“What I’m saying is, maybe we should diversify our search,” I explained.
“And what I’ll say is, if anyone knows where she’d go, it’s Sam. First, he and Gordo were like brothers. Nope, strike that, what they had was bigger than blood. Sam stepped in with her when Gordo bit it and when I say that I mean big time. They were close before, Sam and Luci, but now they’re really friggin’ close. Anyone knows where she’d go, it’s Sam. So that’s where we’re goin’.”
“Right,” I whispered my thoughts on Luci and his words.
What they had was bigger than blood.
Two brothers Sam lost.
Two.
Shit!
I fell silent.
Skip drove like a demon.
Finally, Skip said, “Nothin’ there.”
I craned my neck and scanned the coastline, asking, “Can you see the bay?”
“No, woman, what I’m tellin’ you is, Sam and Luci are thick as thieves but not that way. Not the way he was with you at the Shack. Fact is, ‘fore you, he never brought a woman to the Shack.”
Oh wow.
That was news.
My eyes shot to him. “Really?”
“Just don’t get fool shit in your head ‘bout them. That’s all I’m sayin’.” He jerked his chin to something and stated, “There’s the bay.”
I looked back to the coastline to see a short outcropping of rock. It wasn’t tall and it was covered with green. You could see the trail running from a small parking lot-slash-pit stop on the road.
Skip swung in as I undid my seatbelt. He barely came to a halt before my door was open and I was out.
“Shit woman!” Skip shouted but I took off toward the trailhead, my robe flying out behind me.
About a minute later, I was thinking it was time to join Sam in some kind of workout regime because I had a stitch in my side.
Two minutes after that, I was thanking my lucky stars that the trail was relatively well-used and definitely well-maintained for I was traversing it easily even on flip-flops.
Thirty seconds after that, I was heading down and I could see the bay.
Luci was sitting in the sand, knees cocked, elbows to knees, jaw in hands, eyes to the water, the waves rolling toward the shore licking her ankles.
I kept going flat out.
I was across the beach and five feet away from her when her head jerked to me as her body jumped, she looked up and her mouth dropped open.
Then she asked, “Kia, cara mia, what on earth are you doing here?” Her gazed moved down to my middle then back up and she finished, “In your robe?”
I stopped abruptly, sucked in breath and told her, “You’ve been gone for three hours. Everyone is worried sick.”
She blinked up at me and queried, “Has it been three hours?”
“Yes, Luci!” I cried. “Celeste is freaking out. We all are.”
Her eyes moved beyond me and her brows drew together. “Is that Skip?”
“Yes, it’s Skip. He was at the house being cantankerous when Celeste showed freaking out.”
“Woman! What the hell!” Skip yelled when he arrived.
She gracefully stood saying, “I’m so sorry, I lost track of time.”
“For three hours?” I asked and she looked back at me.
“I…” she looked to the ocean then her eyes came again to me. “Yes,” she whispered. “For three hours.”
I studied her face, I did not at all like what I saw so I said, “Skip, give us a minute.”
“Hell with that, I –”
My eyes sliced to him and I ordered firmly, “Skip, give us a minute.”
Skip scowled at me. Then he scowled at Luci. Then he turned and stomped down the beach toward the trail Hap was running down with Celeste following him some distance behind.
I turned back to Luci and got closer. “Are you okay?”
Her head tilted to the side, her mouth curled into a small smile but her face suffused with sorrow. The jig was up, the shutters thrown open. No hiding. All of it there for me to see.
And it hurt to witness.
She whispered her answer, “No.”
“Luci,” I whispered back, moving even closer, my hand reaching out and taking hers.
Her fingers curled tight on mine but she looked to the sea and kept whispering. “I remember. I remember what it was like to fall in love.”
I kept silent but my heart squeezed because there it was. Watching Sam and I was torture for our Luci.
“Like it was yesterday,” she went on softly. “Funny how you can fall so hard but it doesn’t hurt. You’d do it again. You’d do it again and again and again. You’d do it forever.”
I held her hand and held my peace.
“I thought we had forever,” she whispered to the sea.
I swallowed back tears and kept my focus on Luci.
She kept talking quietly. “We used to make love here. In the sand.”
Oh God.