“Don’t.” He shook his head. Held up a hand. “Don’t apologize. This is my fault. My mistake. I should have—”
“Insisted that we do something different for the proposal?” she said. Her face was as white as a sand dollar.
Max nodded. “Yes, exactly.”
The Charlie’s Angels exchanged worried glances, and their dance steps slowed to a stop.
“Is everything okay?” Opal said, resting a tender hand on Molly’s forearm. “Sweetheart, you look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“It’s fine.” Molly waved a hand. “Don’t worry about me. This is such a nice evening, and—”
“Would you stop?” Mavis rolled her eyes. “We know you well enough to notice when you look crushed.”
Ethel nodded. “We’re old and wise, remember?”
Max felt his jaw clench. He really didn’t want to get into this here, not until he’d had a chance to collect his thoughts and come up with a back-up plan for the aquarium’s future—something he should have been working on all along.
“We didn’t get the grant,” Molly said flatly. “I was wrong. We should have done something more conventional, like Max suggested.”
“Oh, honey. Don’t blame yourself. You worked so hard on that proposal. The aquarium is going to be just fine, no matter what.” Opal squeezed Molly’s arm and glanced at Max, clearly waiting for him to jump in and say something.
But he couldn’t. No more playing Mr. Nice Guy. He never would have let things slip so far out of his control in Baltimore. And he certainly couldn’t make empty promises about the aquarium’s future.
“Max?” Mavis prompted. “Don’t you have something to say to Molly?”
All eyes turned toward him. Color was beginning to flood Molly’s face again. Her cheeks were two bright spots of pink.
He cleared his throat. “You’re not to blame, Molly. It was me. I let—”
He didn’t even know what he was saying. The music, the lights, the sea creatures floating everywhere—it was all such a stark contrast to the worry gnawing at him that he couldn’t form the right words.
Molly’s eyes narrowed, glistening like emeralds forged by fire. “Are you trying to say that you let charm override your good judgment?”
Why did that sound so familiar? “Yes, I guess I am saying that.”
She let out a laugh that didn’t sound at all amused. “Wow.”
Opal shook her head. “Molly, I’m sure Max doesn’t mean that the aquarium would have won the grant if he’d written the proposal himself.”
“On the contrary, I think that’s exactly what he means.” Molly’s tone was sharp, but at the same time, her eyes swam with unshed tears. “Isn’t it?”
“There’s no way of knowing that for certain,” Max said, but his words came out sounding stilted, even to his own ears. How was he somehow making this situation worse every time he opened his mouth?
“Max.” Opal sent him a look that could kill.
“No, it’s fine. I get it. Message received, loud and clear.” Molly sniffed. “He’s right. I just can’t believe that I let myself think you actually agreed with me and thought it was a good idea. You felt this way all along, didn’t you?”
Just as the words left Molly’s mouth, there was a lull in the music. Couples around them turned to stare, and a few feet away, one face in particular came into sharp focus.
Max’s stomach hardened. Uncle Henry had just witnessed their entire exchange.
Opal fanned herself with a shaky hand. “I think everyone just needs to take a deep breath and—”
“You were right a few weeks ago,” Molly cut in, gaze trained on Max as her tears spilled over. “Working together really has been a mistake. But not as big a mistake as thinking we could actually have a future together.”
He opened his mouth to contradict her, but he was struck dumb by the sight of her tears sliding slowly, excruciatingly, down her porcelain cheeks. What had he done? He’d made Mollycry.
There was an old legend that said mermaids were so powerful that their tears, once shed, turned into pearls. And even though Max knew that Molly wasn’t a real mermaid, seeing her cry made him into a believer. He sensed her power deep down in his core, like a blow to the chest, and it felt strangely like something he knew for a fact was real—it felt like love.