Sunshine Beach (30 page)

The demolition of the cottage patios and original concrete paths that bisected them had been going on for days. Everywhere Renée looked there were pulverized chunks of concrete. The ground lay in ripped-up clods all around them. Even worse was the constant whine of the concrete saws that pierced the air. The sound plucked at Renée's nerves. Jangled up her spine. Yanked her back to that horrible week in 1952 when an underground pipe had burst and had to be replaced. The grounds looked and felt much like this the week her father died. But then it had been jackhammers not concrete saws, which according to Avery had not yet been invented.

Even when one saw would stop another would be whining. The sound reverberated in the air and ricocheted off the cottage walls. If power tools had existed in the Middle Ages, the concrete saw might have convinced far more heretics to convert than the rack ever had.

How she could have imagined that this would be a logical time to rethink the hotel grounds she did not know. Yet here she stood, staring at the hibiscus and surrounding trees and vines that obscured the family cottage, trying to do just that.
Just do it
. She placed the pencil tip to the pad, trying to blot out the noise and all it conjured, and began to draw.

The jungle could be tamed, the grounds brought back just like the buildings. All she needed was a workable plan to present to the garden club, of which she'd been president more times than any other member.

She'd had a view of the hibiscus from the window of the bedroom she'd shared with Annelise. It was a part of every memory, every dream, every nightmare. All these years she and everyone else had believed that she had dealt better with their shared tragedy than Annelise had. While Annelise had freaked out, acted out, and obsessed about uncovering the truth and exacting some sort of revenge on whoever had caused their father's death and abducted her mother, Renée had accepted reality and moved forward. She had been “healthy”; Annelise had not. Renée had married, borne and raised two children, loved and been loved by John. Annelise had done none of those things. When Annelise had refused to allow the hotel to be demolished and the land sold, Renée had once again moved on, treating the hotel as if it no longer existed, blacking it out in her mind. Virtually every single day of her adult life, she had driven past it, relieved when the trees and vines had swallowed it, convinced that it had no hold on her. That it was only a remnant of the past that had nothing to do with her current life. She'd told herself this over and over until she'd believed it. She'd pitied Annelise for getting stuck and for lacking the ability to move on.

She stopped sketching. Squeezed her eyes shut in an attempt to blot out the damned sound of the concrete being destroyed. But the truth refused to be shut out. She might have been the better actor, but she had not moved on or handled the loss like an adult. She had been like a child who closes her eyes, puts her hand over her ears, and spouts noisy gibberish so that she can pretend she doesn't see or hear the things that frighten her.

She forced herself to open her eyes. Adjusted her grip on the pencil. The hibiscus bush swayed gently, its heavy red blooms nodding and winking knowingly at her
. No.
It was too large. It had overstepped its bounds, gobbled up ground. She'd cut it back, remove large clippings. When the walled patios were complete she'd incorporate a piece of the hibiscus in every single one of them.

Skirting the bush, she walked to the family cottage.

The door was propped open, as were the windows. She walked inside. It was empty now; stripped of its contents and its personality, there was nothing there to differentiate it from the other two-bedroom units. Strangers would rent it one day and never know that her father had died there.

The concrete walls buffered the noise outside. Images wavered in her mind's eye. Her father and Ilse behind the closed bedroom door. Had she heard them that night? She moved toward the bedroom. Stopped and closed her eyes trying to hear, trying to remember. And then, there it was floating on the edge of her memory. Voices. Strained and cracked as if they were . . . arguing. Her eyes flew open as she realized the argument had taken place in an odd mixture of English and German, the words harsh and guttural. Was it just Ilse and her father? She stood perfectly still, barely breathing, her heart racing. Or had there been a third voice? Oh, God. Could it have been Heinrich Stottermeir? If she'd knocked on the door, could she have altered what happened? Would the night have ended differently? Could her father's death have been averted?

Renée held her breath desperately trying to remember, trying to shut out everything else so she could decipher the words that she'd tried not to hear that night and then spent the rest of her life blotting out. Guilt rushed through her. If she'd made herself remember sooner, if she'd spoken up, could she have saved Annelise from all these years of turmoil?

Nikki sat in the waiting room of Drs. Gabianelli, Gutschenritter, and Payne OB-GYN leafing through a
Life & Style
magazine, which in her current condition seemed an intentional insult since she no longer had a life or a style.

Maddie had made the appointment, overseen Nikki's consumption of a ridiculous amount of water, then dragged Nikki out of the land of denial (a.k.a. her bedroom at Bella Flora) and to the doctor's office to keep that appointment.

