by T. I. Lowe
The doctors had supplied him with plenty of narcotics in the beginning, but only a few months in, it was apparent that he was heading down a slippery slope to becoming too dependent on them. Plus, the man they created was nothing but a dark shadow of his true self. They’d helped to form the darkest days of his life, and it had nothing to do with the explosion flashbacks. Over-the-counter pain meds didn’t work near as good, but at least he could function while taking them and keep his demons at bay.
“Hey!” Tucker’s muffled yell rang out from the storage closet as a pounding started up on the barricaded door. “Let me out!”
Carter and Zachary joined Lincoln by the door of the closet. All three had their arms crossed and were grinning. It hadn’t taken hardly any effort the night before to pull Tucker and his sleeping bag in there, but it was taking a whole lot more effort not to roar in laughter at the moment. The door shook, but the wedged chair remained in place.
Lincoln glanced over at his cohorts. “Who’s gonna let the beast out?”
Biting his bottom lip, Carter scratched the scruff on his cheek. “Perhaps Zachary should.” He nodded but stopped when Lincoln and Zachary shook their heads in return.
“Nah. The beast may come out swinging. Can’t risk the little guy like that.” It was the first time Lincoln could recall the boy not protesting about being called little. Lincoln looked back at Carter. “He’s gonna come out in attack mode, so let’s think about a plan of action for a minute . . .” He tapped his chin.
Carter scoffed. “Okay, soldier boy . . .” He narrowed his eyes as a menacing grin took over. “I’ll be right back.” He dashed out the side door and returned in a flash with a large shrimping net.
“I like the way your mind works, music boy,” Lincoln fired back, sending Zachary into a fit of giggles.
The two men moved over and spread the net in front of the door. Once they had their stance secure, Carter nodded for the little boy to move the chair away from the doorknob. Zachary did and then dashed out the way as Tucker came out like a raging bull only to be stopped in his tracks by the net, tangling himself the more his fists flew all over the place.
“Y’all gonna pay for this,” Tucker bellowed as he continued to thrash around with the two men pinning him inside easily.
“You sure are mouthy for someone in your predicament,” Carter fired back just as his phone went to singing an old song Lincoln recognized as one of his grandparents’ favorites.
“‘My Girl,’ seriously?” Lincoln teased.
“Dominica’s my girl, seriously.” Carter dropped the net and pulled the phone from his pocket. “Hey.”
Tucker untangled himself, and before Lincoln could stop him, the teenage boy kicked his uncle’s feet out from under him, sending them both to the floor. As they rolled around, Lincoln scooped up Zachary to keep him out of harm’s way.
“They gonna get it from Momma,” Zachary whispered as they both watched the wrestling match.
Somehow, Carter managed to pin Tucker down and put the phone back to his ear. Panting, he said, “Sorry, babe. Everything okay?” He suddenly released Tucker and shot to his feet. The normal easy expression on his face transformed into a scowl that looked completely out of place.
Lincoln’s body stiffened in response. “What’s wrong?”
Carter shook his head, offering nothing, and kept listening. “We’ll see if we can get out there to her.” He nodded to whatever Dominica was saying. “Okay, babe. Love you.” He listened for another second before lowering the phone and fiddling with it a moment or two.
“Well?” Lincoln’s voice came out a little sharp with his impatience as he set Zachary down.
“Dominica just saw Opal’s store on the news. It was hit pretty hard by the storm.”
At the mention of the woman’s name, Lincoln’s stomach winced with embarrassment. They’d not left things on a good note whatsoever. Just recalling that stern look she’d leveled at him, reminiscent of an ole spinster ready to tear into a petulant child who was irritating her, made Lincoln feel a good bit foolish over his behavior. And now he really felt like a jerk, with the storm throwing attitude at her as well.
Derek bounded down the stairs a few beats later, tugging on a sweatshirt. “Hey, Carter, can you hang out here with the boys for a while? Nan and I need to head over to the restaurant. My manager just arrived and said most of our back deck is floating down the inlet.”
