Karma by the Sea

by Traci Hall

Joe sat next to her, his arm behind her back. “Coffee?”

  She handed him one of the hot cups with steam escaping from the plastic lid. “Careful, careful.” She took the lid off of hers, and blew on the dark brew. “Smells great.”

  “Wait until you try it with the donut. Mind blowing.”

  “I’m kind of worried about your palate.” She held up her hand. “But you made excellent shrimp for dinner, so I’m willing to believe you.”

  Joe opened the bag of donuts, took two out, and gave K one. “Thanks. There’s a new place that just opened up called Ambrosia. We should go for lunch. Probably right up your alley. I’ve heard it’s got interesting flavor combinations.”

  K took a bite of the blueberry cake donut and let the flavor burst over her tongue. Not too sweet, the fruit was center stage. She sipped her coffee. The richness of the roast combined with the blueberry cake was wonderful.

  Joe waited expectantly. “Well?”

  “Delicious,” she agreed. And then, because she couldn’t help herself, she leaned over and kissed Joe. “Delicious.”

  “Yeah.” He grinned and inched closer to her. “I was hoping you wouldn’t be sorry about spending yesterday afternoon with me.”

  “No regrets,” she said, leaning back into his chest.

  “You were on my mind all night.”

  They each faced the water as the sky went from gray to pink. “It’s infatuation—totally caused by hormones. You and I have a very intense sexual attraction. I think I may have a little hero-thing going on. You literally pulled me from the water. That’s primal boy- saves-girl sexy.”

  “It isn’t just sex, K,” Joe said, his voice deepening. “When you say it like that it lessens how I feel about you.” He burrowed his fingers in the thick hair at her neck, something that made her purr. “I can’t stay away from you.”

  “Obsession,” she said, leaning back with her eyes half-closed in pleasure. “The need to touch one another, get in each other’s personal space. My heart races, my breath hitches, my skin gets hot. I have the symptoms too.”

  Joe pulled his hand free, loving the silk of her hair on his fingers. “You make it sound like we have the common cold.”

  “Nothing common about sexual attraction. I looked it up last night, because you’re right, what we’ve been feeling is very intense. I’ve never felt like that before and I was curious if it had something to do with you saving me.”

  “You Googled sexual attraction?”

  “Of course. I’m a woman with the world at her fingertips,” she said with a flash of those pale pink nails. “And there is no faking sexual attraction. You either feel it or you don’t. But if one person is, then there are certain things you can do to get the other party on board.”

  “Like what?” Yeah, he wanted to know. He was a guy, wasn’t he?

  She turned around so they were knee to knee on the blanket, nodding slowly as she held his gaze. She did something with her eyes that made them all soft and gooey, like melting chocolate. His groin paid attention. “Like that? What you’re doing right now?”

  “Yes.”

  “What else?”

  Eyes partially closed, she slowly traced her finger across her lower lip, flicking her tongue out to get the tip before sucking the digit in. He went from interested to hard in a second.

  “Oh yeah. That works.”

  She shook her head and laughed, leaning her palms against his chest. “But you were already interested.”

  “I’m easy, what can I say?”

  “The point is that we are feeling the effects of increased adrenaline and phenylethylamine, along with decreased serotonin, the stuff that normally makes us feel good, which causes the obsessive behavior.”

  Joe snorted. “Remember that I sold street drugs in college? I didn’t do much studying.”

  She rolled her eyes. “You and I are experiencing amazing things, Joe, but it isn’t love.”

  She tried to turn so she could look at him, but he put his arms around her and kept her facing the front. She guessed he didn’t want to hear her theories on love being an obsession that wasn’t healthy and usually didn’t last.

  “Just watch. Listen to the consistent crash of the waves against the sand. The caw of the seagulls. Sometimes fish jump in schools. I’ve even seen dolphins.”

  K sensed this really was important. She was afraid that it was.

  She leaned back into Joe’s warmth, taking in the silvery-gold fingers across the dark ocean. There was something peaceful about the Atlantic that was much different than the ocean off of Hawaii.