“I'm so full I'm going to burst.” She turned to Maddie. “Please let me go to the bathroom. I'll only pee a little bit.”

“Sorry. You have to follow the instructions. The extra water is so they can do an ultrasound.”

When her name was called, Nikki sloshed her way to the examination room. Maddie came with her.

Polite and professional in a white lab coat over a beige dress and wearing low heels, Dr. Payne appeared to be in her early fifties. As she washed her hands, Nikki wondered if she'd been born with the last name or married it. Payne seemed an extremely troubling surname for a doctor. Even worse than Tease for a hairstylist or Storm for a meteorologist. A long line of unsuitable names presented themselves as the doctor approached. This was what her brain did lately; it either fixated on unimportant minutiae or checked out completely until someone or something yanked her back to the present. You didn't have to be Freud to know that her brain was working overtime to relieve itself of her unpleasant reality. Which included her brother. Who despite being incarcerated seemed able to do, communicate, and send pretty much anything he felt like. Including the package that had just arrived with the six safe-deposit box keys tucked into their individual numbered envelopes from six different Florida banks.

She thought about the safe-deposit boxes and Malcolm's threats while the doctor introduced herself, made chitchat
about the weather, then opened the manila folder that contained the forms Nikki had filled out.

Nikki began to count ceiling tiles as the doctor palpated her abdomen. They were laid out in an even pattern. With rows of small perforations dotting each tile.

“Did you hear that?” Maddie's voice made her lose count.

“I'm sorry?” Nikki roused and forced herself to focus on the doctor's face.

“I said I would estimate you're ten to eleven weeks,” Doctor Payne said. “You're almost through your first trimester.”

Nikki nodded numbly.

“Doesn't that mean the nausea and morning sickness should go away soon?” Maddie prompted.

“Usually,” the doctor replied smiling. “Shall we take a look?”

“We're going to see it?”

“Um-hmmm. And probably pick up its heartbeat.”

“A heartbeat?” Nikki's brain kicked all the way in. The pregnancy had seemed unreal. None of this should be happening. “We could hear a heartbeat?”

“Someone hasn't been reading her
What to Expect When You're Expecting
,” Maddie said.

It was true. She'd barely gotten through the initial cheery chapters because none of it had seemed remotely applicable to her. The only thing she'd been expecting was heartache.

“This will be a little cold.” The doctor spread a thin layer of gel over Nikki's bare stomach. Then she positioned a monitor so that they could all see it, turned on a knob, then began to skim a metal wand over Nikki's stomach. It took Nikki a few moments to understand what she was seeing.

“Is that . . . is that the baby?”

“It is.”

“But it looks like E.T.”

The doctor smiled. “Yes. There's a lot of head from this view.” She pointed to the monitor. “And here's the sac.” She
circled the monitor with her finger. “Those are the hands and feet.”

Nikki watched in fascination. “It's moving. Is that normal?”

“It is. Doesn't it look like it's waving?” Sure enough there was a back-and-forth movement.

Nikki's heart fluttered in her chest as her brain tried to absorb what she was seeing. There was a baby inside her. Joe Giraldi's baby. “Oh, my God. I can't believe it. It's . . . it's real.”

“It's real, all right,” Dr. Payne said. “And that's its heart.” She gestured to something that pulsed in and out. Nikki watched, mesmerized. “Shall we see if we can pick up a heartbeat?” She moved the wand slowly, and suddenly there was a scratchy racing sound. Staticky lines kept pace on the screen.

“It's so fast.”

“Just as it should be,” the doctor said.

“There's a baby. With a heart and everything.” She turned to Maddie, who was also smiling crazily.

“And . . . oh . . .” The doctor hesitated. “Let me see what this is . . .” Fear pinched out Nikki's excitement as the doctor moved the wand. The doctor's hand stopped moving. “Well look at that.” She smiled. “There's another sac.” She pointed to the screen and Nikki saw it. It reminded her of the screen in the fighter jet that Tom Cruise was flying in
Top Gun
. First there was only one “bogey” then one moved out from behind the other and there were two. “You're carrying twins.” Her finger circled first one baby-filled sac then another. They floated next to each other while the tadpole E.T.s did what looked like calisthenics.

“The sacs are separate, which indicates fraternal rather than identical twins.”

“Are you sure about all this?”

“Definitely sure,” the doctor laughed. “And those are nice strong heartbeats. Just the way we want them.”

Her own heart was beating just as frantically as the baby's.
Babies.
She hadn't even believed she was carrying one baby.
How could there be two? She looked down at her stomach. “I don't understand how this could have happened.”

