Beach Girls (31 page)

“Oh, Maddie . . .”

“And then I passed out. When I woke up, I was in the hospital. Jack was with me . . . Chris was on the way. I was medicated, I'd just been through three surgeries to save my arm—and all I could think of was Emma. I wanted to know if she was all right. And I had to tell Jack about the crisis she was in—so he could stop her, get her back. I wanted him to prevent Father Richard from visiting her. I just thought, if he knew what he was dealing with, he could stop it. He could work to save their marriage, keep Emma from leaving Nell.”

“You had to tell him,” Stevie said.

“Really? Do you really think so? Because what did it matter, in the end? Emma died! I could have kept her secret and saved my family!” Madeleine sobbed.

“Maddie—it would have torn you up. You didn't know that Emma would die . . . you wanted to help.”

“But if I had waited—waited till after the shock of the accident. He refused to believe me. He thought I was making it up. He was just so grief stricken about Emma, so afraid of losing her. He couldn't bear to see her in that terrible light—about to leave him and Nell.”

“He was in shock,” Stevie said.

“Total shock that's lasted more than a year. Taken him from Atlanta to Boston to Scotland—he had to leave the country to get away from me!”

“Not from you,” Stevie said. “From his own pain.”

“If only I had kept Emma's story a secret,” Madeleine said. “Then Jack wouldn't have had to face it, carry it.”

“It was the truth,” Stevie said. “His truth, and Nell's—not just Emma's. Maddie, don't you know that you acted out of love? Love for your brother?”

Madeleine bowed her head, wracked by sobs. The sound of her own blood rushing through her head merged with the crash of the waves on the beach. The tide was advancing, the waves slipping higher over the sands. The reggae band played easy, happy melodies. The sounds came together, surging in such a way that Madeleine barely heard his voice.

“Her idiot brother,” he said.

There, not a foot away from their table, stood Jack, tears welling in his eyes too.

“You're here,” Stevie gasped.

Madeleine jumped up and threw herself into her brother's arms. She couldn't believe that Jack was here, that he was really here. He held her, rocking her, saying, “I'm sorry, Maddie, I made a mistake, it wasn't your fault.” It was the voice she'd grown up with, the voice of her big brother; something in her heart let go, and she cried harder, with relief now.

“Jack,” she sobbed.

“Oh, Maddie,” he said. “I went to Scotland with Nell because you loved it. But you're not there, and I can't go on without you in our lives.”

Madeleine kissed his cheek, but couldn't quite speak. She let go of him, sitting down in her chair and closing her eyes for just a second. In that moment, she heard his voice again.

“You either, Stevie. We can't do this without you,” Jack said.

When Madeleine looked up, she saw Stevie and Jack locked in a kiss, arms around each other and hair ruffled in the sea wind. The waves broke on the beach one after another, the steadiest sound in the world. Madeleine listened, feeling her heart beat harder than the waves, knowing that her brother had come home to stay.

Chapter 28

ALTHOUGH THE INN WAS FULL, AUNT
Aida found a way to cram everyone in. Since there was no way Madeleine was driving home to Providence on the night when she and her brother were reuniting, she called Chris and told him she was staying—and for him to come down the next day dressed for Henry's wedding. She and Nell would be staying in Stevie's room—an upstairs parlor with two beds and a Victorian chaise. Henry gave his room to Jack.

“I don't want to put you out,” Jack said.

“I'm going to stay with Doreen,” Henry said. “I'd planned on sneaking over there anyway. No way am I spending one more night without her, starting now.”

“That sounds like a very good idea,” Jack said.

Stevie happened to look up as Jack said those words, and she saw that he was staring straight at her. The sight sent a quick shiver down her spine. She smiled at him, and when he smiled back, the tremor started right up at the top and shot down again. Madeleine's story was reverberating in her mind, but the shock and joy of seeing Jack and Nell momentarily pushed it aside.

Nell had slept on the plane and was now wide awake and raring to go. She clung to her aunt's hand. Stevie saw the rapture in both their faces—and Jack's. Aida sat in the background, smiling with barely contained satisfaction, as if she knew love—all sorts of love—was in the air, and that she had done something to bring it about.

“Were you surprised to see us?” Nell asked, looking up at Maddie.

“More surprised than I've ever been in my life!”

Stevie gazed at Madeleine. She had almost certainly aged since Nell had last seen her. She had been through a sort of war—and it showed in the lines around her eyes, a streak of gray in her brown hair, some extra weight around her hips. But Stevie thought she had never seen her friend more beautiful. She was a veteran who had made it through, surviving on love and faith.

“How about you, Stevie?”

“Me, too,” Stevie said. “I still can't believe you're here.”

“How did this come to be?” Aunt Aida asked.

