Sandpiper Island (The Bachelors

by Donna Kauffman

  “You told me not to tiptoe around you. Well, same goes. I can’t say I think about Henry, but I miss Tommy and Gran every day, in some form or fashion. I remember them fondly, happily, not mournfully. Life’s too short for that.”

  “Wise words.”

  “Where did you sleep?” She shook off the last of her dream daze, but she didn’t want to think about the loss he’d actually been referring to, either, much less talk about it. Back to business.

  “I was going to move you to your bed, but you were sleeping so soundly. I figured you needed that more than anything, so I thought it best to leave you to it.”

  “My bed, then.”

  The look he gave her was inscrutable. She liked knowing she could read people. She prided herself on it, in fact. It made it easier to take care of them when she could tell what it was they really needed. So, she was not a fan of inscrutable. He was one of the only people in her life who could pull that off. She’d forgotten how inscrutable he could be.

  “It was available,” he said, at length.

  “Okay.” He’d done her a favor. Like the old friend that he was. So what if she’d been lying a mere room away from him, having dreams that, if he knew his role in them—She cleared her throat, looked down at her still-clothed self. “Well, you’re right. A good night’s sleep is never a bad thing. So, I’d better get up and put it to good use.” She eyed his braced arm pointedly.

  “You’ve got the morning off,” he said, looking less inscrutable now, and perhaps a tad uncomfortable.

  “Do I now?” she asked, surprised—no, shocked—by his apparent high-handedness. “And how would that be?” She started to sit up again, but flopped back when she hit the arm. “You didn’t close the diner, did you?”

  He raised both eyebrows, but otherwise kept a smooth expression. “Would the world as we know it end if that were the case?”

  “Just the Cove. So . . . same thing.”

  “Dee—”

  It shouldn’t annoy her when he called her that. In her dreams, it was the exact opposite of annoying. Probably there was a connection there, but she was too distracted by the diner situation to worry about it. “The same folks have been coming in for breakfast, coffee, lunch, and the like for—well, between Gran and me, longer than I’ve been alive.”

  “I assume they won’t die of starvation or from shock if they were left to fend for themselves for a morning.”

  “That’s not the point.”

  “Then what is the point?” He cut her off before she could tell him exactly where he could take his point and put it. “I know folks like having their daily routines, and you’re a big part of the day-to-day fabric of this entire community. Not the food, or the shelter, but you.”

  She—had no response for that. She hadn’t been expecting it. “All the more reason for me to get up and get my fanny in to work.”

  “What I’m saying is you’ve banked a lot of goodwill in these parts. You take care of everyone. They would be fine with a small break in the routine if they knew that it was a chance to repay the favor.”

  Yet another Maddox frustrating her with making logic seem all . . . logical. “Ford—”

  “I called Peg,” he said, ending the discussion. “She opened. You’re trading your shift with hers. So, you’re not due in until the lunch shift.”

  “Peg is not even remotely a morning person. That’s why she never opens. Ever. How on earth did you—”

  “I asked.”

  The repercussions of Ford calling Peg at God knew what time of the morning to ask her to open the diner, and what possible reasons he could have given Peg for why he’d been the one doing the calling—Delia groaned. “I can never step foot in there again.”

  He merely gave her a questioning look.

  “What did you tell Peg? About why she needed to open? And why you were doing the asking? What did she say? And how did you even know to call her? Or what her number was?”

  “I said you were exhausted and needed some sleep. She said fine, she’d cover for you. I found her name, along with everyone else who works for you, on an old typed-up list tacked to the corkboard next to the phone in the kitchen. And I knew to call her because, though it’s been a while since I was a regular, she worked for you back when I was. Just because I moved out to Sandpiper didn’t mean I lost all memory of what came before.”

  And just like that, a very specific memory of what had come before—most specifically the two of them, well . . . coming—flashed into her brain. Like a heat-seeking missile. Seriously, she really had to find a way to make that stop. She looked away, forcing the images out of her overly fevered, clearly undersexed brain. “Thank you.”

