Best Beach Ever

by Wendy Wax

  Chase stepped back and motioned her to go ahead. She was aware of his solid presence behind her all the way into the kitchen.

  “Wow, that smells fabulous.” She bent over to place a kiss on Jeff’s cheek, remembering how once she’d been unable to reach his face without going up on tiptoe. He’d been her father’s closest friend and business partner, the only parental figure she had left. “In fact, it smells a lot like your famous cheeseburger casserole.”

  “That it is.” Jeff wheeled his chair backward. “I was just thinking about how nice the kitchen used to smell when Deirdre was taking those cooking lessons we gave her.”

  “A completely self-serving gift as I recall,” Chase observed.

  “It was,” Avery said. “But it was the first time I ever saw her enjoy being in a kitchen.” It had also been the last.

  “Why don’t you come have a seat, Avery?” Jeff said in a tone that acknowledged the unexpected hole her mother’s absence had left. “Chase, can you open that bottle of wine?”

  Chase pulled a corkscrew from a kitchen drawer while Avery took the seat Jeff pulled out for her. She watched Chase’s broad back and the slight ripple of muscle as he pulled the cork from the bottle and poured two glasses of wine, which he carried to the table. He set one in front of his father’s place and one in front of her.

  “Can you pull the cheese plate out of the fridge? The crackers are there on the counter.”

  “Quite a feast you’ve got planned here,” Chase said as he did everything his father asked. But he didn’t make eye contact, pour himself a glass of wine, or sit down. He just leaned against the counter while Jeff checked the timer on the oven and plied her with questions about the Wyatt project and how far along she’d gotten on her first official tiny house build.

  “Well, we started framing this morning,” she said. “I’m aiming for three to four weeks. It’s a tight schedule, but I’ve got a great crew working full-time and a fabulous client who has no problem making and sticking to decisions.”

  “Why, that sounds great,” Jeff enthused. “Doesn’t it, Chase?”

  “It does.” Chase nodded. But he stayed where he was and his smile looked more like a wince.

  “Chase is just finishing up a new spec house in Palma Ceia,” Jeff said, mentioning a nearby Tampa neighborhood.

  “That’s great,” Avery said, careful not to look directly at Chase. He’d spoken only when prompted and didn’t move from his position against the counter except when his father asked him to do something.

  When the timer buzzed, Jeff managed to remove the casserole from the oven and place it on a waiting trivet on the table then wheeled to the vacant spot across from Avery. He looked up at his son. “Aren’t you going to come sit down?” He motioned to the third place at the table.

  “No,” he said.

  Jeff looked at him more closely. Avery busied herself unfolding her napkin and smoothing it over her lap. If she could have, she would have covered her ears with her hands.

  “That’s the problem with springing something on someone. Sometimes that person has somewhere else they need to be.”

  Jeff looked at Chase in disbelief. Avery just felt sick to her stomach.

  “Well, I know Jason’s occupied tonight. What could be more important than having dinner with us?” Jeff demanded.

  One of Chase’s dark eyebrows sketched upward. An odd, yet unapologetic, smile played around his lips. “I’m afraid I already have plans for dinner tonight.” He detached himself from the counter. “I’ve got a date with someone who’s interested in more from me than ‘just a good time.’”

  * * *

  • • •

  Bitsy sat in June Steding’s office feeling almost as miserable as the clients who’d come in that day in search of the lawyer’s help. “I don’t understand how you do this every day,” she said, her grip tight on the bottled water she’d been nursing. “It seems like everything is a finger in the dike with no real hope of holding back the rising water.”

  The attorney nodded. “It’s true. Mostly you do a little bit for a lot of people. In baseball, I think they call it ‘small ball.’ Lots of singles to move the runners around the bases instead of relying on a home run.”

  “What about Gary Kaufman?” Bitsy asked, thinking about the forensic accountant who even now must be working through her financial records. “Is he a home-run hitter?”

  “I’ve seen him hit more than a few.” June smiled and tilted back in her chair. “Knowledge is power. And if anyone can follow the money and figure out what crimes Bertie’s committed, it’s him.”

