Conley didn’t put on a sundress, but she did take the time to pick out a pair of white shorts that showed off her legs, and a scoop-necked coral-pink tank top. She ran a brush through her hair and, in a begrudging concession to her grandmother, put on a pair of dangly silver earrings and some peachy-coral lipstick.
She was in the kitchen, pouring herself a glass of chardonnay, when she heard Skelly’s feet on the staircase outside.
“Your boyfriend’s here,” Winnie whispered from her seat at the table.
“Stop it!” Conley ordered.
G’mama moved with surprising swiftness toward the living room and the front door. “Sean Kelly, come on in here,” she said loudly.
She ushered Skelly into the kitchen. He had Conley’s navy-blue backpack slung over his right shoulder and was holding out a bottle of wine.
“I was getting ready to lock up the store, but I kept hearing this buzzing noise. I thought I was going crazy, then I spotted this backpack on the floor by the lunch counter.”
“Oh my God, thanks!” Conley eagerly unzipped the bag and rummaged around until she found her cell phone. The screen was black.
“I think the battery died while I was on the way out here,” Skelly said.
“I’m just glad to have it back,” she said, plugging it into an adapter near the kitchen counter.
“I bet you’re hungry after that long ride out here from town,” Lorraine said, beaming at him. “Why don’t you sit right down and let us fix you some supper?”
Conley shot her grandmother a warning look, which was ignored. “Sean probably needs to get back home to look after Miss June, right?”
“Actually, her aide is staying over with her tonight,” Skelly said. “Thanks for the offer, but I already grabbed a sandwich before leaving the store.” He turned to Conley. “But I wouldn’t mind a short walk on the beach.”
She grabbed the wine tote she’d already packed, adding an extra plastic tumbler. “You read my mind.”
“You look pretty serious,” Conley said as they trudged down the path through the dunes. “What’s wrong?”
“I got the digital issue of the Beacon,” he said. “I guess it took me by surprise. I mean, Gray told me y’all were putting out a special issue, but geez, Conley, that story about Symmes Robinette, dying under ‘mysterious circumstances’ and all that stuff about him giving his farm to his first wife and then Vanessa running against Charlie? Was all that really necessary? It seems like pretty private family stuff to me.”
“He was an eighteen-term member of Congress who died in a one-car crash at three in the morning,” Conley said. “And the medical examiner’s office still hasn’t ruled on the cause of death.”
“You make it sound so sinister,” Skelly said.
“We’ve talked about this, Skelly,” Conley said. “None of what Michael and I wrote is gossip. It’s not conjecture. It’s news. And before you ask, yeah, it is relevant. And what’s news—and especially relevant—is the fact that the family hushed up Symmes’s terminal cancer diagnosis last year so that he could start quietly setting up his son as his anointed successor.”
Conley ticked off the talking points she’d used to persuade Grayson that the stories were credible, relevant, and important to their community.
But Skelly still didn’t look convinced.
“Are you regretting your decision to make that ad buy with the Beacon?”
“Maybe I’m just not used to seeing anything controversial in the paper,” Skelly admitted. “But I will say I think the ad should bring in some new business for Kelly’s Drugs. Besides, if I want folks in Silver Bay to shop local—at Kelly’s instead of the damn chain stores—I need to walk the walk.”
“Attaboy,” she said, patting his back. “Maybe if a bunch of other local businesses see Kelly’s advertising with us, they’ll decide to do the same thing.”
They reached the edge of the dunes. Conley was already barefoot, but Skelly kicked off his loafers, and they dropped the tote bag near a weathered cedar swinging bench. Conley uncorked the bottle of chardonnay and held it up to show him.
“Wine?”
“Don’t mind if I do,” Skelly said, holding up his tumbler.
Conley dug her toes into the sand. “This is what I missed, living in Atlanta. Going barefoot. The smell of the ocean.”
“All the things we take for granted living on the Gulf coast,” Skelly agreed.
The sky turned a soft violet, shot through with streaks of orange. The Gulf was quiet tonight, sending gentle rolling waves washing along the beach. They walked north without speaking, wading out just far enough to let the warm water lap against their ankles.
As the sky darkened, they saw lights switching on in the houses just above the dunes.
Conley held up her empty tumbler when they’d walked all the way to the pier, a healthy half-mile stroll. “Ready to head back?”
Skelly nodded, and they pivoted and walked south.
