“Abby, what’s wrong?”
I could only shake my head, feeling Todd’s eyes boring into my face, studying me again. I couldn’t bear the thought of his looking at me like that, discovering that the Abigail Kelly he saw on TV and in magazines was nothing more than a freak behind a mask of ice-blue contacts, bleached hair, and painted-on smiles.
I was about to plaster on one of those phony grins and tell him, ever so brightly, that nothing was wrong. But I didn’t have the heart to pretend. Instead I kept staring down, digging, wondering if I could escape the scene by digging my way to China. Then I felt something on my foot. I looked up to see Todd’s finger, tapping.
“You’re uncomfortable,” he said. “I see that, but I’d deem myself unmanly if I didn’t tell you that, personally, I consider you—”
I opened my mouth to speak, but I was cut off. “Nope. Still my turn.” He tugged gently at my foot. I uncrossed my legs, stretching them out toward him. “Okay?” he asked.
I nodded.
“Okay then,” he confirmed. “And I was about to say that this morning, I was surprised. Your face and your . . . your eyes, especially.”
I still couldn’t look at him, knowing I’d once more become a disappointment to somebody.
“You don’t look a thing like your pictures.”
“I know,” I blurted out, choking on sudden tears in my throat. “Those pictures—it’s like I’m another person. It’s me, but a flawless me, a perfect me. Abigail Kelly without blemish. She’s a freak!” My voice broke. “A freak who doesn’t really exist.”
It was absolutely mortifying to know that Todd thought the same thing. I faced the wind, holding back more tears. Surely he would cut his losses now and head for the nearest tiki bar. Could I blame him? I was a basket case.
“You don’t realize it, do you?”
Hearing his voice, for a moment I was surprised he was still sitting there, methodically brushing sand off the bottom of my foot. I closed my eyes, trying to focus on the feeling of his touch and not the knot of self-disgust in my stomach. I nodded obediently at whatever his question was.
“Obviously you don’t,” he argued, his hands gripping around my foot. “Those photos are misleading. Abby, in person you’re absolutely stunning.”
Slowly I opened my eyes, staring first at my foot between his hands.
“Stunning?” I whispered, wondering if that word had a negative implication in this context. I kept my eyes down and shifted uncomfortably, hyper-aware of how I’d jumped into the ocean with all my clothes on and then proceeded to bake under the sun like a pickled herring. I tried to slide my foot away from him, but nothing doing. His grip was ironclad.
“You can go back to your pouting when I’m finished. But right now, I need you to believe me, and . . . I would really like you to look at me.”
When I did, I was surprised at what I saw. Instead of some goofy smirk to cheer me up, Todd’s expression looked a little anguished.
His glance was the one that fell away first this time. “If you want,” he said, his voice dropping lower, “I’d be more than happy to share what was running through my mind when I first saw you at my store, before I realized who you were.” His index finger ran over the arch of my foot. When my leg trembled, a satisfied little smile returned to his mouth. “I took a full minute before approaching. You intimidated me.”
I rolled my eyes. Clearly nothing intimidated Todd.
He looked down, concentrating on drawing figure-eights over my skin. “With little effort, Abby, you’re driving me completely mad.”
“Ditto,” I whispered back without even thinking.
Todd’s finger stopped circling. When he lifted his eyes to me, something hot shot through my chest, landed, and burned. I could clearly picture how I was about to act upon this sudden chemical reaction: lean in, crawl over, scale him like a Mount Everest Sherpa.
Then I noticed Todd’s expression change. He was frowning at something in the air over my head. His arm shot straight up. When he brought it down, he was holding a red Frisbee. He stood, muttered something under his breath, and whizzed the red disk to someone way behind me who hollered a faraway, “Thanks, man!”
Todd looked down at me, hands on his hips. “Abby, I was thinking—” But that was all he got out, because the next second, the red Frisbee clocked him square on the bridge of his nose. Stunned, he stumbled back, falling into a sit on the rock behind him.
I shot to my feet. “Are you all right?”
He was nodding, one hand over his eyes. When he lowered it, his gaze flashed to something over my shoulder. After muttering a single swear word, he grabbed my wrist, yanking me forward, down onto his lap.