Maddie laughed. Dr. Payne said, “If you haven't been undergoing fertility treatments, I assume it happened in the usual way.”

Her period had been so infrequent; she'd assumed she was going through menopause. “I was told a long time ago that I'd never conceive again and that if I did, I'd never carry full term. How could this happen now when I'm practically menopausal?”

“I think the operative word is ‘practically.'” The doctor smiled once again. “Doctors are occasionally mistaken. And plenty of women in their forties get pregnant and go on to give birth to healthy babies. Older mothers are more liable to have multiples.”

Nikki looked back at the screen, still trying to absorb what was happening, what she was seeing. Both babies seemed to be waving. And possibly blowing raspberries. She hadn't believed in this pregnancy enough to be frightened before. But now she couldn't take her eyes off the screen. They were so tiny, so vulnerable. There were two of them! “Oh, God. I can't believe this is really happening.”

Maddie reached out and took her hand. “It looks pretty real to me.”

“Let's get a picture so you have proof,” Dr. Payne said, moving the wand slightly and then holding it still. The monitor did a freeze-frame documenting both sacs floating side by side, their occupants frozen mid-wiggle. “My assistant will give you paperwork and help set up regular visits. You can call with questions anytime. You're welcome to bring your partner with you to any and all visits.”

Partner
. Her brain shied away and ran in another direction . . . “Oh.”

“Oh, what?” Doctor Payne asked. The monitor spit out an image. Dr. Payne handed it to her.

Nikki's eyes blurred with tears. “I can't believe they're real.”

Joe would be so excited. So proud. She swallowed as she imagined his reaction. When she finally found the nerve to tell him. Her hands shook as she buttoned her blouse and pulled on her pants. She was going to have to find a way to tell him. But first she was going to have to put a stop to Malcolm's threats and demands. So that they were rid of him and Joe's career and reputation remained intact.

“Who did this?” Nikki walked into the kitchen, where Maddie was filling a pitcher with ice and sliced fruit. Avery was busy ripping open yet another bag of Cheez Doodles. Steve was peering into the oven.

Maddie poured a bottle of red wine into the pitcher. A shot of brandy and triple sec followed. “Did what?”

“This.” Nikki held up the business suit, the vintage coral Chanel suit with the Peter Pan collar. “My lucky suit. The one I wear to call on potential sponsors. The one I was wearing when I introduced that Saudi prince to the woman who is now his wife.” She held up the jacket and skirt with its silk print trim and button closures. Which had shrunk to a miniature imitation of itself.

Avery stopped what she was doing to look. “Wow, that's small!”

Nikki could see her trying not to laugh, which only infuriated her further.

The suit had been her first real splurge. Her first validation of her success. One of the few vintage pieces she had not
sold for cash when Malcolm had bankrupted her. “How could this happen?”

Steve turned from the oven, a bewildered expression on his face. “I don't know. I washed it in cold water. And I put it on a low setting in the dryer.”

Maddie winced. Avery bit her lip.

“Are you frickin' kidding me?” Nikki's temple throbbed. “First of all, you should not be touching my clothes. Second of all, haven't you ever heard of dry cleaning?” She tried to calm down. But while the nausea had, in fact, finally begun to recede, her emotions were pretty much calling every shot. “Seriously, Maddie, you were married to this man for twenty-five years. Didn't you require him to do anything?”

“Nikki,” Maddie began.

“It's not like I did it on purpose,” Steve interrupted. “I was trying to help.”

“Shrinking people's expensive and irreplaceable clothing is not helpful. It's, it's . . .” Her mind went blank. She could not think of words that were bad enough. “. . . criminal.”

“Well, you should know!” Steve snapped.

Her temple throbbed harder. Did pregnant women stroke out when they got upset? “What do you mean by that?”

“I think that would be obvious,” Steve said.

Kyra came in. “What's going on? I thought we were going to do sunset toasts.” She noticed Nikki and the shrunken suit. “What happened?”

“Your father washed my suit!” Nikki all but shouted. “In the washing machine!” She took a deep breath but it just made her light-headed. “I can't take any more of his ‘helping.' It was easier when he just sat around and whined!”

“Nikki, please.” Maddie had stopped mixing the sangria. “I know Steve's sorry. Maybe he could replace the suit.”

“This suit is not replaceable. It was designed by Coco Chanel. I paid close to a thousand dollars for it.”

Steve snorted. “A thousand dollars for a pink suit? Thank God you were never frivolous like that, Maddie.”

