Passionate Kisses

by Various

  For a moment, none of the guys spoke. Neil kept his eyes on the sky. Finn got up to flip the burgers. Finally Rich said, “Whatever happened there, man?”

  “What d’ya mean? With Sophie? Nothin’.”

  “You’re full of shit.” Finn brandished the spatula.

  “Nothin’ worth mentioning.”

  “You sleep with her?”

  “Didn’t know that was any of your goddamned business.”

  Finn laughed. “That’s a yes.”

  Neil took his eyes off the sky and leveled Lucas with a gaze. “So she’s the kid, right? The grandkid of the Smiths.”

  “So what?”

  “So what about the treasure? You know someone’s sneaking around lookin’ for it. They want to get to it before she does. Or before you do. Hell, most of the town knows you got a thing for her.”

  “What are you, twelve? A ‘thing’ for her?”

  He shrugged. “Call it what you want. You been followin’ her around, taking her home, rescuin’ her cute ass, now I guess hittin’ it too–all that makes you a target for whoever wants the treasure.”

  “I don’t even think it exists.”

  “It might,” Finn said from the grill. “Makes more sense than a ghost.”

  Lucas didn’t answer. It wasn’t his mystery to explore. Frankly, if Sophie found the treasure, dug it up and took with her, he’d be grateful. The fewer questions around Lindsey Point, the better.

  “So the show’s done, huh?” Rich asked.

  “Yup.”

  “She’s leavin’ town?”

  “Guess so.”

  Neil set out four paper plates and a handful of plastic utensils. “Saw two cars with new York plates pullin’ out of the Beacon Inn a couple hours ago. I’m guessing she was with ’em?”

  Lucas didn’t say anything.

  Finn slid a pile of burgers onto a platter and set it on the table. Rich fished out another round of beers and handed them to the guys. “She’s cute, though. Best thing to come around Lindsey Point in–shit, maybe ever.”

  “She’s a pain in the ass,” Lucas said.

  “She’s kind of a spitfire,” Finn agreed. “Still cute as hell, though. Smart. And sort of famous.” He wiped his hands on the front of his shirt. “And she slept with you? Man, you’re a dumbass if you let her go.”

  The guys huddled around the table, but Lucas didn’t feel like eating. Didn’t feel like doing much of anything except maybe getting rip roaring drunk. Let her go? Yeah, he had. What else was he supposed to do?

  How do you know who you are and what you like if all you’ve ever experienced is here on the coast of Connecticut?”

  He ignored the food and focused on the beer instead. “Well, thanks for the advice.” He didn’t need either Sophie or Shannon complicating his life, and here he was trying to figure out a morning’s worth of both of ’em.

  * * * *

  Sophie closed the last folder. Twenty-one total articles in the Lindsey Point Ledger about her father, eleven in the first few months after the murders, and the other ten scattered through the following years.

  President of the Student Council. Co-captain of the soccer team. Voted to be Class Speaker at graduation. Sophie rested her chin in her hand and studied the picture in the yearbook. So those were the pieces he’d passed down to her. Her eyes. Her hair color. The funny, off-center shape of her smile–at least she knew who to blame for that now. She ran her fingers over the other three yearbooks she’d found his face in, watched him grow from a freshman to a senior, from a boy to a man who’d become a parent she’d never known.

  Sophie rolled her wrist from side to side, achy from jotting down notes over the last two hours. There was something here. Something she wasn’t seeing. She read her scribbles over, trying to pull some kind of meaning from them.

  ...enjoyed camping on the point...

  ...asked Town Council not to approve commercial zoning...

  ...donated family picture to town time capsule...

  Nothing about any hidden treasure. But the treasure had belonged to his father, if it had even existed at all, and nothing in any of these pages told her more than the rest of Lindsey Point already knew. No clues in this room.

  Someone rapped on the door, and she slid her notes under her purse as Katie Oakes poked her head in. “How’d you do? Find what you were looking for?”

