Beside a Dreamswept Sea

by Hinze, Vicki

  Cally half wished the woman would stop threatening and really quit. And that Bryce would let her. But even if she did, he wouldn’t. Mrs. Wiggins was a tie to Meriam, and those ties he would hold on to for dear life. Forever.

  And why that fact made Cally jealous and angrier than hell, when she should find him being steadfast admirable, she hadn’t a clue. But it did. Jealous. And angry.

  She liked both, and definitely didn’t like liking either. They made her feel petty and small, even if they were feelings attached to the battleaxe.

  Tony stood in the hallway, watching the two girls walk out of the bath, a smile curling his lip. Frankie was exactly what Suzie needed. She couldn’t recapture her childhood, but if she could get these dreams out of her way, Frankie would give Suzie a run on another one.

  “Frankie, what are you doing with that sign?” Suzie moved to take it out of Frankie’s hand.

  She snatched it back. “I’m taking it off the door, is what.”

  “Why? No one will know Cally’s in there.”

  “Shh. She’ll hear us.” Frankie hiked a thumb toward Cally. “That’s why I’m moving it. So nobody’ll know she’s in there.” Frankie gave her head a shake, then propped the sign against the wall on the floor, a fair distance from the door. “She’s nekkid, remember?”

  “She’s taking a bath.”

  “I know.” Frankie grinned, ear to ear.

  Suzie shrugged. “Don’t you take a bath without your clothes?”

  “Yeah, but this ain’t about her taking a bath.” Frankie clicked her tongue to the roof of her mouth. “Look, you want her to be your mom, right?”

  Suzie nodded.

  “Well, you can’t just tell her, so we’ve gotta help her out a little.”

  “By taking the sign off the bathroom door? How does that help?”

  Frankie’s expression went lax, then closed. “I ain’t saying. If you gotta ask, you’re too little to know.”

  “I’m as big as you are.”

  “You ain’t as old. I’m nine and seven months. You’re only nine and two months. I’m older, and that’s that.”

  “Tell me.”

  “I can’t. My mom’d skin me alive.”

  Suzie gasped, paled.

  “Geez, Suzie. I meant she’d be ticked off at me.”

  Suzie gulped, lifted her chin. “I knew that.”

  “Did not.”

  “Did, too.”

  Frankie grabbed Suzie’s arm. “Come on.” She headed toward the stairs. “Let’s go follow Batty Beaulah.”

  “Who’s she?”

  “The old lady next door. She wears these goofy hats and has legs like a bird.”

  “Where’s she going?” Suzie stepped down the first of the stairs.

  “Ghost-hunting.”

  “Huh?”

  Frankie’s eyes sparkled. “She’s got binoculars and everything.”

  Suzie stopped at the crook in the landing. “I don’t want to hunt any ghosts.”

  Frankie halted beside her, looked up at the two portraits hanging on the wall. Cecelia and Collin Freeport. “Hey, I know about her. She was a doctor.”

  “No she wasn’t. She was a healer. Lucy Baker over at the Blue Moon told me all about her. She’s why miracles can happen here. Because she loved everybody so much and love doesn’t die. It stays forever and forever, and it fixes broken stuff.”

  “Honest?”

  “Selena said.” Suzie nodded. “I asked her on the phone.”

  “Who’s Selena?”

  “My grown-up friend at home. She says love lingers forever. That’s how I’m supposed to know Meriam still loves me and she always will.”

  Frankie stuffed her hand in her pocket and leaned against the banister. “Who’s Meriam?”

  Suzie started down the stairs. “She was my mom . . . sort of.”

  The third stair from the bottom creaked. Liking the sound, Frankie paused to jump on it three times. “How can you have a sort of mom?”

  Suzie jumped off the steps and stopped beside the grandfather clock in the gallery, then pressed her ear close to the glass to listen to its ticks. “Be born to Meriam.”

  Tony grimaced. The kid definitely needed a mother. Definitely.

  “Okay, Tony. I confess.” Bryce tossed up his hand and paced the length of the bedroom, his cane thumping dully on the carpet. “I’m having a little trouble dealing with knowing Meriam is content.”

