30. Sloane
M ermaid Beach, Florida
“Begin by taking cleansing breaths to shake off the day’s stresses and be truly present for these next ten minutes ? —”
A skill saw whirrs, cutting off my online yoga instructor’s soothing voice. I grind my teeth. Will the construction ever end? They’ve been building that bloody hotel for years. At least it’s not the constant hammering today. I can’t sit out here and enjoy the gulf breeze on those days.
“Now let’s roll our body up and head into our downward facing ? —”
“I’ll park wherever the hell I want. I live here too!” Cody’s raised voice carries out an open window a moment before our front door slams.
So much for shaking off the day’s stresses. With a heavy groan of defeat, I flop backward onto my yoga mat and wait for my fiancé to march out here and complain about our tenant. Again .
The late-afternoon sun is warm, the palm trees providing no more than dappled shade over the white sand. The summer’s unbearably humid heat is around the corner, so I’ll enjoy this while I can as I study my little beach house.
I owe it all to my grandmother, Ruby Parker, affectionately known to all as Gigi.
She bought this home and the land it’s on forty years ago when she moved back to Florida from O‘ahu, freshly divorced and with a young daughter—my mother—in tow.
Back when Mermaid Beach was nothing more than a quaint fishing community.
When Gigi signed the property over to me eight months ago and moved into Palm Oaks, a home for the elderly twenty minutes away, she warned me not to skip a year of maintenance or this place would start fading away like a derelict shack and, as usual, she was right.
The sun and salty sea air from the Gulf have done a number, washing out the turquoise siding and leaving the white porch floor raw in patches.
At least the silver metal roof I installed last fall looks new.
“Frank’s being a prick again!” The back door swings open and slaps shut as Cody plows through, Gatorade in hand, his cut arms on display in a tank top. He’s fresh from the gym and still sweaty.
“What now?”
“I parked my truck like I always do, and he told me to move it.”
“You mean, you backed up to his porch so he can barely squeeze out his front door?” Frank has lived in a trailer on our property for fifteen years, since Gigi hired him to help run the Sea Witch, a coffee and rentals shop on the beach.
I arch a judgment-laden eyebrow at Cody. “I told you to stop doing that.”
“I’m not parking near the coop. The birds shit on my hood!”
“They shit on your hood, anyway.”
“Yeah, ’cause Frank trained them to do it.”
I roll my eyes. “How has Frank trained a bunch of chickens, whose brains are literally the size of marbles?” Though it’s hard to ignore the fact that they seem to target Cody’s fire-engine-red Dodge Ram while Gigi’s old Jeep Cherokee, painted the color of a clear summer sky, remains unscathed.
Cody trots down the eight steps to the sand. “I don’t know, but I’m tellin’ ya, I’ve had enough of him.”
“That’s too bad for you because Frank’s not going anywhere.” We see each other every day. We celebrate holidays together. He’s family to me.
“Unless he decides to leave.” Cody’s voice rings with challenge.
Tension cords my muscles. I know where this is heading if I push it—a huge fight about Cody doing his damnedest to make Frank feel unwelcome.
I don’t have the energy for that battle today, so I steer the conversation to a safer topic.
“We need to paint the house before high season. I figure between the three of us, we can have the whole place done in no time.”
“That’s actually what I want to talk to you about.” He bends over to press a kiss against my lips before pushing his hand through chestnut-brown hair. His thick mane was the first thing I noticed about him, followed quickly by his bright crystal blue eyes and flirtatious smile.
“Painting the house?” I say doubtfully. Cody is a lot of things—charming, spirited, attention-grabbing gorgeous—but eager to do physical labor is not how I would describe him.
“No. About selling it.”
My jaw hangs. “Did someone drop a weight on your head at the gym?” Gigi signed the beach house over to me so I could call it my own, not so I could cash in.
He crouches beside me, his face earnest as his palm smooths over my bare thigh.
“Come on, babe, you’ve been complaining nonstop about that hotel.
” He gestures behind me to where it looms in the near distance.
“It’s not even open yet. Imagine how much worse it’s gonna be?
How much busier? You won’t be able to sit out here anymore without being gawked at by strangers on the beach.
It’s not gonna be the same quiet place anymore. ”
My stomach knots as he voices my ongoing worries. We’ve been fighting the powers that be since the first notice went up on the vacant lot five years ago but have gotten nowhere, evidenced by the modern behemoth that now waits to house wealthy tourists.
Cody peers at me. “Look, I really didn’t want to say anything, but you haven’t been yourself lately and people are noticing.”
“People?” I frown as his words prick my pride. “What people?” Who’s been talking about me?
“Just … people , you know. About how this whole thing has taken a toll on you, made you bitter.”
I roll my eyes. “Let me guess—your mother.” Who despises me and has never hidden her feelings. I’m the one who stole her precious baby away.
“Things haven’t been the same for months. I’m talking about between us . Tell me you haven’t noticed it.”
“I … guess?” We’ve definitely been fighting more—about work, about Frank, about money. About everything, it seems. “I don’t know why.”