  Forcing herself to be in the moment, K breathed in the scent of the ocean. Salt, sand and the hint of fish oil. Joe. His subtle cologne had a citrus note that tickled her senses. He scooted to the side and she immediately felt a chill at her back as he kicked off his flip flops.

  “Want to put your feet in?” he asked, his voice a seductive whisper against her ear.

  She started to shake her head, but he was already up, pulling her with him.

  “Come on. It’ll be fun.”

  “It’ll be cold.” She pulled back, but not very hard, willing to go along for the adventure.

  He folded his hand around hers and tugged her toward the low surf. He wore dark shorts and a plain gray Henley—simple, but perfect for a morning on the beach.

  “I have to roll up my pajamas.”

  Joe stopped and knelt before her, which did a funny thing to her stomach. “I won’t let Namaka get you,” he said as he gave her pajama bottoms two inch cuffs.

  “Going to save me, are you?” She felt herself close to dangerous, emotional territory.

  He lifted her foot and kissed the top. “Only when you need it.”

  Her inner independent woman really liked that answer.

  He walked into the water to his ankles, and she, after a slight hesitation, followed. “It’s warmer than I thought.”

  “You didn’t have the best introduction.”

  “I was mad,” she admitted. “I assumed the water would be cold, but I don’t remember.” She closed her eyes, feeling the gentle lap of waves over her feet before it rushed out again. K would be lying if she denied the familiar connection to the water, the sand, the breeze. She took a deep breath, letting the gentleness of this ocean into her body. Her mind. The soft welcome tugged at her closed-off heart.

  “What are you thinking?” Joe asked.

  “I have so many memories of the ocean on Molokai. Paolo and I would watch the whales come into the bay. Storms on the island were magnificent. Powerful, so much so that you had no doubt as a child that the gods were real. They were watching, and if you were good, they blessed you.”

  “There’s always a catch,” Joe said.

  “I tried to behave, really, but I had no guides to teach me. I felt in tune, though, with nature around me.” A bittersweet memory surfaced. “I found a baby sea turtle once, struggling to make it to the big water. My father always told me not to help the baby on its journey. It had to gain its strength for the ocean by the trials of leaving the bay. Oh, but I saw it get washed back, again and again.” K put her hand to her chest, surprised at how painful the image was even after all these years. “And so I scooped the baby turtle up into my hands and I walked out as far as I could go to help it on its way.”

  Joe squeezed her hand, his presence comforting. “How old were you?”

  She shrugged. “Ten, maybe?”

  “And?”

  “It didn’t go far before it just stopped trying. It was probably too tired. It wasn’t strong enough to make it on its own–it just, sank.”

  “You tried, babe.”

  “It wasn’t enough. My father was right.”

  “Maybe for the sea turtle but that’s not how you raise a kid.”

  K turned to look at Joe, who stared out at the rising sun. They stood in the silvery path of the rays. “Why didn’t my father know that?”

  “We will probably never know the answer to that question. Does yo
ur dad love you, K?”

  She blew out a breath, very uncomfortable with the conversation the way it was turning. “Yes, of course.”

  “And you love him?”

  Fidgeting, K shrugged again. “Sure.”

  “Then you, in my humble opinion, have got to let it go. Your parents have a relationship that doesn’t make sense to you.”

  “It doesn’t make sense to anybody,” she said defensively.

  “To them, though, it works.” He cleared his throat. “I’m not saying that it’s right or wrong, I’m just saying, K, that it hurts you to this day. You will feel better if you stop imagining that every woman you free from the tyranny of marriage is your mother.”

  Shocked, K pulled her hand free. “What did you say?”

  Joe turned toward her, his expression filled with empathy that cut. “Your mom chooses to be in a partnership with your dad. You and I don’t know why it works for them, but neither one wants to split the sheets. Do you ever see them happy? Laughing?”

  K tried to get beyond the anger toward Joe’s observation, but it stuck about mid-throat. She looked out over the horizon, falling back on her yoga breathing to find her equilibrium.

