An Unlikely Father. Cynthia Thomason
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“Hello, handsome,” she said as she walked between Finn and the television to deposit her enormous tote bag on the sofa. As she passed, he grabbed a fistful of gauzy skirt and pulled her back onto his lap. She landed with a low chortle and nuzzled her face in the crook of his neck. “It’s a good thing you don’t have feeling in these legs or you’d be hollering about my weight.”
“Ha! I’d never complain about that. Besides, I’ve got feeling where I need it, and you are lighting my fire, woman.”
She laughed and stood up. Okay. There were still moments of pure excitement in her life after all. “Hold that thought, old man. I’ve brought your dinner from work. I don’t want you passing out from lack of nutrition.”
She spread the top of her bag and took out a sack from the Green Door Café. “Snapper sandwich, fries and coleslaw,” she said. “It was the special today.”
Finn had already returned his attention to the television. “Damn news,” he said. “Damn Republicans. I miss Walter Cronkite. At least he could deliver the news without depressing the hell out of a person.”
Pet warmed his dinner and brought it out on a tray with a glass of iced tea. He turned off the television and began eating. “So, any news from town today?” he asked.
This was her chance. “Oh, you bet. Since that fella from Anderson Enterprises arrived, everybody’s talking about the reopening of Dolphin Run.”
He grunted, dipped a fry in ketchup. “Bunch of damn fools to get all riled up over an Anderson in town.”
Pet ignored him and pressed on. “Everybody’s making plans,” she said. “The town council’s talking about sprucing up Island Avenue. Larry hired a contractor to give him a quote on fixing up the Green Door’s outside eating area. He wants to expand and add new lighting, maybe some of those outdoor heaters so we can keep the patio open even in the cold months.
“Claire hired a couple of guys to paint the town hall. She’s picked a nice shade of peach. And I saw new porch furniture at the Heron Point Hotel today.” Pet took a sip of her iced tea. “It’s exciting, Finn. Really it is. Change is good, you know. Keeps us young.”
Finn stared at the television as if he hadn’t turned it off, his way of avoiding eye contact with her, she supposed. “Not if it means Archie Anderson is coming to town,” he said. “That kind of change will ruin Heron Point, you mark my words.”
Being a self-proclaimed spiritual person, Pet didn’t rise to anger quickly. She’d found it easy to maintain a calm sense of being in Heron Point. This little town made hibernating bears out of the most aggressive beasts. But she was angry now. She set her tea glass on the floor, crossed her arms over her knees and leaned so close to Finn that he actually jerked back a couple of inches.
And she blasted him. “Finn Sweeney, I am sick of hearing you spew all this negativity about Archie Anderson. For over a month now you’ve berated the man and his company without offering one bit of concrete evidence to support your contempt.” She sat back and let her gaze wander slowly over his features from the top of his head to his shoulders. “There’s a bad aura about you, has been for weeks. You’re under a psychic cloud, while everybody else in Heron Point is standing in the sunshine.”
His face pinched up, so for a moment his bushy gray eyebrows seemed to connect with his moustache and beard. A hairy monster about to explode. “You don’t like it, Petula, there’s the door.”
“You’d like that, wouldn’t you? You’d like me to leave you alone to stew in the cauldron of discontent you’re trying to brew up for this town. Well, it’s not going to happen because I’m not going anywhere unless it’s out to Dolphin Run to do a little investigating of my own. I guarantee you I can walk inside that big ol’ place and sense what’s going on as fast as you can snap your fingers.” She snapped her own in front of his face to prove her point. “I’ll find out if there are ghosts around that run-down resort. I don’t need you to tell me.”
His brows drew together in a threatening frown. “You stay away from Dolphin Run.”
“I will not. At least not until I get some answers from you.”
He stared at her, his gray eyes glittering. Just when she thought steam might come out of his ears, he said, “All right then, Petula, what’re the damn questions?”
Now she was getting somewhere. “How do you know Archie Anderson? Why do you hate him? What did a big financier from Manhattan ever do to you, a fisherman from Heron Point? What connection do you have with Dolphin Run? How…”
He held up a hand. “Hold your horses, Pet. You’re making my head spin.” He took a deep breath.
She waited.
He clasped his hands in his lap and stared at them a full minute before speaking so softly she had to strain to hear him. “Forty-seven years ago a boy drowned off the dock at Dolphin Run. And a twenty-one-year-old man tried to save him and nearly lost his own life in the process. And it was all Archie Anderson’s doing.” She gasped. He looked up into her eyes. “And that’s just the half of it,” he said.
THE ENTHUSIASTIC PARTY of five meandered among the Friday-night crowd the two blocks from Wear It Again to the Pepperoni Pit, Heron Point’s only pizza restaurant. Helen lagged behind Jack, Claire and Ethan, and walked with Jane. They kept up a lively discussion about school and boys and Claire’s upcoming wedding to Jack. Tonight especially, Helen enjoyed Jane’s company, maybe because the idea of having a child of her own was not as remote as it always had been.
Plus, there was another advantage to walking behind the other adults. Helen decided right away that she liked the view of Ethan’s back as he moved through the crowd. Having abandoned his neatly pressed pants for a worn pair of jeans and a navy-blue-and-white knit shirt, he looked almost like a local tonight. Traces of Manhattan still defined him, however. His shirt was tucked into the waistband and, in Claire’s shop, Helen had noticed an embroidered emblem over his pocket. That simple knit garment had probably cost as much as Helen spent on clothes in an entire year.
Ethan was shaped nicely, too. Not like the muscle-bound cycle types who showed up in Heron Point on weekends. And not like the wiry, skinny men who lived in town year-round and drank beer and shot pool in the local taverns. No, Ethan was sculpted like a fine work of art, broad across the shoulders, narrow at his hips, rounded at his quite admirable buns. If he made money for Anderson Enterprises by sitting at a computer or attending high-powered meetings, he obviously made time for fitness, as well.
While she stared at him, he turned toward Jack, said something that made them both smile and raked his long fingers through his light brown hair. The style was neat and trim, just long enough for strands at his neck to brush the collar of his shirt. His profile was nice, too. A well-defined nose and chin, a slightly sloped, strong brow. Helen hadn’t been able to study these details the night before when they’d sat in the dark on the hood of her truck eating cake. And the day she’d smashed his car she’d been too nervous to give him more than a quick once-over. But now, in the soft rays of the setting sun, Helen liked what she saw.
She shook her head to keep her thoughts from wandering in a dangerous direction. “Stop it, Sweeney,” she said. “You made a promise to yourself, remember? No more…”
“What did you promise?” Jane asked.
Helen pressed her lips together and reminded herself that she was talking out loud. “Ah, pizza,” she said. “I promised I wouldn’t eat pizza for a while.” She laughed. “I never should have promised that, now should I?”
They were coming to the entrance of the pizza shop, and Jane skipped ahead to her mother. “Heck, no.”
Ethan held the door, and Claire and Jane went inside. Since Heron Point was packed with strangers, Helen didn’t expect to see anyone she knew. The townies usually stayed home on Friday nights, at least during the dinner hour. Which explained her shock when she stepped into the doorway and bumped into Maddie Harrison.
“Helen!