A Shore Thing (2 page)

A rugged smile broke out across Squid’s closely-bearded face. The brightness of his smile dazzled. “Well then, carry on.” He spun back around, and faced forward as he led us through the forest.

My senses filled with the crispness of pine-infused air, the effect so cleansing that it almost wiped away the sting of condescension that pricked me at the start of this particular weekend. Not quite, but almost.

Even as I inhaled the cool breeze that tickled my cheeks while we moved along on the hike, I continued to replay my conversation with Natalia. Who knew that I could be a victim of ageism at such a young age? Most of the college-aged counselors working weekends at camp liked to give me good-natured ribbing about my
wisdom
and
experience,
while I teased them about wearing diapers and sucking pacifiers. It’s always been in jest because—really—is thirty all that much older than those fresh-faced souls who walk the hallowed halls of academe?

Excitement interrupted my wallowing. “The beach!” Xander, who only moments before had dug in his heels, lit up, enthusiasm glowing on his young face. “Woo! Yeah! The beach!”

Squid caught my eye and I went on alert, ready to corral campers who tried to dart for the sea which lay at the foot of the cliff. Most of the kids lived too far inland to be able to visit the beach very often, let alone a protected cove so saturated with marine life like this. My heart leapt at the thought of sharing this place with the kids, one of the few panoramic vistas untouched by development.

We stood at the edge and gazed at the beach below. Etched rock formations and drenched peaks rose from the bottom of the sea. Soon the pitted and crevice-carved home of bountiful marine life would lie exposed in the sun. A perfect day for tide-pooling. Squid raised the bullhorn along with the camper’s sign of respect displayed on one hand: the thumb, forefinger, and pinky. He waited, his stance unruffled, until every eye was on him. His sober expression may shake up the kids, but I knew better. Lines at the corner of Squid’s eyes stretched gently toward his temples, belying a smile.

The campers quieted. “Okay, my friends, listen up.” Squid put on his tough voice. I’ve heard it so often that I could replay it in my dreams. “Pretty soon, we’ll head down those stairs and do some tide-pooling at negative tide. That means the water level is lower than average. While it is possible to walk out further than the boundary markers we’ll be giving you—don’t do it.”

“A-ah!” Xander protested.

I held my forefinger to my pursed lips, urging Xander and his buddies to listen.

Squid continued. “After lunch, my assistant Seabird over here and I will be explaining the rules of exploring to you—”

A hand went up.

Squid nodded at Megan, the youngest of our campers here this weekend. “Hang on, Meggy, and I’ll get around to you in a second. For all the rest, get into your preassigned groups. The lunch wagon has arrived compliments of Tidal Wave—aka camp cook. And the counselors will be handing out de-li-cious ham and cheese sandwiches with all the fixins to the quietest groups first.”

Rustling and shushing went on all around us, the hungriest campers urging their group mates to quiet down. Squid was about to signal the counselors that it was time to serve the lunches when Megan’s petite hand rose above her curly brown hair again.

“Yes, Megan. Did you want to say something?”

Her grin barely fit across her face. “I was just wondering . . . is Seabird your girlfriend?”

The rest of Megan’s group—older girls whose counselors had been coaxed into welcoming the young one to join their cabin—giggled behind hand-covered faces. A couple of boys in the back stood and crashed back onto the ground as if they’d been shot by wayward arrows.

Squid smiled and nodded. “All right, all right.” He held up the sign of respect. “Seabird and
all
the counselors are my friends. Now eat your lunch or we’ll miss out on that super-low tide.” He shot me a wink that sent a quiver right down my leg.

Squid and I had been a team for more than a year. As my own duties had grown, though, I missed having more opportunities to participate in hikes like these—especially with him at the helm. Hiring Squid for camp director was the smartest decision the board ever made. At twenty-nine, he still wore youthful exuberance like a treasured baseball cap. And yet I’d have to be blind and stupid not to notice him as more than an energetic leader. How could I not notice the way his chiseled arms fit snugly against the flannel of his sleeves, or the way his white teeth flashed against dark facial hair when he smiled? Dare I admit how an unfamiliar warmth flowed through me when our eyes linked and I knew precisely what he was about to say?