  Bitsy lifted the water bottle to her lips. “I never thought I’d be eager to prove my husband committed crimes. Especially crimes against me.”

  “Well, documenting fraud is key and can point us in new directions. In the meantime there is a way to divorce Bertie even if we don’t find him and can’t serve him with papers.”

  “Really?” Bitsy sat up. “I mean, I want to see him locked up and I really, really hope we can find where the money’s stashed. But I also want to be free.” She studied the woman across from her. “Is it very complicated?”

  “Not really. It’s a matter of filling out a form that documents your efforts to locate him. At the same time, we prepare a Notice of Action for Dissolution of Marriage for publication in a newspaper that specializes in classified legal advertisements. If the missing spouse doesn’t respond in twenty-eight days, we file a motion for a default divorce. From start to finish you’re looking at about ninety days.”

  “You never mentioned this before.” She considered the attorney, hoping it wasn’t a sign that June thought the odds of finding Bertie were slim.

  “No, I didn’t.” June folded her hands on her desk. “Because I really want to see him dragged back and locked up. And the money returned. But it’s always good to have a backup plan in case you need it.”

  When Bitsy got home, Sherlock met her at the door with what she was pretty certain was a sympathetic expression on his face. She lingered outside, drawing in great gulps of fresh air while he visited and anointed his favorite bushes and trees, only heading back inside in the gathering dusk.

  She was eyeing the Lean Cuisine she’d nuked and had no interest in eating when a knock sounded on the cottage door. Sherlock sat up, cocked his head, and woofed. Bitsy looked through the peephole then opened the door.

  Bits of sawdust clung to Avery’s short blond curls. Dirt and grime streaked her cheeks. Her cargo pants were filthy and the logo on her T-shirt was no longer recognizable.

  “What happened?” Bitsy asked. “Are you all right? Do you need to use my shower?”

  “No. I couldn’t find my corkscrew.” Avery held up a bottle of red wine. “I need you to open this bottle. And then I need you to help me drink it.”

  “It’s a little late for sunset toasts.”

  “I didn’t really come here to toast. You can toast to anything you want. I’m mostly interested in the drinking part.” Avery pulled a second bottle out of an oversize pant pocket. “I really don’t have a single good thing to share. I meant to bring Cheez Doodles. But the wine seemed more important.”

  “No Cheez Doodles? Now I know it’s serious.” Bitsy stepped back so that Avery could enter. “But I loaned my corkscrew to Nikki.” She poked her head out and glanced down the walkway. Seeing that the Giraldis’ porch and living room lights were on, she sent Nikki a text. Two minutes later Nikki arrived carrying the corkscrew, a bottle of wine, and a baby monitor.

  Bitsy pulled three wineglasses out of the cupboard while Nikki opened the first bottle. Avery paced, which took real skill considering the minimal square footage. “Come sit down. You’re making me nervous.”

  Avery sat. Nikki settled on the love seat beside her. Bitsy took the lone chair and raised her glass. “To?”

  “Do we have to drink to something?” A
very asked.

  “Well, we would if Maddie were here,” Bitsy said. “But I’m not sure I have the strength to come up with anything, either.” She was pretty sure finding out you could divorce your thieving husband of fifteen years by publishing it in the paper would not qualify as a good thing.

  They clinked glasses and drank.

  “You’re just lucky the ‘good enough’ police aren’t listening in. But just in case they are, let’s drink to sleeping children,” Nikki said with a glance at the monitor. “And to the whole eight ounces I’ve lost over the last three days.”

  “Eight ounces, huh?” Bitsy asked. “I think I can see it in, uh, your cheekbones.”

  Nikki snorted. “Yeah, I think that four ounces on each side is making a pretty significant difference.”

  Avery rolled her eyes. It was an automatic gesture, but a small smile followed. “Good thing I didn’t bring those Cheez Doodles. I know how hard a time you have resisting them.”

