They spent half an hour skipping stones on the water, though neither Connor nor Margaux was very good, even after Nick helped them with their technique. But they laughed a lot, at least Margaux did, and she thought Connor did because his whole body vibrated when something funny happened.
Nick did seem to lighten up a bit, but Margaux was beginning to think he never unwound completely. Maybe he didn’t even know how. Which was a shame.
They took off their shoes, waded across the cove, and climbed the rocks of the jetty where Margaux pointed out her house to Connor. She felt Nick tense beside her and realized that he was looking at the old lifeguard stand and she cursed herself for making the suggestion.
The sun was beginning to head toward the horizon as they retraced their steps back to the truck. Margaux had spent more time than she’d planned with them and she knew she should use that as an excuse to get out of going to Deke’s. She was aware of how people would jump to the wrong conclusions.
But it had been so long since she’d just had fun that she brushed her good sense aside. So instead of asking Nick to drop her off at the marina when they drove back toward town, she stayed quiet and concentrated on the passing scenery.
They turned onto the bumpy road that led through the salt marshes to the narrow bridge that was the only access to the Crescent Cove beach and boardwalk.
One minute they were on a paved street flanked by stores and houses, the next they were surrounded by delicate stalks of marsh grass that swayed and shimmered in the breeze. All around them the fragile tips reflected peridot and amber from the setting sun.
Margaux gasped. “Stop, please.”
The truck screeched to a stop. “What is it?”
“Can you wait just a minute? I’ll be right back.” She was already getting out of the truck.
An idea had exploded in her head. She had to get a better look, engrave the subtle colors in her brain before memory dimmed them into gray.
“Or go ahead, I’ll meet you at Deke’s.”
Near the bridge, a wooden platform jutted a few feet into the sanctuary. She walked out to the end. All around her, shades of green, gold, and silver glimmered and changed with the light or with a passing cloud. She let her peripheral vision melt the grasses into a myriad of shades, tones, and luminosity, all combining to create a sea of living color.
She heard a car door shut, the patter of feet behind her, and turned to see Connor running toward her. As he reached her he opened his arms, his eyes wide and dark and lonely.
She caught him up, swinging him onto her hip and pointing out to the marsh. “Look at that. What do you think, Connor? Shall we make a dress the color of salt grass?”
He nodded, then pointed toward the horizon. An egret lifted out of the grass, its white wings spreading against the blue sky and flying across the sun until it was merely a silhouette.
“And an egret, too,” she said. “You are such a smart boy.”
He’d seen what she had been missing. It was out there, vibrant and alive. Had been surrounding her all along, but she hadn’t seen it. She had been too busy reacting—to her impending divorce, to losing her job, to something she couldn’t name until now as she gazed at the marshland. Fear. She was afraid. To let herself come out in her designs, to face life alone, to let herself be attracted to a man with whom she had nothing in common. To find joy again.
It was calling to her, that missing something. Somehow she had to capture it and bring it back into her life again.
As she stood there with Connor, she wasn’t seeing marsh grass. She saw silk chiffon, shimmering in the lights of the runway. It was a stunning idea. Could she translate these colors from nature to cloth?
The sun flared from behind a white cloud as it settled toward the horizon. But Margaux was seeing a gown of red, gold, pink, mauve, a train the colors of sunset fanning out behind it like the sun itself.
Nick came up beside them. “What are you doing?”
“Seeing color,” Margaux said, and laughed. “Isn’t that right, Connor?”
Connor nodded and wrapped his arms around her neck.
Suddenly she was aware of how crazy she looked, of how she’d picked up Connor without thinking. She let him slide down her hip and peeled his arms from her neck.
“Sorry, I got a little carried away.” She turned back to the truck. Nick took Connor’s hand. Connor reached for Margaux’s hand and he skipped between them until they reached the road.
They were quiet as they drove over the bridge to the boardwalk. It wasn’t a true boardwalk. The walk was actually asphalt, though big chunks had heaved out of it over the last decade and weeds grew up in the cracks. At one time it had been the center of local life in Crescent Cove.
She and her friends sometimes came over to play the games at the arcade or ride the carousel and reach for the golden ring. They’d eat fried dough and buy clam rolls from Deke’s father. Sometimes they’d come to watch the beach movies, scooping out the sand to make pillows for their heads.
Nick pulled to a stop in the parking lot. Everything but Deke’s looked closed now. The arcade was boarded over. The smaller stores were dark. The Seaview Motel, the only motel in Crescent Cove, had closed years ago. But it still sat behind the parking lot, a one-storied, sky blue, concrete bunker, deserted and unused.
They got out of the truck, and Connor ran over to the rail fence that surrounded the parking lot. He pointed across the beach to the point of land that jutted into the Sound like a fallen stalactite.