“I put a message in a bottle and sent it to Stevie,” Nell said, laughing. “But Dad found it.”

“Is that true?” Stevie asked.

“It is,” Jack said.

Stevie wondered what the message had said. She wondered whether Nell had really thought it would make it all the way across the Atlantic Ocean, through storms and currents, against the tide. Could Nell possibly have believed that could happen? But then Stevie thought of the birds she painted, the heart-stopping courage and tenacity of hummingbirds—birds no larger than a flower, migrating from one continent to another—and she thought, of course! Yes, Nell had expected the message to reach its destination.

And it had. It was right here, in the presence of Jack and Nell herself.

“That's my Nell,” Madeleine said.

“She makes things happen, that's for sure,” Jack said.

Everyone was tired, and tomorrow would be here before they knew it. So Henry kissed Stevie and Aida, told them he'd see them in the morning. Standing at the foot of the stairs, Jack kissed Nell and his sister goodnight. Stevie saw Madeleine and Nell bubbling over with happiness, and she told herself she wanted to give them a minute.

“I'll be right up,” she said.

“Okay,” Madeleine said, throwing her a look of total happiness.

When everyone else had gone upstairs, Stevie turned to Jack. They were alone in the lobby—the night clerk had gone home at nine. The room was warmly lit—lamps with fringed peach-silk shades, brass wall sconces, and a shaft of moonlight.

“Let's go outside,” Jack said, “and take a walk.”

“That sounds good,” Stevie said. She was still reeling with Madeleine's story, and with the shock of seeing Jack and Nell. She needed to clear her mind and get her heart into some sort of normal rhythm.

They headed out the door, ran across the wide green lawn. A sturdy fence reached across the property, and they unlatched the gate to step out onto the Cliff Walk. Shining with moonlight, the wave-tossed bay was rough silver. They hadn't gone five steps before Jack grabbed Stevie's hand.

“Why did you really come?” Stevie asked.

“Nell's message,” he said.

“What did it say?” she asked.

“I'll tell you,” he said. “Only not right now.” Instead, he wrapped her in his arms, pulled her hard against his chest, and kissed her. It was a kiss to end all kisses. His mouth was hot and filled her with passion. Her hands gripped his arms—she needed to feel his skin. His body felt hard and strong, and she wanted to press against it all night.

When they broke apart, they continued on in silence, keeping the moonlit bay on their left. The tide was in, the waves crashing on the rocks below. Stevie felt a sense of vertigo that had nothing to do with the cliff's steepness. Jack was holding tight to her hand, but she felt herself falling—she actually had to catch her breath.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

“I am,” she said. It was a soaring feeling, as if she had spread her wings, was gliding over the bay. She had always studied birds for her work—their anatomies, their wingspans, the way the air held them aloft—and right now she felt like one of them. This wasn't like other times when she had fallen in love—where she had felt she needed to hold back, when she knew she wanted more than the other person was capable of giving. In flying home from Scotland, Jack had met her more than halfway.

“You're smiling,” he said. “I can feel it, even though it's dark.”

“I was just thinking about flying,” she said.

“What about flying?”

“You don't know how many times I thought about traveling to Scotland, to do research for the book.”

“Do you think Nell didn't plan on that?”

“Did she?”

“And do you think I didn't know she was planning it, when I bought her art supplies to send you drawings?”

“But what is it all about?” she asked. She needed to know. “Why are you there? And why am I writing a book about there?”

“It has to do with distance,” he said solemnly, as if the statement was completely profound instead of just obvious. With a rush, Stevie realized it was both.

“Is part of it . . . what happened to Emma? Maddie told me the story.”

“About the accident?”

“Well, more about what happened before the accident. About Father Kearsage.”

“It's been really hard to believe,” he said. “She went to him for help—counseling, I guess. I've hated looking at myself in all this. She always told me I needed to communicate better—wanted us to go to a therapist. I always thought people who went to a marriage counselor were one step away from breaking up.”

“She wanted you to go see him together?”

“Initially. But I always put her off. I was working hard—traveling for my job, building bridges all over the Northeast. I thought, ‘As soon as things settle down, I'll be more available. She'll be happier.' You know?”

Stevie nodded, thinking of the many ways she had stayed in ruts, ignored the real problems in her marriages until it was too late.

“But then he invited her to join this volunteer program he ran. She loved it—and suddenly she was saying she really felt she had a purpose.”

“Emma was always such an enthusiastic person,” Stevie said. “I can completely see her joining right in.”

“I was hurt,” he said. “Offended . . . I mean, I thought she already had a purpose—being my wife and Nell's mom.”

“She was those things,” Stevie said quietly. “But she was also her own person. That must have been the part she needed to bring out.”

