4. Ward
4
Ward
W ell, that had not gone the way he’d planned. Ward dropped his chin to his chest as her car disappeared around the corner.
“Everything all right?”
He jumped, a frisson of irrational anger coursing through him at being snuck up on once again. “Geez,” he muttered, turning to look at Juno, who had come to stand next to him. “I’m glad I wasn’t holding a hot cup of coffee.”
“Me, too,” Juno quipped, not bothering to hide her smile. “Would have been a shame if you’d spilled any of my fine brew.” She patted his shoulder. “But what on earth did you say to her? She left without saying goodbye to me.”
“Nothing.” He glanced down at the empty chair where Penny had been sitting, a slight indentation in the soft seat cushion the only telltale sign that she’d been there.
“Did you give her the coffee?”
“I did. And she made sure it wasn’t from me before she took it.”
“But it was from you,” Juno said, giving him a bemused look.
“She wouldn’t have taken it if I’d admitted as much.” Ward had seen the look in her eyes, the hesitation as she stared at the cup in his hands. Like she thought he might have spit in the drink, or something. “She was quite appreciative when I told her it was from you, though.” A flush warmed his neck as he thought of the delicate sound she’d made when she tasted it.
Juno nodded slowly, still studying him. “Hm.”
“What does that sound mean? Why can’t you women just say what you’re thinking?” Because he’d bet his bottom dollar that the noise she’d made held a world of meaning in it.
The woman’s chuckle rarely failed to elicit a smile from him. He liked the sound of it, the way it flowed out of her like a burbling mountain brook. But now, he frowned, something he’d been doing a lot of since his morning encounter with Hazel’s guest. It was something he’d been doing a lot of since moving back to the lake, if he were being honest. “It means, my dude, that I don’t know what’s going on here, but I do know something is going on, and I’m trying to figure out just what exactly that something is.”
Ward was shaking his head before she finished her sentence. “Never mind. I think I prefer the one-syllable version.”
“Oh Ward.” Juno gave his shoulders a quick squeeze. “Don’t be such a crabby pants. I won’t let you come in here if you’re just going to keep scaring off my customers. I like that one, especially, too. She’s good people, you know.”
Ward let out a grunt, and Juno stepped back, cocking her head at him. “And what, pray tell, does that sound mean?” she asked him, her smile discrediting the censure in her tone. “Why can’t you men just say what you’re thinking?”
He shook his head and snorted. “Okay. I deserved that. Sorry, Juno. I’m in a mood today.”
“Yeah, you are,” she agreed amiably. “Want to come back to the bar so I can whip you up something that will turn that frown upside down?”
“Nah. I gotta get going. I have a repair across the lake.”
“A WOOT?”
“Yep.” He tried to hide his reticence, but she picked up on it without too much effort.
“What’s going on with you? I mean, you’re always a bit of a grump, especially since—well, whatever. But today?” Juno crossed her arms, her brows drawn down in concern. “Is it your mom?”
Ward shook his head, ignoring her “grump” jab and the slip she’d almost made. “Mom is doing okay. It’s the North Shore job,” he admitted. “It’s a repair Dad supposedly already made a few days ago.”
“Huh. That doesn’t sound good,” she mused.
Ward grimaced. "Yeah. And it’s one of the Austin’s boats.” Everyone knew who the Austins were. Year-rounders, but still WOOTS by definition, Camden and Lysha Austin owned the largest of the North Shore homes across the water, complete with its own private sand beach, large dock, and two-story boathouse that looked like a slightly smaller replica of their house. Lysha Austin sat on the Board of Directors at the resort, while Camden Austin came from old money. His job was keeping the caddies busy at the North Shore Country Club.
It was Lysha who had called about having him come take a look at her bowrider. Ward had routed all work calls to his cell phone—his father had been letting too many of them go to voicemail and then never retrieving them. “My pretty boat is making a horrific squealing sound whenever I start it up. Word around town is that you’re the one to call when I need a repair,” she’d purred over the phone, making Ward scowl in distaste. He didn’t need her flattery to ensure he’d do a good job. His father had built his business on a reputation of good work ethic, quality service, and fair prices.
Ward had assigned the job to his dad. It wasn’t an uncommon problem and should have been a straightforward fix, since the alternator belt was a part Ted kept stocked in his work van. So when Lysha had called Ward back, reporting that the boat was still making noise, he’d promised to come over that afternoon to take a look at it himself.
Lysha Austin had seemed far too pleased when he’d assured her it would be him this time and not his father. “You’re the one I really wanted to see, anyway.” He got an uneasy vibe from the sultry way she spoke, but he couldn’t tell if she was intentionally throwing out double entendres or just naturally sounded that way.
