He grinned. “I’d know you anywhere.” Looking around, he asked, “Are you on the clock? I don’t see that aunt of yours lurking around corners.”
“She’s back at the house. Apparently we get to relax in the summer.” I lowered my sunglasses so I wouldn’t be squinting, and he sat on my towel next to me. I was very aware of the heat of his leg almost touching mine—and even more aware of how unclothed I was. “Wait—I didn’t tell you she was my aunt.”
“Maybe I asked around about you.”
“Who would you ask? I just arrived!”
“There are no secrets in Oxford Circle. Or Avalon, for that matter.”
I gestured to his trunks. “Are you here for the summer, then?”
“I am. My last summer of freedom before I graduate and have to decide between law school and the family business.”
“Which is?”
He looked sideways at me. “Sizing me up as a match or asking for yourself?”
“If there are no secrets in Oxford Circle, Ada already knows all your business.”
Freddy swept some sand off the towel, brushing against my leg in the process. “She does. You know, she called me after you got my number, and I asked about you. She said you weren’t available.”
“Did she now?”
He nodded. “Is it the rabbi’s son? Or was that whole story a red herring?”
I scrunched up my nose, making a face that would surely upset Ada and her concern for future wrinkles. “True, unfortunately. But I did refuse him.”
“Then you’re not available because—?”
“Because Ada says I’m not.”
He smiled, then rose off the towel. “We wouldn’t want to go against Ada Heller, now would we?”
I felt a slight sense of disappointment as he prepared to leave. Ada had said no men, but what Ada didn’t know . . .
“I have the afternoons free,” I said. “Maybe I’ll see you around.”
“Maybe. How strong a swimmer are you?”
“Decently so.”
“Shame,” Freddy said, his lips spreading into a flirtatious grin. “I’m certified in mouth-to-mouth.”
“Good to know,” I said. “I’ll make sure you’re around before I start drowning.”
Suddenly he was kneeling back on the towel. “We could practice now.”
I pushed his chest away playfully and he tumbled over into the sand, clutching his heart. I couldn’t help but laugh. “Get up, you fool.”
“I can’t. I’m mortally wounded. Only true love’s kiss will break the spell.”
There was another lifeguard sitting in a chair a little ways down the beach, and I pointed toward him. “Should I go get him to help you? I bet he’s certified in mouth-to-mouth too.”
“Another dagger to the heart. Maybe I should give up and try one of Ada’s matches after all.”
That sobered my mood quickly. He should, actually. I was off limits, especially if she was working with him. Ada made that much clear.
“Hey,” he said softly, sitting up. “What just happened? You stopped smiling, and it’s like the sun went away.”
Against my better judgment, I leaned over and kissed his cheek. “That’ll have to do.”
“For now,” he said, standing up again. “I’ll see you soon, Marilyn.”
And he took off jogging down the beach toward the lifeguard stand.
I reached up and touched my own cheek. I was smiling. Not smart at all. But a little flirtation couldn’t hurt anyone. As long as Ada didn’t find out.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Ada sent me to the small grocery store in town two days later.
“Isn’t that Frannie’s job?” I asked. It wasn’t like I did any of the cooking.
“Frannie deserves days off just like everyone else,” Ada snapped. “It won’t kill you to pick up some produce.”
Yes, Frannie deserved a day off, I grumbled to myself as I walked the half mile to the store. But so did I. Okay, I had the afternoons, and Freddy had come to find me on the beach both days. Of course, even on the days we didn’t have clients, Ada had errands or other jobs for me to do. I would have liked a morning to sleep in and do what I wanted instead of catering to her.
But that was my penance, I supposed. Had I any idea that Daniel would have been so much trouble—well, who was I kidding? I probably would have done exactly what I did regardless. But maybe I would have stayed away from that stained glass. I had no regrets about anything except getting caught.
I soon found myself in the produce aisle, utterly confounded by the melons. Ada said to make sure they were ripe, but short of cutting one open, I had no idea how one would go about doing that. And I feared they would frown upon me cutting them all open and sampling them.
“Marilyn?”
I turned around to see Shirley. “My goodness, you’re here to save me, aren’t you?” I threw my arms around her neck.
Shirley laughed. “What do you need saving from?”
“These blasted melons. Ada said to make sure I got a ripe one, and there’s no way to tell with the rind on. You create a distraction, and I’m going to try to crack one open like a coconut.”
She looked at me like I had grown a second head. “Or I could show you the trick. Might be easier than smashing them.”
“I suppose that’d do.”
“Here,” she said, pressing a thumb to the indentation on the top. “You press the belly button and then smell it. If it smells like you want to eat it, it’s a good one.” She held it out to me to smell, and the aroma was heavenly.
“Thank you. There’s no greater joy than thwarting that woman, and she clearly expected me to fail. What do you know about peaches?”
Shirley shook her head. “Haven’t you ever bought fruit before?”
I remembered Ada’s disparaging comment about Shirley’s family. Grace did most of our shopping even though Mama insisted on cooking. I had accompanied my mother a few times as a child when she went, but after I destroyed an entire tower of canned goods by plucking some from the bottom, she began leaving me home—a tradition that continued to this day.
It was amazing they hadn’t sent me away sooner.
“Far too much of a troublemaker for that, I’m afraid.”
Shirley linked her arm through mine. “Come on. We’ll have Ada thinking there’s nothing you can’t do in no time.”
After we had fulfilled both of our shopping lists, Shirley asked if I wanted to grab a cup of coffee at the diner across the street. I did, but Ada expected me back.
“Dinner, then? My family would be happy to have you—Ada too, of course.”
I didn’t think Ada would say yes, but I told her I would ask. Shirley rattled off her phone number, telling me to just let her know. We walked back together as far as 21st Street, when Shirley turned to go to her family’s shore house.
Ada sighed when I asked her. She took a bite of a peach. “You picked well,” she said.
“Shirley helped me.”
She waved a hand at me. “You go. Send my regards but say I already had plans.”
“Do you? Have plans?”