The Hawkins family called the area where the swing was located Pops’s Cove. It was the spot where her grandfather liked to “pitch camp,” as he put it, spreading out the picnic blanket, the cooler of cold drinks, the hamper of sandwiches or fried chicken, and the folding aluminum lawn chairs.
In the winter, they’d build a fire here and roast Apalachicola oysters, which they’d smear atop saltine crackers doused with Tabasco sauce.
This was the spot where the family gathered after Pops’s funeral and after Conley’s father’s funeral too. Later, G’mama had commissioned a local carpenter to build a six-foot-long swing hung from two A-frame posts. A small brass plaque on the back proclaimed it dedicated to the art of “sitting around, doing nothin’,” which her grandfather always claimed was his only hobby.
Skelly held the swing still while Conley refilled their tumblers, then they both sat down, staring out at the deepening sky.
“I took a ride by Grayson’s house on the way out to the Dunes today,” she told him. “I’m pretty sure Tony’s gone. His car’s not there, and the yard looked pretty raggedy.”
“Sad,” Skelly said.
“Even sadder is the fact that my own sister can’t be straight with me. I wanted all of us to go out for drinks after we got off deadline to celebrate our first big digital experiment, but Grayson said she had stuff to do. Then I saw her car at the parking lot at the country club.” She shook her head. “Why can’t she just be honest and tell me what’s going on?”
“Maybe she’s embarrassed,” Skelly said. He stretched his arm along the back of the swing. “I know the last time Danielle left—for good—I didn’t tell anybody. I kept thinking, maybe she’d change her mind. It’s stupid, but I guess I thought if I didn’t admit we were getting divorced, it would keep it from happening. I wouldn’t have to admit that our marriage was a failure. And so was I.”
“Denial is a powerful emotion,” Conley said, sighing. “It must be a generational thing. From the time I was a little kid, nobody ever leveled with me about what was going on with my mom when she up and disappeared.”
“When she left, she was gone for long stretches of time, right?” Skelly asked.
“Yep. And the times got longer over the years.”
“What did your dad tell you and Grayson?”
“The first time, he said she was going to graduate school. Someplace out west.”
“But that wasn’t true?”
“No. I think she was actually in rehab. But nobody has ever admitted that to me. Later, as I got older, I figured out that things weren’t working in their marriage. They never fought as far as I could tell. She’d just … vanish.”
He let his palm rest on her shoulder, and after a momentary shock, she realized his touch was welcome. Reassuring even.
“Must have been hard on your dad,” he said.
“The worst,” she agreed. “Every time she came home, he was so happy! I’d hear him humming to himself. He’d bring home little presents for her in the middle of the week—some flowers, a bottle of her favorite perfume, maybe a piece of jewelry.” Conley sighed and took a sip of her wine. “But the rest of us, G’mama and Pops and Grayson—even Winnie—we were all … holding our breath. Everybody knew it was just a matter of time before she left again. Everybody but Dad. And then, when she was gone, he just got so quiet. And sad. So very goddamn sad.”
Skelly tilted his head toward her, absorbing her words. He was a good listener, which she found to be a precious quality in a man. His eyes were a deep blue green, and they were bracketed with crow’s-feet.
“I’m sorry,” she said suddenly. “This must hit awfully close to home for you. Anyway, it’s old history. Let’s talk about something else.”
“No, it’s actually a relief to talk about it,” Skelly said. “I went to a therapist for a while after Danielle left, but once she filed for divorce, eventually it felt like a waste of money. Like, she’s not coming back, so why keep beating a dead horse?”
“Would you take her back again if she decided to try to make it work?” Conley asked.
“No,” he said quickly. “Too much has happened. And not just with her. With me too.”
“Like what?”
He looked away and blushed slightly. “You really want to know?”
“Yes.”
“Don’t laugh. You moved back home.”
“Oh God, Skelly,” she started to say.
He tapped his fingertip gently to her lips. “Let me finish. When you walked into the bar at the Legion last week, my brain lit up like a pinball machine. Endorphins, whatever. And then when we danced together…”
“We’d both been drinking,” Conley said. “Me, especially.”
“No,” he said stubbornly. “I had two beers. It wasn’t the booze talking. At least for me it wasn’t.”
“I’d forgotten what a great dancer you were. Are,” she corrected herself. She found herself thinking back to the only other time she’d danced with Sean Kelly. God, how she’d looked forward to that night. She’d gotten her first professional manicure and pedicure, even talked G’mama into taking her shopping at the mall in Tallahassee for her dress. She’d had a huge crush on Sean Kelly, one that she’d never confessed to a single soul.
