“I—need to go home . . . first.”
“Come back. I’ll be in the bar here.” He jerked his head in the direction of a small place called the Sand Bar. “I don’t know anybody else around here. My buddies all took off sailing, but I’m not heading home till tomorrow.”
“Where’s that?”
“California. I’m based out of Los Angeles. I sell sports equipment up and down the West Coast.”
Belinda had immediately thought about the pounds she needed to lose and she’d been deeply embarrassed.
“Go on home,” Rob encouraged, “but come back. What do you like to drink? I’ll have one waiting for you.”
She didn’t drink, as a rule, but she didn’t want to seem unsophisticated, so she said tentatively, “A cosmopolitan?”
“Perfect.” He smiled at her again, a flash of white, then had headed toward the bar. She’d almost followed right after him, but she’d forced herself to go home first, then had looked in the mirror in despair. How could he be interested in her? It didn’t make sense. But then, he was just trying to pass the time and he’d seen her and knew her. It couldn’t be from the clambake, though. She wanted it to be, but she’d barely arrived at the beach when her mother had called and demanded she help with Grandpa, who was raising hell at the nursing home again.
Who cares? she’d told herself at the time as she squeezed into her best jeans and the purple blouse, real silk, that made her breasts look good and had a sexy shimmer in dim light, which the Sand Bar had in spades. Sometimes it was so dark there you felt like you had to raise your hand to within an inch of your face to see it.
She’d hurried to meet him, slipping a little on the wet concrete walk that led to the Sand Bar’s front door, her new boots kind of pinchy and uncomfortable, but they looked good.
Inside, she’d followed the dull path of carpet to the darkened main bar where, luckily, a pink neon beer sign in the shape of a crab helped her make out some forms.
“Belinda!” Rob called, standing up at a table in the back of the room.
She threaded her way carefully toward him, decrying her bumpity-bump hips as they brushed the tables. When she neared him, he reached out and grabbed her arm, guiding her the last few steps to a black Naugahyde bench. He sat right down beside her, their thighs touching, and he turned on his phone and used it like a flashlight to show her her drink.
“It’s really dark in here,” she said apologetically.
“I kind of like it.” And his hand had slipped along her forearm, sending her nerve endings into high gear.
She honestly couldn’t remember all that much about the rest of the evening, except that he drove her home and kissed her lightly on the lips at the front door of her crappy apartment. She’d told him she was a teacher’s aide, and had said she was working on her degree; she remembered that much. And she did recall throwing herself into his arms and planting a sloppy kiss back at him.
Embarrassing!
But he’d laughed, squeezed her, and said that he would keep in touch.
She’d thought that would be the end of it, but he was as good as his word, texting her from every city he visited. Two weeks after that first encounter he was back, and that time she’d let him into her bedroom. Actually, she’d practically dragged him in, and he’d made love to her so sweetly she’d fought back tears. Luckily, she hadn’t broken down and cried. How juvenile would that have been? At the door he’d kissed her hard enough to make her toes curl.
“When will you be back?” she’d asked, dying inside at the thought of not seeing him for a while. She would die without him. Just die.
“Next Saturday night. Take the last ferry out of Friday Harbor to Orcas Island,” he told her.
“The last ferry? I could come earlier,” she said eagerly.
“No. The last ferry. Go to the upper deck. I’ll have something special for you.”
So, here she was, cruising along. The sun had sunk into the sea and there was a quiet somnolence to the humming engines and near empty boat. She couldn’t concentrate on her book. She half-expected something amazing to happen, like he might suddenly appear or something, but so far there’d been no surprises.
Bzzz. She jumped when she heard the text.
I see you, little bird.
She looked around wildly, eagerly. He was here? Where?
And then she spied him on the outside deck, peering through the window at her. He lifted a hand in greeting, his grin a slash of white. Abandoning her book, she ran to the door, sliding it open, and was greeted by a slap of cold sea air and a buffeting wind. When she rounded the corner he’d disappeared from where he’d looked at her through the window. “Where are you?” she called, but the wind threw her words back into her throat.
“Right here.”
He was behind her, grabbing her around the waist.