She could hear him put his smile in place. “No, darling, I’m only…all right, sometimes I do feel that way, but I don’t want to dissolve. It’s just that, when we were married we both put everything into the business. I still am, and you’re not.”
“That’s why we’re not married anymore, Tom. Our marriage was the business. That’s all it was. I am totally committed to the agency, but I really need this time away. And don’t call me darling. I haven’t been your darling for a long, long time. So, what is this emergency you’ve been trying to get hold of me over?”
“No emergency, Luce, I only wanted to make sure you were accessible if one arose.”
She blew out a long breath. “Well, I’m not accessible. In fact, I haven’t even thought of the agency since I left.” She realized that was true, except for the brief but irritating conversation with Chris last night. “And I don’t feel bad about it. I’m allowed to do that, take a real vacation, you know.”
“Have you got that tropical fever? Maybe you’d better come right back and see a doctor. You want me to make the arrangements?”
“I do not have any tropical fever. It’s just that I have enough to deal with right here, and I want this settled before I return.”
Tom had a way of sounding like a boy at times, and that tone crept into his voice now. “So, what’s that park you inherited like? Primitive little place?”
Ever since he’d heard about her inheritance, he’d been sniveling about it. “No, it’s great, huge, with dolphin shows and a hundred aquariums filled with exotic marine animals, and you should see the crowds. It’s right on the ocean, a real gold mine.”
And then she turned to find Chris standing there with that folder in his hand.
“That sounds…nice. Hey, my line is blinking, and I have a meeting with a big, prospective client in twenty minutes. Will you call in once a day at least?”
“I will not. I may call in a few days, but I’m not making any promises. Bye.”
She laughed nervously when she hung up. “I can explain that little…exaggeration.”
Chris shook his head. “Listen, I gave up on trying to understand people a long time ago.”
“This is different.”
He replaced the green folder.
“See, that was my ex, the one I own the agency with, and he makes me so crazy sometimes with his attitude, and I don’t even know why I lied.”
He snagged her hands, which were trying to express what she was saying. “I don’t care. It’s all part of the Great Green Lie, and that’s not my world anymore.”
He glanced down to where he held her hands. She wondered if it felt as good to him as it did to her. As though in answer, he tightened his hold before releasing her and heading out. She curled her fist and tapped her forehead with it. What a fool she’d made of herself! Not only caught in an inane lie, but babbling to try to explain it. She hated what Tom made her sometimes. But it wasn’t just Tom, it was everything.
It was who she was.
BY THE END of the day, Lucy had contacted a real-estate person to come out and give her an idea of what the property was worth. She tried to find Bailey to tell him she was leaving, but found herself at Liberty’s pool where Bailey was nowhere near.
Chris was floating on a blue raft, arms and feet dangling in the water. He was still wearing that swimsuit that accentuated his small derriere and the taper of his back as it flared into nice, wide shoulders. She caught herself licking her lips. It wasn’t like her to lust, other than at untouchable celebrities. Chris was definitely touchable, at least in a physical sense. Liberty swam below him, like an odd-shaped shadow.
“You’re not going to try to explain yourself again, are you?” he said.
“I don’t care what you think.”
His lips quirked. “Yeah, right. You even cared that a bartender thought you’d seen me naked. What do you want? I’m busy.”
She tried to let his rudeness roll off her, but it stuck in her skin like a cactus spine instead. “You don’t look very busy.”
“I’m observing him. I want him to get used to my being here without thinking he has to react to me. I don’t want him to think of me as human so much as just something in his area.”
“Like a piece of seaweed?” She couldn’t help the grin that erupted on her face as he lifted an eyebrow at the comparison. Wonder what he’d think about the eel comparison? Their gazes held until she had to clear her throat and focus on the dolphin again. “I wouldn’t think he’d like humans very much.”
“Would you blame him?” He rolled over on his side, facing her. “But they hold no grudges. They actually seem to like people, though I can’t understand why.”
She looked at him, wondering again what made him dislike people so much. “He seems to like you, though I can’t understand why.” He splashed water at her. She ducked, but caught the edge of the spray. “Ah, you can dish it out, but you can’t take it, eh?”
He laced his fingers behind his head. “Come here and I’ll show you how I can take it.”
“Uh-uh. I’ve already had a fish thrown in my lap and now a saltwater bath. I think I’ll pass.” She waved dismissively at him and turned to go, but her heart had somehow taken off in some other direction because it was thumping heavily inside her. Good grief, he was just goading you on, girl. Don’t be a fool.
LUCY FINISHED packing up the apartment of the man who had fathered her. She put the maps in a separate box, not exactly sure what she was going to do with them. Her mother thought she was crazy for coming down to this “tropical infestation of drugs and bugs,” but Lucy was glad she’d come. This gave her a sense of closure she’d never had concerning her birth father.
Her mother called Sonny a bum, a loser, and she’d wanted that influence nowhere near her daughter. Lucy knew her mother hadn’t made it easy for Sonny to keep in touch, but she still wished he had. Maybe he had been a bum in some ways, but he’d been her father. She decided that she was proud to call him that.
She flicked on the small television to watch the weather. It still amazed her that she hadn’t thought about work, much less home, since she’d left.
Cold and rainy in St. Paul. Time to call her best friend Vicki and rub it in. Vicki was a journalist for one of the large St. Paul newspapers. They’d met years ago when Vicki did a piece on Advertising Genius, and they’d been friends ever since. She dialed the number, waiting to hear Vicki’s always-cheerful voice. Sometimes Lucy wished she could be more like her friend, spontaneous and carefree. Lucy couldn’t remember ever being that way, even when she was little. Be a good girl, Lucy. Act like a proper lady now.
“Hello!” Vicki answered breathlessly.
“Hi, it’s me.”
“Lucy! It’s about time! Hold on, let me get my portable phone. I just walked in.” After a second, she said, “I’m looking at a picture from a magazine of the Bahamas with beaches as white as snow and water the color of glass cleaner that can’t be real. So…is it beautiful there?”
Lucy bit her lower lip as the image of Chris flashed through her mind. “Actually, I haven’t had a chance to look at the beach.” And the water was right there beyond the park’s boundaries.
“Oh, Lucy, that is so like you! This is supposed to be a vacation, isn’t it?”
“Yes and no. But it’s more complicated than that. I have to decide what to do with the park. And there’s this guy who’s taken custody of the dolphin there and is training—or rather untraining him to set him free.”
“A