I was too shocked to do anything but gasp.
The next second he threw one arm around my waist while the other hand was at the back of my head, shoving my face into the side of his neck.
I squirmed to get away. Silly reflex. This only made his grip tighten.
“Shh-shh,” he whispered. “Hang on.”
That’s when I heard the running footsteps from behind, heading straight toward us.
“Yo, sorry, dude.” Male. Probably early twenties. My spine stiffened. “Oh. Hey, Todd.” I could feel the dude’s eyes on me now—or on the back of me, at least. Thanks to Todd, he couldn’t see my face.
Realizing what Todd was up to, I decided to relax and play along. I slipped my arms around his back and snuggled in, to make our sexy cuddling on the beach look legit.
While I pressed my face into his delicious-smelling neck, he wound his other arm around me tighter, forcing me flat against him. Frisbee Dude was still gabbing on about something, until Todd started in with the tickling.
“Oh, you know,” he was saying to Frisbee Dude as I frantically squirmed on his lap, “we’re just hanging out. Ha ha, you’re so ticklish, puppy.” His fingers tiptoed over my ribs. “Uh-uh, baby, no getting away from me.” He laughed merrily, his hand clamping my face in place.
Yes, I understood that Todd was putting on a show to make Frisbee Dude feel intrusive and thus leave us alone, but it obviously wasn’t working, and I was laughing so hard I couldn’t breathe. Tickling and the sound of rushing waves were not a good combination for me.
“Stop, Todd!” I squealed. “Stop. Stop!” I attempted to twist and arch my vulnerable, crumpling body away from him. I was sure Frisbee Dude was getting an eyeful.
“Puppy, puppy, hold still.” Both his arms were around my back now, leaving me able to hook my chin over his shoulder. “You’re so squirmy. Remember last time when you laughed so hard you—” He broke off, chuckling hysterically at some made-up memory. He dipped his chin, and I could feel his breath on my shoulder. My limbs went instantly weak; I was at his mercy.
“Uh, yeah, I’ll catch ya later, man,” Frisbee Dude muttered, probably red with embarrassment to be front row center to our PDA.
A few seconds later, Todd’s grip loosened some. We were both breathing hard and fast from our playful struggle, but neither of us moved away from each other.
“Puppy?” I finally whispered.
Todd snickered. “I was winging it.”
“Nice going.”
“I told you I’d do better next time.” He patted me gently on the back, his long fingers brushing against the skin at my neck.
“Did you have to go overboard with the tickling?” I pulled back to face him but didn’t get off his lap. Oh, no, no dummy here. “That was very dangerous.” I smiled at him through the darkening sky. “I have a history of laughing till the pipes burst, so to speak.”
A look of mock horror crossed his face as he glanced down at his lap. “Do we need to go back in the water?”
“No, no, I’m all good,” I said as I climbed off, a bit begrudgingly, to sit on the sand. After a content sigh, I wiped the remnants of happy tears from the corner of my eyes. “What a chill day. My life is usually more like a hard day’s night.” I chuckled, combing my fingers through my hair—it was finally dry, t
hanks to the wind. “But not today. Today’s been the best day I’ve had in longer than I can remember. I think I’ve laughed more than I did all last year.” I sniffed and glanced at Todd. “Thank you for that.”
“For the record, I’ve had a pretty okay time, too.”
I tipped my chin, watching the sun lower behind a thin layer of clouds. “Ah, endless rain,” I whispered, leveling my face to stare out at the water, “in a paper cup—”
“Okay, forgive me for asking,” Todd cut in, “but what is it with you and the Beatles? That’s about the tenth time you’ve quoted their lyrics in conversation today.”
“I know. Sorry. I hardly notice when I do it anymore. It drives my family crazy when I call my hair ‘Arthur’ or refer to things as ‘dead grotty.’”
“Grotty?”
“Grotesque,” I explained. “That’s Beatles lingo.”
Todd scooted back, leaning against the rock behind him. “So you’re a fan.”