  Tony debated. He could nix this with Bryce, but it’d be better to let the guy work through it so he could get it out of his system. Tony leaned back against the window, avoiding the mirror in the washstand tucked into the corner. He hated mirrors. Not seeing his own solid reflection but his essence, he empathized with Cally, knowing how cruel those innocuous bits of glass really could be.

  At least he’d always had a fondness for this room. His mother, Cecelia, had named it the Cove Room because looking out the window, past the stand of trees and the hint of rooftops in the village, you could glimpse the cove. As it had then, now it still bore all the markings of being a man’s room. Deep-stained cherrywood furniture, a king-size bed covered with a forest-green comforter and brown and green print pillows. None of the frills or lace of the Great White Room.

  He let his gaze drift over to the armoire on the west wall. It settled on the small crystal bowl atop it, filled with Sea Spray-scented potpourri. Then he looked to the desk in front of the windows, homed in on the stubby brass vase that held a single yellow rose. Hattie’s touches were everywhere. Even in the terra-cotta berry box beside the crystal bowl. Bess Mystic had bought it for Hattie. And she’d bought a second one for John, to show her estranged husband she’d welcomed him back into her life and her heart. A precious moment, that.

  After a lengthy monologue, Bryce circled back to his opening statement. “I guess I’m having more than a little trouble dealing with knowing Meriam’s content without us.”

  Tony lowered his gaze from the cathedral ceiling to Bryce. He looked like he always did: crisp white shirt, perfectly creased slacks, a navy and gray silk tie. Provided things worked out here—and realizing that, right now, that outcome looked rather grim—Cally had her wifely work cut out for her, getting Bryce to chill out a little. For Tony, the time had come to cut in. Doesn’t it ease your mind to know Meriam’s content?

  “Of course it does.” Bryce forked a hand through his hair, paced an angry path between the louvered closet doors and the bed. “It’s just that—”

  You do want her at peace, right? I mean, you couldn’t be content knowing she was miserable and unsettled, could you?

  “No, I couldn’t.” Bryce dropped his hand to his side. “But I—I—” Frustration twisted his expression. “Hell, Tony, I don’t know what I want. I’m mad. So damn mad. I know it’s wrong, but there it is.”

  Would you mind if I materialize? I’m getting dizzy, trying to keep pace here.

  Near the foot of the bed, Bryce halted. “Materialize?”

  So you can see me and so, when you’re talking to me, I won’t have to run you down to see your face. That really does get tiresome, Bryce. When talking or listening to someone, a person always looks at their eyes. It’s a lifelong habit that doesn’t break just because you die. It just gets more challenging because the person can’t see you, you know?

  “Um, go ahead, then.”

  Bryce sounded anything but enthused, and his knuckles went white, gripping the head of the cane, yet Tony sensed the man was sympathetic to his special challenges.

  He watched Bryce’s expression carefully. Some thought they were ready to see a ghost, but when they actually did, they passed out cold. At least if Bryce fell, he’d fall on the bed and spare his knee any more trauma. Hattie would appreciate that, and Tony had heard quite enough of her ear-blistering for the time being. She’d railed for hours about his telling Suzie the “new mom” bit of business.

  Bryce’s throat went thick. Tony stood before him, looking as solid as Bryce himself, wearing an old A
rmy uniform with shiny brass buttons—Class A’s, Bryce suspected—and a yellow carnation pinned to his lapel. “So that’s why Suzie was so knocked out by Cally’s carnation.”

  Tony smiled, clearly pleased about something. What, Bryce had no idea, but the man had a friendly face and, next to Miss Hattie’s, the kindliest eyes Bryce ever had seen.

  “We need to resolve these feelings of yours about Meriam, Bryce. They’re keeping you chained to her, and her chained to a life that doesn’t belong to her anymore.” Tony ruffled a hand through his hair. Brown, but touched by the light, it streaked gold. “You both need to move on.”

  “I’m trying.” Bryce was, wasn’t he? He was here.

  “I know you are.” Tony hiked a hip and sat on the edge of the desk.

  “What’s it like for her? Being on the other side?”

  “She’s at peace. And she’s content. Isn’t that enough to know?”

