Grey shrugged, his answer lost as Nikki fled into the kitchen. Once there, she leaned against the stainless steel refrigerator door, remembering his arms wrapped around her, the two of them lying in the sand. “Forever,” he’d whispered in her ear and she’d believed him. Damn him for his lies. Damn him for making her think their love could overcome the differences in their backgrounds…anything the world threw at them. Damn him for making forever so very brief.
“Nikki?” Bridget entered the kitchen. “Grey says he’s ready for his tour whenever you are. He’ll wait for you outside.”
Nikki sighed. “I might as well get it over with,” she said more to herself than to Bridget. After taking a deep breath, she walked through the back room and out into the sunshine. “Where to first?” she asked without preamble.
He pulled a handful of papers out of his pocket. “Before he died, my father had been receiving complaints about safety violations. I thought we’d check those out first.”
“I can’t imagine what kind of violations there would be concerning safety. Sure, things need painting, but safety has always been a priority here.”
He handed her one of the papers, a letter written complaining about the hazardous condition of the Ferris wheel. She scanned the contents quickly. “You can’t take this seriously,” she scoffed. “Whoever sent it didn’t even sign it. Probably one of the townspeople who didn’t win a stuffed animal and wrote this in a snit.”
“Still, I intend to take it seriously,” he returned evenly. “Nikki, if there’s any chance of keeping the boardwalk open, I’m going to have to see what kinds of obstacles we’re facing, what kind of financial backing it will take to make Land’s End more profitable. So, we take these things one at a time and check them out, okay?”
Minutes later as Pete Ely, the Ferris wheel owner, showed Grey the documentation of recent safety inspections, Nikki studied Grey, trying to attain some objectivity. It had been easier to maintain distance when she’d seen him before, when he’d been dressed in his tailored suit and expensive dress shirt. But today, wearing a pair of worn dungarees and a short-sleeved sports shirt, he was uncomfortably like the Grey of her youth, the Grey she had loved with a passion that had been all-ending. But the man of her past had made his choices. He chose to end his responsibility to her with an envelope of money. Blakemores didn’t get involved with boardwalk brats—how many times had she been warned of that? Still, she’d been certain in her heart that Grey wasn’t like the other Blakemores. She’d been wrong.
She wished he’d married. Perhaps if he was married, she wouldn’t be feeling the insidious stirrings of temptation. Every time she looked into the dark depths of his eyes, she saw an image of a serpent, whispering that it was safe to taste the juicy apple. But she’d already tasted the meat of the fruit, and she’d discovered that it bore bitter seeds.
“Well, I guess this takes care of that particular issue,” Grey said, frowning as he looked up at the Ferris wheel. “Although it certainly could use a fresh coat of paint.”
“Everything around here could use a fresh coat of paint,” Nikki replied. “We went to your father several months ago and asked if he would be willing to lower the rent for a few months so we could use the extra money to make some improvements, but he refused.”
“Point taken,” he replied as he moved in the direction of the carousel. Nikki lagged behind, dreading to go to the place where it had all begun so many years ago.
His footsteps slowed as he approached the ancient merry-go-round and she wondered if he, too, was entertaining thoughts from the past.
She watched as he stepped up on the carousel’s platform, his feet moving him toward the huge silver steed they’d fought over. He placed a hand on the saddle that had once been such a brilliant blue, but was now worn to the paleness of distant dreams. “It hardly seems worth fighting over now, does it?” He smiled wistfully and ran his hand lightly down the horse’s flank. “In my mind, it was always bigger, brighter.”
“I guess when you look back, you always remember things as being much better than they really were,” she said pointedly.
“Who’s running the equipment now?” he asked, removing his hand from the horse as dark shutters slid into place over his eyes.
“Walt Simon.”
“Walt Simon? He must be a hundred years old by now.”
Nikki couldn’t hide a small smile. Everyone was surprised by Walt’s longevity and eternally youthful spirit. At that moment, Walt himself walked out from behind the ticket booth, his keen blue eyes immediately spying Nikki and Grey.
“Well, I’ll be damned,” he exclaimed, moving toward them with the peculiar gait of age and arthritis. He held out his hand to Grey, who clasped it and shook it vigorously. “Well, I’ll be double damned.” He grinned, a toothless smile that transformed his grizzled, weathered face into that of an innocent child. “I knew you wouldn’t stay away forever. You and Nikki were my very best customers for a lot of summers. First ones on when I opened and the last ones to ride before I’d close up. Remember?”
“I remember,” Grey said, smiling tightly as he dropped the old man’s hand.
“Yes, sir,” Walt said with a wistful smile that fully displayed his toothless gums. “Those were the days. The walkways were filled with people, and I’d have lines of kiddies waiting to ride the fellas.” Walt frowned suddenly. “I don’t get lines anymore.” He looked at Grey anxiously. “Have you come back to help us? Have you come to breathe life back into Land’s End?”
“He doesn’t know whether to breathe life into it or suck the last of its life out of it,” Nikki explained.
“Suck the…you mean close us down?” Walt looked at Grey incredulously. “But, you wouldn’t do that, would you, Grey?”
Grey grimaced. “Walt, I’m trying to make a sound business decision.”
“Grey has taken over the Blakemore family business interests,” Nikki interjected.
“But you never were like the rest of those people,” Walt protested. “Your family always made business decisions, but you always made heart decisions.” He gazed at Grey in sadness. “I don’t understand nothing anymore.” He ran a gnarled hand through his thin, gray hair. “I’ve fought the Blakemores for the past fifty years. I always thought you’d be different…somehow better.”
Nikki noted the slight flush of color that suffused Grey’s face as he stiffened his back. “There’s nothing to understand, Walt. I have obligations and priorities. I am a Blakemore.”
And don’t ever forget it, Nikki mentally added. There was a time when she had forgotten, but she had paid the price and now would never make that mistake again.
“You know, if you decide to close us down and move us off, we won’t make it easy for you,” Walt observed. He grinned like a mischievous boy. “Me and the fellas—” he gestured to the carousel horses “—we can be pretty damn stubborn when we set our minds to it.”
Grey’s eyes glinted with a touch of admiration at Walt’s distinct challenge.
From the carousel they moved on, Grey surveying the condition of the wooden walkways, making notes about everything he saw.
Nikki