“Ah, shoot. Sounds like Lacy went on a rampage last night. Opal’s store took a beating too. I was going to go check on her.”
Conceding to the fact that he needed to make amends for his folly with the shop owner, Lincoln began looking for his shoes. “I’ll go.”
“You better grab a coat or something. It’s actually chilly out,” Carter advised. After a long exhale, he warned, “Just letting you know, her friend Sophia will probably be there too.”
Lincoln continued collecting his belongings. “So?”
A snort sounded from behind him. “So she probably knows how you treated Opal. You may want to keep out of her way. That one is the feisty member of the Sand Queens.”
Lincoln finally glanced over his shoulder, his brow furrowed. “Sand what?”
“Queens. That’s what the locals have called those three since they were babies.”
“Oh. Okay.” Unimpressed, Lincoln went back to rummaging in his duffel bag. He pulled out a zip-up hoodie and shrugged it on. He slung the bag over his shoulder and waved goodbye before heading out the side door.
Sure enough, as he hobbled over to his Jeep that was speckled with leaves and twigs, Lincoln took note of the chill in the air. Another aftereffect to storms late in the season was that they tended to steal the humidity in their paths and leave much cooler temperatures behind. The storms wanted folks to know they’d been there . . . as if the debris and destruction they flung everywhere wasn’t enough evidence.
Zipping his hoodie, Lincoln climbed in and begged the throb in his leg to leave him alone long enough to try to make things right with a certain redhead. He sure was feeling awfully remorseful all of a sudden.
It was slow going, dodging downed power lines and trees. Lincoln even had to maneuver the Jeep around an upturned canoe in the middle of an intersection. The closer he got to the coast, the more destruction he found. Several palmetto trees were uprooted and slung in odd places. He noticed one on the roof of the bank. Another was wedged in the spokes of the Ferris wheel. He wondered if he had a beach cottage to go back to but kept his focus on checking on Opal as the main priority.
It was no easy feat to get through town, but Lincoln finally made it to the store and parked in the debris-strewn lot beside it. He gazed out the windshield at the trio of women in the small front yard.
Josie, the tall blonde who towered over the brunette by at least a foot, wore baggy jeans and a tattered long-sleeved T-shirt. Certainly the tomboy resembled nothing close to a queen to him. The other one had to be the feisty Sophia. In her skinny jeans, knee-high boots, and tailored blazer, he could see her as Posh Queen. Oddly enough, those two were hovering around Quirky Queen, who was sitting on her lawn chair throne. The moment they noticed the Jeep, the short one zeroed in on him.
Lincoln didn’t understand the firm warning Carter had delivered back at the firehouse about Sophia. She looked even smaller than Opal. The brunette was glaring at him with enough menace, though, that it did kick up his curiosity. “I turned down a job offer. I don’t see where that merits you giving me the stink eye,” he mumbled, even though she couldn’t hear him.
After giving a raised eyebrow in Shorty’s direction that he hoped conveyed the message Bring it, Lincoln tore his eyes away from her and studied Bless This Mess. Once he got a good look at the building, the idea of heckling Sophia was instantly forgotten.
There it sat, situated on the corner of Front Street, looking quite different from the first time he’d seen it. His first impression, two weeks ago, was that it stuck out like a sore thumb. The left exterior wall
was a faded-teal color with the store name written in what reminded him of a faded-black chalkboard font. The other side was dressed in a mosaic mural of ocean waves and sunshine with a fairy in the midst of the swirls. The mural remained, but today it looked beaten down a bit with pieces broken off the top edges of the mural. That wasn’t the main problem, though. No roof remained.
“Ah, shoot. All of her junk has to be ruined.” Lincoln leaned forward to get a better angle. He glimpsed what appeared to be a chunk of the roof on the street behind the building. He moved his attention back to the redhead sitting there in a floral dress and a bulky cream sweater that looked like something his gran would wear. He wondered why she wasn’t sobbing or having some hissy fit over her loss, but there she sat eyeing the building blankly. What was she doing just sitting there like that?
