Meet Me at the Beach (Seashell Bay) (17 page)

“I worry about him too. Maybe your father lends him money?”

“I doubt it, because Dad says he’s in bad shape too. Always seems to have money for booze and smokes, though.”

“People always manage to find money for those things,” Lily said.

Aiden couldn’t miss the bitterness in her voice. He knew she was thinking about her dad. Tommy Doyle wasn’t nearly as big an asshole as Aiden’s father, but he had his own struggles with the bottle. “Dad gets Social Security, that’s all, and Bram has absolutely no income. He’s been living off some money Mom left him when she died, money she’d inherited and kept separate from Dad. But that must be nearly gone by now after all his gambling.”

“I’m so sorry, Aiden,” Lily said, her gaze soft with sympathy and concern.

That was one of the things he’d always loved about her—she wore her heart on her sleeve. And God, it felt good to talk to her about the worries that were keeping him awake night after night. He’d confided in her when they were teenagers, and now he realized how much he’d
missed that. Lily Doyle was one of the few people he could trust with the secrets of his soul.

He decided to lay it all out for her. “I can’t help worrying that Bram might be in debt to…”

“A loan shark?” Lily guessed when he paused.

“Something like that. Maybe I’m just being paranoid.”

She grimaced. “No, you’re right to worry. Look, I know Bram can’t fish anymore, but has he even tried to find a job? The word on the island is that he doesn’t want to work, especially now that he thinks he’s going to make a pile of money selling his land.”

There was some truth to that, but there was another side to the story too. “Maybe, but you can probably put yourself in Bram’s shoes, because all you ever wanted to do is fish, right? Well, it was exactly the same for my brother. All he ever wanted was to be a lobster fisherman, just like his dad. He always loved boats, loved the sea. When he was old enough, he worked his ass off as a sternman and then waited for years until a commercial license finally came available. He saved every dime so he’d be in a position to buy
Irish Lady
when Dad was ready to retire.” He stared at her, willing her to understand what he was trying to say. “I was proud of him.”

Lily braced her legs against the swell of a passing ferry, totally focused on him.

Aiden’s throat went tight, like it did every time he thought about Bram’s accident. “But then it all came crashing down. One little distraction was all it took. It could have happened to anybody.” He shook his head. “It could have happened to you.”

She nodded. “It still could. I think about that all the time, because there’s always danger waiting on the water.”
Then she gave a funny little shrug. “Then again, you city folks can step off the curb and get run over by a bus, right?”

“Sure, but my point is that the accident changed Bram forever. It sucked the life out of him. You can understand why.”

She nodded, her lips pressed tight with reluctant agreement.

Aiden turned half away from her, leaning on the railing and gazing at the beach past Wreckhouse Point. Two little boys, maybe seven or eight, were racing along the thin strip of sand, followed by a lumbering old black Lab. There was no adult in sight, and that was just fine. Short of drowning—and every kid on the island learned to respect the water at an early age—there wasn’t much to worry about. Life didn’t come much safer than it did on Seashell Bay Island.

At least until you took to sea on a small fishing boat.

“Bram and I spent a fair bit of time together after that,” he continued. “In Philly, or somewhere on the road where I was playing. I wanted to get him away from the island and the bad memories for a while.” Aiden shrugged. “He was okay as long as we didn’t talk about his future. Every time I said a word about that he threatened to split if I didn’t get off his case.”

“Hardheaded,” she said quietly. “Like a true islander.”

“Anyway, even if he wanted to get a job now, who would hire him? His head’s messed up, he barely graduated high school, and he drinks way too much.” Aiden clenched his fists against the anger he had bottled up over Bram’s rotten luck. “One way or the other, Lily, I have to make sure he’s going to be okay. I love my brother, and
I’m not going to let him sink into some kind of pathetic drunken poverty if I can help it. I will not let him turn into my dad.”

Lily leaned over and gave Aiden’s shoulder a sympathetic squeeze. He liked the feel of her slender but strong hand on him too much. “Of course you won’t. But Bram has to be able to help himself too, right?”

“Yeah,” Aiden said. Actually, he would have liked nothing better than to scoop Bram up and whisk him to Philadelphia or wherever else he ended up, but he’d already floated that idea to Bram and had been met with wounded disbelief.

Aiden, I’m your brother, not your charity case.

Bram, like most Flynns, intended to live out his days in Seashell Bay and be buried in the family plot at Saint Anne’s-by-the-Sea. The island held his brother in its relentless grip, and nothing Aiden did or said would change that.