“What’s that?” he breathed.
“It’s Crescent Point. On a moonless night, if you go to the very end, you can see the whole Milky Way.”
He looked up at Margaux and screwed up his face.
“Not the candy, goose. But stars that look like milk in the sky.”
“I want to see it.” His whisper carried a little louder than before, but Margaux might have imagined it.
She wanted him to see the Milky Way, but she wasn’t about to intrude into Nick’s territory.
“I’m sure Uncle Nick will bring you when the moon is a sliver.” She raised her eyebrows, but Nick wasn’t paying attention, he was looking into the mid-distance halfway between her and Connor, oblivious. “Isn’t that right, Nick?” she said louder.
He actually jumped. “What? Sure?”
Connor pointed to Margaux. “You, too.”
She definitely heard him then. Nick was looking at him, too. She shot him a warning look not to make too much of the tiny breakthrough and risk pushing him back into silence.
“Okay,” she said tentatively. “We used to go out there when I was a kid.” It was the most popular necking place in the area. “See the big house with the turrets, the round things on the side? We thought it was haunted.”
“Really?”
“Yes, but it turned out that these really nice people lived there. And they used to rent out cottages that looked just like they belonged in a fairy tale.” She turned to Nick. This time he was watching her. “Do the Vanderhoefs still live there?”
Nick nodded.
What was wrong with him? He’d just started easing up and now he was remote and unapproachable again.
“You hungry?” Margaux asked.
Connor nodded.
The three of them walked across the street to Deke’s.
“Mom said the town is going to restore the boardwalk and beach,” she said conversationally. “That would be good for the community.”
“As long as they don’t go overboard.”
Margaux smiled. “That’s exactly what Mom said.”
He looked down the broken asphalt to the row of abandoned businesses. “I love this town the way it is. And a small arcade would be good. But if it gets too fancy, the community will be pushed aside like they are everywhere else.”
Margaux smiled at his vehemence. “So they should fix it up, but just enough for the local folks to enjoy it.”
“Exactly.”
Nick hadn’t meant to say all that stuff to Margaux. For some reason he kept saying things he didn’t mean to say when she was around. Before she came, he would never have just showed up on someone’s doorstep with groceries. He’d never invite a woman out with him and Connor.
The grapevine would be humming with speculation by tomorrow, and he didn’t want anyone to get the wrong idea or set up expectations about him and Margaux. He especially didn’t want to start getting ideas about Margaux himself, because it would be too easy to hurry down that dead end.
Connor had taken to her immediately. Nick guessed children had an instinct about whom they could trust. And it was really evident he trusted Margaux. Hell, the kid was skipping today. A few minutes before, he’d come as close to talking out loud as Nick had ever heard him. And Nick knew it was because of Margaux.
Part of him was ecstatic, the other part was filled with dread that Connor was pretending he had a mother and father again and would be devastated when Margaux left to go back to New York. He probably shouldn’t encourage their friendship, but he didn’t have the heart to say no.
So here they were, the three of them, walking into the Clam Shack at the height of the dinner hour. At least it was off season and the middle of the week.
Only four of the ten tables were occupied. Everyone looked up when the door opened and Margaux and Connor walked in before him.
The Thompsons froze with smiles on their faces, then Mrs. Thompson waved her fingers at them, said something admonishing to her husband and he looked away. Doug Loomey, who owned the bait shop, just nodded and went back to eating his fish dinner. Nick didn’t recognize the people at the other two tables.
But Peg stopped in the middle of the floor, both hands carrying plates. Her mouth went slack. “Margaux Sullivan.” She hurriedly deposited the plates and rushed forward to give Margaux a hug. “I wondered how long it was going to be until you came by. Hey, Deke,” she called over her shoulder.
Deke O’Halloran slid two plates through the food window. “What is it? Oh Lord. Hi, Margaux, how you been?”
“Good, thanks.”
He nodded, grinned, and disappeared from the opening.
Peg looked up at Nick with a twinkle in her eye. “I see you’ve met our new chief of police.”
Nick swore Margaux blushed, but she said smoothly, “He was nice enough to drive me and Connor on our dinner date.”
Peg chuckled. Connor pulled Margaux toward a table by the window. Nick shrugged and followed them, Peg grinning after them. They’d barely gotten Connor settled next to the window when she showed up with servings of coleslaw and pickles and three plastic glasses of water.
“What can I get you?”
“What do you want, Connor?” Nick asked, schooling himself not to answer for the boy. Keeping his fingers crossed that he might actually speak.
Connor’s mouth moved. Nick knew he was saying “fish fingers.” He guessed that Peg did, too. He always got fish fingers at the Clam Shack.
Margaux’s hand went to Connor’s hair, she smoothed it away from his forehead. “Peg couldn’t hear you. Tell her again.”