“Fan.” I scoffed under my breath. “That doesn’t even begin to describe it.”
“That’s pretty odd for someone our age.”
“So says the Sinatra enthusiast.”
“Fair enough,” he said after a chuckle. “I’ll tell you my story later. You first.”
I re-crossed my legs, bent forward, and dumped a scoop of sand over Todd’s feet. “It’s not much of a story.”
“Go on,” he coaxed. “Remember, we’re past all respect and dignity.”
“Okay.” I smiled at a memory and rolled my eyes. “When I was sixteen, my father agreed to help me buy my first car. He’d match whatever amount I had, which was eight hundred dollars. The only thing I could afford was this junked out eighty-six Chevy Nova. It had a decent engine and it ran fine, but practically everything else was broken.”
“And . . . ?”
“And when I bought the car, their blue greatest hits was stuck in the tape deck.” I shrugged. “That’s it, really. I was a goner. After that, nearly every extra cent I earned went toward building my Beatles collection. I’m an absolute junkie.”
Todd steepled his fingers under his chin. “And the puzzle pieces are fitting together.” He looked to the side, following a pair of kids with inner tubes running past us, splashing into the dark blue water.
“Please,” I whispered, twirling a loose strand of my crispy hair around one finger, “tell me something embarrassing about you now. No dignity, remember?”
His bottom lip was pushed out, his eyes up and to the left. “I’ve got nothing,” he admitted apologetically. “Sorry. And I lost all dignity hours ago. Tempting you with ambrosia from the sea, showering you with gifts to keep you around.” He flicked the brim of the straw hat sitting at my side. “And let’s not forget how I shamelessly mauled you a few minutes ago.”
The way he was smiling made me want to maul him back one better, but I was not about to make this conversation all about me. “Okay then.” I folded my arms. “Tell me something about you that you don’t share freely.”
Todd squinted, in deep thought, his fist at his cheek, index finger tapping his temple. “All right, but this isn’t something that I know for a fact, but I have it on very good authority. Several authorities. It’s as good as factual.”
“That’s acceptable,” I confirmed, leaning against the rock behind me.
“I know . . .” he began, leaning in a little closer. But then he paused and looked at me, I mean really looked at me, directly in the eyes, until his gaze dropped to my mouth for just a flash of a second.
My heart skipped.
“I know,” he repeated, his green eyes staring into mine again, “that I’m the world’s best kisser.”
I didn’t know how much time went by before I realized my jaw muscles had gone slack and my mouth was hanging open like a goldfish. Likewise, some part of me knew my eyes were going dry from staring into space.
“Blink,” I heard Todd say, sounding like he was at the other end of a tunnel, “if you can hear me.”
Obediently, I blinked and coughed into the crook of my elbow. “What was that?” I sputtered in between gasps, eyes watering. I held up one finger, letting him know I wasn’t finished. “How do you do that with your eyes?”
“Huh?”
“You did the same thing this morning when I was leaving your store. All that Sinatra talk. You were staring at me—at my face. You did the same thing with Chandler. You shot a single look at him, and he was completely at your mercy. How do you do that?”
Todd shrugged, not quite grinning. “It’s a gift. I’ve always been able to isolate and tame in times of peril.” He raised his right hand. “But I swear to you, I use my power for good.”
I shook my head and laughed. “You better be careful with that. Some girls would not take a tempting gaze like that lying down.”
Todd’s half grin stretched into a full smile. “I’ll consider that fair warning, Abby.”
When I returned his smile, I didn’t care if he could see I was blushing.
“Honestly, though.” He grew more serious. “That moment you were leaving my store, I could’ve been less obvious about it, but I was trying to get a better look at you.” He leaned in, studying my face through the twilight. “I always thought you had blue eyes.”
I automatically looked down. The moment was gone. “They’re just gray,” I mumbled.
“Don’t,” Todd entreated. “Please don’t do that.”
The insistence in his voice drew my gaze back up to him.
“And they’re not just gray,” he contradicted. “They’re sky and smoke, like a whirlpool of clouds. I’ve never seen anything like them. To quote John Lennon, you’re like the girl with kaleidoscope eyes.”