  “Um, to an extent. Not completely. But one of my college professors used to say the best answers only lead to more questions.” She folded her arms on the table. “I think that’s where I am now.”

  Katie busied herself with rearranging the file folders and returning them to their drawers. “It must be hard for you. Coming back here. Seeing and hearing these things about someone you never knew.”

  “It’s strange, I’ll give you that.” But plenty of kids grew up without one parent or the other. Tragedy happened all the time: car accidents, murders, heart attacks or falling tree branches or fill in the blank. She’d reported on enough random deaths over the years. Of course, if she was superstitious she’d clear out of Lindsey Point while she could, considering the karma that had struck not only both her grandparents but her father.

  “Did you know them?” she asked suddenly. “The Smiths, I mean?”

  Katie shook her head. “No. My mother did, though. She mentioned Miranda a couple times. But I only know the stories people tell. Nothing else.” Something passed over her face, a shadow that was gone before Sophie could wonder what it meant.

  “Do you think it’s possible Petey killed her? Maybe he came home, found her with someone else and snapped?” Sophie couldn’t imagine it. It seemed so violent, so unpredictable–both the affair and the killing. Of course, passion was a fine-edged sword; swing it too far in either direction and risk slicing out a piece of heart or soul somewhere, but still. “Or do you think someone else did it? An intruder? Or even...I don’t know. A drunk, turned around the wrong way on the beach? Someone who wound up on their doorstep and...” She stopped. That sounded silly.

  “I don’t know. Lot of people have an opinion one way or another.”

  “You don’t?”

  “I’d like to think someone else did it.” Katie pressed her lips together. “I’m a sucker for true love. I like to believe two people who fall for each other would never, ever do anything to hurt each other.”

  Lucas’s face slipped into Sophie’s mind’s eye, along with the moment of tension between his parents. Sometimes it was so easy to hurt the other person without meaning to. People made mistakes. They said things, did things, they didn’t entirely mean. Is that what had happened? Had her grandparents simply argued? Had one thing turned to another until it became violent? She shook her head. Words were one thing. Taking someone’s life was another thing altogether.

  “What else can I help you find?” Katie’s gaze took in the stack of yearbooks and the articles piled on the table.

  “I don’t think anything in here, right now.” Sophie stood, her back creaking a little as she found her feet. Ankle hurt. Neck stiffened. Mostly, though, her insides felt empty. “Maybe some fresh air.”

  Katie nodded. “Nothing like ocean air to clear the mind. It’s usually beautiful down there this time of day. I know they’ve blocked off most of the beach, but there’s a nice little path on the east side, near the point, away from the lighthouse.”

  “Thanks. Sounds like a good recommendation.” Ocean air. A view of the sky and the sea. The sound of the water against the shore. It all sounded heavenly to Sophie. She gathered up her things and followed Katie into the bright white foyer. A view of the sky and the sea. Sophie froze. Where had that phrase come from? Not her own thoughts. She stood perfectly still and closed her eyes.

  Caught between the stars and the sand,

  Between a view of the sky and the sea,

  I reach for the moon…

  “Honey?” Katie laid a hand on her back.

  Sophie’s eyes flew open. Was it that easy? She rolled over the w
ords inside her head. Maybe–maybe not. But reporter’s intuition told her she was onto something. Some part of her suspected where the treasure lay. Or at least where to start looking for it.

  “Sophie?”

  She’d almost forgotten Katie was standing there. “Oh. Yes. I’m fine.” She waved away the woman’s look of concern. “Sometimes I get a little lost in my own head.”

  “You’ll let me know if I can do anything else?”

  “Yes. And thank you again. It helped to go through those things.”

  The front door banged open, and a cluster of women walked into the library. Two, she recognized. The others she didn’t. But their fake-bubbly conversation lowered to whispers and trailed off altogether when they saw her standing there.

  Shannon stepped from the middle of the group. “Sophie! I thought you’d left town.”

  Darn it. She’d forgotten to slip her sunglasses back on. “Why would you think that?”