  It was Bitsy’s turn to snort. She took a healthy sip of her wine, glad not to be drinking alone.

  Nikki looked Avery up and down. “So, I can’t help noticing that you’re wearing a lot of building materials. Were there any left on-site?”

  Avery took a long pull of wine. “Very funny. I’m working on a tiny house. That means close quarters. It’s not like staying clean is a primary construction goal.”

  Nikki was still eyeing Avery. “Didn’t you have dinner at the Hardins’ last night?”

  “Yep.”

  “How was it?” Bitsy asked, noting Avery’s squirm and the quick gulp of wine that followed.

  “Dinner was fine,” Avery said. “It was great to see Jeff. And Jason’s doing way better since he came back from the Outward Bound program. He’s been filling out college applications.”

  “And Chase?” Nikki asked. “How’s he doing?”

  Avery reached for her wineglass. “Oh, he seems to be doing fine, too. We caught up a little bit. Of course, that was before he had to leave to go pick up his date.”

  “Ouch.” Bitsy winced.

  “Yeah, well, to be fair, I don’t think he was intentionally flaunting it. He didn’t know I was coming to dinner. And I’m the one who didn’t want a serious relationship. He is free to date anyone he wants to.”

  Nikki sat back and closed her eyes briefly. “This is that moment when Maddie would have said the perfect thing.”

  “Yeah,” Avery agreed. “I almost called her to ask for advice. But then I thought she’s finally free to relax and not worry about anyone else. And I didn’t want to interrupt her time with Will.” She paused. “I guess doing a conference call or getting her on speakerphone right now is out of the question?”

  There was a brief but hopeful silence. Bitsy knew it would only take one of them to cave and hit speed dial. This was what happened when your glass-is-half-full person was missing.

  “We can’t do that. She deserves a break from being there for all of us,” Nikki finally said. “Me included. But, God, I miss her.”

  Bitsy topped off their drinks as they stared stupidly at each other.

  “But we all know Maddie pretty well. Sometimes I can even hear her voice in the back of my head,” Nikki continued. “Maybe all we really have to do is ask ourselves WWMD—what would Maddie do.”

  Thirteen

  Maddie had no earthly idea what to do. It was eight A.M. on Friday. Will had eased out of bed before sunrise, leaving her a note that he was headed into the studio to work on the new song. One he’d been working on all week and was determined to finish before they left on tour.

  Lori was in the office happily checking things off her countdown-to-tour list. Hudson Power had been out on the flats for hours guiding two longtime anglers to favored fishing spots. Every other person on Mermaid Point was busily engaged in either helping others or working on themselves.

  Back before their lives had been decimated by Malcolm Dyer’s Ponzi scheme, Maddie had contemplated her recently emptied nest and believed that a shiny new life was about to begin. She had imagined the freedom to do whatever appealed to her; to be anything she chose. She had dreamed of doing absolutely nothing for a really long time.

  Those dreams had been put on hold while she did what had to be done to ensure her family’s survival. In the process she’d grown stronger than she’d ever imagined. She had learned how to leap tall buildings in a single bound. How to face and conquer whatever life threw at her. Except, it appeared, free time.

  She’d been on Mermaid Point for four and a half days now. Four and a half days spent reminding herself how lucky she was to be there, how great it was to have no responsibilities and nothing she had to do. Four and a half aimless, endless days of waiting for everyone else to finish what they were doing so that she wouldn’t be alone with nothing to do.

  Who knew that doing nothing could be so hard? Or that she might be so incredibly bad at it.

  She got up and wandered through the great room, admiring the plank floors that she’d help refinish, trailing a finger over the tobacco leather furniture that surrounded the fireplace feature wall of pressed shell, rock, and barnacle, tilting her head back to take in the acid-washed pecky cypress walls that rose to the vaulted beamed ceiling. All of it imagined by Deirdre Morgan, made a reality by her daughter Avery Lawford with the lot of them serving as slave labor while the network recorded their misery. The work had been brutal and she’d hated the network’s mean-spirited reality TV version of the renovation show they’d envisioned. But Do Over, stressful as it was, had given shape and purpose to their days.

