by Liz Johnson
Grabbing her phone, she found a text from Oliver.
I’m in town. What time do you want to meet?
Oh, what had she been thinking when she told Oliver she’d meet him in Charlottetown? He said he needed some new gear, and he’d offered to show her what the rest of the lobstermen wore too. She knew she’d be in town for her mom’s appointment. She just hadn’t counted on being such a mess.
Flipping down the sun visor, she took quick inventory. Red-rimmed eyes, glassy from tears that had smudged her mascara. The tip of her nose had turned pink, and she had to bite her bottom lip to keep it from trembling.
All in all, not her best look. And she wouldn’t have cared if . . . well, she just didn’t need Oliver asking all of his questions about her family and her mom’s health and her own mental state. Because right that minute, her mental state felt about as solid as mercury.
She started to text him that she couldn’t make it. But a little voice in her head reminded her that she didn’t have time to waste. Setting day was less than a week away, and most lobstermen weren’t her size. If she had to order something, it could take weeks to arrive.
And then what? She’d have to wear her sneakers and shorts. She didn’t see the problem with that, but when she’d suggested as much, Oliver had looked like she’d said semiformal. While they weren’t best friends, he wouldn’t point her in the wrong direction. After all, like he’d said, the winner at the end of the season wouldn’t be the person who drove the other away. That’s not how her dad worked, and Oliver wouldn’t risk it.
At least, she didn’t think he would.
She deleted the half-typed message and replaced it.
How about now?
“How about these?” Oliver held out a pair of Carhartt pants, long and lean and plenty tough to last a season. They matched the three pairs already hanging over his arm.
When Meg cringed, he immediately knew his mistake. His pants were straight and a little boxy, the stiff canvas material about as form-flattering as a garbage bag. They were utilitarian. Functional. They were not for making anyone look their best. And truthfully, he’d never thought about it before. He hadn’t been looking to impress Whitaker or Kyle, the longtime deckhand. And he sure wasn’t looking to impress Meg with his sense of style.
But it would be a shame to put her long legs into a circus tent like those pants, so he shoved them back onto the shelf of the general store. All the while, Meg flipped through a row of hanging sweaters and water-resistant jackets, her gaze not quite focused.
“You’ll need something warm. A couple sweaters probably. And some sturdy pants.”
She nodded but didn’t look at him.
“Do you see something you like?”
She nodded again, her eyes focused somewhere past him on the far wall of gear and tackle.
“What’s that?”
Meg’s only response was a silent dip of her chin.
Oliver pressed a hand to her shoulder as he whispered, “Meg?”
She literally jumped, both of her feet leaving the ground. She headed for the nearest rack of sweaters, so he wrapped his hand around her arm and pulled her toward him, catching her about the waist with his armful of pants.
She crashed into him with a loud whoosh of air and an embarrassed laugh. “Sorry.”
She tried to push away, her hands small against his chest. But something about the worry lines around her mouth kept his hand locked in place. A chunk of her hair had fallen into her face, and he only then noticed it wasn’t pulled back in its usual work ponytail. Everything inside him wanted to brush that strand behind her ear, to find out if it was as soft as it had been on the boat, let himself get lost for just a minute. But he refused to give himself permission, even a fraction of an inch.
“Hey. What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. I’m fine. I’m good. I was just . . . thinking.”
“Thinking, eh? Must have been something pretty important.”
She met his gaze then, intense and fiercely controlled, and shook her head. He knew she wasn’t being honest with him. But he couldn’t bring himself to push her. Not this time. Not when Violet’s voice kept ringing through his mind.
Stepping back, he released her waist and held her shoulder at arm’s length. He grinned as he made eye contact, hoping it reached every corner of his face. “You have a very important decision to make.”
“I do?” Her voice was barely a squeak.
“Yep.” He nodded toward the shelves at her back. “You’ve got to choose between a tent and a burlap bag.”