“What?” he asked, leaning closer. “You’re still mad at me for taking you home early, and then, after … you know, with Steffi … I was an idiot. A horny, teenage idiot. You’ll never know how many times I wished that night had ended differently.”
“Me too,” she said simply. She took another sip of wine and then another. “As long as we’re dabbling in true confessions here, maybe now is the point when I tell you that you broke my silly girlish heart that night.”
He closed his eyes and buried his head in his hands. “Gaaaaaah,” he groaned. “I was such a pig. Such a loser.”
“I had the night all built up in my mind,” she went on, liberated by the wine and the passage of time. “I was the only girl in my class at boarding school who was still a virgin. Okay, maybe the others were lying, but I was convinced that I was the only virgin left in the world. So I decided it was high time to … you know … become a real woman. And I’d made the decision that the most perfect boy in the world to give it up to was … Sean Kelly. The world’s cutest boy next door.”
He raised his head and regarded her with sad puppy dog eyes. “You’re totally making this up just to torture me.”
“Nope,” she said sadly. She mimed an X over her chest and repeated the oath she and Grayson—and Sean—had shared as kids. “Cross my heart and hope to die, stick a needle in my eye.”
“You’re killing me here,” Skelly said.
“I had the whole evening all planned out. We’d dance the night away. You’d wrap your arms around me during the slow dances, and I’d press my miniature breasts up against your masculine chest, and you’d be so swept away with passion, you’d kiss me right there on the dance floor.”
Skelly took a long gulp of his own wine. “Go on.”
“That’s about it,” she said, shrugging. “At one point in the evening, I went to the ladies’ room, and some girls had a flask of Southern Comfort. I took three or four swigs, and then, when I went back out to the ballroom to start my big seduction, you were dancing with Steffi. And you had your hands all over her ass.”
“She asked me to dance,” Skelly protested. “And for your information, she was grinding on me like a cat in heat. Also, now that you mention it, the guys in the men’s room were passing around some stuff that night, but it wasn’t Southern Comfort. I guess I was semi-buzzed, because if I’d been sober I never would have had the nerve to grope Steffi whatshername right there in front of God and the chaperones.”
“You broke my heart that night,” Conley said. “I found Grayson and begged her to get her date to take me home, but they had plans of their own, so I just had to sit there, watching you dry hump the biggest slut in Silver Bay.”
“I’m sorry,” Skelly said. He took both her hands in his. “Teenage boys should not be allowed out in public. They should be chained until their hormones are under control and they learn how to be decent human beings.”
Her mind wandered to Charlie Robinette and the excruciating humiliation he’d inflicted upon her only a year or two after that night at the country club with Skelly. They’d both been horny teenagers, but the difference was that Charlie had gone out of his way to hurt her.
“That’s a little extreme, don’t you think?” Conley said, looking down at their entwined hands. “Anyway, in retrospect, it’s probably all for the best. No telling how long that condom I stole from Grayson’s dresser drawer had been in there.”
Skelly’s eyes widened. “You brought a condom? To the country club dance? For real?”
“It was in my evening bag with my lipstick, a roll of Certs, and a quarter for the pay phone. My mama might not have been around a lot, but she did sit me down when I turned thirteen to explain the facts of life,” Conley said primly. “Her only words of advice before my freshman year of college were to never let a stranger buy me a drink in a bar and to get myself to the student clinic and get on the Pill.”
“Well, damn,” Skelly said. “Just … damn.”
“I know,” she agreed. “You didn’t even kiss me at the front door. All my fantasies died that night.”
Skelly leaned his forehead against hers. “If only there were a way I could make it up to you now,” he murmured, tilting her chin until his lips hovered over hers. “If only I knew your big sister wasn’t hiding in the bushes, waiting to beat the crap out of me for making a move on you.”
Conley’s lips curled into a smile. “I happen to know that at this moment, Grayson’s ensconced at the bar at the club, and I’m the last thing on her mind. What the hell. Give it a shot.”
“Really?”
She took his face in her hands and kissed him, long, slowly, deliberately.
He pulled away for a moment. “So that’s a yes?”
Her response was to wrap her arms around his neck and pull him closer. “Do you need a permission slip?”
His first kiss was gentle, tentative, like a prolonged sigh. He wove his fingertips through her hair, kissed her earlobes, then the hollow of her throat. He rained kisses on her bare shoulders, then worked his way back up to her mouth, parting her lips with his tongue.
