Shattered (5 page)

Laura lifted an eyebrow playfully, twirling a pineapple spear in her drink. “Well, if it's only T-shirts...”

At Carol's lack of response, she shrugged and said, “Come on, kid, so you lost a couple of sales. It's not like you can't make them up before summer ends.  Beach real estate is on the upswing, don’t you listen to the news?  Why are you so down on yourself lately?”

“Low self-esteem.”

“Oh, right, that's always been your biggest problem. That must be why you've been president of the board of realtors only three times in the past five years, not to mention the ranking member of the million-dollar club for two years running and, frankly, I don't think I'll go on. I'm starting to depress myself. How's the swordfish?”

Carol shrugged disinterestedly.

Laura looked at her sympathetically. “Do you know what you need? A vacation. I mean, business isn't going to pick up here for another month at least. You know what spring break is going to do to the traffic around here in another month, and with your back acting up again, why don't you just take off for a couple of weeks?” She speared another forkful of pasta.

“But that's the trouble with living in Paradise, isn't it?” replied Carol wryly. “There's no place to go on vacation.” Then, with an obvious effort to hold up her end of the conversation, Carol said, “Why don't you have a date tonight, anyway? I thought you and that pony-tailed fellow were on your way to becoming an item.”

“Winston?” She waved a dismissive hand in the air. “Too weird.”

Weird, in reference to Laura's dates, was a relative term, but Carol chose not to point that out. “I thought he was nice.”

“He played with dolls, for heaven's sake.”

“He collected,” Carol corrected, “priceless antique porcelains.”

“Which I suppose means he was in touch with his feminine side.”

“What it means is that he had a steady income, which is a vast improvement over most of your gentlemen friends.”

Laura shrugged. “Maybe that was the problem. I like my men a little more dependent.”

Carol rolled her eyes helplessly.

A male voice spoke behind them. “Evening, ladies. Buy a sailor a drink?”

Laura glanced around, pretended to spot someone up front, and beckoned. “Oh, bouncer.”

Guy pulled up a chair between them and straddled it backward. “Mind if I join you?” He reached for a roll from the basket.

Laura returned, “If you don't mind picking up the check.”

Carol was constantly surprised by the way the sound of his voice could still make her heartbeat speed—sometimes with anger, sometimes with agitation or surprise, but always with anticipation. It was an instinctive thing, like a blush, that she could neither control nor explain. There was chemistry between them still, she supposed, and always would be.

At forty-two, Guy was lean and lanky—too lean, occasionally, because he sometimes forgot to eat—with brown hair that was thinner than it had been when Carol had married him, and a long, thoughtful face that disguised an acerbic wit. From her father Kelly had gotten her dark hair and her impish sense of humor; from Carol she had gotten green eyes and a tendency to worry. Guy never worried. That was only one on a long, long list of reasons their marriage had not worked.

Carol said, “What do you want, Guy?”

“A double scotch and a rare rib eye will do me just fine. Or don't they serve anything but pasta here?”

Laura smiled sweetly. “No carnivores allowed.”

Sometimes it still gave Carol a strange feeling to look up and see Guy. Right after he had moved out, Carol kept tripping over the empty place in her life where Guy had once been. But knowing that she could see him, accidentally or on purpose, any time of the day or night, was both reassuring and disconcerting. When he had moved to Tallahassee, and Kelly was gone, too, the emptiness had taken on a life of its own, threatening to consume everything in its path. A world without Guy seemed to be a world that was very wrong indeed, like a world without stars or in which tides flowed backward.

But that was a long time ago. Carol had changed, Guy had changed, life had changed. And even after a year, Carol wasn't quite sure how she felt about having him back in town.

Guy said, “So how about inviting me over for a soak in the hot tub?”

Laura lifted her wineglass in a small salute. “In your dreams.”

“Don't flatter yourself. I was talking to your friend.”

Carol mimicked Laura's sweet smile. “What she said.”

“Hey, I used to own that hot tub.”

“You also used to have hair,” Laura returned tartly.

“I resent that. Besides, I still have hair ... more or less.”

“Not for long, sweetheart.”

Guy glanced at Carol. “You know she really adores me, don't you?”

It was then that Carol noticed that Guy had torn a roll into three pieces, littering the white tablecloth with crumbs, but he hadn't eaten a bite. This was so unlike Guy that Carol's stomach contracted once, sharply, with consternation and concern. And then Carol glanced sharply at Laura. Was it possible that Laura had called Guy, after all, and told him about the distressing phone call? The only time Guy ever fidgeted was when he didn't know what to say—which was virtually never. But if he were trying to find a way to reason with his near-hysterical ex-wife before she fell over the edge of a breakdown, that might well put him at a loss for words—however temporarily.

The waitress stopped by and Guy ordered his drink. Carol discreetly nudged a bread plate toward Guy and waited until the waitress was gone to ask coolly, “What's on your mind, Guy?”

“The national debt, Mideast tensions, the decline of family values ...”

Laura raised her eyebrow to an exaggerated height. “All that in that tiny space? I'm impressed.”

Guy said, “One of these days you're going to go too far, Capstone.”

“Excuse me.” Carol raised her hand in a plea for peace. “Who divorced this man, anyway?”

Laura retorted, “It's beginning to look as though no one did.”

Carol decided that if Laura had set this up, she was a better actress than Carol had ever guessed.

The waitress returned with Guy's drink and he dropped the mangled pieces of bread onto the bread plate Carol had provided, looking mildly surprised as he realized the damage he had done.

Carol said, trying to neutralize the conversation, “So, Guy. Now that you're managing editor, what are the chances of featuring Beachside Realty in the Focus on St. T. section of the paper this June?”