Although he’d seen the woman several times since he’d first come home—it was hard not to run into the same folks in their small town of fewer than a thousand year-rounders—he’d only officially met her a couple of months ago when he’d gone across the lake to work on a pontoon for one of her neighbors, George Caper. She must have seen them out on the dock from her home, which sat a little higher on the bank from George’s place. She’d made her way along the well-maintained boardwalk that connected the private North Shore docks along that stretch of the shore, greeted George with a warm hello, and they’d chatted briefly about her husband’s golf game. Then she’d turned to Ward and introduced herself, giving him the once over as he straightened from where he’d been switching out an aluminum 3-blade propeller for a stainless steel 4-blade one that would give George a little more control over the big boat. Ward had felt a bit like a horse at auction under her bold perusal.
“So you’re the St. James of St. James Mobile Boat Repair,” she’d said. “I’m Lysha Austin.” She didn’t offer her hand, presumably having noted the state of his after putting George’s motor back together.
“Actually, no,” he’d corrected her. “That’s my father, Ted St. James. I’m just helping out for a few months.”
“But you are a St. James, aren’t you?” She did one of those slow-blink, cocked head things women did that reminded him of a cat toying with its prey. She was quite beautiful, with her sleek black hair and ebony eyes. Her very feminine curves strained strategically at the designer outfit she wore, and her shoes, impractically high for George’s dock, gave her already statuesque figure several more inches, so that she towered over her neighbor and stood eye-to-eye with Ward.
“Yes. Ward St. James,” he confirmed, wanting nothing more than to get back to the job he’d been hired to do. It was late in the day, he was starving, and he still had one more stop to make before heading home. He didn’t feel like being the mouse in her game.
Because he recognized it for what it was. This wasn’t the first time he’d been called up to “fix a boat” for a bored North Shore wife whose husband was too busy working or at the country club to “do the repairs himself.” The first time that it happened, the guys had laughed it off when Ward mentioned it over a game of Cutthroat Pool at Patsy’s Pizza one night. They’d assured him that requests like that came often from the North Shore, and Alex had propped his hands on his hips. “Come mow my lawn. Clean my pool. Patch my roof,” he’d said in a sugary falsetto to a chorus of chuckles and catcalls and even a few eye rolls. He’d slapped Ward on the shoulder and added, “Get used to it, man. As far as they’re concerned, we South Shore locals are here to please.”
Alex, Ward had discovered that night, had a reputation for taking on a few of those North Shore jobs.
It was a reputation that Ward wasn’t interested in garnering for himself, and he’d gone over and above the call of duty to present himself as nothing but professional on every job. He knew what signals to watch for, and typically, it started with the once-over, like the one Lysha Austin had just all but assaulted him with.
“Well, if I ever need my boat fixed, I’m giving you a call, Ward St. James,” Lysha Austin had promised that day on George’s dock, before heading back down the boardwalk the way she’d come. To Ward, it had sounded more like a threat.
“Are you more worried about the woman or about your dad?” Juno’s question drew his attention back to the moment. The way she asked had him shaking his head with wry amusement.
The question was valid, though. At least the part about his dad. Within a few weeks of being back in town, Ward had realized that there was more going on with the business than Ted just taking some time off to care for his sick wife. There were unpaid notices from suppliers dating back six months or more, jobs his father had done in that same time that had never been invoiced, and therefore, he'd never been compensated for, and the cargo van that was usually kept immaculate and well-stocked with parts was neither. It had taken Ward several sixty-hour weeks to catch things up in time for their accountant to file year-end taxes, and even longer to get the business back to just breaking even. He expected to be operating in the black by the end of the summer, and his plan was to hand everything back into his father’s care and head home to California.
“Dad, of course,” Ward admitted. With a wry grin, he added, “Mrs. Austin is pretty scary, but I can handle her.”
Juno snorted. “If you say so, big guy.” Then she sobered. “How is your dad? Your mom?”
“He insists he’s fine,” Ward said with a shrug. They'd had this conversation before. Juno knew his concerns about his dad’s neglect of the business, but she also understood that Ted had good reason to be distracted these days. “Mom is doing better, all things considered. She’s getting used to taking things slowly and resting regularly. Of course, she’ll sigh despairingly and tell you she’s resigned herself to being old before her time.”
Juno chuckled softly. “I can see how slowing down would feel that way to her.” His mother was one of those women who woke up ready to roll, stayed busy all day, then slept like the innocent all night long. Since being sick, all of that had changed.