“Okay?” he asked, his lips still against hers.
“Skelly?”
“Mmm-hmm?”
“You’re doing just fine.”
His kisses grew more urgent, and Conley responded in kind. By mutual agreement, they tumbled, giggling, out of the swing and onto the soft sand below. At some point, she realized that the sky had grown darker, violet deepening to purple.
“Hey,” she said, sitting up suddenly. She pointed toward the horizon. “The sun’s about to set.”
Skelly propped himself up on one elbow, dropping a kiss on her bare shoulder. He gazed out at the orange fireball poised to disappear. “Beautiful. Like you.”
“I’ve missed this,” she said.
“What? Making out on the beach with the cutest boy next door?”
“I was gonna say sunsets. I can’t remember a single night, living in Atlanta, that I stopped what I was doing just to watch the sky turn this amazing color. But making out with you on the beach is pretty amazing too,” she said, smiling down at him.
He sat up and wrapped his arms around her chest, kissing her neck and shoulders, and she leaned back into his embrace. Finally, the sky was an inky blue black, scattered with stars and a waning crescent moon.
Skelly pulled her back down into the sand, tugging at her clothes with renewed urgency, nudging her knees apart with his own. She pulled his shirt over his head, and he obligingly removed her top. He easily removed her shorts. She found his zipper and slowly inched it down, stroking him as she went.
They reclined on their sides, facing each other, their legs entwined, touching, stroking, kissing.
“Um, Conley?”
She was kissing his chest, working her way down his abdomen, enjoying how ragged his breathing got the farther south she moved.
“Did you by any chance keep that condom you stole from Grayson?”
She stopped what she was doing. “A twenty-year-old condom? Um. No. But what kind of pharmacist doesn’t keep birth control in his pocket for emergencies like this?”
“The newly divorced kind. The kind who’s convinced he’ll never have sex again.”
She kissed him lightly, then pulled him on top of her. “Lucky for you, I was a Girl Scout. And I’m always prepared.”
“Wow,” Skelly said, draping an arm over her side. “What was in that wine?”
“Nothing special,” Conley said lazily.
“Unlike you,” he said, nuzzling her neck. “I can’t believe what just happened here. Sarah Conley Hawkins jumped my bones.”
“I seem to remember that you made the first move,” Conley said, reaching for her top and pulling it over her head.
“I was trying to restore your faith in humanity. To make all your teenage fantasies come true,” he said.
She chuckled. “I’d say my fantasies were more than realized.”
Skelly sat up and gazed around. “I didn’t want to say anything because I didn’t want to spoil the mood, but for a while there, I kind of had this creepy feeling that we were being watched. You, uh, you don’t think your grandmother could see us from the house, do you?”
“No way,” she said flatly. “I can see the cove from my room, but G’mama sleeps downstairs. What time is it, anyway?”
He consulted his watch. “Nearly nine.”
“Then G’mama and Winnie are either bent over their jigsaw puzzle or fast asleep. I’d vote for sleeping.”
“Hope so,” he said, pulling on his shirt. “I don’t want her chasing me down with a shotgun for besmirching her granddaughter.”
She handed him his pants and donned her own panties and shorts. “Don’t be so dramatic. The besmirching was mutual. Anyway, my grandmother adores you. Always has.”
He put one leg into his pants and then the other before pulling her to her feet. “And what about you?”
Conley busied herself brushing the sand from her bare legs, arms, and neck. “God. I’m a mess. I’ve got sand in places I didn’t know I had.”
“Me too,” Skelly said. He reached for her hand. “You haven’t answered my question.”
“Skelly.” She drew out his name. “What do you want from me?”
“Never mind,” he said curtly. “What was I thinking? We literally had sex on the beach here a few minutes ago, but how self-involved am I to think you might indicate you have some kind of feelings for me?”
“I do have feelings for you,” she protested. “I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t. But this—you and me? This is so new. I’m just out of a relationship, you’re newly divorced…”
“Were you in love with this guy Kevin? The reporter in Atlanta?”
“No,” she said slowly. “I cared about him, but it hadn’t gotten that far.”
“Well, I’ve been divorced for almost a year,” Skelly said. “And Danielle and I were off and on separated for the last five years of our marriage. This isn’t some rebound thing for me, Conley.”
“Oh, Skelly,” she said softly. “Give me some time, please?”
He picked up his shoes and started walking up the path through the dunes. “I don’t have much choice, do I?”