Her mouth opened and a tiny chuckle popped out, sweeter than the call of a wood thrush. The corners of her eyes crinkled, and the stress around her mouth eased until her lips were curved and wide. “Are those my only two options?”
“’Fraid so.”
“Not at all.” The other voice spoke over his, loud and assured.
Oliver turned around to see a woman taller than Meg and almost as broad as he was. Her tan skin was dark as leather but looked soft as down. She wore shapely jeans and a flannel shirt tied in a knot at her waist. But she wasn’t looking at him, her gaze for Meg.
“Kelsey Sanders,” she said, holding out her hand. “Your first season?”
Meg took her hand and shook it quickly. “That obvious?”
“It always is when the men try to take the women shopping.” Her side-eye landed directly on him, a clear indictment that he had been tried and found wanting.
Meg’s eyes grew round and filled with questions. “You work a lobster boat?”
“Only the best out of Tignish. Twenty-two seasons.”
The season for the small fishing community on the northwest shore had long come and gone, as it had for the rest of the island. “What brings you all the way to town then?” Oliver asked.
Kelsey gave him a surprised look. “A sale, of course.” She held up two long black pairs of . . . not quite pants. They were too skinny for that, but they immediately caught Meg’s attention.
“Do you wear leggings on the boat?”
With a wave of her hand, Kelsey led the way to the back corner of the store, a corner Oliver had never explored before. Tucked behind the boots and the changing rooms he’d never needed to use, three silver racks held a slew of clothes. Softer, gentler clothes.
“Your boyfriend’s right,” Kelsey said.
“We’re not—”
“I’m not—”
He and Meg stumbled over each other to correct Kelsey’s assumption, but she didn’t seem to care one way or another. With a flick of her wrist, she waved them both off. “You’re going to need something sturdy. This is a good brand, and these utility leggings are the best. Stretchy but thick enough so . . . you know. And the knees are reinforced. Plus they have pockets.”
Oliver was pretty sure they were talking in some sort of code. Didn’t all pants have pockets? But Meg was fully engaged, nodding every few seconds.
“Get a few pair. You’ll have to wash ’em every day.”
“Will they last?”
“Yep. At least a season. Maybe more.”
Meg pulled three pairs off the rack, held them to her waist, and tucked her hand into one of the pockets. Her expression was exactly the opposite of the one she’d made when he held up the circus tent. “So soft,” she muttered to no one in particular.
“One in every color then?” Kelsey asked, already grabbing the hangers out of Meg’s hands.
“I suppose I won’t have time to come back to town once the season starts, will I?”
Kelsey shook her head, the light catching a few gray hairs among the mass of pale brown folded into a braid. She tossed the pants toward Oliver. Without a word she was telling him to hold them. It wasn’t unlike the guys he’d seen carrying their wives’ purses. Meg’s small black purse hung across her body on a thin strap, so her hands were free. And as long as he kept holding her things, he supposed they would remain so.
This was not how men shopped. And it definitely was
n’t a side of himself that he’d show to Whitaker, unless he wanted a few elbows to his ribs the next morning. But maybe it was a side that Meg needed to see. Something had been bothering her since she walked into the store, all tight-lipped and lost gaze.
If he could help Meg prepare for setting day—even if his entire role became carrying the items Kelsey pointed out—then he’d do it. So long as Whitaker and Kyle, Little Tommy, and all the others from Victoria by the Sea were far from sight.
Kelsey helped Meg pick out a few sweaters and undershirts and socks that wouldn’t fall down into her boots. Then she led the way to a narrow wooden case along the back wall. It was filled with fancy little boxes adorned with purple flowers. Little silver tins sat open on the top row. Whatever was coming out of them smelled like heaven, like wildflowers in heaven.
“Stock up on this. It’s expensive but worth it,” Kelsey said as she pulled three boxes off the shelf and tucked them into the crook of her own arm.
Oliver leaned forward, trying to read the fancy lettering on the box, drawn in by the scent. No one had ever shown him this stuff before. No one had bothered pointing out the back corner, for that matter.
