Searching for Sea Glass: BEST-SELLING AUTHOR (Sea Glass Secrets Book 1) (5 page)

“Did Willie tell you anything about her family?”

Sunny stilled. Something told her to keep what Willie had told her to herself. At least in the short term. She didn’t like lying, but she figured maybe telling a little white lie in this particular circumstance would be the right thing to do.

“Willie was rambling. Some of what she said didn’t make a whole lot of sense.”

The nurse nodded. “That’s understandable. The drugs can do that to a person. I’m just glad you got to see her. To speak with her. I hope you said your goodbyes.”

Sunny looked away. “We talked about everything that mattered.”

“Good,” the woman said, obviously relieved. She patted Sunny on the shoulder. “Closure like that will help you later. It’s always a good idea to be able to say goodbye.”

Sunny nodded. She knew the woman was just trying to be kind. But she didn’t want to think about what she was going to do if Willie died tomorrow. Right now she just focused on retrieving her bike from the bike rack outside the hospital. She faced a five mile ride back to her house. And she knew from hard experience her ribs were going to scream at her every inch of the way. She’d been doing it for three weeks. You’d think she’d have gotten used to the pain by now. But some pains didn’t get better over time. Some just got worse. And this was one of them.

“You need a ride home?” Trey Dunn stood in the middle of the small parking lot. He was leaning against a late model truck. He was out of uniform.

Sunny was struck once again by how attractive he was. Over the last few weeks he’d made a habit of stopping by the hospital to offer her help. Sometimes, like tonight, he spared her the agony of pedaling the bike home. Once or twice he’d showed up in the ICU waiting room with a bag of fast food or a magazine. He wasn’t pushy. He’d just been helpful.

“I’d love a ride.” Sunny smiled at him. She rolled the bike to the back of his truck.

He hoisted it up into the truck bed. “You had anything to eat tonight?”

She nodded as he helped her up into the passenger seat of the truck. “Yep, one of the doctors had a birthday. We all shared the cake.”

“That’s all you’ve had? A slice of cake?” He shook his head. He cranked the truck and pulled it out onto the road.

“It was enough. I haven’t been very hungry lately,” she said. She gnawed at her ragged thumbnail.

“Did your mama leave you any money when she took off?”

“You’re asking a lot of personal questions tonight.”

“I’m just worried about you.”

“I’m fine. I don’t need anybody to worry. I’ve got money and I’ve got food.”

“So you say,” he said skeptically. “You know I’ll float you a loan if you need one, right?”

“I don’t need a loan. I’m telling the truth. I’m fine.”

“Ok, Ok.” He gripped the steering wheel. “I’m just trying to help.”

“I know. And I appreciate it, I really do.”

“So you want to stop and grab something to eat?”

“No, but thanks. I need to get home and make a few phone calls.”

“At this time of night? They must be pretty important.”

She shrugged. She’d probably already said too much. Trey Dunn was a smart man. And he wasn’t easily fooled. She had to make sure Willie’s folks wanted the baby. If they didn’t, it was better that no one knew who they were.

“Sunny?”

“What?”

“Have you ever thought about going out with me?”

“You mean like a date?”

“Yeah, I know I’m a few years older than you. But only a few. I’m twenty-five. And you seem older than your years. Would you, like, want to catch a movie with me sometime?”

Sunny looked over at him. She wasn’t entirely surprised by his question. And he was a nice looking guy. But she felt nothing other than friendship for him. JD McIntyre had taught her about passion on the night her life had begun to unravel. Now she knew the difference between common attraction and a chemistry that stirred the body and the soul. She wasn’t willing to settle. But Trey’s eyes looked so hopeful as he glanced her way.

Suddenly she felt the weight of the world on her slim shoulders. She didn’t want to hurt him. And she didn’t want to lead him on.

“Everybody at the hospital thinks Willie isn’t going to make it tomorrow Trey. If that happens, I’ll be needing to grow up real fast. I won’t be some footloose kid anymore. That baby will need a mother. And that person is going to be me. I agreed to pay all of Willie’s hospital bills, the ones that won’t be paid by the government. And I’ll have the baby’s bills and mine to pay too. I’ve got five thousand dollars, a house with a leaky roof, and a rundown café. I’m not a good bet right now. We can be friends, but that’s all.”