Lincoln took a fortifying breath and braved getting out of the Jeep. As he closed his door, he watched Sophia whisper something to Opal while both women regarded him. Opal nodded once like she really didn’t care, and that simple nod had Sophia making a beeline right over to him.
Hands on her hips, manicured fingers tapping against the fancy jeans, she glared up at him. “You have a lot of nerve coming here.”
He sent the glare back to the Tasmanian devil. “How’s that?”
The chilly breeze whipped her hair around and the prissy thing flicked it away before pointing at him. “You say one thing out of the way to Opal today and I promise you’ll regret it.”
Lincoln crossed his thick arms, making sure the fabric stretched taut against his bulging biceps, and gave her his best intimidating stare—jaw ticking, lips in a firm line, brows pinched. It was a stare known to intimidate grown men carrying heavy artillery, but it didn’t faze Sophia. She sent the look way back up to him before stomping over to Opal.
“What have I gotten myself into?” he mumbled to himself before following in her haughty wake.
In effort to not say anything that could be classified as “out of the way,” Lincoln chose to say nothing at all. Instead, he quietly stood just outside the circle they’d made around Opal and got a good look at her. The unruly curls were pulled to the side in a low ponytail, so there was nothing blocking the view of her beautiful face. He noticed her bottom lip kept trembling, the only clue she was battling any emotion. Every so often, she would bite down on it, as if to say, “Buck up. It’s going to be okay.”
Strangely, her resilience in the dismal moment was unnerving. How could such a fragile-looking woman be stronger than he was when faced with such a challenge? He had no clue. Something began to soften inside of him for her, but he quickly chalked it up to pity. Filing it away, he glanced around at other nearby buildings. Most were fine with minimal damage. Bless This Mess seemed to be the only casualty in this battle. Lincoln could relate to that. He was the only one not able to walk away from that last battle he fought overseas.
Josie began to speak, beckoning Lincoln’s attention back from the dark thoughts it began to wander toward. “Do you want me to get someone here to help?” she asked while gently placing her hand on Opal’s shoulder. “A roofer?”
Opal gave her a faint smile. “No. Daddy is taking care of it.”
Josie nodded her head and began walking the soggy perimeter with Lincoln following behind her.
Once they were out of earshot, Lincoln said, “I think we should go ahead and line up some help.”
Josie picked up a chunk of mosaic tile lying in a puddle by the wall. “Why?”
“If her dad is anything like her—”
Josie snorted loud enough to hush him. “No worries there. Her dad has this under control.” She pointed toward the building. “And you’ve clearly gotten the wrong impression of Opal. She restored this building once from a plan she’d formed all on her own. She’ll do it again.”
“Okay . . .” Lincoln sensed it was best to let it go. He was already feeling way too involved in the situation—and the intriguing woman at the center of it—than he wanted to.
4
The day before Hurricane Lacy barreled onto shore and wreaked havoc on Sunset Cove, a few members of the Knitting Club showed up at the store with a plastic baggie filled with Opal’s favorite granola cookies and a secondhand account of a Gray Man sighting. Ghost lore was as much a part of low-country culture as fried chicken and collard greens. Sightings of the ghost dressed in a gray suit wandering the coast of Pawleys Island went as far back as the 1800s. According to the legend, if the Gray Man was seen on the shore, locals had been warned of an approaching hurricane and better make preparations.
Opal popped the last bite of a cookie into her mouth and reached to pull down a wind chime as she listened to Bertie Matthews go on and on about the sighting that had taken place earlier in the day.
“The young couple was interviewed on the news and everything. Said he looked like a pirate combing the beach for treasure.”
“It’s nice and all that the Gray Man is kind enough to warn folks of the approaching storm,” Opal commented absently as she placed the wind chime in the wagon with the yard ornament she’d fashioned from soup cans. She was merely humoring the ole gals, wondering why on earth they weren’t already hunkered down in the back of Sunset Cove First Baptist Church. “But I think the Weather Channel has it covered. They even gave us an entire week’s warning instead of just one day.”