  He looked sincerely surprised at that.

  “What?” she said. “I’m not—I was just surprised. It was a nice thing you did. Above and beyond the call of friendship. I’m sorry I wasn’t more . . . immediately grateful. But I am. Grateful. I’m more of a morning person than Peg, but that doesn’t usually involve dealing with people until I’ve had a few hours with a sharp knife in my hand.”

  Now a smile played around his mouth. Oh, that mouth, and the things it did for her, had been doing to her, less than an hour ago in her dreams. She shifted her gaze to his arm. To the rumpled, sleep-creased shirt she was wearing. Still wearing. Anywhere but at that mouth.

  “Good to know,” he said, with an edge of humor that buzzed right along her nerve endings, like the caress of a broad, warm palm across her skin.

  “So . . . can I get up now?” She really needed some alone time. Or, more specifically, some away-from-him time.

  “There’s something else I need to talk to you about.”

  She frowned and tensed. “What now?”

  “I didn’t come over last night to play white knight. I had a reason for stopping by.”

  “Oh. Right. I forgot about your stealth visit. And what’s up with that anyway? It’s becoming a habit.”

  “I wanted to speak to you alone. That’s the only time I know for certain you’re away from the diner and all the listening ears that go with it.”

  “Okay. So . . . what’s up?”

  “It’s about Winstock. And Grace.”

  Her gut squeezed on the first name, her heart on the second. “Maybe there should be coffee before we go any further.” The moment she said the word coffee, her stomach growled in clear agreement. She gave him a wry smile. “The ayes have it, then.” She finally pushed at his arm. Hard. “Let me up.”

  He didn’t budge.

  “Unless you want to be in charge of the percolator, let me up. And by percolator, I mean the real deal. It was Gran’s. Brews the best coffee you’ll ever taste. Even better than what I brew at work, which is pretty awesome, but doesn’t touch my homemade. Sometimes the old ways are better. Don’t tell anyone, though, or they’ll start dropping by.”

  “Dee, there’s something I need to tell you—”

  “Let me up,” she repeated with an edge, damning her own heart for fluttering every time he said her name. Add him needing her, for any reason, and well . . . she was hereby officially never sleeping again.

  He lifted his arm, but clearly against his better judgment. She kicked off the old quilt he’d tossed over her, then immediately grabbed it back. “You—” She peeked under the quilt again, but she definitely wasn’t dreaming now. “You took my pants off?” She looked at him accusingly.

  “About that.”

  She was confused, because she very clearly still had on her bra and shirt—what the hell? So it took her a moment to see his face had reddened. “About that,” she repeated. “Enlighten me. Did we have a sudden storm I don’t remember? Where only my pants got soaked? What?”

  “You . . . uh.” He broke off and looked away. “You don’t remember then.”

  She’d already opened her mouth to prod him to explain himself in a more stringently worded demand, only to snap her mouth shut. A heat she hadn’t felt in a long time crept up the back of her neck. It was the heat
of embarrassment. Not the typical day-to-day, do something dumb embarrassment. Everybody had those, and she was no exception. No, this was looking to be the kind of embarrassment that made lists. Specifically that Most Embarrassing Moments Ever list that everyone kept tucked away somewhere on a mental tally sheet. She could only assume, given the nature of her dreams, that perhaps she’d removed her own pants—she closed her eyes against the images of what that striptease had looked like, given her overall appearance at the time.

  “No,” she finally managed, in a much smaller voice. “I don’t suppose I do.” Before he could say another word, and to spare them both what was sure to be further embarrassment all around, not to mention a dash of total humiliation tossed in for grins, she said, “You know what, it doesn’t matter. You stopped by to tell me something and I all but passed out dead at your feet. You did a very kind—if unnecessary—thing,” she added, “by staying to watch over me, even making sure I could get more rest than usual. Like I said, above and beyond a good friend gesture. I slept here, you slept there—” She gestured in the general direction of the narrow, cypress plank steps that led up to her second-floor bedroom. “All’s well that ends well. I don’t think any further explanation is needed.”

