CHAPTER 6
I JERKED AWAY QUICKLY enough that the crab trap tightened around my wrist, the salt-encrusted edges leaving red marks on my skin as the lines pulled taut in Paul’s hands.
“Whoa, hey, hang on a minute,” he chuckled, grabbing the metal rim to open it. “There you go. Relax. I wasn’t going to toss you into the dinner bucket with the captives, I promise.”
“Sorry.” I stepped backward, putting distance between Paul and me. I could feel Ross watching as his truck crossed the parking lot, but I didn’t turn to look. I didn’t want to seem like I’d been caught at something. “I hope I didn’t break it.”
Paul bent to wrap the lines around the net, his face disappearing beneath the fishing hat. “Nah, this old thing’s tougher than that. I found it with some of my granddad’s fishing rods when I moved back here to look after Gran. It’s been around the block a few times.” I had a feeling he was talking about more than just the net, but I didn’t have time to wonder. I could hear Ross getting out of his truck. Inside, a part of me cringed as the door slammed shut. I felt like I’d been doing something wrong, and now I’d pay for it. Old habit.
Not that Ross had ever treated me that way, but there were a couple times when guys got friendly on the beach, and Ross had already let me know he didn’t like it. He thought I was doing something to bring it on. You’re pretty, Tandi. You look at a guy, he’s gonna look back. When he said things like that, I soaked it up as a compliment. Everywhere we went, women from seventeen to sixty checked Ross out. Chicks he knew smiled and hugged him when we went into surf shops and restaurants and whatnot. He could have pretty much any girl he wanted, and he wanted me.
Paul was completely oblivious to the change in the air around us. He whistled the theme from Jeopardy!, his head bobbing back and forth as he shook out the tangles in the lines and wound them around the net.
“Well, thanks for telling me about J.T.,” I said, loudly enough that Ross could hear every word as he approached. What was he doing here, anyway? Had his friends at Captain Jack’s told him I’d come looking for him last night? “I’m glad J.T.’s doing so well in science.”
Paul quirked a brow at me, probably wondering if I thought he was deaf all of a sudden. He didn’t know we had company until Ross was right there on top of us.
Ross didn’t say anything —he just stopped and stood with his hands on his hips, his fingers spreading into his jeans pockets, the muscles in his arms flexing around the hem of a short-sleeved Western shirt that fit just right.
He looked like a dog bristling when another dog comes sniffing around. “What’s goin’ on, Tandi?”
“Hey, Ross.” I blinked at him like I hadn’t noticed him driving in. “Where’d you come from? I figured you were still crashed out after your last trip.”