This time “fish fingers” came out on an expulsion of breath.
“Ah, fish fingers. Those are Ceci’s favorites, too.” She took Nick and Margaux’s orders and went to relay them to Deke.
Nick stared at his paper place mat. While they’d been on the beach and in the woods, he’d felt totally happy to be with someone Connor liked . . . someone he liked. But in the tiny restaurant he felt uncomfortable.
Margaux seemed totally at ease. She had leaned toward Connor and they were looking out the window. She was pointing to something, though Nick only saw darkness closing in on the boardwalk.
“When did the arcade close?”
“What?” Nick wrenched his thoughts back from the long road they’d been traveling. “Last September. It stayed open but mostly empty last summer. It’s up for sale.”
Margaux sighed. “That’s too bad. We used to love to come play the games and ride the carousel. I heard they designated it a historic site.”
“Yeah, Jake McGuire’s dad owns it. Jake’s planning to get it up and running by next summer. It’ll take a huge amount of work and money. But Jake’s determined.”
“Good for him.” She looked back out the window. Her hair was beginning to curl and Nick liked that promise of wildness she obviously wanted to control.
She was beautiful, but he didn’t think happy. If she was here for a vacation, why had she rented space at Linda’s?
Peg returned with their meals.
Connor reached for the ketchup. Margaux and Nick both turned to help him. Margaux pulled her hand back and Nick flipped open the plastic top and squeezed the ketchup onto his plate. Connor jabbed a French fry into the ketchup and stuffed it into his mouth.
They ate without much conversation. After a few desultory tries, Nick gave up. They both talked to Connor, who nodded and kept eating.
Peg came to clear away the plates. “Why don’t you go on back and see Ceci, Connor, while Uncle Nick and Margaux have their coffee?”
Connor glanced up at Nick.
“Sure. Go ahead. We’ll be right here.”
He looked at Margaux.
“Right here,” she said.
Connor slid out of his chair and squeezed past Margaux. Peg looked surprised and delighted before she turned and followed Connor to the back of the restaurant.
Nick stared after them. It was the first time Connor had willingly left to play with another child. Of course Connor knew Ceci, felt comfortable with Peg. It was a small step, he cautioned himself. But it was a step. He felt a resurgence of hope.
“He’s a sweetheart,” Margaux said.
Nick nodded. “It was really nice of you to come out with him today. He isn’t very outgoing.”
“It was my pleasure.”
Peg came back with two beige mugs of coffee.
“He’s fine. They’re watching The Little Mermaid. It might be hard to drag him away, so take your time.”
Nick only wished that would be the case, but he knew that when it was time to go, Connor would merely get up and leave. Sometimes he longed for a tantrum or whining or something that said Connor was a normal boy.
He’d prayed for Connor to show an interest in something or someone beyond his grandmother and uncle, but he never expected him to be attracted to Margaux. A woman who lived in the fast lane, who was a career woman, who had no children, and who was going to leave.
Maybe he should explain that it wouldn’t be good to get too close to the boy and raise his expectations. Or to raise Nick’s. When Connor had been skipping between them out in the sea marsh, they’d felt like a family. And even though Nick knew it was an illusion, he fell into it and let himself wonder.
He took a sip of coffee, put down his mug. “Connor’s mother left him with a neighbor one day and never came back.”
Margaux looked up, her face going pale. A few freckles powdered her nose, probably brought on by the sun. He imagined she used all sorts of creams and beauty products to keep them at bay. He circled his cup on the tabletop.
“That’s terrible. Is she . . . dead?”
Nick shrugged. Why on earth had he blurted that out? Now, she would expect him to tell her all about it. And for the first time in the two years since Ben had died he thought he might want to tell someone. He wanted to tell her.
“I don’t know. Frankly, I don’t care.”
“How could a mother do that?” Her hand went to her mouth. “Sorry. I’m sure there were extenuating circumstances.”
“If you call a guy on a motorcycle extenuating, then yeah, there were.”
He shouldn’t be telling her this. He hadn’t confided in anybody, just gave them the line the army gave him, husband dead, wife couldn’t cope with the stress. Yada yada.
“Connor’s father was deployed most of his life, and he doesn’t remember much about him. I visited him when he was younger. He was a normal kid. A terrible two. It was great. But now—he’s sad sometimes. But he’s happy, too.” Like when he’s with you.
“He seemed to be having a good time today.”
Nick realized he was shredding his napkin. He dropped the remnants. “I just don’t want him to suffer any more loss.”
“Of course not.”
She wasn’t getting it. He tried again. “You’re going to be busy while you’re here.”
“And?”
Nick swallowed. “He seems to already be growing attached to you.”
