Lately, though, there was a glimmer on the horizon from a most unexpected source. Her father—yes, her super-accomplished, goal-oriented father—had introduced her to a guy. His name was Orlando Rivera, and he was heading up the general’s run for office. Like the general, he’d attended West Point. He was in his thirties, ridiculously handsome, from the eldest son of a monied Cuban-American family. He had the dark appeal of a Latin lover and was fluent in English and Spanish. And, maybe most importantly of all, he was in the tight inner circle of satellites that revolved around her father.
“I’m allowed to hate anything I want,” Zach said, grabbing the champagne from her hand and guzzling it down.
Defiantly, she picked up a half-empty bottle that was bobbing in an ice bucket and took back the glass. “It was Daisy’s big day, and if you were any kind of gentleman, you’d be happy for her. And for me,” she groused at him. “I got to stand up at the altar for my best friend—”
“Hey,” he groused back. “I thought I was your best friend.”
“You never come to see me.” She feigned a dramatic sigh. “You don’t call, you don’t text… Besides, I can have more than one.”
“Best is a superlative term. There can only be one.”
She refilled the glass and took a gulp, enjoying the lovely head rush of the bubbly. “You and your rules. Both you and Daisy are my besties and there’s nothing you can do about it, so there.”
“Oh yeah? I can think of something.” He grabbed her hand and pulled her down toward the dark, flat expanse of Willow Lake.
“What the heck are you doing?” she said, twisting her hand out of his.
“The party’s over, but I’m not tired. Are you tired?”
“No, but—”
“Hey, check it out.” He led the way down the slope to the water’s edge.
“Check what out? I’m going to ruin my shoes.”
He stopped and turned. “Then take them off.”
“But I—”
“Lean on me,” he said, going down on one knee in front of her. He slipped off one sandal and then the other. She felt an unexpected frisson of sensation when he touched her. “That’s better, anyway.”
She sniffed again, unwilling to admit that the coarse sand on the lakeshore felt delicious under her bare feet. “Fine, what are we checking out?”
“I saw something.…” He gestured at the water lapping gently up the sandy slope.
She saw it, too, a glimmer in the moonlight. Then she frowned and lifted the hem of her dress to wade out and grab it. “A champagne bottle,” she said. “Somebody littered.” Holding it up to the light, she squinted. “There’s a message inside, Zach.”
“Yeah? Open it up and check it out,” he said.
“No way,” she said. “It might be someone’s private business.”
“What? How can you find a message in a bottle and not look at it?”
“It’s bad karma to pry into it. I won’t be party to snooping around someone else’s emotional baggage.” Defiantly, she flung the bottle as far as she could. It landed unseen, with a decisive plop. “What kind of idiot leaves a message in a bottle in a landlocked lake, anyway?” she asked.
“You should have looked,” he said churlishly. “It might have been important. Maybe it was a cry for help and you just ignored it.”
“Maybe it was some teenager’s angsty poetry and I did her a favor by getting rid of it.”
“Right.” He grabbed her hand and pulled her toward the dock jutting out into the lake.
She pulled back. “Wait a minute. Now what are we doing?”
“I told Wendela I’d take the boat over to the boathouse.”
Wendela was the wedding planner, and Zach did most of the videography work for her. In addition, she often enlisted him to do other odd jobs at events. In a small town, it was a way for him to cobble together a living, Sonnet supposed. He was talented at what he did; during the reception, Wendela had told her he’d won some prestigious awards for his work. But like all artists, he struggled. Awards didn’t translate into a viable income.
“You’re here as a wedding guest,” she protested. “Wendela wouldn’t expect you to work tonight.”
“What, driving a boat is suddenly work? Since when?”
“You have a point. What is it with guys and boats?”
“There are some things that cannot be resisted.” He slipped off his bow tie and opened the collar of his tuxedo shirt, his Adam’s apple rippling as he sighed with relief.
Good Lord, had he been working out? She didn’t ask, because everyone knew that was just code for “I think you’re hot.”
And she didn’t. How could she? He was Zach—as familiar as a lifelong friend, yet suddenly…exotic.
“I shouldn’t have done those Jell-O shots,” she murmured. Pulling her attention elsewhere, she stood on the dock and looked out at the moon-silvered water. The sight of the lake never failed to ignite a rush of memories. She had been here before, many times through the years.
During her junior high and high school years, when Camp Kioga had been closed down, she and Zach used to sneak onto the premises with their friends on hot summer days, swimming and reliving the glory days of the resort, which dated back to the 1920s. And every once in a while, the two of them would slip into the boathouse and pretend to be smugglers or pirates or stuntmen in the circus. Sometimes, even as youngsters, they would fall so deep into the fantasy that they’d lose track of time. She remembered talking with him for hours, seemingly about nothing, but managing to encompass everything important. When she was with Zach, it never felt strange that she didn’t have a dad, or that she was biracial, or that her mom had to work all the time to make ends meet. When she was with Zach, she just felt…like herself. Maybe that was why their friendship felt so sturdy, even when they almost never saw each other.
An owl hooted from a secret place in the darkness, startling Sonnet from her thoughts. “It’s getting late,” she said softly. “I’m leaving.”
He gently closed his hand around her wrist. “Come with me.”
A shiver coursed through her, and she didn’t resist when he drew her close, slipping his arm around her waist and edging her toward the boat moored at the end of the dock. It was a vintage Chris-Craft runabout, its wooden hull and brass fittings polished to a sheen so bright it seemed to glow in the moonlight. The old boat had been used in the wedding, mostly for a photo shoot but also, and most romantically, to transport the bride and groom to the floatplane dock, where they’d been whisked away to their honeymoon at Mohonk Mountain House. A Just Married sign was tied to the stern.
“Hang on to me,” Zach whispered. “I don’t want you falling in.”
“I won’t fall—whoa.” She clung to him as the boat listed beneath her weight. The open cabin smelled of the lake, and the flowers that had been used to decorate it, and the fresh scent made her dizzy. The second wave of champagne was kicking in.
“Take my jacket,” he said, wrapping it around her shoulders. “Chilly tonight.”
She took a seat in the cockpit, feeling the peculiar intimacy of his body heat lingering in the folds of the jacket. She reveled in the slickness of the satin lining, which smelled faintly of men’s cologne and sweat. Oh boy, she thought.
There was an open bottle of champagne in the cubby by her knees, so she grabbed it and took a long, thirsty swig.