“I don’t care what baggage you come with Sunny Murphy. I’ve got some stuff of my own that needs dealing with. Everybody does. I’m not asking if you can promise me love everlasting. I’m just asking if you want to go to the movies and dinner. It’s not a lifetime commitment.”

“You’re a good man, Trey Dunn,” she said softly to her window.

She couldn’t look at him because everything she felt was written across her face. She’d give her soul, right now, to have somebody strong, like Trey, take over her life and tell her what to do. Because she didn’t have a clue how she was going to survive. But she couldn’t do that to him or any other man. She had to stiffen her resolve, and just find some of that good old southern grit he claimed she had. She’d had a plan for her life, a good plan. She’d dreamed of being a prima ballerina. But plans changed just like life did. Now, it seemed she would learn to be a steel magnolia.

“I hear a
but
coming,” he said with a steady voice.

“But I don’t feel that way about you,” she told the truth. It was hard. But she did it.

“I get that. But just so you know, the offer is always open. I might grow on you.”

She smiled at him across the truck’s cab. “Or you might just decide I’m not worth the trouble.”

He snorted and rolled his eyes. “That’ll never happen.”

When they got to her house, he helped her out of the truck and walked her to the door. He waited while she searched through her ratty bag for the house key. He watched when she put it in the keyhole and cranked open the lock.

“Good night Sunny,” he called over his shoulder when she pushed the door open.

“Night Trey,” she answered. She turned on the porch light and stood there until he drove off.

When his truck was down the road and out of sight, she made her way over to what her mother had euphemistically called the
garage apartment
. Palmetto bugs scattered when she flipped on the one single light bulb that hung like a condemned man from the low ceiling. Sunny went right to the cot and began searching. Just as Willie had said, under her pillow were an expensive looking business card and a fat sealed business-sized envelope.
Lorenzo
was printed in big blocky letters across the front. Sunny turned the business card over by one of its gilt edges.

“Crap,” she whispered as she read the name out loud. “JD McIntyre.”

There was no use putting off the inevitable. She’d made Willie a promise. And she planned to keep it. Picking up both the business card and the envelope, she went back outside. Crickets were making their music. The stars were clear and bright in the black sky. She could hear the roll of the waves coming from the Pass a hundred yards away.

She looked up at the wise moon and asked a rhetorical question, “What’s wrong with me? Why can’t I want a nice guy like Trey?” The moon remained silent. She walked into the house. She shut the door behind her.

The inside of her house was dull and dreary. The carpet smelled like an old dog. The paint peeled in yellowed strips down the walls. And the mud-colored couch cushions had ripped and been repaired so many times there was hardly a scrap of the original fabric left without a patch on it.

Sunny set her jaw. She stared at the old rotary phone on the end table. She walked to the couch, sat down, picked up the receiver and began to dial the number on the business card.

In Dallas, Leanne Simmons rolled over in her bed. Her condo was on the top floor of a high-rise. She sat up and saw the lights of the city through the floor to ceiling windows that made up one wall of her bedroom. She glared at the buzzing cell phone on her night able. It was JD’s. She’d taken it the night he’d kicked her out of his place at the beach. She knew he had lots of them. All with the same number. Billionaires with connections could get just about anything they wanted. His immediate staff all had one of the cloned phones. They typically screened his calls. But she’d been hoping he’d miss this particular one. He might call just to see who had it. She knew it was probably a long shot. But she was grasping at straws these days. The mortgage payment on the condo was due next week. She needed to get back in his good graces.

Picking up the phone, she frowned. She didn’t recognize the number. But she answered it anyway. “Hello,” she said in a sultry voice.

On the other end of the line, Sunny recognized the voice of the blonde viper. It was just another cruel irony in the litany of many that presently plagued her. The woman was obviously in JD’s bed again.

Sunny breathed through her nose. She launched into her hateful task with a calm, professional voice. “May I speak with Mr. McIntyre, please?”

“Who is this?” Leanne demanded. “And what are you doing calling JD at this outrageous hour?”

“My name is Sunny Murphy. And I’m sorry, but this call is an emergency.”

“Sunny Murphy?” The named sounded familiar to Leanne. A mean smile turned up her lips when she realized who she was talking to. “You’re that jail-bait kid from the beach, aren’t you?”

Sunny refused to allow her anger to rise. She had more important things to do than defend herself to this woman. “Could you please just get Mr. McIntrye to the phone?”

“I’m sorry, but he’s in the shower.”

“Can you please give him my number and ask him to call me back as soon as he’s able?”