Meg flipped a box over, and he physically recoiled at the sticker on the bottom. At thirty dollars, the tin should have been made out of gold.
Meg scooped up three boxes of her own and turned to walk away before Oliver got his question out. “What is it?”
Kelsey made a pitying face that his mom had many times before. “Oh, honey. It’s face cream.” She patted his cheek. “You know what the wind and waves do to a paint job. Your skin is even more delicate.”
He and Levi had repainted their mom’s place the year before, and the seaside wall had been a mess of chipped and cracked paint. They’d had to scrape it off completely before applying a fresh coat.
He rubbed his cheek where Kelsey had patted him. It wasn’t exactly soft, and his whiskers were a few days old. But it wasn’t too bad. Then again, he was six seasons into a lifetime, and he had no desire for his skin to turn the color and texture of cowhide.
“I’ll take one of those.” He snatched a box from the shelf and added it to the pile on his arm. Both Kelsey and Meg shot him raised eyebrows, but he shrugged. “What? I like to take care of my skin.”
Before either of them could respond, someone behind him cleared his throat. Oliver turned slowly and had to drop his gaze several inches to find the man responsible. He was a slender man, barely reaching Oliver’s shoulder. The wispy brown hair combed across his forehead was likely intended to cover his receding hairline. It wasn’t successful.
But it clearly didn’t matter what Oliver thought. Not when the man was looking at Kelsey as though she’d hung the moon and every star. She giggled like a woman half her age and reached for his outstretched hand.
“Are you ready, honeypot?” he asked, a hint of an Irish brogue dancing through his words. His eyes glowed like gold in the sun, and he pulled her hand to his mouth, pressing a gentle kiss to it. “I couldn’t wait another minute to see you.”
“Oh, sweetheart. I’m sorry to keep you waiting.” Kelsey tugged him to her side, looking down at him with love in her eyes. “I was just showing my new friend what she’ll need for the season.”
“From Summerside?”
Meg shook her head at the same time Oliver said, “Victoria.”
“Aye. A lovely area.”
Oliver agreed but got the feeling that Kelsey’s love couldn’t care less. He had eyes only for her. Their shared gaze was practically tangible, and Oliver glanced over at Meg to find her holding back a smirk.
After what seemed an hour, Kelsey finally looked up at them. “Excuse us. We’re newlyweds, and . . .”
“Enough said.” Meg held up her hand and waved them off. “Thank you for your help. And congratulations.”
The bride and groom walked away hand in hand, and Oliver wasn’t sure how to follow that up. All he could really wonder was if that’s what love was supposed to look like.
His parents had been just about the opposite—no joy between them, no care for the other, no desire to spend time together. If he didn’t know better, Oliver might have thought that was the reason his dad left. But he could still hear the seething murmur in his ear and the stinging smack across his cheek that reminded him exactly why Dean Ross had walked out on their family.
And the memory made it hard to breathe.
“Well . . .” Meg nudged him with her shoulder. “Boots?”
He managed a shallow breath and followed her to the seats in the footwear section. “Yes. I know about boots.” Plopping onto the padded bench, he set his stuff and all of hers to the side.
After trying on and modeling half a dozen rubber muck boots of varying heights with nonslip soles, Meg settled on a pair she liked. Then she sat beside him and held out her arm.
Oliver handed over the things she’d chosen, and she clutched them to her chest. But she didn’t make a move to get up. Instead, she stared into the store, her gaze once again distant, lost somewhere in the future or the past. Certainly it wasn’t in the here and now.
“You want to talk about it?” he finally asked.
“No.”
“All right.”
She heaved a great sigh, the tip of her pointed chin dipping until her hair fell around her face in a golden curtain. “My dad’s going to need our help.”
He opened his mouth to tell her that Whitaker already had whatever he needed, but her lifted finger stopped him.
“My mom is . . . We saw a specialist today.”