  “I guess not.” Passing the armoire, Bryce picked up the little terra-cotta berry box, ran his fingers over its rough surface. “I want her content, but I’m angry because she is. And I feel guilty because I’m angry. It’s not logical or rational, Tony. It’s garbage, and I don’t know where to dump it.”

  “I think you’re relieved. And I think you feel guilty not because of anger but because you’re falling in love with Cally.”

  “I’m not.” Bryce looked up from the vine cut into the top of the box to Tony. “We’re friends. That’s all. And I’m trying to help Cally realize she’s a wonderful, desirable woman—which she is—remember?”

  Tony crossed his arms over his chest. “Oh, I haven’t forgotten.” He stood up and slid a hand into his pocket. “Sit down.”

  “What?”

  “Sit down.” Tony nodded to the edge of the bed.

  Bryce sat, then looked up at Tony.

  “Now forgive me if I’m a little out of step with the times. I would remind you that I’ve been dead fifty-one years. But I think as men we have a responsibility to remember something vital in our relationships with women.”

  “We have tons of responsibilities, I agree. You can cut out the sarcasm and cut to the chase.”

  “No problem, Counselor. What you’re saying is normal and fine, except for one thing.” Tony stopped directly in front of Bryce, then looked down at him. “Friends don’t kiss friends like you kissed Cally Tate.”

  “Typically, no, they don’t. But that wasn’t about passion.”

  “Looked pretty passionate to me.”

  “It wasn’t,” Bryce insisted. “It was about loneliness.”

  “Ah, well, that explains it, then. Raging hormones and good old-fashioned lust had nothing to do with it. The very basic human need to touch and be touched had nothing to do with it, either. In fact, what you’re telling me is that, when you get down to brass tacks, Cally had nothing to do with it. Is that right, Counselor? Is that what you’re saying here? That it wouldn’t have mattered who the woman was, so long as she was in your arms?”

  Bryce lied through his teeth. “Right.”

  “Animal crackers.” Tony backed up to the desk, perched on the edge, then stretched out his legs and crossed his ankles. “You were supposed to be showing her she’s desirable. I left her in your capable hands.”

  “So they’re not so capable. That shouldn’t surprise you. You know about Meriam, Suzie, Wiggins. Hell, Tony, what did you expect?”

  “I expected honesty.” Tony snorted, tapped a pen from the desk against his palm. “Sometimes you people really irk me. You’ve got everything I want right at your fingertips and you lie to yourselves and turn away from it. Well, I know that’s comfortable for you. I know it eases your fears of putting your heart on the line again. But it does present us with a little dilemma.”

  Bryce stood up. “What dilemma?”

  Tony rubbed at his neck. “Seascape is a healing house. But you know that already, don’t you? You’ve felt the effects of it, and Suzie’s told you and Cally all about it, hasn’t she? You just haven’t wanted to listen because you’d rather play ostrich and tell Cally how she needs to be looking in the mirror. I strongly suggest, Counselor, that you stop pointing fingers long enough to take a look at yourself.”

  “I’m trying to help her. Have you forgotten that?”

  “You’re hiding behind a desire to help her, using it like a shield—and we both know it.” Tony gritted his teeth, curled his hands into fists, then forced his tone civil. “I crave—not want, damn it, but crave—everything you’ve got, and you’re not only refusing to appreciate it, you’re refusing to even see that it’s there.”

  “You mentioned a dilemma.” Bryce clenched his jaw to keep his temper under control. “Will you be getting to it anywhere in our future?”

  “Very well.” Tony twisted his lips, relaxed his fingers. “It’s my job to make sure you have every opportunity to heal in this house, Counselor. That’s why I’m here. If you lack the courage to do your part, well, that makes me doing my part more complicated. I don’t like complications. And, while I’m empathetic with your situation and the troubles that have kept you straddling the fence and seeking comfort here, I’m going to have to insist you leap to one side or the other. In other words, from now on, every time you lie to yourself I’m going to be in your face telling you that you’re lying to yourself. Now, whether or not you elect to be honest with me doesn’t really matter. You’re damn well going to be honest with you.”

  Bryce glared at him. “You’re nothing like T.J. said you were.”

