Page 17 of The Sea-Mist Cottage Inn
“How are you, Leo?” he asked, his eyes diving into mine.He looks that way at everybody, remember. He cares about everybody. He’s basically Jesus—whom you also, admit it,thought was hot when you were in high school.“You getting things arranged at the motel alright?”
“I’m good, thanks. And yeah—we’ve got the main cabin mostly livable. It was in surprisingly good shape, considering.”
That was true—it needed alotof work, but mainly of the cleanup and update varieties, getting it to look like our home. Right now, it made a good shelter. The roof seemed solid, none of the windows were broken, and the largest intruder we’d discovered so far was a fat house spider with an extremely well-developed web. We’d razed that poor girl’s house and sent her on her way to build another somewhere else.
There were a few signs of mice, but only their leavings. We hadn’t come across anything excessively gnawed yet. We’d got off easy.
I hadn’t gone into all the guest cottages; I didn’t know it yet, but soon enough, I wouldn’t feel like things were so easy around the Sea-Mist.
“In fact,” I continued, “we’re thinking of getting the old fire pit going tonight and, I guess, christening the place. We need animal flesh. What’s good today?”
His grin spread wide. “Everything’s good at Mendoza’s, Leo. But I have some beautiful flat-iron cuts that will grill up like a dream.”
“Sounds perfect. I’ll take two.”
“Great! Come on over.”
He went around the counter and pulled a length of white butcher paper from the roll. I stood before the case, taking in the delicious-looking meat, as he selected two steaks and wrapped them for me.
“Is Finn a local now?” I asked, still smarting a little from the encounter with the grump.
“Well, he’s only been around about five years, so no, he’s not a local. But he lives here—he mans the lighthouse.”
I looked up and let my jaw fall open. “He does what?”
Bluster Cove had a lighthouse, yes—a cute little one with tall, paned and beveled windows around the lamp and a cozy red-roofed cottage at its foot. It sat on a rocky islet about half a mile beyond the entrance to the cove itself. It had been around since before Bluster was an official town. But it had been automated when I was a little girl—and more to the point, it had been declared unnecessary by whatever state bureaucrats made those decisions. The town had kept it running for a while just for the historical factor, but they’d eventually decided it was too expensive to maintain the equipment, so it went dark when I was about thirteen.
“The lighthouse is running again? And there’s a keeper?”
Roman set my steaks on top of the case. He kept his hand on the package as he answered. “Yeah. About five years ago, the Chamber of Commerce made a big push to try to increase tourism, and the council agreed to start the lighthouse back up. Tourists were always disappointed that it was dark, you know. The council decided it would be cheaper in the long run to hire somebody to live there, run the light, and keep the place maintained than to get the machinery running again and keep that in good shape. I don’t know if that’s true, but the town PR makes a fuss about our ‘manned lighthouse.’”
“Well, that guy seems like the type to prefer living on a rock in the ocean, so I guess they picked well,” I replied.
Roman laughed. I tried hard not to be affected by the musical good nature of that laugh. I failed.
Ten years or so wasn’t much of an age gap in this point in our lives, was it?
I should have pushed Jessie for more gossip. She didn’t like gossip for schadenfreude’s sake, butobviouslywe’d routinely talked about people we knew back in the day, and she’d been full of talk yesterday. Mostly about herself and getting me to talkabout myself and Wyatt, but we’d covered town news I’d missed, too. If I’d told her about seeing Roman at Catherine’s, and that brief, dark reaction he’d had when I’d asked after his wife and son—and the fact that he hadn’t answered me—she would have told me enough so I understood.
His left hand still rested on the package of steaks. There was no ring on his finger. He’d worn a ring before.
If I hadn’t asked about Mrs. Mendoza and Gabriel yesterday, I would have felt able to do so while I stood before him now. But I had, and he hadn’t answered, and I didn’t know what to do with that.
Wait. Why was it so important that I know the man’s marital status? I was still digging my son and myself out of an avalanche of grief and trouble caused by my husband’s death not much more than a year earlier. I was not interested in anything but getting us—Wyatt and me—on a stable course. Giving my child a good life, where he felt safe and loved and happy. Maybe that was in Bluster. Maybe it was not.
I was not interested in Roman Mendoza, no matter if I’d crushed on him as ateenager. His marital status was nothing more than gossip to me.
I reached up and took hold of the package of steaks. “Well, thanks for this. I guess I pay over there?” I nodded toward the register, where his employee, apparently named Davy, was wiping the counter down.
Roman didn’t move his hand right away, and our fingers brushed together. See, no. No! I was not living in a romance novel, so I absolutely did not feel a little thrill at that touch. Jesus, what was wrong with me?
Finally, he pulled his hand back, and I gathered the package of raw meat to my chest.
“Yep, Davy will take care of you.” He paused and did that deep-dive into my eyes again. “It’s good you’re back, Leo. Real good.”
I reminded myself that he looked at everybody that intensely and I hurried my butt over to the register. I needed to get back to my kid.
NINE: Grief & Relief