“He and I had a good time laughing about how pitifully naïve you are, honey. I hope you’re not expecting anything from him. JD likes a woman with experience. And a sense of… curiosity when it comes to sex. We’re both hot-blooded and have quick tempers. But he and I have an understanding. We’ll be getting married soon.”

“Congratulations,” Sunny said through gritted teeth. “Could you just ask him to call me?”

“What’s this all about?”

“It’s personal.”

“It better not be too personal. If you don’t tell me what you want, he’ll never know you called at all. Maybe I should just hang up?”

“No, please, it’s about Willow.”

“That spoiled runaway?” Leanne sneered. “I’m pretty sure the whole family has disowned her. Her mama caught her in the act with the Mexican pool boy. She’ll never amount to much in Dallas now. The good folks in this town have real long memories.”

“Just please ask Mr. McIntyre to call me.” Sunny wasn’t above begging if that’s what it took to keep her promise.

“Sure thing. I’ve got your number right here on the caller ID. He’ll get back to you as soon as he can.”

Leanne ended the call. She had no intention of telling JD or anyone else in his family about the call. Why should she split any of the McIntyre money with that greedy runaway Willow? The girl had made her bed. Let her lie in it. Leanne settled back under her comforter. She was asleep in less than two minutes.

Two Years Later

“Give your flowers to Mama, Billy,” Sunny held the toddler's pudgy hand and led him over to the simple grave.

She was proud of his chunky little body. He was healthy. And he was happy. The sun glinted off of his straight black hair. Nobody who took the time to really look at William Lorenzo Murphy could mistake his Latin heritage. His chocolate brown puppy-dog eyes and olive skin told the tale. He was going to break plenty of female hearts one day. Sunny was sure of it. He’d snagged hers the moment she’d first held him in her arms in the hospital nursery.

He’d been her baby ever since. Her son. Though she made sure he knew everything she could tell him about his biological mother, Willie. The one whose grave they visited every week with a grocery store bouquet.

Sometimes Sunny still couldn’t believe her sweet friend Willie had been related to that heartless shark JD McIntyre. The man had all but assaulted her that night on the beach. At least that’s what she told herself on those steamy nights when she woke up from the hot dreams that seemed to plague her. They all featured the aforementioned McIntyre in his low-slung jeans and bare feet. Just the way he’d looked that night.

She’d never dated. Work, school, ballet, but most of all her suspicious dad had seen to that. And in the last two years, she just hadn’t had the time. It wasn’t that she’d had a sheltered upbringing. And it wasn’t that she’d lacked for the opportunities to date. Trey still asked her out at least once a week. And she still turned him down. Other men had approached her as well. She felt nothing for any of them except friendship. And she never dreamed about any of them. Curse JD McIntyre.

“Come on Billy, we need to get back to Sea Glass Café,” she said with a little smirk of revenge upon her lips.

Yeah, maybe she was petty. And maybe she might be the teeniest bit obsessed. But if the man could haunt her dreams, she could steal the name of his spa hotel for her humble seafood shack. Besides, he deserved it. The jerk had never even picked up the phone to call her back. Apparently he thought she’d turned into a perverted stalker or something. Or maybe he just didn’t give a flip for his poor little sister, Willie, not after she’d
polluted
herself by falling in love with a man whose ethnicity didn’t fit into the Dallas social scene. Thankfully, her poor friend had never known. Willie hadn’t made it out of the recovery room after her surgery.

Sunny didn’t care about the man, really she didn’t. Just because she had started reading that online Texas tabloid, didn’t mean anything. And now that she thought of it, her choice of names for her newly refurbished restaurant, Sea Glass Café, had nothing to do with him either. It was a good name. One that was attracting a whole lot of traffic from the tourists who had begun flocking to the family-friendly beaches of Sea Glass Point.

And yeah, it kind of bothered her that McIntyre had been able to have her hometown’s name changed. But she couldn’t argue with the way the old Murphy’s Point had morphed into a nice, quaint, laid back coastal village. There were vintage street lamps downtown now. Colorful baskets of flowers hung from them. There was a Victorian bandstand and white park benches in the center of the town’s square. New sidewalks rimmed the business district. Boutiques and quirky vendors had taken up residence in the empty storefronts. There was a Saturday Farmer’s Market with homegrown vegetables, fresh seafood, organic dairy products, and local honey. All of it courtesy of McIntyre Industries. That, now familiar logo, was on everything.

