Chapter 21
“This is the stupidest thing I’ve ever done,” John Lawry said to his friend Niall Fitzgerald as Niall drove them to the parking lot at the island’s southernmost point.
“Really?” Niall asked. “This is the stupidest thing? Then you ain’t been living right.”
“I was a cop. Remember?”
“Eh, that was so last month. Now, you’re a civilian, and it’s time to do stupid shit like stand in a hurricane and show it who’s boss.”
“What if it shows us who’s boss?”
“You’re not afraid, are you?”
“Kinda? I mean, there’s a perfectly safe house with a generator where we could be riding out the biggest storm to ever threaten this island.”
“What fun would that be? Let’s go check it out.”
“Are you sure this is a good idea?”
“Absolutely not, and that’s what makes it fun. Come on!”
While everyone else on the island was taking shelter, John had let Niall talk him into this foolish outing to see just how bad the storm really was. On the ride out there, the rain had been falling so hard, they couldn’t exceed fifteen miles per hour, and they’d been the only fools on the road.
When Niall opened the car door, the wind pulled it right out of his hand, nearly ripping it off. “Whoa!”
“Maybe that’s a sign that this is a dumb idea!” John had to yell to be heard above the roar of the storm.
“Nah, it’s fine.”
Despite his reservations, he didn’t want to be seen as a wimp by the man he had a massive crush on, so John used both hands to open the door and still nearly lost control to the wind.
He had zero desire to be out in this hellscape, but he stepped out of the car nonetheless and was almost immediately knocked off his feet by the sheer power of the wind.
Niall was facing into it, arms out and face lifted into the rain like a god of weather or some such thing.
John made his way around the car and wrapped an arm around Niall’s waist, hoping their combined weight might make it less likely that they’d be swept away. They were standing about ten feet back from the new fencing that had recently been erected after several near-miss disasters on the bluffs.
He hoped they weren’t going to be the next disaster as it took every ounce of strength he had to remain standing when the wind was strong enough to easily knock them off their feet. “Okay, we did it. Can we go now?”
Niall put an arm around him. “Not yet. It’s just getting good.”
They had to scream to be heard over the storm. “Uh, this isn’t good! This is insanity!”
“Feel the power of it? It’s awesome!”
John was about to disagree when Niall suddenly kissed him.
They were so caught up in the kiss that the storm nearly succeeded in toppling them.
Niall laughed and kissed him again. “Now do you feel it?”
“I feel it.” He felt so many things for the talented Irishman who’d captured his attention at the Beachcomber, where Niall was a regular performer. “But can we take this somewhere less dangerous?”
“If we must.”
“We must.”
As John released his tight hold on Niall’s coat, the strongest gust of wind yet succeeded in knocking them to the ground.
While John would’ve panicked, Niall laughed.
He stretched his arms and legs out like he was making a snow angel and laughed his ass off.
“We need to go, you crazy bastard!” John screamed at him.
“Not yet. It’s just getting good.” He grasped John’s hand as the rain beat down on them, and the wind roared. “I’ve never felt more alive than I do right now.”
John couldn’t deny he felt the same way. Maybe he’d spent too much of his life playing it safe, and it was time to take some chances. Meeting Niall had been the best thing to happen to him in a very long time, if ever, and he was looking forward to whatever adventures they would have together.
One thing was for certain, he’d never forget Hurricane Ethel and the first time he kissed Niall.
The full strength of Hurricane Ethel roared ashore on Gansett Island at 2:10 in the morning, with sustained winds topping a hundred miles per hour.
More than three inches of rain fell the first hour, and the storm surge brought the ocean inland, flooding many of the lower-lying streets, including Ocean Avenue.
Despite being exhausted from a relentless week, Blaine was awake listening to the intensifying storm while Tiffany and the girls slept through it.
The wind and rain had gotten louder as he’d lain awake waiting.
For what? He couldn’t say for certain, but it felt like they were in the middle of Armageddon.
All he thought about every day was protecting his family and community from anything that would threaten their safety.
So he felt particularly helpless at a time like this, when there was nothing he could do but hope for the best.
A loud crash outside had him sitting up and then bolting out of bed to investigate what’d happened. He ran downstairs to the back door and flipped on the floodlights that illuminated the backyard.
Shit. A tree had come down on Tiffany’s red VW Bug. The car was crushed under the weight of the tree. That would break her heart. She loved that silly little car.
“What is it?” she asked from behind him.
“Your car just met a tree.”
“No! Not my Bug!”
“I’m so sorry, love. We’ll get you a new one.”
“I hate this storm!”
Blaine put his arms around her. “A car is replaceable.”
“I know, but I’m still allowed to be pissed at Ethel for squishing my Bug.”
“Yes, you are. Let’s go back to bed for a bit.” His alarm was set for six so he could get a jump on assessing the damage. While he was up, he decided to check in with Wyatt.
“Hey, boss. How’s it going?”
“That’s what I wanted to ask you.”
“Very quiet. Not hearing much of anything.”
“How about next door?” he asked of the fire department.
“Same. No calls.”
“I guess no news is good news. Let me know if anything comes up.”
“Will do. Get some rest.”
Blaine ended the call before he could retort that rest was hard to come by when his island was under attack by Mother Nature.
“Would you feel better if you were at work?” Tiffany asked.
“No, I want to be here with you guys in case anything else happens.” He needed to be in both places, but nothing was more important than the safety of his wife and children. With his hand on her lower back, he guided her toward the stairs to go back to bed.
