Chapter 20 #2
“Ugh, don’t go there,” she said out loud as she crossed the street between the Beachcomber and the Surf.
“He doesn’t have anyone else.” Do you know that for certain?
Why did her inner voice have to sound so much like her father?
She would give anything to never think of him again or to have him sowing doubts in her mind about the first man to genuinely interest her in longer than she could remember.
She refused to let Mark Lawry have a say in anything she did or who she liked.
“Why are you looking so stormy, Cin?” Owen asked as he came down the stairs from the hotel to the sidewalk.
“I’m thinking about things—and people—who are best forgotten.”
“Yeah, don’t do that.” Owen hugged her. “Too many better things to think about these days, for all of us.”
“That’s right.”
“Did you bring your scissors? Laura says I’m so shaggy, I’m borderline feral.”
“I did, and you are looking kinda ragged.”
“That’s why I need you. I’m just running across the street for a minute. I’ll be right back. Go on in. Laura is at the desk with the twins.”
“Hey, O?”
Owen turned back to her.
“I just want you to know… I’m so glad I can see you any time I want these days.”
“Likewise,” he said, grinning. “I love that the whole family has followed me back to Gansett. We just gotta get Josh here to make it perfect.”
“Let’s work on that.”
He gave her a thumbs-up as he crossed the street.
Cindy went up the stairs and into the hotel that had been a place of childhood magic for the Lawry kids.
The smell of the place always took her back to the most idyllic days of her life, filling her with feelings of love and nostalgia.
The memories tied to those summer days would stay with her forever.
Her sister-in-law, Laura, came around the desk to hug Cindy. “Thank goodness you’re here. My whole crew needs you so badly.”
“Auntie Cindy to the rescue.”
“Sorry to do this to you on your day off.”
“No worries. You know I love any excuse to see the kids.”
“They’re very excited for haircuts with Auntie Cindy.”
The next forty-five minutes were sheer chaos as Laura, Owen, Sarah and Cindy corralled three toddlers into submission so Cindy could cut their hair.
By the time they were finished, the adults were exhausted, and the kids were seemingly energized, bouncing off the walls of Laura and Owen’s small apartment on the third floor.
“Why is it that we’re wrecked, and they’re shot full of jet fuel?” Laura asked as she flopped on the sofa.
“They’re insane,” Owen said. “We’ve known this for quite some time.”
“Are you ready for your haircut?” Cindy asked him.
“I guess so. Some kinda day off this turned out to be for you.”
“This is the most fun I’ve had in ages.” Not counting the fun she’d had with Jace during the night, she thought, trying not to giggle. “Step into my office.”
Owen sat in the kitchen chair they’d placed in the living room.
Cindy put a towel around his shoulders, and while the kids ran circles around them, she gave him a good trim.
“Take more,” Laura said from the sofa. “So it lasts longer.”
“No more,” Owen said. “She’s trying to fully domesticate me, and it’s not going to work.”
“I hate to tell you, brother, but you’re already fully domesticated.”
“I’m hanging on to my shaggy hair with everything I’ve got,” Owen replied.
“But you’re so hot and sexy when it’s short,” Laura said suggestively.
“Maybe a little more wouldn’t hurt anything,” Owen said with a dopey grin for his wife.
Cindy laughed. “You two are so cute. What’s the secret to keeping it going after being together awhile?” That was where things usually fell apart for her. She tended to lose interest after the initial glow wore off and reality set in.
“We laugh every day,” Laura said.
“Mostly it’s her laughing at me, but it’s still laughter,” Owen said.
“And sex,” Laura said. “We have a lot of sex.”
“Children!” Sarah placed her hands over her ears. “There’re parents present!”
Laura laughed at the face Sarah made. “Oh please, like you’re not getting busy on the regular over there in your love shack.”
“Do something about your wife, son,” Sarah said, her face bright red.
“She’s incorrigible,” Owen said, “and I wouldn’t have her any other way.”
“That’s right,” Laura said. “He loves my mouth.”
“Aren’t you glad you asked, Cin?” Sarah asked, smiling.
“I’m getting more information than I need,” Cindy replied.