Kyra and Avery both looked like they were having a hard time holding back their laughter. Nikki would kill them if they laughed at her and her pitiful, miniature suit.

“I'm sure my dad didn't mean to do that,” Kyra said. “I'm sure he's really sorry. Right, Dad?”

Steve nodded even as smoke began to seep out of the oven he'd turned his back on. Maddie rushed over, yanked open the oven door, and pulled out a cookie tray of burnt offerings. The smoke detector went off as she dropped the tray in the sink.

“Are those my Bagel Bites?” Kyra asked in dismay as Avery clambered up on a chair to turn the siren off.

“They were.” Steve looked downcast. “And I'm afraid that was the last of them.”

“It's okay, Kyra,” Nikki snarled. “I'm sure he's really sorry. Right, Steve?”

“Hey!” Steve protested.

“Why don't you air out the kitchen, Steve?” Maddie put a restraining hand on his shoulder. “Kyra, can you carry the pitcher of sangria outside? Avery's got the Cheez Doodles. Nikki, why don't you put the suit down for now and carry out this tray of glasses?” She removed the miniature suit from Nikki's hands and laid it carefully across the back of a kitchen chair. Then she put the tray of glasses in Nikki's hands, presumably so that she couldn't use them to wring Steve's neck. “I'll grab some of the Ted Peters smoked fish spread and crackers.”

Outside, Nikki tried to focus on the water and the sun that was just beginning to set, but her insides rose and fell like a boat on a choppy sea; so did her thoughts and emotions.

Avery poured a glass of sangria and handed it to Nikki. “I think you need this. Maybe it will help you calm down.”

Nikki stared stupidly down into the glass. Fruit slices floated in the red liquid. It smelled sweet with sugar. Nutmeg floated on the top. She had two babies floating inside her.

“I think this might taste better right now.” Maddie arrived just in time to swoop in, remove the glass from Nikki's hand, and replace it with the glass of ice water she'd brought with her.

“I'll drink it,” Avery said, reaching for the glass in Maddie's hand.

“Will you pour me one, too?” Kyra plopped down in a chair. She reached for a cracker and slathered fish spread all over it, then added a drop of Tabasco.

“We all need to calm down,” Avery said as Maddie poured a glass for Kyra. “What's going on?”

“Well, Troy has taken some time off,” Kyra said. “He claims he's gone to work some of his contacts on our behalf. But I think he's just gone to look for a paying gig. Every time I start letting down my guard he does something squirrelly. I don't trust him.”

They all heard the emphasis on the word “trust.” Maddie knew there was more to Kyra's scowl than just Troy taking off. “And?”

Kyra took a long drink of the sangria. “And I called to talk to Dustin a little while ago and some woman who was not the nanny answered Daniel's phone.”

“Maybe he was on set and it was just whoever could get to the phone or something,” Maddie said.

Her daughter looked at her. “That would be great except random people don't touch a megastar's personal cell phone, let alone answer it. Plus she told me that Daniel was ‘resting' and maybe I should just call back later.”

“And you're jealous,” she observed, more tartly than she should have.

“I'm actually starting to feel some empathy for Tonja Kay,” Kyra said. “Even when Daniel's not intentionally looking, there's a horde of women trying to get noticed and hoping to be ‘chosen.'” She drained the last drops from her glass. “You're lucky that William doesn't give you reason to worry.”

Ha!
Maddie's subconscious had arrived. And it arrived scoffing.
What about those post-concert photos in Orlando? And the two girls photographed tiptoeing out of his suite?

He said they were trying to tiptoe in
, she informed her mocking subconscious.
And that he had them escorted out of the hotel.

He always has an explanation, doesn't he? And what do you think is going to happen when it's easier to say yes than to fend someone off?

“Anyone have a good thing to toast?” Maddie asked, mentally shoving her subconscious out of the way.

“Let's see,” Nikki said through gritted teeth. “I now have a perfect gift for a five-year-old fashionista with an appreciation for vintage designer clothing.” The complaint was aimed squarely at Maddie.

In deference to Kyra's presence, Maddie managed not to point out that she and Steve were no longer married and that she had not invited him here, but just barely. “I really don't think it's fair to hold me accountable for Steve's actions,” she snapped. She drew a deep breath of air into her lungs in an attempt to calm down. “Now. How about you, Avery?”

“A good thing?” Avery shook her head. “Not me. In fact we've got way bigger problems than overly amorous movie stars and shrunken designer clothing. We're still pretty much out of money. We're going to have to downsize our plans again unless we come up with more.” She gave Nikki a pointed look.