Of all the things to say!
As my breathing became shallow, I felt myself leaning forward. Ready for a free fall.
Then Todd did the worst thing possible. He pulled back and looked at his watch.
Seriously?
“I think I should be getting you home.” He seemed to be studying his watch for longer than necessary. “I don’t want your posse out hunting for you.”
I couldn’t move at first, stunned by the wave of disappointment that hit me in the face. “You’re probably right,” I managed to say. But I didn’t mean it.
As I watched Todd pat the sand around himself, making sure we hadn’t dropped anything, I couldn’t help thinking just how complicated my life really was. I didn’t know what tomorrow would bring. Would I still be around? Would my cover be blown? Would I see him again? In one day we’d gone from being total strangers to . . . something else. We had shared things, personal things. We’d laughed together; I’d almost cried. The mere memory of the way he held my foot earlier was making me hot under the collar.
The thought of not seeing him ever again sent a different kind of ache through me. It left me reluctant to get to my feet or even move, reluctant to put an end to the day.
“I know an easy way back to the Square,” Todd said, standing up, brushing sand off the front of his shirt. “I’ll walk you to your bike, maybe throw it in the back of my truck, if you’re too tuckered out to ride home.”
“Har-har.”
Our shoes were at the end of the boardwalk where we’d left them hours before. I didn’t put mine on for our jaunt back, preferring to remain barefoot.
“On second thought,” Todd said as I followed him up the stairs, “there’s bound to still be a pretty big crowd at the Square. We should probably take a different way.” He looked at me over his shoulder. “It’s not exactly a short cut. Is that okay?”
“Sure,” I answered casually, while deep down I was mildly ecstatic to be with him for a little while longer.
When we reached the bottom of the stairs, he stopped walking and turned to me. “Also . . .” He ran a hand through his hair. “There’s one more thing I want to show you.”
{chapter 10}
“THE FOOL ON THE HILL”
With Lindsey and Steve busy checking and doubl
e-checking on their pseudo-sleeping boys, I took a cool shower, unwillingly rinsing off the hot sun and salty water of my enchanted day. I couldn’t help winking at my reflection as I towel dried my hair. It was the first time in months I’d been able to take a good look in the mirror without seeing a stranger.
Also, for the first time in months, I couldn’t wait for tomorrow.
During the day, my cheeks and shoulders had turned a soft pink, tan lines crisscrossing my feet and ankles from my sandal straps. I felt pretty and feminine, as if my entire body were glowing from the inside, humming like a beehive.
After crawling into some silky pajamas, I wandered downstairs to the dark kitchen and grabbed a green apple from a bowl. In the spacious living room, the ceiling fan was tick-tick-ticking ten feet above my head, swirling cool air. I stretched out on the leather couch and ate my dinner.
As I stared at the ceiling, fantasies ran through my head. I imagined a tall, dark man on the deck of a sailboat, out on the open sea, the wind blowing through his hair, rustling his clothes. I saw myself leaning off the starboard bow watching the sunset in a sailor’s cap and long braids. He would toss me a rope, and together we’d hoist the mainsail. In my dream, I didn’t know where that breeze was taking us, but I hoped it was worlds away.
I yelped when something tugged my big toe.
“Hey.” Lindsey grinned at me, and I grinned back. “You were just singing.” She took my apple core. “What were you thinking about?” She walked into the kitchen, and I heard the beginning sounds of bedtime-snack cleanup.
“Nothing,” I called to her. “Just daydreaming. ‘Strawberry Fields’ and all that.” I picked at the light blue piping along the cuffs of my pajamas. “Need any help in there?” I offered over the sounds of dishwater splashing, silverware clinking, and cabinet doors closing.
“Steve’s doing the rest,” she answered as she returned to the living room. I sat up when she sat down in one of the armchairs. “I make food; he cleans up. That’s our deal. It takes him a while some nights, but he always gets to it.” She leaned over and picked up some coloring books from the floor. “These are little John-John’s favorites.” She ran her fingers over the scarred picture on the cover. “He loves firetrucks.”
Abby Road Page 10