  She wandered past the pool table and large pine farm table to the eastern end of the room. The accordion glass wall had been folded open and she stepped out onto the balcony. The ocean breeze that set Mermaid Point’s palms swaying rifled her hair and caressed her cheeks as she stared out over the pavilion and pool to the turquoise-streaked ocean that stretched out into infinity. Morning sun sent shards of reflected light bouncing off the steel frame of the Alligator Reef Lighthouse in the distance. Boats passed in the far channels, their frothy white wakes unfolding behind them.

  She leaned over the balcony railing to watch seagulls and other small birds chase after food in the sphere-shaped tidal pool.

  In the clearing Romeo threw back his head, puffed out his chest, and crowed. Even the time-challenged rooster had a reason for being and a gaggle of admirers to witness him doing it. Did standing around worrying about doing nothing qualify as doing nothing?

  Stop it, she chastised herself. Take the boat to the mainland and go shopping. Go out for lunch. Take a dip in the pool. Lie in the hammock and read the novel you haven’t even opened.

  She could practically see Kyra rolling her eyes at what she liked to call “first-world problems.” Kyra, whom she’d left alone to navigate a hostile environment, so that she could be with Will.

  Maddie pulled her phone from her pocket and hit speed dial.

  Kyra answered on the first ring. “Mom?” Her voice trembled slightly.

  “Are you all right?”

  “Of course.” The assurance was automatic, but the tremble remained. “They’re lighting Dustin’s first scene right now. We’re just leaving the trailer to head over to the food tent for breakfast.” She paused. When she continued the tremble was gone. “I know he’ll do great. And I’ve explained to him that if it takes a few tries to get the scene down, it’s no big deal.”

  “Should I wish him luck? Or do people still say ‘break a leg’?”

  “We’ve got to get going. But I’ll tell him for you. Maybe we could call you after?”

  “That would be great.” Maddie knew she should simply hang up, but every single maternal instinct she possessed was jangling. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

  “Of course.” Once again, Kyra’s response was automatic, her tone cheerful. But to her mother’s ear her daughter
sounded like a child trying her hardest to sound like an adult. It sounded like a cry for help. “Why wouldn’t we be?”

  Maddie stood stock-still, staring out over the ocean after Kyra hung up, replaying the conversation. The tremble in her daughter’s voice, her fear and uncertainty, had been unmistakable. But she’d also heard the bravado, the will to see things through, the can-do attitude in the face of adversity; the very combination that had gotten Maddie through so many tough times. Kyra was an adult. A mother. She would handle whatever was thrown at her. Intellectually, Maddie knew this. And yet the urge to race to her daughter’s side, to help smooth the way for her and Dustin, was a visceral thing.

  It was that primitive instinct to protect her offspring that made her rouse her phone, Google distances, figure out logistics. It was 302 miles from Mermaid Point to Winter Haven. If she got in the car right now and took the Florida turnpike, she could be there in five hours, too late to watch Dustin’s first scene, but in time for the aftermath. Maybe they’d even spend the weekend at the Sunshine. Where she could check on Nikki and the twins and Bitsy and Avery.

  She turned and headed back through the great room with a heretofore missing sense of purpose, her thoughts full of what she’d need to take with her, how quickly she could pack. Whether she should come back to Mermaid Point next week or just meet Will in Dallas for his first concert and then travel on with him.

  Her step faltered. Will. Whom she loved and who was under a ton of pressure of his own. How could she leave Will?

  She left the house, hurried down the path, and slipped through the opening in the massive run of palm trees and tropical foliage to his studio. All the way telling herself that he would understand. That he had Hud and Lori and the entire staff at Aquarian, while Kyra and Dustin were alone.

  The squat one-story building was built of tapioca-colored blocks and topped by a simple gabled tin roof. It sat on a small rise that overlooked the ocean. Will claimed the small porch commanded the best sunrise view on the island and often watched it from there, guitar in hand.