“I think he needs help,” Lily said in a careful voice. “Professional help and a support group for his gambling.” She gazed up at him, searching for his understanding and, possibly, approval.

“You’re talking about a shrink?” Aiden tried not to sound too defensive. Lily wasn’t trying to manipulate him to her advantage. He knew she cared for Bram.

“Some kind of therapy.” She shifted from one sneakered foot to the other, clearly uncomfortable but not backing down.

“Well, you might be right, but you’ve known Bram all your life, Lily. Seriously, can you see my brother on a shrink’s couch? Hell, maybe we could talk Dad into going too. Get a two-for-one discount.”

Lily turned away and shoved the gaff into the water, hooking it under the buoy. “It’s easy to be cynical, Aiden, but I don’t hear you coming up with better answers.”

When she fed the pot warp into the hauler and started it up, it effectively ended the conversation, since Aiden wasn’t about to shout over the loud whine of the machine. Sighing, he widened his stance and got ready to receive the lead trap.

There wasn’t much more he could say, anyway. Lily was right that he didn’t have any better answers. And Bram’s bad habits were obviously becoming more deeply ingrained.

Every day Aiden spent in Seashell Bay pounded home the fact that his family was deep in an epic shithole. And he sure as hell didn’t have the faintest idea how to make it right.

L
ily parted the curtains and scowled out her front window at the fog that refused to quit. It was already late morning, and yet the murk had only slightly dissipated since dawn. Now, though, she could at least glimpse the outline of her parents’ house on the other side of the trap lot. Still, she didn’t dare take her boat out. When it was this bad a couple of hundred feet inshore, on the water it would be heavy enough to make fishing dangerous even with radar and GPS.
Miss Annie
would remain at her mooring.

One thing she could easily see out her window was her mother bustling down the pea gravel track that connected Lily’s place to her parents’ house. Her mom carried a square Tupperware container cradled against her stomach as she strode purposefully past Lily’s Jeep.

Muffins? Coffee cake? Banana bread?

Lily was glad she’d made a fresh pot of coffee. When her mom showed up midmorning with baked goods, it meant she intended to stay for a chat. She’d no doubt correctly guessed that Lily would be in a blue funk over the weather that had prevented a day’s fishing.

Lily had called Aiden at five forty-five to catch him before he headed down to the dock. She’d expected him to be relieved, but to her surprise, he’d sounded a little disappointed when she told him he was off the hook for fishing today. He’d even told her—with apparent sincerity—to call him right away if the fog broke enough later to let them head out.

His unexpected response had left her standing in the kitchen, staring at the disconnected phone as she tried to figure him out.

Lily smiled as her mother pushed open the door. “Hi, Mom.”

“Good morning, honey. Goodness, that fog was as thick as terry cloth out there first thing this morning, wasn’t it?” Edith Doyle shook herself as if the fog had been clinging to her slight form. She wore a gray cardigan over a white blouse and black mom jeans, and her graying hair was pulled back into a ponytail and secured by a neon-pink scrunchy.

Her never-ending supply of brightly colored scrunchies never failed to crack Lily up.

Her mother kicked off her shoes at the door. “I thought you could use some blueberry muffins to cheer you up on such a foggy morning.”

“You’re the best, Mom. Thanks,” Lily said as she headed into the kitchen.

Her mother padded behind in her stocking feet. When she pried off the Tupperware lid, the amazing smell of freshly baked muffins filled the room. Lily’s mouth started to water. Her mom’s baking was better than chocolate and almost as good as sex, and she could feel her mood starting to lift.

Soon after they sat down and took their first sips of coffee, her mother cocked an eyebrow. “You look quite out of sorts this morning, sweetie. Is it more than just the fog?”

When she paused significantly, Lily knew she was in for it.

“Are things not going so well with Aiden after all?” Mom asked.

Lily had told her parents—after some prodding—that Aiden was adapting to work on the boat much better than she’d anticipated, but she’d refused to go into detail. Trust her mother, though, to not let sleeping dogs lie.

“Aiden’s doing well enough,” Lily answered, “given all the stuff he has to deal with. I don’t think he realized just how awful the situation was with Bram until he came home.”

Her mother nodded. “I’m sure he didn’t fully understand—not when he’d all but disappeared from his family’s life.” She held up a hand when Lily started to protest. “I know he’d fly Rebecca and Bram out for visits, but that barely scratched the surface. Rebecca always worried about Aiden. She thought he was running away from his family and his past.”

“Well, heck, what else could he do? With a father like Sean, who could blame him?”

Her mother sighed. “He can’t do anything about his father, but it’s not too late for Bram. At least I hope not.”

