Chapter 18
A fter leaving his father’s, Brody stopped for Mexican.
He was not particularly hungry, but he wanted to put a space between the confrontation and everything that came next.
The taqueria was a favorite with his former crew, and he ran a risk coming here.
But he loved the food, and he arrived between the lunchtime work crowd and the dinner crunch.
A few families were eating, the children chatting musically, the parents quiet and tired and smiling.
He took his order to an empty table and ate slowly.
Every now and then a bolt of memory struck.
Single flashes of an image that came and went in seconds.
Afterward, his body hummed, a temporary shift away from his placid state.
A glimpse of his father’s rage. The acidic strike of words that could not stab as they always had before.
The sight of Janet’s fearful gaze. Smoke boiling into his mother’s office.
On the surface, it had been merely another minor confrontation.
A few words spoken in bitter wrath, just another father–son drama.
Only this time the power to wrench his life from its course and fracture his days was absent.
Brody found his attention increasingly pulled away from the argument to his own calmness.
Then he climbed the Radio Island bridge, and the waters sparkled and beckoned, laced as they were with the rising wind. His peace returned. At least for this one moment. It was enough. And far more than he deserved.
Brody pulled in behind Emma’s home and parked by Cottage Six. The afternoon light formed blades through the trio of trees forming the lawn’s central island. As he climbed from the truck, the empty garden became filled with ghosts.
In the weeks running up to leaving Charlotte, these sudden appearances had become part of his nights. Faces of scarcely remembered ladies floated into his vision, silently condemning him to a cage of guilt and remorse.
Today, however, was different.
There, among those he had cast aside and forgotten, were others.
Friends and family he no longer determinedly kept out. Women who were coming to trust him. Despite everything. These were the ones who accompanied him up the cottage’s front steps.
As he crossed the front porch, Brody felt as if the calm now had both a purpose and a name. Facing up to his past was helping him make space for a different future. What shape that might take, he had no idea. But one thing was for certain. The days ahead now possessed an element of hope.
He dropped his gear on the bare kitchen table and took a quick look around.
He had been in and out of these guesthouses for years, doing odd jobs, being helpful, trying to show Emma how much she had always meant.
The interior was no great shakes, but lovely just the same.
Two smallish bedrooms, a single bath, the spacious front room.
The heating had been off long enough for the floor and walls to radiate a distinct chill.
Brody worked the controls, then returned to the front porch and stood there, growing accustomed to this new space in his world.
The calm was there waiting for him, a weightless sensation.
Brody felt it all come together. Wind and sea and light and dark.
He turned on his phone. There were eleven texts, three from his mother, seven from his sister. Which meant his mother had told Olivia what was happening. The most recent, though, was from Rae, and held just two words. Call me .
He touched the callback, mostly because he needed to say the words pushing up from his chest. A declaration that needed to be released. Now. While it still burned his heart and throat.
Soon as she came on the line, Brody said, “I know I’m not the only man who has a lady’s tears staining his past. Right now, though, I’m the one trying to make amends.”
Rae rewarded him with silence.
Brody went on, “I’ve lived my life like a kid with nothing to lose. It’s time I grow up and take responsibility for my actions. Learn what it means to give myself fully to the moment, and to the people I care for and who care for me. Accept the challenge of far horizons.”
He stopped then. Wishing for better words. Rae deserved them, whatever they might be.
Rae knew what she was going to do long before Brody finished describing the confrontation with his father. All the residue from her conversation with Holden was gone. Smoke in the wind. Less.
Brody needed what she could offer. His attorney. And his friend. Everything else could definitely wait until her heart’s bruises had eased.
Brody’s sister had mentioned Harvey Sewell was the attorney representing their father in the divorce.
She asked Brody to wait one second, long enough to switch over and text him.
She asked Harvey for ten minutes of his time, less, regarding an urgent legal matter, and she was coming over now.
Then she was back on the call with Brody, telling him to continue, slinging her purse and locking up, and heading for her car.
She scurried the two blocks, not quite running, totally immune to the wind and the cold.
She started the engine and put Brody on hands-free.
Then she sat there, listening to the man and her own internal voice.
When she spoke again, it was to ask, “How do you feel?” A question directed as much to herself as Brody.
She listened to Brody describe doing his best to clear away the detritus of past mistakes. Making room for a future he could not name. The man sounded shaken, sorrowful. Yet calm. A remarkable mixture of smoke and honey.
When he finished speaking, Rae thanked him for sharing. Brody asked, “Is there anything in particular we need to discuss? Your text sounded urgent to me.”
“It was. Very.” She started to tell him where she was headed, then decided that could definitely wait. “I needed to hear from a friend.”
Brody breathed on that for a time, then replied, “I like having you consider me that, Rae. A friend.”
“I do.”
“I like that a lot.” Another breath. “Can I come see you?”
“There’s the small matter of me being an attorney, with attorney-type things that need doing.”
“Oh. That.”
“Yeah. That.”
“So what time are we hitting the water tomorrow?”
“Emma’s been sleeping in lately. By the time she’s up and breakfasted and ready, my guess is late morning.”
“In that case I’ll head over to the marina around eight, check in with Charlie, then ready the boat. Make coffee, sit behind the wheel, pretend I belong.”
Rae cut the connection and sat at the final light before taking the island bridge. Thinking about Brody’s first words, how precisely they fit into her heart’s vacant space. The right thing to say at the perfect moment.
She felt as if the door to her inner world was flung wide open. Despite the terrible timing, Emma’s declining health, all the pressures and uncertainties that filled her days. She had so very much that she wanted to say. To Brody. About feelings. And tomorrows. And them. Together.
The biggest change, at least for her, was how her perspective on Holden had altered. She no longer saw their latest conversation as yet another failure. Instead, Rae now felt as if she too was making room for something more.
All her logic and careful strategies were cast aside. She wanted to be with Brody Reames. She wanted …
The huge expanse of that unfinished declaration filled in her mind and body until there wasn’t room to draw a decent breath.