“Wait Billy-Boy.” She bent down and patiently pulled the daisy out of his mouth. “Don’t eat the flowers. I know you’re hungry, sweetie. As soon as we get to Sea Glass I’ll ask Harry to make you a hamburger, Ok?”

“Ha-burger?” He cocked his head. He smiled at her and melted her heart. It happened every time. There was so much love, so much trust in that big grin.

“Yep, You’re going to have the biggest hamburger in the world.”

“Let’s go,” he squealed. He took off as fast as his chunky little legs would carry him.

He would have been halfway across the cemetery, if she hadn’t snagged his arm. She walked him back to the humble grave marker.

“First tell Mama you love her,” she instructed.

This was part of their weekly ritual. It was one of the ways Sunny made sure he knew Willie. Billy was still just a toddler. But he already felt comfortable coming to the cemetery. He knew the woman in the photo on his dresser was his mother. He knew she had loved him. He knew he could always come here to visit her. For now, it was enough.

Sunny felt a twinge of guilt. Maybe she should try calling Willie’s brother one more time. He and his family could do so much more for Billy than she was able to do. The boy could go to the best schools. He could have the crème de la crème of all that life had to offer. At least the parts money could buy.

But she could give him love. And she could give him family too. Not family with blood ties. But friendship kin. She had plenty of those folks to share with Billy.

She watched as he squatted down. His little starfish hand began patting the granite of Willie’s grave stone. Her throat choked.

“Love Mama, love, love Mama,” he assured the flat white square with his childish lisp. When he was done, he looked up expectantly at Sunny. “Now ha-burger?”

The woman swallowed hard. She smiled. She nodded down at the little boy who was the center of her world. “Now hamburger.”

Together they walked to the nearby bus stop. In a few minutes, the free shuttle that ran from town out to the beach stopped for them. The hydraulic door slid open. A wave of cold air spilled out. Sunny was glad of it. It might only be the start of summer, but it was already scorching. Maybe this year she’d be able to get a window air conditioner for the house. At least in Billy’s room.

“Hey Sunny,” greeted the bus driver. She was a black lady with short, gray natural hair. The name tag on her uniform shirt read, Maxine.

“Hey Max,” Sunny smiled at her as she helped Billy up into the bus.

“What is tonight?” the driver asked.

“It’s Cowboy Poet and Gumbo Night,” Sunny answered as she made sure Billy was settled.

Maxine shook her head. “Sounds too redneck for me. What’s tomorrow night?”

“Max, it’s not redneck at all. Some of the poetry is pretty good.”

“It’s old, fat white guys in cowboy hats and boots, it’s redneck Sunny. I like that every night is something different over at your place. But Cowboy poetry is not for me. What’s tomorrow?” She looked out over the narrow two lane road before she pulled the bus away from the curb.

“It’s Jukebox Jubilee and Shrimp Creole.”

“You still got the good stuff on that old jukebox you had Trey haul from that junk shop over in Pensacola?”

“I sure do. I probably won’t ever change the music because those 45s are hard to come by.”

“Good, ‘cause honey, that’s my kind of groove. Nothing beats Otis Redding and Sam Cooke.”

“I’ll save you a spot by the jukebox. Bring plenty of quarters.”

“I will. I might even bring my old man with me. He can still dance, when he sets his mind to it.”

“I’d like to see that,” Sunny said with a smile. Maxine and her husband were a fixture at Sea Glass Café.

“Well, it’s a sight to behold, for sure. That man got hips like a snake. He can sure shake his…” She stopped when she saw Billy’s big round eyes fixed on her. “That is to say, he can dance real, real good.”

Sunny’s laughed. “Yeah, I bet he can. You bring him in tomorrow night and the first quarter set is on me.”

“Three songs for a quarter. Times have sure changed.”

“I guess they have,” Sunny said.

The bus pulled up to the base of the bridge that went over the Pass. She and Billy got out. They waved back at Maxine before starting down the gravel drive that led to the Sea Glass Café. The breakfast crowd had thinned. And it was too early for lunch. The parking lot was almost empty.

Sunny gazed at her business with a sense of justifiable pride. She’d built it up from a dirty hole-in-the-wall with a questionable clientele to a clean family place. The outside was painted turquoise. A big hand-painted sign showed the name,
Sea Glass Café
, in bright island colors. Savory aromas drifted down the drive to the pair. The spicy sting of Cajun seafood and the smell of onions frying combined. Sunny helped Billy navigate the wood stairs and get up onto the wide porch that ran across the front of the small building.