Ward nodded. “Yeah. It’s been tough, that’s for sure. For both of them. I think Dad isn’t quite sure how to handle any of it, so he just doesn’t, you know? He hovers around Mom until she shoos him off.”
Something had happened to his father during his mother’s illness last year, and Ward wondered if either of his parents would ever fully recover from the terrible virus that had nearly taken his mom’s life. Ted had been sick, too, but his symptoms had been nothing like Rachel’s, and Ward felt in his gut that his father’s loss of footing was a direct result of having come face to face with the real possibility of losing his beloved wife.
Rachel had come home from the hospital just before Thanksgiving, and they’d celebrated with a quiet, small feast with Hazel, who had shared their holiday table on many occasions over the years. Without family of her own, she’d taken them under her wings, and with her bed-and-breakfast closed for the season, she usually did most of the cooking, too, desperate for someone to take care of.
It was after that Thanksgiving meal, while Ted and Rachel napped, that Hazel had urged Ward to consider coming home for longer than the six weeks he’d planned.
“Your mother is your father’s world,” she’d said to him. “I think they both lost a little bit of themselves to that awful virus, and I’m not so sure they’re going to be able to go back to life the way it was before.”
She’d been right; Ward knew as much even before she put his concern into words. But he had a full life out on the West Coast, where he and his business partner, Johnny Bolton, co-owned and operated Blue Waters Boat Chartering, a company that offered fishing trips, sightseeing tours, and party charters along some of the most beautiful coastlines of the Pacific Ocean.
Ward had entrusted the care of Blue Waters into Johnny’s hands—something that still made his gut churn uncomfortably, since Johnny was much better behind a desk than on the water. But they had a dependable crew, and four solid helmsmen, two of whom had been with them since the beginning, and Ward met with them via Zoom calls at least once a week. Things were running better than he could have hoped for in his absence, which made his extended stay in Autumn Lake doable.
He’d also been in a comfortable, long-term relationship with Rochelle Trebler, a much-sought-after muralist whose artwork could be found all over Laguna and the surrounding beach towns. They’d met when she’d chartered one of his boats for her father’s sixtieth birthday. She’d returned the following week to pick up her jacket that she’d ‘accidentally’ left in the cockpit after she’d asked Ward to show her what all the controls were for.
He’d asked Rochelle to take some time off and come with him to the lake, knowing she wouldn’t. She was a Southern California beach girl through and through. “You’ll be back,” she’d told him, her face pressed into the hollow of his neck, her tears warm on his skin. “And I’ll be right here, waiting for you.”
He wasn’t sure if she was trying to convince him or herself of his return. But as the weeks turned to months, their good intentions of traveling to see each other kept getting blown off course, and their phone calls and emails, and then even their texts, grew fewer and farther between. They’d both been so busy once spring set in, and Ward hadn’t worried too much about their flagging communication.
But Rochelle had called him one evening in April, and he’d recognized immediately that he’d let things flounder too long between them.
“Oh, baby. You shouldn’t have to choose between me or your family,” she’d said in that husky voice that reminded him of gentle waves washing up on the beach. “I know you’re doing what’s best for your parents right now, and I absolutely support you in that.” She loved no one in the world more than her own father, and Ward knew she meant what she said. But he’d also thought she was his family. They’d been together almost three years, and although they hadn’t made anything official, they’d always talked about their relationship as permanent.
“I’m coming back, Ro. I just don’t know exactly when,” he’d tried to tell her, but she’d stood her ground.
“If—when—you do return, then come find me. I’ll be here; you know I’ll never leave this place. But baby, let’s give each other the freedom to live right where we are, okay? Let’s not miss out on the moments we’re in because we only have eyes on the moments that may never come.”
He hated it when she called him ‘baby’. It usually meant she was trying to placate him. He’d known then that she’d met someone else.
Juno was right; he’d been grumpy ever since that phone call. Longer than that, if he was going to be honest.
“Come on.” Juno looped an arm through his and started maneuvering them back toward the bar. “You’re at least going to take a goodie bag with you. Something to look forward to after you fend off the wiles of Mrs. Lysha Austin. And something to take to your folks, too.”
“To give the woman the benefit of the doubt,” Ward said, letting her pull him along. “It’s possible that Mrs. Austin might actually just need her boat worked on.”
“Hm. Is that what you kids are calling it these days?” Juno’s chuckle made him grin in spite of himself, and when she handed him a brown paper bag with a sampling of her organic fruit tarts and a pint of his mother’s favorite non-dairy pumpkin spice chia pudding, and then refused to let him pay, he stuffed the tip jar with cash.
Juno’s crew, Tyler and Poppy, had thanked him effusively. At least he’d managed to make someone happy today.