| |
After Sam left Garrison and Aiden, she drove around the lake and surveyed her cabins, which were all full this weekend. The lake buzzed with the sounds of speedboat motors, rang with the laughter of skiers and spotters and swimmers. It was late afternoon, and somebody'd fired up a charcoal grill. The scent of hamburgers and hot dogs filtered through her open window and made her mouth water.
She drove to the small beach, grabbed her bag, and found an empty picnic table beneath the trees. The vacationers had congregated near the water and in the sun, so they were far enough away to be background noise. The table was rough but relatively clean. She set up her laptop and connected to the Wi-Fi in her nearest cabin. She'd bought a Wi-Fi booster for that cabin specifically so she could sit out here and work, a perk of ownership.
She'd been thinking about this ever since Garrison's call that morning. She didn't know much about addiction recovery, but she knew there were a lot of options—many of them bad. Maybe she could help narrow Garrison's choices.
She opened her browser, started to type, and stopped.
Was she overstepping? She and Garrison were friends, nothing else, and although she was always willing to help friends with research, with whatever they needed, her friends would ask. Garrison hadn't asked, but he had to be overwhelmed. And hadn't he confided in her, wanted her help to find a place to stay? Would he think her too forward if she dug into rehab places? Would he suspect her motives?
What were her motives?
She pushed the laptop away and stood. She didn't want to ask herself that question because she knew, deep down, what the answer was. She had feelings for Garrison that went beyond friendship. Ridiculous as it was, she was falling for the guy and had been since the first time she'd seen him, back when she still feared he'd throw Marisa, her new friend and a woman whose daughter had been kidnapped, in jail. But wow, how he'd come through for them, helped Marisa and Nate get to the bottom of the mystery that had had Marisa running for her life. If not for Garrison, would Marisa have ever gotten her daughter back?
Sweet little Ana. Who knew what would have become of her if not for Garrison?
He'd swooped in like a hero, then disappeared abruptly, and she'd feared she'd never hear from him again. It wasn't as if they'd even had time to develop a friendship in the one day they'd spent together. Then out of the blue, he'd called a few weeks later. He'd dropped out of the investigation looking for Marisa's daughter because his son had been getting in trouble more and more, sneaking out, taking off. Sam had little experience with teenage boys, but she knew how to listen.
Their friendship had developed over the next months during those phone calls. They'd laughed together, shared secrets, even worried together as Garrison had told her his fears for his son. But until this morning, they hadn't seen each other again. Garrison was too afraid to leave Long Island, even when Aiden was at his mother's house, because of her addiction issues and Aiden's drug use. He'd invited Sam to visit, but she couldn't do that.
Thank heavens she'd had a good excuse. Summer was her busy season, and she needed to be close by. It was true—mostly. Sure, her management company could handle just about everything, but the cabins were her responsibility, the guests her guests, and she felt she needed to be close, just in case.
Nothing had happened, of course, except for the leaky roof that had proved to be advantageous for her and Garrison, and the management company could have handled that. But even if she'd known the summer would go smoothly, she wouldn't have driven to Long Island. How could she have?
She wouldn't have made it as far Manchester.
As soon as Garrison figured out her issues, he'd shake her off like an insect.
Fine, there was no future for them. They were just friends, they'd always be just friends, and friends did stuff for each other. And if it bothered him that she'd started investigating rehab centers without his blessing, so be it. The sooner their friendship ended, the sooner that little flame of hope would be snuffed out, and she could go back to her life the way she'd planned it.
She stared at the families in the water and on the beach. Two beautiful little children sat on the shore and splashed in the gentle lap of the waves. The little girl was maybe three, the boy still crawling. Their parents watched from a few feet away.
Sam sat alone in front of her computer and opened her search engine.