His stomach dropped. He already feared the worst, whatever that might be—a drawn-out illness with endless treatments, a terminal diagnosis, or more of the unknown. He waited for Meg to fill in the blanks, but she didn’t speak. “What did he say?”
“She needs more tests, more specialists, more scans.” Throwing her head back, she clicked her tongue. “I don’t know why they think more is going to help her. No one has been able to help her in years. But suddenly this doctor in Toronto is going to have a diagnosis.” She didn’t even try to cover the frustration in her tone.
He could fill in the blanks himself. “Your dad is going to be out of town for a while.” No question mark. No question.
When she looked at him, little lines puckered between her eyebrows and her teeth sank into her bottom lip. He’d never seen her look so vulnerable, so delicate. Everything inside him wanted to throw their things on the ground and pull her against him. He just wanted to protect her, eliminate every bit of her pain.
Which wasn’t exactly normal, given their history.
He gripped his new pants a little tighter against his chest and tried to show the right facial expression—understanding and empathy.
“We don’t know when yet. It’ll be short notice, and I just need for my dad to be . . .”
“Free to focus on your mom.”
“Yeah.”
He nodded.
“Like completely free. Like we need to field all of the calls and orders and everything.”
There was an unspoken request too. They couldn’t go to Whitaker with anything. If working together wasn’t working out, they’d have to figure it out on their own.
He stared at her, watching the way her bottom lip wiggled back and forth as she worried it, waiting for the animosity that had been between them to bloom. It didn’t.
Because they had to do something big. Together.
nine
Oliver couldn’t sleep. Like a kid on Christmas Eve, he lay awake, eyes wide open, feet twitching in his bed. He kicked off his sheet then pulled it back across him, flopped over, and pressed his face into his pillow. Pinching his eyes closed, he shut out the light of the moon coming through the window in his one-room apartment.
Still awake.
A lot of the lobstermen slept in their shacks, close to the dock. Oliver only lived a kilometer away, and he usually got better sleep in his own bed. The cots in the shanties didn’t extend pas
t his ankles and barely fit his shoulders. He’d rather sleep on the cement floor. Since his bed was an option, he’d taken it.
But he hadn’t gotten better sleep in his own bed that night.
Long before the alarm on his phone went off, he rolled off of the firm mattress, stumbled to the bathroom sink, and splashed cold water on his face. Staring into the mirror, he told himself the truth. “You can do this.”
He took a deep breath and ran a hand through his shaggy mane. He hadn’t bothered flipping on a light, and the moon made the room glow, his pale eyes with it.
This wasn’t his first setting day. But it was his first as the captain of the boat, his first with an untried, inexperienced hand. One who happened to have an equal say in everything.
Lord, let her be easy.
Everything else about setting day burst with excitement and required his focus. He just needed Meg to leave all of her ornery temper and sharp tongue on the shore.
He threw on his work pants, a T-shirt, and two sweaters before shoving his feet into thick wool socks. After pulling on his muck boots, he lined his pockets with protein bars and bags of peanuts.
He snagged his keys and his wallet before racing out the door and down the rickety wooden steps behind the garage. The main house was still dark, but a shadow on the other side of the kitchen window promised that Mama Potts was awake. He was almost to his truck when the kitchen door flew open, and a disembodied hand held out a paper towel–wrapped sandwich.
“Eat something before you go.”
“Yes, ma’am.” He jogged over to take it from her, and she stole a kiss on his cheek.
“I’m proud of you, Oliver.”
Her words carried an unexpected weight, a million reminders of all the reasons she might not say that. He hadn’t always been worthy of her pride. Not after Meg. Not after he’d failed to provide for them. Not after Mrs. Whitaker had started bringing them groceries.
A sudden lump in his throat made it hard to respond. He shoved half of the grilled cheese-and-egg sandwich into his mouth and mumbled a thanks around it as he backed toward his truck. Swallowing the mass of spicy cheese, he said, “See you later.”