  He nodded and looked as relieved as she felt. Which was no small amount.

  “So, uh, where are my pants? Actually, never mind.” She pulled the quilt around her, feeling silly as she bumbled upright. It wasn’t like he hadn’t seen her bare legs before, though that had been in the very distant past, but what were bare legs anyway? Nothing. It was the sex dreams making it all seem more . . . suggestive. Besides, she was still wearing underwear. At least . . . dear Lord. Am I? She didn’t dare wriggle to find out. “I’m going to go shower, change clothes. Then coffee. You—can you wait just a little bit longer? God, I’m being a lousy hostess and even worse friend. Why don’t you go on with your day and we’ll figure out another time to chat.”

  “Go shower. I have the time.”

  Awesome. Dammit.

  He straightened his long frame and shifted to the side, away from the spindly tea table. She pretended not to notice him reach a hand to help her maneuver the bulk of the bundled quilt between couch and table, and busied herself scooping the corners of it up off the floor as she managed to get herself past him without tripping. Or touching him.

  “Ten minutes,” she said, not bothering to add she had no intention of waiting until lunchtime to go in to work. What the hell else would she do all morning? She’d already set up a time with Blue to look at the fresh catch that afternoon and she’d gotten in the veg and meat order the day before. She had paperwork to do. There was always paperwork to do. But otherwise . . .

  She felt the newly familiar clamp start to tighten around her heart. It didn’t help matters any that as she climbed the stairs, she could feel the quilt rub across her very bare fanny. But she had bigger concerns than the fact that she’d quite possibly flashed her lady parts at Ford the night before. Who had not accepted the invite. Don’t even go there.

  She flipped the shower on, waited for the steam to rise, then stepped in and hoped the beastly hot spray would bake the worry and the indecision right out of her. She stuck her head under the streaming water, then tilted her chin down and let it beat on the tight muscles of her neck and shoulders.

  The diner wasn’t just her job; it was her home, the place she felt she most belonged. Her little cottage was the place she and Tommy had lived for most of their childhood, at least all that she could remember of it, and yet, it was pretty much just the place where they’d slept, showered, changed clothes. Gran’s restaurant was where they’d lived. Where they’d gone every day after school and stayed until bedtime, oftentimes past bedtime. The restaurant was where they’d done homework, had their sibling squabbles, and existed in the bosom of what was the Cove. The regulars were their extended family, and waiting tables, washing dishes, their version of family chores.

  Delia’s Diner had quickly become to her exactly what O’Reilly’s had been. Her home. Where she belonged. Where she lived. Ford was right in that she gave to the community, but they gave back tenfold. They were and always had been her very large, very extended family, with all the love, friendship, support, and yes, dysfunction, that went with it. She owed them everything. In the Cove, at her diner, was where she felt her worth, where she felt valued, loved. All for doing something she loved to begin with. Who could want anything more than that? She had no regrets about the choice she’d made not to follow Henry’s dreams but to stay in the Cove and follow her own.

  But there was still a future ahead of her, and more choices to be made. Choices she hadn’t seen coming . . . and the feelings those choices had evoked had been startling and unexpected. The little trickles of unease, of dissatisfaction she’d been feeling, made her feel ungrateful and . . . well, scared. She didn’t want anything more, at least not in the way of having a life that was bigger or broader than life in the Cove. Her place was here and that knowledge, that certainty, were both comforting and fulfilling. So . . . why the unease? Why the sense that there should be something more . . . somehow?

  It would be easy to blame Winstock. But, truth be told, the niggles had started before all this. Thinking about what might happen to her diner, and what that would mean to her, to her life, had only underscored the unexpected thoughts she’d already been having.