  “Well? Christmas, birthdays?” His hand grazed her shoulder, traveling down her arm to take her hand again.

  “Yes, there were happy moments.” She thought back to their little house on the bay. Goats and a garden. Her mother frying the fish her father had caught earlier, adding pineapple salsa she helped dice. Picking cilantro from the herb bed. Washing the dishes in the sink together afterward. Singing by the fire on the beach as the sun set as her father played the ukulele.

  Then friends would come over and the atmosphere changed. The bowl was passed, the bottle shared. Her mother crying, her father leaving.

  She would wake up alone.

  “Try to remember those,” Joe suggested.

  “Even they have a sad ending.” K started to walk out of the ocean and back to the blanket, away from the freaking emotion the water seemed to bring out of her. She preferred calm and cool K, the one who kicked ass and protected the victims.

  “Wait,” Joe said, tugging her back to look at the morning greet the day, her feet back in the warm water. “This is magic, Karma Namaka Aneko. Feel the warmth as it touches your face. It’s like a blessing.”

  Annoyed, she pulled free. “I am too old to believe in magic.”

  “Please, K?” He took her hand, then held her so that they faced the sun together, ankle deep in the ocean. “Just let the sun’s rays shine off the calm water and heal the hurt in your heart.” Wrapped around her, he covered her hand with his, then placed it over her chest. “It wasn’t your fault Paolo died. Namaka wasn’t punishing you for anything.” Tears brimmed at Joe’s words. “As shitty of an analogy as your dad gave you about the sea turtle? Well, maybe your journey was about learning to fend for yourself. Which you did, so well. You had to. Still do, and you care for others too.”

  Joe protected her in a cocoon, as if he could absorb the energy from the sun and the water and pour it into her wary heart. She’d been devastated, over and over again. How to walk that line between companionship and losing yourself in someone else?

  He turned toward her so they were each brushed equally by the rays. “I want to be with you. I want to share the road you’re on. I have no idea what that looks like.”

  K blinked past the tears in her eyes that she blamed on the sun. “Joe. I don’t want to be alone anymore—but I just can’t make any promises.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Joe gently cupped K’s cheeks, kissing her thoroughly as the sun inched higher in the sky. It wasn’t words of love, but that was all right. For K, admitting that she didn’t want to be alone was pretty damn good.

  They broke the kiss, staying in the circle of each other’s embrace. “I missed you last night too,” Joe whispered as they leaned together, forehead to forehead.

  “Did you catch any bad guys?”

  “A few. This place is pretty quiet.”

  “I was really worried about you.”

  He hugged her tight, then whirled her around in the air, the waves splashing up around them. “I don’t like how close you came to being hurt.”

  K grabbed his arms to steady herself as he put her back down. “Did they find anything in the backseat?”

  “The detail team went through my car with infrared, but the only fingerprints that showed up were mine, or small, like a woman’s—yours. I haven’t had anybody else in my car.”

  “What did your boss say?”

  “The chief wants me to go into seclusion. I told him no, but I plan on being careful. I’m very aware that someone is in this town that wants to hurt me.” The bullet had been a pretty clear message, Joe thought. But he wasn’t running scared again.

  “They want to kill you,” K clarified in harsh tones. “No sugar-coating.”

  He understood that she’d lost someone she loved to the ocean. To something out of her control. That she might be scared of caring for someone who had his life on the line. Not just in the normal police officer line-of-fire, but as in someone gunning for his ass.

  “I have a plan.”

  “What is it?”

  “I’m still working out the kinks.” He knew that if he asked her to stay put in Rita’s apartment all day, she’d want to know why. And he didn’t think she’d like the answer. It was best to avoid the issue and not talk about it at all.

  “Let’s go,” he said, getting the urge to move. He scanned the pier. Fishermen. The covered sitting area and the benches? An old guy sat there, reading a paper. As planned.