  Her eyes widened. “I mean, with everything that’s happened down on the point, I thought you’d want to... My father told me about the attack and the investigation, I mean, and I talked to Lucas a little while ago and...” She trailed off.

  She’d talked to Lucas? Of course she had. Sophie tried to ignore the hot flash of jealousy surging through her. Had he called up his ex-girlfriend the moment she’d walked out? Or had Shannon gone over to his place with an offer to nurse him back to health?

  “I’m still on assignment,” she said. “Story’s not finished yet.” She dropped her sunglasses onto her face and pushed through the group of women before they could say anything else.

  “Anyway, Katie, about those flyers...” Shannon’s voice floated out, the last thing Sophie heard before she hit the sidewalk and headed back to the bed and breakfast.

  First stop: Francine’s, to shower and change. Second stop: Marcia and Lila’s, to ask if she could have the box of her father’s things. Third stop would be the treasure, if she could figure out its location. It wasn’t the lighthouse, she was almost positive. Or the keeper’s house. The thing was, a lot of times people looked for answers in the wrong places. She’d discovered a long time ago that sometimes you had to turn things upside down, consider them from a completely different perspective, to get the answer you sought.

  Sophie limped to the corner and crossed her fingers for a cab parked somewhere on Main Street. Her ankle wouldn’t hold out much longer.

  Between a view of the sky and the sea...

  * * * *

  “Of course. It’s yours.” Marcia refilled Sophie’s glass with iced tea. Beads of sweat slicked the side and landed on the coaster. “I wish you’d taken it with you when you were here the first time.” Something like curiosity darkened her eyes.

  “But then we wouldn’t have had the pleasure of her company again,” Lila said. She nudged a half-empty plate of cookies across the table. “Please eat some of these. I can’t afford any more.” She patted her stomach, round and ample and lost under a brightly-colored dress.

  A breeze lifted the curtains and tickled the back of Sophie’s neck. Quiet out here, away from town, with a different kind of silence than Francine’s house by the beach. Or Lucas’s apartment on the other side of town, not that she was thinking about it or him or what she might have done differently this morning. Nope, her thoughts weren’t anywhere but right here. She willed Lucas’s face out of her mind and wrapped her hand around the cold glass.

  “Thank you,” she said. The box sat on the floor behind her, and though she didn’t turn to look at it, she could feel it waiting for her to open it. Nothing to be afraid of, she told herself as her heart fluttered inside her chest. Nothing inside but bits and pieces of things. But those pieces might lead to a whole answer or two.

  “What made you come back?” Marcia asked. “Change your mind, I mean?”

  Sophie cleared her throat. “I was doing some reading, some research down at the library this morning.” Deep breath. “You were right. You and everyone else around here, I guess. I just found out for sure Peterson Smith was my father.”

  “Ah.”

  “I read through some old yearbooks and newspaper articles.”

  “Mm hmm.” Marcia waited.

  “And so I thought I’d like the box of his things.” She concentrated on the thin flavor of the tea, the tan color contrasting with the darker sunlight falling across the hardwood floor.

  Marcia smoothed her hair, pushing it back from her eyes, and for another long moment she studied Sophie without words. I’ve lived here almost all my life, her expression seemed to say. I know about questions and answers and looking for yourself in places you never expected to.

  “I hope you’ll find some comfort in having them.” Her smile lifted the room from deep afternoon auburn to comforting gold.

  “Thanks.” Sophie took a cookie. “Mm. So good. What is this inside? Mint?”

  Lila nodded. “From Charles’s Cafe.”

  Of course. The man was a culinary genius. “You know, he should give baking lessons. I bet he’d fill up a whole kitchen of people who’d love to make things like this.” She examined the cookie. “Unless he doesn’t want to give away his secrets.”

  “Good idea.” Marcia offered her more tea, but Sophie shook her head. “I’ll mention it to him next time we’re there.”

  “You mean tomorrow?” Lila laughed.

  “Yes, tomorrow.”