Dalma snickered at Opal’s comment while the other two gave her a sour face.
“Why do you always gotta be such a smarty-pants?” Ethel yanked the bag of cookies from Opal’s hand as she went to pluck another one out, which was unfortunate because Opal was starving. She hadn’t had a chance to eat due to hurricane preparations.
“I’m not trying to be smart with you. I’m just looking at it in a practical sense.” Opal wiped her hands on the front of her denim overalls before grabbing the handle of the wagon. She started off toward the back of the building. “Are you ladies ready for the storm?”
“Josie and that teenage boy she tends to take care of helped me secure things around the house,” Dalma commented as she picked up a clunky rock from the ground and placed it into the wagon.
Opal glanced at it, not bothering to ask why, and continued on. She placed a half sheet of plywood over the steps and used it as a ramp to roll the wagon up to the back porch. After pulling it inside the store, Opal paused to retie the bandanna holding her hair out of the way and then made her way to the store showroom with the three women on her heels.
“How about you and Miss Ethel?” Opal asked Bertie, trying to figure out how to get them to leave without appearing to be rude so she could finish up and head inland to her parents’ house. She really wanted those cookies back.
“We’re as ready as we’ll be. Some of the youth from church helped us out earlier.” Bertie gazed around the store and clucked her tongue. “This place is a mess. How can you find anything in here?”
Opal held in the snarky retort wanting to slip out, that the old woman wouldn’t be bothered by her mess if she’d simply stay away.
“I thought that stranger with the limp was supposed to be helping you out around here?” Ethel chimed in, finally getting around to what their unexpected visit was about in the first place.
If they wanted Opal to talk, they’d better hand over those cookies. She held her hand palm up and wiggled her fingers toward them. Ethel gave the bag back and Opal made the women wait until she’d eaten her fill, three more cookies, before saying, “You are referring to the giant, grouchy man, correct?” The sisters nodded but Dalma didn’t seem to agree.
“That young man is a teddy bear pretending to be a grizzly.” When Dalma’s comment received three incredulous frowns, she explained, “I saw him just this morning at Growler’s. He was there getting supplies like the rest of us, and when a young’un dropped her MoonPie on the floor as soon as she opened it, he was quick to buy her another one. Even took the time to carefully open it for her. And do you want to know what else that fine gentleman did?”
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Opal could easily agree on the fine part—she wasn’t blind—but she wasn’t so sure about the gentleman part. She didn’t want to appear too interested in hearing what else Dalma had to share about Lincoln, so she downplayed it with a noncommittal shrug.
“He walked my bags out to the bike for me, but when I told him I was riding it over to Josie’s, he wouldn’t hear of it. Loaded me and the bike up and drove me over there.”
“He’s still a grouch,” Opal maintained, even though that was mighty gentlemanly of him.
Dalma tsked. “My Gerald lives with chronic back pain from that car accident. He can’t help it when the pain gets to be so severe that he can’t think past it and ends up snapping at me like a Doberman pincher.”
“Pinscher,” Opal corrected, deciding not to point out that Dalma’s Gerald had passed away well over a decade ago. No way was she reminding the little lady of that fact.
“One pinched me right on my bottom when I tried running away from it when I was a girl, so I said it right,” Dalma insisted while settling into a chair. “What was I saying . . . ? Oh yes!” She snapped her fingers. “That young man’s eyes hold the same kind of pain I’ve seen reflected in Gerald’s. Like he’s barely hanging on. And can I just say Lincoln has one good-looking set of eyes even with the agony crinkling the corners. They remind me of warm maple syrup. Hmm . . . I sure could go for some of that over hot biscuits.”
“Oh, my gracious, you mooning over a boy who could be your great-grandson,” Bertie scolded Dalma before setting her sights back to Opal. “I do agree with her, though. Who knows what war he’s battling internally behind his grimace. Sounded like that bomb tore into him real good.”