  “You want to come up?” She looped her arm through his as they left the water toward their blanket. “I’ve got a great way to spend the morning before making us lunch.”

  It sounded great, but he had a bad guy to catch. “I’ve got some things to take care of today.”

  “Oh,” she said, her steps slowing as they reached the blanket. She reached down and gathered their cups and donut bag. “Okay. I need to find out what’s happening with Jamal anyway.”

  “Is he all right?” Joe half-listened as he kept his eye on the beach. It was quiet still. Early.

  “I hope so. He was so upset about the hearing being rescheduled. He sent a text that he was sorry, and just letting off some steam. But then you called, and I’ve been here.” She stepped back so that Joe could fold the blanket. “Let me just see if he…” She pulled her phone from her jacket pocket and frowned. “Nothing.”

  “Can you call the center?”

  “Yes. Good idea. Thank you for this magical interlude,” she said, leaning toward him for a kiss.

  Joe concentrated on folding the blanket. What if she was unable to get beyond her own tragic past? What if, despite their attraction, K didn’t see the possibilities of a solid relationship between two adults? What if his job was too dangerous for her to accept?

  Joe had a therapy appointment at ten. He’d ask some questions about adrenaline and serotonin and maybe even soul mates. He just couldn’t believe that what he was feeling wasn’t real. Hurt by K’s casual dismissal of what he knew to be true in his own heart, Joe admitted she was right in that he wanted to be closer to her than her own skin, but she was wrong about the depth of his feelings—there was more to what he had going on than just getting off.

  *****

  K realized that something had changed in Joe’s demeanor, but wasn’t sure why. He probably had a lot on his mind that didn’t include her and her problems. “Do you feel okay going back to your place?” It would freak her out to think someone had been in her home while she was gone.

  “Yeah. The chief put in a new alarm system last night while we were working. He’s got units driving by. I’ll be fine. We’ve got two extra cars that have been making the rounds. Creating a bigger presence. I told the chief about the black Charger you saw, too. But this is a tourist town—hard to say who that car belonged to.”

  “I feel better
knowing that you’re on top of it.”

  “I don’t want to die,” Joe said, meeting her eyes. “I’ve found more reason to live in this place,” he jerked his thumb toward the ocean, “than I have in any other. Not just the yoga, or therapy, but there is something about the water that seems to feed my soul.”

  K blinked. “That’s pretty beautiful for a college druggie,” she teased.

  “And you K, you came from the ocean too.”

  She looked away. “It isn’t like Finders-Keepers, Joe.”

  He spoke to her emotions. He seemed to want a promise of forever, when she was leaving in a week. Using her logical, practical mind, K didn’t see a happy outcome. Yet she wanted him so badly that if he’d give an inch, she’d throw herself in his arms and go back to his place. Where was her independence in that thought? That’s how women ended up victims.

  “Listen,” she said. “Since you aren’t coming up, why don’t I just run back, and,”

  “No, K. You don’t get to leave here by yourself in your bare feet. I’ll drive you. It’ll just take a minute.”

  Joe put the blanket over his arm, his expression shuttered. She fought the urge to assure him that everything would be fine, but the personal risk to her mental health was too high.

  She was already attracted to Joe. He was a great man and she was tempted to see it go further, but at some point, he would stop wanting her. Stop thinking that she had beautiful eyes, or that he liked her perfume. And then what? She’d live alone with wine and pills and pets? Regretting the loss of the one she’d loved?

  “Come on,” he said, taking the lead up the sand.

  K quickly caught up so they were together. She looked around the area, smelling bacon and coffee from the restaurants coming to life. Joggers with headphones and neon sneakers went sole to tire with the cyclists on the road. People living in paradise without a clue of the danger Joe was in. She grew dizzy as they left the sand and she stopped to regain her balance, leaning against the outdoor shower spray.

  “What’s wrong?” Joe asked, right there at her side.

  “I prefer the skyscrapers in Chicago. There’s more protection. This,” she gestured to the wide expanse of sand and water, “is too open. Anything can happen.”