“To summarize, the secret is laughter and sex,” Laura said.
“Thank you for your wisdom,” Cindy said.
“Speaking of laughter and sex, how are things with Jace?” Sarah asked.
“Wait, what?” Laura sat up straighter. “There’s a Jace?”
“Maybe,” Cindy said, keeping her focus on Owen’s hair as her entire body heated with memories from the night before.
“Has our girl been keeping secrets?” Laura asked Owen.
“Looks that way. I’m going to have to pay a visit to the bar across the street one of these nights to really check this guy out.”
“Don’t do that,” Cindy said. “I’ve already checked him out—”
Laura howled with laughter. “I’ll just bet you have.”
“That’s not what I meant,” Cindy said, mortified. “He’s a good guy, and I like him. So don’t go over there and do what you do with him, Owen.” He’d intimidated every boyfriend she’d ever had until she moved to Dallas.
“Why should I stop now?”
“Because I’m telling you there’s nothing to worry about.”
“Leave your sister alone, Owen,” Sarah said. “She’s a grown woman who can make up her own mind about people.”
“Since when do I leave my sisters alone when it comes to men?” Owen asked.
“There’s nothing to see here,” Cindy said.
“Nothing at all?”
“A few things, but nothing to be concerned about.”
“You may as well tell him the rest, Cin,” Sarah said, “because you know he’ll go digging if you don’t.”
“Stop the screaming,” Laura said to her children. “Let’s watch Encanto for the nine hundredth time.”
While Laura put the movie on for the kids, Cindy finished Owen’s haircut, finding a happy medium between his wishes on the length and Laura’s. As she moved to inspect him from the front, she found him looking up at her.
“What’s the story with this guy?”
“Do you promise to keep an open mind?”
“When is my mind ever not open?”
Cindy groaned. “Do I need to remind you of all the times you judged guys we dated before you even got to know them?”
“And was I ever wrong?”
“No, but… I don’t want you to do what you do with Jace. I really like him.”
“What is it you don’t want me to know?”
“It’s not that I don’t want you to know. It’s that I don’t want you to overreact.”
“To what?”
Cindy looked into the eyes of the brother who’d been her childhood hero for taking the brunt of their father’s rage to protect the rest of them. “He’s a recovering addict who did time for armed robbery.”
Owen’s expression went flat, but his eyes conveyed the emotional response he had to hearing that.
“Before you leap to judgment,” Sarah said to her son, “I want you to remember that Charlie was an ex-con when we met him. The story isn’t always what it seems. If we had judged him only on his record at the time and hadn’t taken the time to learn more about him, we would’ve missed out on one of the finest men any of us has ever known. ”
Sarah’s words of wisdom took some of the tension out of Owen’s posture. “I know, and I promise to keep an open mind.”
“Thank you.”
“Tell me more about him.”
Cindy conveyed the highlights—or lowlights, such as they were—of Jace’s story to Owen and Laura.
“He’s worked hard to turn his life around, and I like who he is now.
He devotes time every day to maintaining his sobriety and is concerned about his sons.
” She hoped that whatever Seamus had wanted to meet with him about wasn’t going to be a setback for Jace.
“He sounds like a very interesting person,” Laura said. “And he’s hot.”
“Like fire,” Cindy said with a grin for her sister-in-law.
“Easy, Mrs. Lawry,” Owen said.
“What? Am I so married I can’t appreciate a hot-as-fire man?”
Owen scowled at her. “Yes, you’re that married.”
“I’m really sorry Jace lost his brother that way,” Laura said, deliberately changing the subject.
“It was extremely traumatizing for him, and then to be ripped away from his wife and kids… He’s deeply regretful of the mistakes he made and the price his family paid for them.”
“That counts for something,” Owen said.
“It counts for a lot,” Cindy said.
“Why don’t you bring Jace to dinner some night soon?” Sarah suggested. “That’d be a good way for us to get to know him. We’ll have the whole family.”
“Because that wouldn’t be at all overwhelming for him,” Cindy said.
“We come with the package,” Owen said. “May as well get him used to us from the beginning.”
Cindy wasn’t sure that was a good idea. “I’ll ask him and see what he says.”