“I see.” She sat back in her chair, looking hurt, and he wanted to take back everything he’d said. He’d meant to drive her away, and now that he had, he just wanted her closer.
He was afraid it was too late for Connor or him.
“You want me to stay away from him.”
Just say it and get it over with. “I think that would be for the best.”
“I didn’t think about that when I agreed to come. He was so cute. He seduced me.”
She smiled at him and Nick felt his resolution slip as everything else picked up.
“But are you sure that’s the best road to take? He’s going to meet a lot of people passing through his life. He must know that he has you and his grandmother.” She hesitated. “Unless you’re planning on leaving, too.”
He automatically shook his head. “I won’t leave. I have too much that keeps me here.”
She smiled again but this time it didn’t send his blood racing; it was a combination of understanding and compassion and it cut right to his heart.
“Anyway. The damage is probably already done.”
“I agree, but I won’t go out of my way to avoid him. He’s a child for heaven’s sake. He won’t understand.” She looked a little sad. “I’m not much for going to Mass, and if you don’t bring him to the store, I probably won’t see him again.
“But I don’t want him to think I deserted him, too. You’ll have to think of something to tell him, that doesn’t include making me out to be the bad guy.” She stood up. “I guess we’d better be going.”
Peg went to fetch Connor, they said goodbye to Deke and walked across the tarmac to the parking lot. The sky was full of stars, but Nick didn’t call attention to them. He just wanted to get Margaux and Connor home as soon as possible before he lost his resolution and begged her to stay.
He dropped Margaux off at the marina, then backtracked to his mother’s house to drop off Connor. If she noticed that it meant an extra trip for him, she didn’t say. Just thanked him for dinner, said goodbye to Connor, and walked across the street to the house.
He hoped to hell she’d be gone before he returned.
It was harder to walk away than she expected, Margaux thought as she walked up the steps of the old Victorian. She was sad and disappointed at Nick’s decision to keep Connor from her.
On their way back to town, Connor had fallen asleep, his head pillowed against her arm. She had to force herself not to touch him, draw him closer, protect him against the bumps in the beach road. They arrived at Le Coif much too soon. Connor had roused enough to hug her and give her a sticky kiss before she thanked Nick for dinner and got out of the truck.
Nick didn’t look too much happier than she did. He didn’t even make a pretense of walking her across the street. She felt for him and knew he was doing what he thought best. He should probably find someone to marry and give Connor a real mother.
He drove away before she even reached the steps of Le Coif.
She unlocked the front door and tiptoed across the Elvis rug to unlock her new studio. She really didn’t want Linda pumping her with questions about her “date” with Nick and Connor.
She turned on the light and blinked against the glare. The first thing she saw was her “ocean” dress. From the mouths of babes, she thought, and sat down at her drafting table. She would design a dress the color of the salt marsh at sunset. It would be her memory of one fun afternoon with a boy and his uncle.
Several hours later, she heard the front door open and close. Heels clicked across the foyer.
“Holy moly,” squealed Linda. “What happened?”
Margaux whirled around. Linda was wearing black leather pants that molded to her figure like paint. A cowl-neck sweater was covered by a poncho of red, white, and green stripes.
“You look like the Italian flag,” Margaux said on a laugh.
“Yeah, well you try riding around on the back of a Harley at night. I wanted to make sure anybody coming up behind us saw me before they hit me, ya know?”
“I hadn’t thought about that,” Margaux said. “Good choice.”
“Thanks. So how come you’re working and the chief’s upstairs by himself?”
“Oh, is he back?” Margaux asked innocently. She’d heard him go up the stairs hours ago, but she’d pushed him out of her mind and kept working. “I was working.”
“I can see that.” Linda came into the room and walked along the row of sketches Margaux had pinned on the line.
“Where’s the Harley-riding hunk?” Margaux asked.
“Hell, I wore him out and came home to paint my toenails.” Linda grinned at her. “He gets up at six to get to work. Thanks and no thanks. I’m going to bed. He wore me out, too.” She yawned a jaw-popping yawn. “Don’t work too late.”
“I’m almost ready to leave. Go on to bed. I’ll lock up.”
“Yuh-huh.” Linda waved and climbed the stairs to her apartment.
Margaux finished her last sketch, a pantsuit that reminded her of driftwood. She had gotten so carried away that she’d stopped editing herself as she went along. Now, as she looked at the line of new designs, she wondered if they were really couture or just “craftsy.”
She was too tired to make a judgment tonight. Tomorrow would be soon enough, when she had a little distance from them. She felt they were right, but she’d learned to bury that feeling when it came to bringing a project in on budget. In the back of her mind, she knew these new designs were one-of-a-kind couture and she couldn’t afford that now. But she was determined to follow it through.
Because Margaux Sullivan had a dream, and come hell or high water, she was going to recapture it.