“I chalked it up to Gigi leaving and the pressure you’re under with the business, plus the hotel. But I’m not gonna lie—it’s been hard on me. I don’t want to start regretting giving you that ring?—”
I flinch.
“Oh no, don’t worry, babe, I don’t!” he rushes to say. “But I don’t want to see us lose what we have.” He cups my cheek, adding softly, “Do you?”
“ Of course not.” I smooth my thumb over the diamond solitaire on my ring finger, remembering the night Cody proposed, a day after Gigi moved out.
“Okay. So, then … stop being so stubborn. Let’s find a new place for the two of us to start our lives together. Th is isn’t my house. It’s not even yours.”
I inhale deeply. Is he right? Am I being stubborn?
My gaze wanders to the little Florida cottage behind us.
I was born here, when my mom went into labor during a hurricane and couldn’t get to a hospital in time.
Twelve years later, my mother died here.
This is where I’m happiest, listening to the waves lap and inhaling the salty air.
Gigi always jokes that she raised a mermaid masquerading as a human.
Indignation swells in me. No … Cody’s not right. This is my house. But I can see his point, that it’s not his.
Unless I make it so.
I’ve been thinking about this lately. Gigi will skin me alive for it, I’m sure, seeing as she was adamant everything be signed over in my name, so I owned it outright.
But Cody and I are getting married. He’s going to be my husband.
We’re going to share our lives and everything that comes along with that.
I open my mouth, ready to suggest adding his name to the deed after we’re married, when he digs a folded paper out of his back pocket and holds it out for me.
I frown. “What’s this?”
“Remember that hotel lawyer who came by here a few weeks ago?”
“The one I threatened?” That slimeball also handed me a piece of paper, a bid to buy my property that I ripped up into no fewer than twenty pieces without reading.
“He came by the Sea Witch a few days later.”
Unease slips down my spine. I guess it wouldn’t take more than a few questions around town to figure out where else to find me. Mermaid Beach is growing, but it’s still small and we’ve been here a long time. “You told him to fuck off, right?”
“He came to talk to me.”
“ You ? Why?”
“I guess he thought I’d be less emotional, and he wanted to make sure we saw what he was offering.” Cody shrugs in that one-shouldered way that says he’s leaving details out .
“ And ?”
“And I figured why not see what I could get out of him. So, I named a whole bunch of demands. You know, more money, a closing date in the offseason.”
Anger prickles my skin. Cody keeps saying “we” and “us” as if he has a say in what I do with my house.
“I even asked for lifetime passes to the hotel. And guess what? I got it all for us! Not the passes,” he quickly adds, “but an annual golf membership and a week’s stay in one of their penthouse suites. We could go there for our honeymoon.”
I stare at Cody with incredulity, trying to process what he’s saying, making sure I’m hearing correctly.
This isn’t the first time he’s floated the idea of selling.
He used to hint casually, wondering how much we could get for this little cottage by the sea.
Then his hints grew into late-night post-coital ponderings, our naked bodies sweaty and tangled up in each other, about what we’d do if someone handed us a million dollars.
In reality, I could get far more than that.
My bramble of land stretches all the way back to where the road curves inland.
It’s prime real estate in a thirsty market.
But this behind-my-back action? This is brazen and a new side of Cody, one I don’t like.
“So, you negotiated to sell my house with this sleazy lawyer after I’ve made it crystal clear how many times that I am not selling this property to Wolf Hotels or any other money-hungry asshole?” I say slowly, icily.
“You’re being selfish! And, well …” He falters. “What about what I want?”
“What exactly do you want?” Because my cynical side is beginning to spin dark theories.
“How about living in a house we both own!” He throws his hands in the air, sloshing Gatorade.
“We can’t buy another place like this .” These little beachside homes are all but gone, absorbed by developers building four-story monstrosities .
“It doesn’t have to be like this. There are tons of great places for half the price a few blocks inland.”
“ In land!” I spit the word with disgust. Why would I ever trade my view of the ocean every morning for watching neighbors pushing lawn mowers?
“Come on, would you read the deal before you flip out?” With one of his crooked smiles that normally wins me over no matter how angry I am, he unfolds the page and thrusts it in front of my face.
“Look at how many digits there are! And we won’t have to leave here until the fall so we can get married out on the beach like we planned and take our time finding another place. ”
“And you don’t think Wolf would just tear this place down?”
“So what? We can have something ten times nicer! Plus, we can pay off all our debts.”
“I don’t have any debts.”
But he goes on like I haven’t spoken. “And buy that cabin cruiser we’ve always talked about getting. And we could get my mom a new trailer …”
Cody’s words fade as his intentions scream to me, and seemingly obscure details click into place—about the timing of his proposal and his behaviors since. Frank had tried to warn me. Small, subtle comments that made me lash out at him. But he was right! How did I not see this before?
“Babe? Did you hear me?”
“I am such a sucker,” I whisper, a sheen of tears coating my eyes as I give my engagement ring a tug, letting it drop to the sand.