  Sophie leaned back in her chair as Marcia and Lila started talking about the upcoming fall festival and who would be handling the Methodist Church raffle this year and whether or not the teachers’ guild should be allowed to sell fried dough along with candied apples and...

  As they talked, her shoulders unclenched themselves, and her heart slowed its uneven pattering. Even her ankle ached less than it had this morning, though that might be due to the three ibuprofen she’d downed as much as the kindness of the two women sitting at the table with her.

  “Will you be here for the memorial next week?” Lila turned to Sophie. “I think Lucas agreed to speak at it.”

  She frowned. “I’m leaving soon. Tomorrow or the day after. So, no. I don’t think so.” It didn’t matter whether or not Lucas was speaking at it, though half of her wondered what he’d say. If he could say anything at all. But Sophie wasn’t sure standing with the Lindsey Point locals to honor six dead teenagers was any place she wanted to be. Or belonged.

  Marcia nodded. “I understand. Of course.”

  “I should go,” Sophie said after a few more minutes of pleasant silence filled with nothing but the occasional rumble of heat thunder in the distance and a car horn beeping as it passed. Wind. The chatter of some kind of animal. And her own pulse, steady under her skin. Those were the only other sounds she could make out.

  I reach for the moon,

  I cast its light in your eyes…

  Minute by slow minute, the part of her wanting to analyze that poem began to itch under the surface, growing in small degrees and overtaking the part of her that wanted to curl up in a chair by an open window and sleep the afternoon away. Sophie finished her tea, said her thanks, and carried the box out to the cab when it pulled up a few minutes later. She’d give herself one last night in Lindsey Point. If she didn’t find some kind of answer by the time the sun came up, she’d head back to New York and leave this whole mess behind her.

  Chapter 34

  Caught between the stars and the sand,

  Between a view of the sky and the sea,

  I reach for the moon,

  I cast its light in your eyes

  So that forever after you will remember

  How it was the first moment I loved you.

  Not from there, but from here

  Not from the top but from the bottom

  Across the never-ending water you will find the treasure

  I have bought for you, my heart.

  I have buried it deep below

  Every day you seek it

  And every day you see it–
r />   One day, my love, my only, it will be ours.

  This beacon of love will guide us home

  And forever, my sweet, shelter us from the storm.

  Sophie traced each line as she read it. Tape kept the torn pages together now, though she wondered about the jagged line that moved through the words “my heart.” Deliberate? Accidental? Long, low shadows moved over the bed, and she checked the clock. A little after five. She was running out of time.

  “Miss Smithwaite?” Francine tapped her fingers against the open bedroom door. “Are you staying another night?”

  Sophie nodded. “I think so. Is that all right?” She realized they probably hadn’t booked the bed and breakfast through the weekend, though she’d place odds on the fact Francine had a vacancy or two.

  “Of course.” Francine glanced at the box beside the bed, taking in the picture and the t-shirts and the piece of paper on Sophie’s lap.

  “Come on in,” Sophie said.

  “Oh no, it’s okay, I shouldn’t.”

  “Please? I thought you might be able to help me.”

  “Help you? Ah, I don’t know.” She inched her way into the room and perched on the edge of the rocker near the window. She looked like a bird more than ever today, all odd angles and bony wrists and shoulder blades poking through her dress like a hanger, with pursed lips that looked as though they were finishing up a snack of those dry scones.

  “You grew up in Lindsey Point, right?”

  Francine nodded.

  “You ever think maybe there’s more to the lighthouse story than people say?”

  Francine pushed her toe into the carpet and set the chair to rocking. “I read a lot about it, you know. When I opened this place. I thought people who came here would want to know the story.”

  Sophie wrapped her arms around her knees, pulled up to her chest, and waited.

  “All the articles, those things people said, people who grew up with them I mean, and even the police reports... I read all of it. My mom used to talk about it some, I mean she lived here her whole life too, and...” She trailed off and looked outside, in the direction of the lighthouse. “I don’t think he killed her.”