“Hey, I'm not a miracle worker,” Nikki retorted.

“That's for sure,” Avery muttered.

Maddie's subconscious opened its mouth. Maddie shut it for her.

“Does
anyone
have something good they'd like to share?” She looked at Nikki, wishing that Nikki would hurry up and tell Joe about the babies so that they could celebrate her pregnancy. A celebration of any kind might help break the tension that crackled between them.

“'Fraid not.” Nikki's jaw jutted.

“Fine,” Maddie snapped. “I guess it's up to me, then.” She took a drink of the sangria and stared up at the red-streaked sky as she swallowed it. “Renée showed me the hotel guest registers. There were families that stayed there every year for decades. Multiple generations that their Nana kept notes about and treated like family.”

“That's nice,” Kyra said without much enthusiasm.

“Yeah, great,” Avery added with even less.

“Right,” Nikki mumbled, staring not at the sky but into her glass of water.

Maddie chafed at their dismissal. But as usual she chafed silently.

The rest of the sunset was a work of art done in reds, purples, and golds that no one commented on or even seemed to notice. The cicadas tuned up and mosquitoes came out to eat as dusk turned to night.

Nikki was the first to flee. “I'm beat. I'm out of here.”

“Me, too.” Avery got up. “I'm going to Chase's. I'll be on-site in the morning. We should have the last of the old concrete up and in the Dumpsters tomorrow.”

“I'm done, too,” Kyra said, standing. “And I sincerely hope Dad cleaned up after himself.”

She picked up the tray.

Maddie made no comment as she scooped up the empty pitcher.

“He's going to have to get with the program,” Kyra said as they made their way inside. “And I can't believe I'm saying this, but I hope to hell he stops ‘helping' soon.”

Upstairs, Maddie took her time getting ready for bed but slept fitfully. Near dawn she thought she heard someone in the kitchen but resisted the urge to get up and see who it was.

The house was still quiet when she went down to the kitchen hours later and put on the coffee. From the kitchen
table she watched a small sliver of Pass-a-Grille come to life. Saw boats round the pass and head into the Gulf, saw pelicans and gulls dive for breakfast. At eight
A.M.
she began to worry that Steve might show up determined to cook another meal, so she scrambled eggs and fried sausage patties, then popped bread into the toaster.

She heard movement in Kyra's bedroom but heard nothing from Nikki's. She buttered toast, poured a glass of orange juice, and filled a plate with eggs and sausage, then carried it upstairs. Balancing the breakfast tray, she knocked on Nikki's door. She knew Nikki was stressed out and all these years later she still remembered just how completely pregnancy hormones could jumble a woman's thoughts and hijack her emotions. But Nikki was going to have to get ahold of herself and she most definitely needed to talk to Joe.

“Nikki?” Maddie knocked again. When there was no answer she pushed open the door. “I brought you breakfast.” Maddie stopped in the center of the room. Nikki wasn't there. The room was neat. The bed was made. A note sat on one of the pillows. Worried now, Maddie crossed the room, placed the tray on the nightstand, and picked up the folded piece of paper.

Had to go take care of some things. Sorry to bail. I'm no help to anybody right now.

Maddie walked to the window. Nikki's Jag was not in the driveway. She racewalked to the closet. Nikki's suitcase and a chunk of her wardrobe were missing, but she hadn't taken everything. Maddie tried to think what Nikki might have to “take care of.” She knew someone had been texting her and that those texts had upset her. And then there was the pregnancy.
The pregnancy.
Nikki wasn't thinking clearly and she was most definitely freaked out, but . . . Her emboldened subconscious immediately began to bring up worst-case scenarios.

No
, Maddie scolded back.
You should be ashamed of yourself for even thinking that
.

Is that right
? her subconscious sneered.

But Maddie had no answer. And she didn't have the degree of confidence she wished she did. She had only a prayer. That Nicole Grant might be afraid, under pressure, and in command of less than all of her faculties. But she would never do anything that might endanger those babies.

The midday August sun was a burning orb of yellow, an oven set to broil that Avery would have given anything to be able to turn off. The air was heavy with humidty. The palm fronds hung limp and unmoving. Even the insects seemed to be hiding out waiting for things to cool off.

There was not a man on that site who had not removed his shirt, though the abdomens revealed varied in size and appearance from washboard to beer keg. The water they poured and squeezed over their heads evaporated as it slid down their bodies. But there was no shortage of sweat, which dropped in rivulets and briefly soaked whatever it fell on before it, too, disappeared.