Lily pushed her half-eaten muffin aside. “That’s the only reason Aiden would ever agree to sell his land. He only cares about the money because of what it could mean for Bram.”

“That’s all well and good, but I’m sure Sean could have come up with a smaller project that would have made the
family plenty of money without ruining the island. No, this particular deal is all about Sean’s greed and ego. The man thinks people have been persecuting him for years, so he’s darn well going to show everybody who’s really in charge in Seashell Bay.”

Lily resisted the urge to rub her temples. “We’ve gone over this so many times, Mom. That’s all water under the bridge. There’s only one deal on the table, and it’s going to be up to Aiden to decide whether it goes ahead or not. I’m going to do all I can to push him in the right direction, but I get where he’s coming from. Aiden’s not like his father. He just wants to do the right thing.”

“Well, I have to say the man handled himself well at the social the other night, unlike his father. And yours, I might add. I gave your father quite a talking to when we got home. Sean was an idiot—no surprise there, of course—but Tommy would have played right into his hands if Aiden hadn’t stepped in. I told your father that this feud nonsense has to end. It’s the twenty-first century, for goodness’ sake.”

It had been quite an evening, followed by that steamy encounter on the beach with Aiden. Not that her mom would ever hear about that little incident. “Aiden was great. And I was glad Micah stuck Sean behind bars for the night, the old goat.”

Her mother grimaced. “The town should name a jail cell in his honor. He’s been in it enough.”

Lily waggled her hand. “A little exaggeration there, Mom.”

“Okay, maybe a little.”

“Actually, I wouldn’t mind if the next time Micah throws him in jail, he sends the key to the bottom of the
channel. Sean Flynn is a horrible man. The way he treated his wife and then what he did to Aiden…” Lily had to stop when her throat grew too tight.

“So true,” her mother said in a quiet voice.

The old mahogany grandfather clock chimed the hour, as it had been doing in Lily’s living room for a year now. It had been in the Doyle family for well over a century, but Gramps had gifted it to her on her last birthday, saying it was about time a girl took charge of the “damn noisy thing.”

“Why did Mrs. Flynn put up with it?” Lily asked. “I know it was a different time, but she deserved so much better. I realize he never hit her—he saved that crap for his sons—but he made her life a misery. She was such a nice woman too.”

“Yes, she was, and yes, she did deserve a better fate.” Her mom sounded more thoughtful than sad. “But it wasn’t always that way between them, you know.”

Lily’s mug had been halfway to her mouth, but she set it back down. “What are you talking about?”

“Well, to really understand about Sean and Rebecca, you need to know that he wasn’t always the sad, broken creature you see now.”

Lily snorted. “I’d call him an unrepentant asshole, myself.”

“Language, dear. Anyway, I’m several years younger, but even as a child I knew all about him. And I can tell you firsthand that Sean Flynn was always a wild and impulsive young man. For a girl like me, he was also larger than life too. He was boisterous, fun-loving, handsome, and so very full of himself.” She gave a slight, rueful shake of the head. “A true bad boy, if people still use that term.”

Lily blinked. It was bizarre enough to think of Sean Flynn as the classic, sexy bad boy and even more bizarre to hear her mother referring to him that way. “Okay, this is making me feel slightly queasy.”

Her mother waved that away. “He was the best kind of bad boy, one with a good heart underneath all the bluster. Everyone liked him, even your father—though it was grudging, of course. God knows they fought often enough, in the way high-spirited young men sometimes do, feud or no feud.”

When Lily choked out a disbelieving laugh, her mother shrugged. “It’s true. Rebecca wasn’t the only girl who fell in love with Sean, but she was the one who got him to the altar. I think they were nineteen, maybe twenty, and Sean was working as sternman on his father’s boat. But soon enough—it can’t have been more than a year later—Sean was drafted and sent to Vietnam. I can’t remember many of the details, but I believe he had more than one tour there.”

Lily froze. Now that was truly a surprise.

“All I know for sure,” her mom went on, “is that when he finally came home, he wasn’t the same man. In fact, he was a shadow of that man—a ghost, really. Everything bad that’s happened since started at that point.”

Every muscle in Lily’s body seemed to lock into some kind of weird spasm. Nor was her brain functioning that well, unable to process an image of Sean Flynn that was completely at odds with what she knew about him. Aiden had never breathed a word to her about his father having been in the military, much less slogging through the Vietnam meat grinder she’d learned about in school.

“God, Mom, what happened to him over there?”