“Sandwich?” Carp, one of the counselors, handed me a paper bag, and then another to Squid.

We stood, Squid and I, shoulder to shoulder while watching the children. He swallowed a bite. “Join me on that rock over there?”

I gave him a sideways glance. “Sure.”

Settled on the rock, our lunches on our laps, we continued to eat in silence while watching the campers. There really was no place I’d rather be, and yet sitting that close to Squid my mind gave way again to uncharted thoughts. The late morning breeze wrapped us in its coolness, and goose bumps rose on my skin. I’d forgotten how to act around someone so intriguing. Did our sudden wordlessness seem awkward to him too?

Megan tossed her lunch sack into one of the trash bags held by a counselor, and then skipped toward us. She plopped herself next to me. “You know what? I think you are boyfriend and girlfriend!”

Squid laughed through a bite of sandwich. “Why’s that?”

Megan giggled. “I know a lot of things. My sister is a teenager.”

I wrapped my arm around her shoulder and gave her a squeeze, laughter in my own voice. “Well, then, that explains it.”

Squid bumped my shoulder with his. “Shall we tell her then?”

My chin whipped to the side and I faced him then. I never realized the silver gleam in his eyes before this. “Tell her?”

Squid’s bright grin filled his face. He sent me one of his familiar winks before bending closer to speak directly to Megan. “Seabird here is just too old for me.”

GAGE

THE ALARM’S SHRILL ANNOUNCEMENT that daylight had come in all its complicated glory rousted Gage from the warmth of rumpled sheets. He hadn’t slept well and couldn’t sleep now if he wanted to—not with young Jeremiah’s thunderous four-year-old footsteps to greet him.

Seven a.m. When had he begun to sleep in so late?

Gage smacked the alarm clock’s snooze button. It felt wrong to get up on a Sunday morning knowing full well he ought to be attending church rather than working. He hoped his friend Marc wouldn’t call under the guise of shooting the breeze when it was really a lame attempt to discover whether he had found a church yet in this little town.

He had, but no time today. Gage had work to do. He lolled in bed a minute more, listening to the commotion coming from the living room, trying to picture the scene. Jeremiah liked to roll his dump truck across the Spanish tile hearth before school. Suz, Gage’s baby sister, would have the coffee brewing. Maybe there’d even be enough milk left for him to pour himself a bowl of granola to eat along with that coffee.

He startled at the soft rap on the door. “Gage? Coffee’s on.”

Gage pressed a weary hand to his face and rubbed his eyes. A slight smile raised the corners of his mouth at the sound of Suz’s voice wafting in from the hall. “Thanks. I’m on it.” He sat up in bed, determined to plant both feet on the floor in spite of the growing disquiet that had formed in his gut. He would not allow his anxiety to flourish, no matter what. If not for his own sake, then for the welfare of those he’d promised always to protect.

Chapter Two

Too
old?
First Natalia, and now . . . Squid. My eyes shut at the thought of him smiling at me so winsomely before delivering the deathblow to my daydream. Whoever said that fifty had become the new thirty had gotten it backwards. My face felt crimson, even though it had been hours since Squid made his proclamation about my advanced age to little Megan. How could I have been so stupid as to believe that Squid could have any feelings for me other than the kind of friendship that happened when two people worked together? We were cohorts, and nothing else.

I had returned to the scene of the crime with only a stray dog as my companion. The negative tide had long gone. Only the dramatic peaks of darkened rock appeared above the tide line, and soon that would be gone too. I always came here when troubled, and besides, walking the path was one of the best ways to prep myself for the Sunday suppers that my sister Sheila hosted each week.