“It sounds like a tornado,” Tiffany said warily.
Ashleigh appeared in the hallway. “I’m scared, Mommy.”
“It’s okay, baby.” Tiffany went to her daughter and picked her up, bringing her into their room, where she settled her between them.
The baby monitor on Tiffany’s bedside table crackled to life when Addie started to cry.
“I’ve got her,” Blaine said, getting up to retrieve their other daughter. He went into Addie’s room and lifted her from the crib. “It’s okay, love. Daddy’s here.”
She snuggled into the crook of his neck, the way she always did, and like always, his heart nearly exploded with love for her. He’d had no idea fatherhood would be like that, love on top of love on top of more love.
He returned to their room, keeping Addie snuggled in his arms.
Tiffany had Ashleigh tucked in against her.
As the storm raged outside, the people he loved best were safe. He only hoped that everyone else they loved was, too.
Ned Saunders stood at the sliding door to his deck and watched the storm batter the trees he and Francine had planted last spring—with the help of their sons-in-law, Mac and Blaine.
They’d done most of the work while Ned had supervised.
He was good at that. Supervising, that was.
He wasn’t good at being patient as a monster storm beat the crap outta his island.
He couldn’t believe they still hadn’t invented a way to blow up a hurricane or tornado to keep it from menacing people and property.
Surely there must be a way by now to make these storms go away, and if there wasn’t, there ought to be.
“What’re you doing up?” Francine asked when she came out of their bedroom.
“Just checkin’ things.”
“And is everything the same as it was a few hours ago?”
“Looks like it.”
“Then come back to bed. You’ll find out soon enough how bad it was.”
Because there was nowhere Ned would rather be than in bed with his lovely wife, he let her lead him back to the bedroom, where she gave him a not-so-gentle push toward his side of the bed. “Don’t be pushin’ me around, woman.”
“Someone’s gotta keep you in line.”
“And you think that oughta be you?”
“Who else would you prefer?”
“No one, doll, as ya well know.”
“All right, then. Can we go back to sleep now?”
“I ain’t the one doin’ all the talkin’.”
“Are you calling me a big mouth?”
“Now, would I do somethin’ stupid like that?”
“I don’t know. Would you?”
“Fighting” with her was the most fun he’d ever had in his life.
There were days—most days, in fact—when he wondered how he’d survived for more than thirty years without her, after falling for her when he was young and dumb.
If only he’d tried harder to keep her attention after that charmer Bobby Chester came to town and wooed her away from him.
“Hello? Are you there? Come in, Ned.”
He chuckled at her saucy tone.
“What’re you thinking about?”
“Why I didn’t fight for ya way back when.”
“What? You’re thinking about that in the middle of a hurricane?”
“I think about that all the damned time.”
“Ned, don’t dwell on the past. It’s over and done with. And isn’t the present sort of nice?”
“Sorta nice,” he said with a laugh. “It’s the nicest darned thing ta ever happen to me.”
“Focus on the here and now and forget the rest. I was so stupid back then, so full of myself. I would’ve made a mess of things with you the same as I did with him.”
“It wasn’t you who messed that up.”
“It takes two to mess up a marriage, and I was just as much at fault as he was.”
“I don’t believe that, and I never will.”
“Believe it. I didn’t give him any slack. I was on him all the time about everything he said and did. I was a total pain in the ass, and I would’ve been to you, too. You probably would’ve ended up hating me, same as he did.”
“Never. I could never hate ya.”
“Yes, you could’ve, and you would’ve if you’d been married to that version of me. I’m different now. Life has humbled me and made me appreciate the good things, like what we have now.”
“We’ll hafta agree ta disagree on whether we woulda stayed married. I say we woulda ’cause I never woulda let ya go fer anything, and I don’t wanna hear ya blaming yerself for what the sumabitch did to you and the girls.”
“I don’t blame myself for that, but I take my share of the blame for the marriage not working out.”
“He was damned lucky ta have ya, no matter what ya say, and he shoulda known that.” He looked over at her. “Are ya laughing at me?”
“I’m laughing with you.”
“Except I ain’t laughing.”
That only made her laugh harder.
“What in tarnation sakes is so damn funny?”
“You are. You’re very sweet and cute with your certainty that we would’ve gotten through anything and still be going strong all these years later.”
“We woulda, and I don’t see why that’s so funny.”
“I was a bitch, Ned. A stone-cold bitch. I thought I was the shit, with men falling all over themselves to be with me. The way I treated you, the sweetest, nicest man I ever knew, was unconscionable. You always deserved better than me. You still do.”
“Donchu dare say that ta me. Donchu dare.” He was rarely ever angry with her but hearing her say that lit a fuse in him. “Yer the only one I ever wanted, and ya damned well know that, too.”
“I do, and I feel very lucky to have you.”
“No more a that shit ’bout what I deserve, or ya’ll make me mad.”
“Yes, dear.”
“Get ova here and make up with me. And do a good job of it.”
She moved over to him and propped herself up on her elbow. “What would count as a good job?”
“Use yer imagination.”
She leaned in to press her lips to his. “I’m very sorry for saying I didn’t deserve you. Do you forgive me?”
“Not yet.”
He felt her smile as she kissed him again. “Now?”
“Nope.”
More kisses. “Getting warmer?”
“Yep, I sure am.”
She laughed as she kissed him again. “That ought to settle us up.”
He hooked an arm around her to keep her close to him. “Don’t never let me hear ya say that again ’bout deserving me, ya got me?”
“Yes, Ned, I’ve got you.”
“Good.”