He seemed to relax a little. “No can do. No favoritism under my command.”

“Oh yeah, right.” Laura's voice was heavy with her familiar sarcasm. “Like that feature you did on Walt Marshall's marina wasn't favoritism. Everybody knows he gives you your slip for free.”

Guy grinned. “Yeah, but I was never married to him.”

“There's been speculation about that, too.”

Guy ignored her, sipping his scotch. He said, in the same mild, almost casual tone, “Speaking of the newspaper business, I know you two charming ladies have followed the ups and downs of my career with rapt interest—”

Laura made a muffled sound of derision.

“So in that context I wonder if the words 'Mary had a little lamb' might mean anything to either of you.”

Laura put on a pensive face. “Aside from the obvious connection between your writing style and the intellectual challenges of a nursery rhyme...”

Carol looked at him curiously. “Why?”

Guy turned to her and for a moment she thought he was going to answer. Then he tossed back another swallow of scotch and replied, “No reason. Just trying to see if you were paying attention.”

But now even Laura looked interested. “Is something going on?”

Guy hesitated. “Interest rates are rising. Three thousand college students are set to descend on the Gulf Coast next weekend. Arlene Campbell is having a hysterectomy.”

Laura tilted her head toward Carol confidentially. “I can't imagine why you ever left him. He's better than a radio.”

Carol said to Guy, “Sometimes Laura has difficulty expressing herself. I think what she wants to know—what we both want to know—is what you're doing here, Guy. Did you just stop by to annoy Laura, or is there something in particular we can do for you?”

“Yes to both. I realized it had been far too long since I had annoyed Laura, and I thought since I was in the neighborhood, I could walk you home.”

“I drove.”

“All the more reason. A walk on the beach will do you good.”

Laura said, “I'm not sure I see the logic in that.” But her gaze was alert and interested as she watched Guy. Carol knew then she wasn't imagining it. Something was wrong.

She forced herself to take a final bite of the tasteless swordfish, crumpled her napkin beside her plate and said, “Let's go.”

“I haven't finished my drink,” he protested, but took a final swallow and reached for his wallet.

“Whatever happened to leaving with the girl that brought you?” Laura objected, but not very energetically. The curiosity in her eyes only fueled Carol's own.

Guy said, “I think that only applies to barn dances and weddings.” He placed two bills on the table and touched Carol's elbow, absently and protectively, as she rose.

Laura said to Carol, “If you're not in by nine in the morning, I will be calling the police.”

And Guy replied, “Be sure to get my description right.”

They walked down the fog-shrouded boardwalk that crossed the dunes between the parking lot and the building, and Carol hugged her arms briefly against the cold and damp. The wind, blowing over the water at fifteen or twenty miles per hour, could turn a March evening on the Gulf into one in New England.

“You were kidding about that walk on the beach, weren't you?” Carol said.

Guy, in his shirtsleeves, pretended to ignore the cold. “You used to love to walk in the wind.”

“This seems to be your night for things that used to be, Guy.” They reached the end of the boardwalk and Carol turned toward her car.

Michael's was upscale enough to have a parking lot that was both paved and lighted, and she did not need an escort. St. T was not the kind of place where women worried about anything except breaking a heel when they walked alone across parking lots at night.

Nonetheless, Guy escorted Carol to her car. Carol kept glancing at him, growing more and more curious about what was on his mind, but he walked with his head down, hands in his pockets, and his face in shadows, and he gave no hint as to what he was thinking.

When they reached her car Carol turned to him. “Just tell me. Did Laura call you?”

His frown was puzzled and distracted. “Laura wouldn't call me a son of a bitch if it took more than a minute of her time. Why?”

Carol was growing exasperated. “Then I really don't understand what all this is about, Guy. You track me down while I'm having dinner, spend twenty minutes exchanging insults with Laura, and all this just to walk me to my car? Is there a point to this at all?”

“Actually, I wanted to talk to you.” His voice sounded tense, though he tried to make his tone casual.

“I wouldn't have guessed.” She shivered again.

Guy opened her car door. “I'll follow you home.”

Carol searched his face, but she knew from long experience that whatever Guy had to say would be said when he was ready and not before. She shrugged and got into the car. “Don't expect coffee.”

He stepped out of the way as she closed the car door, and stood watching as she backed out of the parking space. Only then did he go to his own car.

~

Chapter Five

G
uy didn't like to admit it, but his ex-wife made him nervous. He told himself she had made him even more nervous when she was his wife, but that wasn't true. The rules of marriage were simple and easy to follow: faithfulness, patience, compromise. But there were no rules to divorce, or if there were, he had not yet discovered them. And he never knew how to act around Carol anymore.

He was already feeling foolish for making a big deal out of what was doubtless nothing more than a feeble practical joke. After the initial shock, he had been able to shrug it off in front of Ed, and even minimize the whole thing in his own mind, until he heard that voice again,
Do you know where your little girl is?
and he felt sick inside. Because anyone who could joke about a thing like that was twisted indeed, and he was running around loose and he knew where Carol lived.

He pulled his ten-year-old Honda onto the under-house parking pad beside Carol's SUV—all the real estate people were driving sports utility vehicles this year, he had noticed—just as she was getting out. She waited for him at the bottom of the stairs that led to the front door. The security lights were on a motion sensor and had been triggered by her arrival. Guy could clearly see the impatience and irritation on her face as she stood shivering behind the windbreak at the bottom of the stairs. Her shoulders were hunched, her skirt plastered to her slim legs by the wind; her curls, tugged and tossed by the weather, fluffed around her face like a kewpie doll's. She looked small and fragile and deceptively vulnerable. Guy was glad he hadn't ignored the threat, however absurd it might turn out to be.