  She’d never had a family of her own, but she wasn’t yearning for some late-in-life child. She’d long since made peace with the fact that children were not in the cards for her. She liked no strings. No strings meant no pain, and she was perfectly fine with that. But no strings also meant no husband or partner, and, therefore, no kids.

  Single parenting wasn’t for her, either. She wasn’t going to force a kid into her chosen way of life, nor was she going to farm out child care and be a stranger to her own child. Besides, the locals were her children. She nurtured, fed, settled squabbles, gave advice . . . and then locked up and sent them all home every night. What wasn’t to love about that?

  But there was still a feeling she was missing . . . something.

  Her thoughts went to Grace. Delia had tried to hide from the fact that her inner turmoil, the yearning for something. . . more, had started right about the time Grace Maddox had relocated her life to the Cove. Delia had initially thought about the fact that she had no immediate family. That was natural, watching brother and sister reunite. It emphasized the part of her life she was missing, the part she could never get back. Tommy.

  That had also been when she’d started dreaming about Ford. Also not a big surprise, given his sister’s arrival had triggered all kinds of memories about her past experiences with Grace’s older brother.

  Except, instead of getting herself back to normal as Grace found her own niche in the Cove, Delia felt a greater sense of . . . dissatisfaction. Then Winstock had failed in his attempt to buy Brodie’s property out from under him, so he and his conniving daughter had started looking for the next best thing. And Delia had unwittingly handed it to them on a platter by failing to pay attention to the end date of her decades-long lease agreement.

  She had wondered if her screwup had maybe been some kind of subconscious thing, a sign of how deep her life-questioning truly ran. But the truth was, she’d always paid her annual dollar at the end of the year, and she hadn’t thought to make this particular year any different, even though she had been very well aware it was the twentieth one. She’d have had a talk then about what was to happen next, with that most likely being her buying the property.

  She forced herself to shift mental gears, to what it would take now to save the diner, if that was indeed what she wanted. She didn’t see how she could. She supposed she could sue the town if Davis ruled against her, but she didn’t have the kind of resources needed for the very protracted court battle that Winstock would no doubt push her to. He could ruin her financially, and then she’d lose what viability she did have to take out loans and start over. />
  Her entire body tensed almost to the point of physical pain at the thought of having to do that. Start over. From scratch. Yes, she’d have the built-in customer base, but it wasn’t succeeding once she was open that filled her with dread. It was all the rest of it. Taking out loans and being heavily in debt—again—after working so hard to get out from under that. Only this time she was twenty years older, and not all that excited about spending another twenty under that kind of burden.

  Then there was the real estate search, which was finite in a place as small as the Cove, or it was if she wanted to be successful. Folks might love her, but they weren’t about to drive ten or fifteen miles out of town to grab their morning coffee or a late-night burger. Even if she was fortunate enough to have the perfect location open up, there was the building or renovating, and all the incredible amount of work it took to launch a place. She could certainly gut her current place and take everything she possibly could, but it wasn’t a plug-and-play kind of deal. It was rare that two spaces would have the same kind of layout, the same equipment requirements, the same—She broke off as a gulp of unexpected tears rushed up and closed her throat over, spurting out of her eyes before she could stop them. She leaned her forehead against the cool tile as the shower beat on her back, trying to choke them down. Failing. I’m so sick and tired of feeling like this. Wrenched and gutted. All the damn time. She just wanted it to stop, wanted to wake up and have it all be clear, the answer right there in front of her. Then she would know what to do, what it would take to make her feel like herself again, and she’d do whatever that was, whatever it took, happily, because she’d know the outcome would all be worth it. Her problems would be solved.

  Only the answers weren’t there.

  “And if you can’t even figure out what the hell to do with yourself for one morning, what exactly did you think you were going to do with yourself for the rest of your life if it’s not starting over with another diner?”