“No one knows for sure. Not even Miss Annie, and you know how close she and Rebecca became over the years. Sean wouldn’t even talk about it to his family. But Rebecca once told your granny that his nightmares never stopped. He would talk and shout in his dreams about awful, ugly things he must have seen over there.”

Jesus.

“It sounds like PTSD.” Lily knew it had afflicted thousands—probably tens of thousands—of Vietnam veterans. “But did people try to talk to him about it? Get him some help?”

Her mom shook her head. “People went out of their way to try to help, believe me. But Sean hated that, and he lashed out at anyone—and I mean anyone—who even raised the subject. So it didn’t take long before people stopped trying. I guess we all thought it best to pretend that part of his life had never happened. It seemed easier that way.”

Lily rubbed her jaw because she’d been clenching it hard enough to crack a lobster shell. “It’s difficult to believe that people managed to keep their mouths shut about Sean’s military service all this time.”

“Well, Rebecca and Sean had other problems, and they eventually came to seem more important.”

“What could be more important than PTSD?”

“For many years Rebecca couldn’t get pregnant, and it tore them both up something fierce.”

Okay, that Lily could understand. Popping out babies had always been really important on the island, especially to the older generation. Hell, it was still important, since so many of the younger residents left for college or mainland jobs and never came back.

Her mom carried on with the grim saga. “At one point, they went to a fertility clinic in Boston. Sean desperately wanted sons to follow in his footsteps, and Rebecca just badly wanted children.” She gave Lily a grimace that held a world of sadness. “She hoped that having children would change Sean. Give him something to focus on besides the problems with his fishing business, which were getting worse all the time because of his anger and his drinking.”

“Well, he focused on his children, all right,” Lily said cynically. “Like a boxer focuses on a punching bag.”

Her mother began to look irritated. “We all know that story, dear. All I’m trying to do is give you some idea why Rebecca stayed with Sean until she died. That’s what you wondered about.”

“Okay, I get that it must have been complicated. But I still don’t see how she could stand by while her husband abused her sons. If she wanted to take it herself, that was her decision. But she should have protected the boys better, Mom.”

“By leaving? Where would she have gone?” Her mom shook her head. “I know it was tragic, but Aiden seems to have turned out to be a fine young man, and Bram was on the right track until that accident. Rebecca did a darn good job with them under terrible circumstances. Yes, she suffered and kept quiet, but she was hardly the only woman in her situation to do that. Even here in Seashell Bay.”

Lily couldn’t argue about how Aiden had turned out, but at what price? No one could know the long-term effects of that kind of abuse.

Her mother reached over and briefly pressed her hand. “I know it’s hard not to hate Sean for what he did and
for what he’s doing now. But your father and I talk about how it’s hard not to feel pity for the man at the same time. Sean’s been caught in a vicious pattern of shame and self-hatred for over forty years, Lily, and he’s probably going to die a lonely and bitter old man.”

Lily wasn’t nearly as sympathetic as her mother. “Caught because he would never even think about getting help—professional help.”

“Not many lobster fishermen would,” her mother said.

Lily sighed. The men here were hard, proud, and stoic. Would they talk about their feelings to anyone, much less a stranger? Not much chance.

She put down her cup, rubbing her eyes. A few minutes ago, she’d been so eager to get on her boat that she’d been climbing the walls. Now she just wanted to crawl back in bed and hide under the covers.

Her mother pushed away her empty plate, as if to signal the end of the discussion about Sean Flynn. “But let’s get back to you, sweetheart. You’ve been moping the last few days, and you know it. You haven’t been the same since Aiden came home.”

Haven’t been the same
was mom-speak for “fixated on Aiden.” Her mother had an excellent nose when it came to this sort of thing. Of course, Lily and Aiden had probably been emitting enough pheromones to choke a horse. You’d have to have been in a coma to miss it.

Lily gave a little shrug. “I don’t know quite what to make of it either.”

Her mother’s eyebrows lifted in gentle disbelief. “Oh, I think you do.”

“Do we really have to do this now?” Lily said.

Her mother simply gave her a polite smile and settled
back in her chair. Clearly, she wasn’t budging until Lily gave her some answers.

Grumbling, Lily got up and grabbed the coffee carafe from the warmer, quickly refilling their cups. “I need more fuel if we’re going to have another of our fabulous mother-daughter talks.” Then she adopted what she hoped was a martyred expression. “Okay, I’m ready. Lay it on me.”

Her mother laughed. “Oh, stop being so dramatic. I was simply going to say that I think you’re having a little bout of the what-ifs. It’s completely natural when the first boy you fell in love with suddenly shows up again.”