you if you’d let him,” Bonnie continued. “But he said you’re freezing him out.”
“He froze himself out,” Grace said, although that was not the truth and Bonnie probably knew it. Eddie would be there for her, but right now she couldn’t even stand the sight of him. She could hear his voice, a deep voice she had once found mesmerizing, coming from the café. He was laughing with one of the customers. Laughing. She pressed the phone more tightly to her ear to block out the sound.
Bonnie uttered more words of concern, more words of comfort, but Grace barely heard her. She was too absorbed by the thought of Rory Taylor hunting for clues to how that baby came to be on the beach. And by the time she hung up the phone with her old friend, Grace had a plan.
7
THE SUN WAS SLIPPING INTO THE SOUND AS DARIA DROVE into Andy Kramer’s driveway.
“You have an incredible view, Andy,” she said to her co-worker, thinking of how he must enjoy this spectacle every evening.
“I know,” Andy said, opening the car door. “I’m a lucky guy. Now if I just had a decent van.” His van was in the shop again, the third time in the past few months.
Daria spotted the boat tied to the pier behind Andy’s cottage. “I didn’t know you were into boats,” she said. “Is that new?”
Andy laughed, his earring glowing a vibrant rose color in the muted sunlight. “Brand-new,” he said, “but it’s not mine. I share the pier with my next-door neighbors, and it’s theirs. Raises my property value, though, having it behind my cottage.”
She could see his neighbors, a man and woman and a little boy, on the side deck of their cottage, grilling their dinner. She could even smell the steak. “Well, I hope they at least take you out in it sometime,” she said.
“Me, too.” Andy got out of the car and shut the door, but bent over to look in the window. “Thanks for the lift,” he said. “And have a good soak in your tub tonight.”
“I plan to.” She pulled out of his driveway, already thinking about spending a leisurely half hour in the whirlpool tub later that night. The tub was the one extravagance in the Sea Shanty, but it was truly a necessity after a day like this one. She and Andy had spent the day building wall-to-ceiling bookshelves in a huge house in Corolla, and her shoulders and arms ached. Before she could take a bath, though, there was something she needed to do.
She drove the mile and a half across Kill Devil Hills to the cul-de-sac, where she parked in the Sea Shanty driveway. But instead of going inside the cottage, she walked across the street to Poll-Rory.
Rory answered the door in shorts, sky-blue T-shirt and a handsome grin that threatened her resolve. She had to keep the purpose of this visit firmly in her mind.
“Come in, neighbor,” he said, pushing open the screen door for her.
Daria stepped into the living room and took off her sunglasses. She had been in Poll-Rory many times over the years, so the changes in its interior were no surprise to her. She imagined they had been to Rory, though. The furniture, the new paneling on the walls, the artwork and knickknacks had all been selected by the real estate agent handling the property.
Daria spotted a computer on the table in the dining area. Papers and books were strewn across the table’s surface.
“Looks like you’re working,” Daria said.
“Working and playing,” Rory said. “That’s my plan for this summer.” His hands were on his hips, and she felt him appraising her. She probably had more sawdust in her hair. She knew she had paint on her white T-shirt and a smudge of varnish on her cheek.
She looked at him squarely. “I need to talk with you about Shelly,” she said and felt the apology forming on her face. Rory had come all the way across the country to get to the bottom of Shelly’s story, and she planned to make him stop that search before he’d even begun.
He must have seen the concern in her eyes, because his grin faded. “Well,” he said, “this looks like a serious, sitting-down kind of conversation. Let’s go up on the deck.”
She followed him out the back door and up the stairs to the small deck, with its view of both ocean and sound. Nearly as good a view as from the Sea Shanty’s widow’s walk.
“I’d offer you something to drink,” Rory said, “but all I have right now is water and milk. Zack already drank the soda I bought. I’d forgotten how much food he can go through.”
Daria sat in an Adirondack chair and slipped her sunglasses on again, even though the sun had fallen well below the horizon. Rory’s green eyes were uncovered, and she wished that were not the case. There was something about his eyes that had always made her weak-kneed, even when they’d been kids.
After a few moments of chatter about Zack and the view and the changes that had taken place in Kill Devil Hills during Rory’s absence, she got to the point of her visit.
“I know Shelly asked you to find out about her past,” she began, “but it’s really not a good idea. You don’t understand Shelly. She’s not—” Daria hunted for the right choice of words “—like everyone else,” she said. “I know she seems perfectly fine. I know she’s beautiful, and a wonderful person, but—”
“I think I do understand,” he said. “I picked up on what you’re saying when I met her. Did she suffer some brain damage when she was born?”
Daria was surprised that he’d grasped that fact; she hadn’t thought Shelly’s problems were that obvious. She nodded. “Yes, that’s what they figure. Her IQ is in the very low-average range, but on top of that, she has some learning disabilities that kept her back in school. Plus, she has a seizure disorder and, although she’s on medication for it, it’s not under very good control. She’s not allowed to get her driver’s license because she’s never been seizure free for a year, and that’s the requirement.” She glanced toward the Sea Shanty, but the only part of the cottage she could see from back here was the widow’s walk. “She’s a bit phobic,” she continued, “and very dependent on me. After Mom died, she became my responsibility. She was only eight, and I was just nineteen. Now she gets scared when I’m not around.”
“Why was she your responsibility?” Rory looked puzzled. “What about your dad? He was still living then, wasn’t he?”
“Yes, but Shelly was too much for him to handle. She really needed a woman. A mother.”
“What about Chloe? She was the oldest. Why didn’t she help?”
Everyone asked that question, and Daria was ready with her answer. “Chloe was already a nun,” she explained. “She was living in Georgia, and there really wasn’t much she could do.”
“What did you mean about Shelly being phobic?” he asked.
“She’s afraid of a lot of things—earthquakes and snakes, for example, even though she’s never encountered either. But mostly, she’s afraid of being away from the Outer Banks. Pathologically afraid.” Daria wasn’t sure how to explain this. She’d tried over the years to describe Shelly’s fears to doctors and teachers, but no one really seemed to understand. “Shelly is only happy on the beach,” she said. “When she was little, we came to the Sea Shanty for the summers and spent