She stood there a minute. She shaded her eyes and looked over at the new extended space. She’d added a deck on the Pass side of the café. Folks seemed to love sitting out there at the sherbet-painted picnic tables to eat and watch the sun set over the water. The deck had doubled the café’s seating. She’d had to mortgage the business, but it’d been worth it. The patio was already paying for itself.

“Hey boss,” a young woman with a wide blue streak in her blonde hair called from the picnic tables. She wore rubber boots and held a running hose in her hands. She was cleaning up after the breakfast crowd. Families with little kids tended to be messy. And the fishermen who’d been out all night in the Gulf weren’t known for their pristine table manners.

“Thanks Trinity,” Sunny yelled back. “I was going to do that when I got back.”

“It’s no problem. Harry’s getting the inside set up. I bet we have a huge crowd for lunch.”

“Yeah, I love a holiday weekend.”

“Me too, boss. The tips are always outrageous. If we could just keep Sheriff Dunn from showing up and killing the mood, we’d do Ok.”

Sunny said nothing in response. She just smiled again and waved. She suspected there was a lot more to Trinity’s animosity towards Trey than simple dislike. Sparks flew every time the two were within spitting distance of each other. She wished he would realize what a great woman Trinity was. If he did, surely he’d finally give up on Sunny. The man was like a pit bull with a bone.

As Sunny and Billy walked into the cool, dark interior of the restaurant, she saw Harry, her cook, sweeping the floor. The little boy made a beeline over to the grizzled burly man.

“Ha-burger?” he asked.

Harry glared down at the child. Billy should have been terrified. But he giggled. This was a longstanding game between the two of them. “You want a hamburger?” he growled like a bear.

The toddler nodded. “Ha-burger.”

The old man scooped the boy up. He tossed him over his shoulder. “I guess we better go make one for you then.” He stalked off, hauling the laughing boy into the open kitchen.

“Sumner, you’re just the person I wanted to speak to,” said an aristocratic voice from a nearby table.

“Good morning, Maude Evelyn,” Sunny greeted her old dance instructor.

Everybody who knew the older lady would never call her by anything other than her full name. She would not answer to Maude or Miss Evelyn. Nobody knew if those were her given names or if Evelyn was her surname. They just knew she was Maude Evelyn.

“Sit down with me, if you please.” With a very graceful, if slightly bony hand, the woman indicated Sunny should sit across from her.

Maude Evelyn was nothing, if not perpetually formal. There was an old world charm to her behavior. The whip-thin woman, always wore a long-sleeved leotard, tights, ballet flats, and a chiffon wrap skirt that hit her knees. All of them unrelieved black. She was distant, cool, but cordial. The fact that she and Harry were involved with each other struck many as strange. Sunny never speculated on their relationship. She just loved them both.

“I can only take a minute. I’ve got to put out the decorations for the Cowboy Poets Night.”

Maude Evelyn tilted her head in a regal acknowledgement. “This shouldn’t take up much of your valuable time, dear. I want to offer you employment.”

“I beg your pardon?” Sunny’s eyes blinked.

“I know you are very busy here at your café. But I have need of a preschool dance instructor. I believe you would make an admirable addition to my staff.”

It took every bit of Sunny’s self-control not to smile. Maude Evelyn’s
staff
consisted of the lady herself and the elderly pianist from the Methodist church who plunked out classical dance music from an old out-of-tune upright.

“The classes are twice a week. Tuesday and Thursday mornings at 9:30. I’d like you to begin immediately.”

Sunny loved children. And dancing
was
her passion. But she had no idea how she was going to fit giving dance lessons to babies in her schedule. But she knew she’d find a way. She owed this old lady. And she loved her like the grandmother she’d never had.

“Can the classes be held at any other time? That’s right in the middle of my breakfast rush.”

“No.” Maude Evelyn sipped at her cup of hot tea. She was the only person in Sea Glass Point who drank the stuff. Sunny kept a tin of expensive tea bags just for her. “I will give you my generous standard compensation. Ten dollars an hour and free Master classes. We need to work on your posture Sumner, again.”

“How long are the classes?”

“They run thirty minutes each. Longer than that and you lose the poor little darlings attention completely.”