Page 14 of The Magic of Sea Glass
“Of course I will.” He closed his eyes and pressed his lips to hers, tasting the salt on her mouth, the electricity between them giving him the courage to broach the topic with his parents.
She pulled back and drew her arm out of the water, unfastening the bracelet made of green and turquoise glass remnants, polished smooth and strung together, holding it out to him.
Phillip opened his hand, the glass pieces cascading like a miniature waterfall into it. She closed his fingers, wrapping hers around them. “Now youhaveto meet me,” she said with a giggle. “My mother will never speak to me again if she thinks I’ve lost this. She and I made it together.”
He held the bracelet up to the sun, the light glimmering off the water droplets on each of the pieces.
Penelope leaned over and kissed his cheek, making him want to wrap himself around her and never let go. “She doesn’t know I have it.”
“Why did you wear it today?”
She gazed up at him with those green eyes that made his knees weak. “Because my mother said it brings her good luck.”
Penelope didn’t need luck. She’d already roped him right in, all on her own.
FOUR
Rodanthe, North Carolina
A gentle tapping sound outside drew Lauren from her sleep. She opened her eyes, an early-morning purple glow streaming in through the curtains in her bedroom. She checked her phone on the bedside table: six o’clock. With a yawn, she sat up and stretched her arms over her head. Before she even climbed out of bed, the tapping became a loudsshh. Lauren got up and pulled the curtains back, revealing deep gray clouds that were dumping rain into an angry sea.
Wrapping her bathrobe around her, she set the single-cup coffeemaker in her kitchenette and slipped her mug underneath it. While the coffee began to percolate, she got Mary’s calendar and her laptop and sat down at the table, opening the scheduling program.
She pulled up the screen and began entering in the dates and their various codes to denote the service type. The familiar act of facilitating tasks that had nothing to do with her old life was therapeutic in a way. She could function entirely in that moment, and she knew exactly what to do. When Lauren was finished, Mary would be able to view all her day’s agenda items on one page, but she could also click “Personal” to see her private calendar, “Maintenance” for improvements to the inn, and “Meetings and Agendas” for her scheduled meetings in town.
The coffeemaker gurgled and hissed as she typed, a rich scent filling the room. When the mug was full, she got up, pulled the cream from the refrigerator, and poured it in. With her steaming coffee in hand, and the rain outside, she was oddly calm. A sense of purpose took over; sitting in her little kitchen area, she sipped the rich, nutty liquid and continued her work.
After about an hour, a light knock at her door pulled her out of her focused concentration. She left her computer at the small table and peered through the peephole, finding Mary on the other side.
“Good morning,” the woman said with a friendly lift of her eyebrows when Lauren answered the door.
“Good morning.”
“I know yesterday was a whirlwind. I thought I’d stop by to see if you had everything you need.”
“Oh, yes, thank you. I was just organizing your calendar.”
Mary gripped the end of her cane, leaning on it. “Before breakfast?”
“Well, I did make a cup of coffee,” Lauren countered as she opened the door wider. “Please, come in and have a seat.”
Mary wobbled into the room and went over to one of the chairs in the sitting area, lowering herself down.
“Would you like a cup?” Lauren asked as she retrieved her own from the kitchenette.
“No thank you, dear. I’ve had mine already,” Mary called back to her.
Lauren returned and sat down across from her new boss. “I was planning to get something to eat once I was ready for the day. I’m a pretty early riser so I’m used to waiting for breakfast until I’m on my way to work.” She dared not admit that waking before the sun had become a ritual over the last year, because staying in bed too long would allow the thoughts about her empty future to arise, so she’d rather just get up and face the day.
“I’m an early riser, too, and with this rain, my joints had me up earlier than usual.” She kneaded the knuckles on her right hand.
There was something between the two of them that settled any unease that Lauren would normally have while sitting across from someone in her bathrobe. Mary had a mothering quality to her. Even though she was Mary’s employee, she was comfortable with the woman’s unpretentious and friendly nature. And their mutual understanding of loss gave them an unspoken bond that Lauren hadn’t shared with anyone else.
“How was dinner last night with Brody?” Mary asked, shifting in her seat until she appeared to be in a better position.
“It was nice,” she replied. Since she wouldn’t let him ask anything about her, he’d spent most of the night talking about the island.
“He helps me out a lot,” Mary said. “I wanted to take you to dinner myself, but it’s getting so hard to move around these days. I usually don’t venture off the property unless I have to.”
