“Can’t. I’ll call you later.”
I hang up. My palms are sweaty. A mix of thoughts rush through my head. The first is that the FBI just recorded me, and that Cooper is probably already listening to our conversation again to make sure he got everything. The next is a feeling like I’m betraying Ness, which stings deep, because I’m pretty sure I’m falling for him. The last thought is of my own wound, because it’s obvious that he hasn’t been telling me the whole truth, which sucks because of the aforementioned falling-for-him bit. But it’s also a salve for my guilt. Maybe we’re betraying each other. A little.
Back in the house, I find the coffee pot full. Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young are singing about eighty feet of waterline, nicely making way. Ness is sitting up in bed on a throne of pillows as I deliver his coffee.
“Your sister convinced I haven’t murdered you and dumped your body at sea?” Ness asks.
“Not exactly. She says she wants a photo of me with today’s paper to be sure I’m okay. I told her we don’t get the Times where we are. Thank goodness.”
“That’s what I love about this place,” Ness says. He cradles his coffee with both hands, takes a deep breath through his nose, and arches his shoulders back as he stretches. Letting it all out, he smiles at me. “No stress. No work. And the sea in every direction.”
“Yeah,” I say. “It’s perfect here. But I’m guessing we have to get back.”
I try not to make it sound like a question, like I’m eager to leave. I wish I could be more like Ness. Or maybe I’m too much like Ness. But this vacation has become work all of a sudden. I remember why I’m out here, what I’m hoping to uncover. And the lack of computer and cell coverage has me feeling isolated. Cut off. Something’s going on, and I won’t get any closer to it by staying here. And I hate myself for feeling this way.
37
The following day, I wake up in Ness’s bed back in Maine. The memory of Tara Cay is a memory as perfect as it is small. Like a beaded periwinkle, or any shell that requires a magnifying glass to fully appreciate. It was paradise crammed into a fistful of hours, the sort of moment you can lose if you’re not careful.
The view from Ness’s bed is almost as glorious. The storm has passed. Dawn is just breaking, the disk of the sun rising above the Atlantic and throwing the sky into pinks and reds. I watch the colors bloom and fade; sunrises like this are over in a blink. The sky changes from second to second. It reminds me of my week with Ness, which came and went too fast, every breath full of something new and strange and wonderful.
I reach for my phone on the bedside table. The flight home was a blur. I only remember passing out in bed, falling asleep curled up against Ness, eager for the answers he promised I would get today. I want this journey behind us so I can see where the next one will go.
My phone tells me it’s Saturday, which is almost impossible to believe. There are dozens of missed calls and even more texts, but all that will have to wait until I have coffee in my veins. Is it really Saturday? I think back: Monday, we shelled on the beach, Tuesday diving—God, that feels like a lifetime ago—and on Wednesday morning it rained, but that afternoon we flew halfway around the world, spent Thursday at one of the deepest parts of the Atlantic Ocean, Friday on Tara Cay, and now it’s Saturday.
Hours earlier, I woke up to Ness getting quietly dressed. Sweatpants and sneakers. I asked him where he was going, and he said for a run. When I asked where, he said, “To the end of the driveway and back. To get the mail.”
I’ve not yet gotten out of bed when I hear him coming down the breezeway. The sunrise has nearly lost its hues, is now just a single yellow orb. Ness has a triangle of sweat from his neck to his navel. It occurs to me that he may have run the entire length of that long shell-covered driveway to the outer guard gate. My thirty minutes on the treadmill after work and occasional Pilates feels inadequate.
“What’s for breakfast?” I ask, stretching.
He strides into the bedroom, hair matted with sweat, a blank look on his face. He throws a newspaper onto the bed. “Betrayal,” he says. “More than I can stomach.”
He storms into the bathroom while I gather my senses. A different man returned from the one who left the house. What does he mean by “betrayal”? I gather the paper, which flew apart from being thrown onto the bed. I check the Arts & Culture section, an old habit, and see nothing. And then I find the front page. And my heart sinks. I scan the familiar article, making sure it doesn’t have anything about the FBI in there.