By the number of lingerers found resting in contemplation on stumps of fallen trees or splayed atop blankets on the tall grass, others appreciated the solitude here too.

Three men stood together near the ridge all holding notebooks in front of them. My muddled mind nearly missed their curious presence until one of them pitched a lit cigarette over the cliff.

Startled, my chest reeled and anger sucked air out of my lungs. “What . . . What are you doing? Do you realize you just flicked your cigarette into a protected marine sanctuary?”

Even to me, my voice sounded acerbic, but
que sera sera.
As if I were invisible, the men looked past me. So I repeated myself.

One of them, the largest of the three, hunkering in stature, took a step toward me and I tightened my grip on Doggy’s leash. The man squinted, his smile pinched and mocking. “Guess someone’s not doing their job then.”

My blood heated. I should have continued walking, but I was in no mood to back down from a fight. My mouth wouldn’t hear of it. “Otters are finally making a comeback, but because of people like you, they’re likely to choke and die off again.”

Three looming men stood near the edge of one of the most pristine and undeveloped stretches of land here in Otter Bay and watched me, their expressions all too familiar. Patronizing. Insulting.

Except for the one who wore flip-flops, jeans, and a button-down shirt. Instead of the ridicule I’d come to expect from certain people, the laid-back one watched me with a sort of curiosity.
Don’t expect brownie points for that.

As if taking my side, the ocean surged. All three men sidestepped the cliff’s precarious edge. Sea spray landed on the camera hanging around the neck of the bald man in the middle and he cursed.

I cocked my head. “Hope none of your pictures were sullied by litter.”

He shook his head and sauntered away from the pack, pointing his lens at the land, his back to the ocean and to me. The lumbering one continued to glare at me as I proceeded along the path worn into the earth by thousands of pairs of feet that came before to this magical place. More than the view captivated people here. It was also the call of the otters, sea lions, and whales that roamed along the shore, and the song of the birds—pelicans, cormorants, and murres—that migrated overhead on the Pacific Flyway. Even those children we brought from camp, the ones bemoaning their fast from everything electronic and cellular, got lost in the adventure when they arrived.

I breathed in the clean air, and attempted to shake off the annoyance that crept up my back when I noticed that burning ash being tossed into the water. Tension still gripped my shoulders. With my mind focused on the horizon, I pulled Doggy along and failed to notice the tripod laying in my path—until tripping over it. I hung onto the leash and avoided falling by landing hard against the rough surface of a pine tree, both my right elbow and my dignity shredded. Laughter spiked the air a short distance away. Closer to me, a scraping sound chewed the earth as someone dragged the tripod off the path.

The man with the flip-flops and quizzical smile stepped toward me and his eyes homed in on mine. “Don’t move.”

My breathing caught for a moment, but then I ignored him and pushed myself away from the tree trunk using my other arm. Droplets of dark red blood oozed from the wound on my elbow and I winced, the breeze against my raw skin gave me a sickening chill.

“Here. Let me help.” The man continued to stay by my side, his arm outstretched as if I needed steadying. His buddies were less than chivalrous, their snickers still alive.

“No. Thank you. You have done enough damage for one day.” I glanced at the length of metal I tripped over, and then back at him. Doggy began to whimper. “That looks like survey equipment.”

He shoved both hands into his pockets and nodded his head once. “It is.”

“Well, why? This land isn’t being developed.”

He stood silent, the corner of his mouth turned upward. The furrow above his brow told me how wrong I was.

My hands found a place to steady themselves on my hips. I ignored the shooting pain in my elbow and shook my head. “Tell me you’re kidding.”

He shrugged. “It’s not my call. Listen, you need to get that wound cleaned up. I’ve got a first aid kit in my truck.” He pointed up the hill. “If you’ll wait here I’ll run up and—”

My head snapped side to side. “The Kitteridges own this property. They’d never sell it, and certainly not to someone who would put up houses on it—”