  “It’s nearly Thanksgiving.” Tony shrugged. “I’m a reasonable man, but I get a little impatient with men who run scared, especially at Thanksgiving.”

  “Why?”

  “Because that’s when I proposed to Hattie and she accepted.”

  “But before you could marry her, you died.”

  “Yes.” Tony clenched his jaw. “I died.”

  Letting all this soak in, Bryce put the box back atop the armoire. “First, I’m sorry for your loss, but to be frank here, I’ve got my own baggage weighing me down and I damn sure don’t need any more. Secondly, I don’t need or want you in my face. I am honest with myself and I’m attracted to Cally because what happened to her is tragic, and she’s far too special to have been dealt the dirt she’s been shoveled by that bastard Tate. And thirdly, I am lonely. Sometimes I’m so damn lonely I think if it were lethal, I’d be dead. But I’m lonely for Meriam. My wife, who is content without me. And I’m angry that she’s content—even though I know I should feel better for knowing it. I’m angry because I’m so damn miserable without her.”

  Tony dipped his chin. “You were always without her.” He stuffed his hands into his pockets. “I know that’s hard for you to accept. I tried to help her, but I failed.”

  “I wasn’t without her.”

  “You were.” Tony frowned, and compassion clouded his eyes. “She wasn’t there for you, Bryce. She was never there for you or for the kids. Take a look at how things really were between you. Forget the fantasies. Look at your lives the way they really were.”

  “I know how things really were. Don’t you tell me how things really were between us. She loved me, damn it!” Bryce slammed a fist down on the desk. The impact sent shock waves racing up to his elbow. His hand stung. He gripped the desk ledge, and his temper. “She loved me.”

  “Meriam couldn’t love you.” Tony stared at Bryce, softened his voice. “I’m sorry, but that’s the truth. What happened to her didn’t leave her the luxury of loving anyone. Think about it and you’ll know I’m right. Think about yourself. About the kids. And think about Cally.”

  “What about Cally? Hell, the last thing she wants is to love again.”

  “True. In her head. But what about in her heart? You know all about Mary Beth Ladner. Cally’s a lot like Hattie, Counselor. She’s a giver. A nurturer. And she’s got nobody to nurture.”

  Tony mumbled under his breath, then let out a sigh that would power windmills and talked to the ceilin
g. “Here we’ve got a guy who needs nurturing, with three beautiful kids who sorely need nurturing, and a woman who is a nurturer with not a soul in her life to nurture. Now, life hasn’t been extremely kind to any of these folks, but the man and woman clearly are attracted and care about each other, though they hide from it behind words like ‘loneliness’ and ‘friends.’ They kiss. They talk. They go on outings with the kids, and they laugh. Really laugh. Yet both this man and woman are so busy protecting their tattered pride and swearing that they won’t let themselves love again that they’re failing to see—”

  “None of us need more heartache.” Bryce interrupted, his voice stone-cold. “Not Cally, not my kids, and not me.”

  “Ah, true. But you do have what each of you needs. There are a lot of kinds of love, Bryce. We both know it. So maybe between you and Cally romantic love isn’t it. Maybe it’s something deeper. That’s a distinct possibility, wouldn’t you say? Maybe between you there’s a chance for a steady and sure love based on trust and caring. A special love that will help to heal the wounds inside you and Cally, and inside your kids. And maybe, if either you or Cally has the strength and courage to venture beyond your pride to find it, you’ll recognize that kind of love for the treasure it is.” Tony stared deeply into Bryce’s eyes. “Do you have that much strength and courage, Counselor?”

  His expression bleak, Bryce admitted the truth. “I don’t know.”

  Chapter 8

  Cally rinsed the scented soap from her shoulder, muttering under her breath.

  So far, she’d been interrupted in the bath by Suzie and Frankie, by Miss Hattie, bringing in fresh towels, and by Mrs. Wiggins, washing glue off Lyssie’s hands. Thank God the child hadn’t thought it smelled good and doused her hair with it or Bryce would be virtually slitting his throat. If one more person knocked on that door, Cally was going to pitch a fit that would make Mrs. Wiggins’s resignation tirades look like play time at kindergarten.