“Well, Father Richard did that for her,” Jack said. “He got her so involved in the world . . .”

“She did that herself,” Stevie said. “He can't take credit for it.”

“He tried, though,” Jack said.

“What do you mean? You talked to him about it?”

“I didn't just talk to him. I went after him—nearly killed him.”

Stevie just walked beside him, listening to him open up to her.

“He attended her funeral. I saw him there, but I was still in so much shock, and I wasn't at all ready to believe Madeleine, so I didn't say anything. He didn't officiate or anything—just sat in the back. He gave me this stare, on my way out of the church. I wanted to throw him down—a priest, right there in church, in his collar.”

“Why didn't you?” Stevie asked, her own pulse jumping at the idea of that stare.

“Nell,” Jack said.

“She was right beside you,” Stevie said, picturing herself as a child, walking out of her mother's funeral with her father.

“Yes. So it had to wait. The next few weeks were taken up with . . . God, you can't imagine. Getting Nell through. Easing her back into school, picking her up, sitting with her while she cried. All that.”

“I know . . .” Stevie murmured.

“Madeleine was in the hospital, having surgeries on her arm. Chris stayed with us, but as soon as she could be moved, he took her home.

“I heard through the grapevine that Kearsage left the parish. Then I heard that he left the church. I was glad. If he disappeared, I wouldn't have to face anything about Emma.”

“It doesn't work that way,” Stevie said.

Jack shook his head. “One day I came home from work and found him waiting in his car outside my house.”

“Why?”

“He said it was because he loved Emma. He felt guilty, he said—about ‘sending' her off on a weekend with Madeleine. She hadn't wanted to go, he said. She'd wanted to tell me she was leaving, and then she was going to meet him.”

“What was his purpose in telling you?”

“He went on about ‘luminous mysteries.' He wanted to purge his conscience, and he wanted to—see Nell—wanted to know her, because she was half Emma.”

“Oh, God.”

“I went crazy. I told him he was a pathetic narcissist. That it wasn't enough that he wanted to break up my family, take my daughter's mother away from her—but that now he had the fucking nerve to show up at our house and want to see Nell. I . . . well, I knocked him down. I was in a blind rage—I don't even remember doing it. I just felt my fist in his face, and next thing, I was beating the shit out of him.”

“Even he had to know he had it coming,” Stevie said, their feet crunching over pebbles on the path, the waves breaking down on the rocks.

“It was pretty bad,” Jack said. “Not just because he was a priest, but because I didn't know I had such violence in me. I told him to get in his car, drive away, and never come back. I'm lucky he didn't call the cops on me. The next day, I put in for a transfer to Boston. That was no problem—moving within Structural was always easy. And since most of my projects were based in New England, it made a lot of sense.”

“But Maddie,” Stevie said quietly. “If Kearsage admitted that what she'd said was true, then why did you have to shut her out?”

They walked in silence for a while. The mansions on the right were getting bigger; Italianate palaces of marble, their tile roofs glowed blood-red in the moonlight. Stevie could feel Jack struggling with her question. She reached for his hand.

“I shut her out because she loved me so much,” he said when he could talk. “Because she knew the whole story, and was so completely on my side. I couldn't bear how angry she was at Emma, on my behalf. I wanted to shut it
all
out—to close off everything but Nell. The truth was too devastating—I couldn't take any chance at all that Nell might find it out. She's smart—you know how quick she is. She'd have picked up on Madeleine's bad feelings about Emma in two seconds. I didn't want her losing her memory of her mother.”

“I think you underestimate them both,” Stevie said.

Jack didn't respond, as they approached Marble House and entered the tunnel beneath Mrs. Vander Gilt's Chinese teahouse. Inside, the darkness was total. They had to walk slowly, holding each other's hand.

“Madeleine would never hurt Nell—she completely honors her love for Emma. And even if that wasn't so, there is nothing, nothing, anyone could ever do to change the way Nell feels about her mother.”

“How do you know?” Jack asked.

“Remember how she first found me?” Stevie asked. “She was on a quest—looking for a woman who lived in a blue house. Because that's where her mother's best friend lived. She wasn't really looking for me . . .”

“She was missing her mother,” Jack said.

“Yes.”

“It may have started out that way,” Jack said. “But she's fallen in love with you.”

“The feeling's mutual.”

They emerged from the tunnel, into almost blinding moonlight. As they strolled along, Stevie thought about how people have to find their own ways to the light. People take as long as they take, and there wasn't any use trying to rush them. As much as she had wanted to push Jack back to his sister, he had to find his way in his own time.

“What are you thinking?” he asked.

“That right now I feel very grown up. Terrible things happen in life, and they're not fair, and we don't ask for them. But once we've stopped reeling from it all, we realize we've grown from it.”

“Life shapes us,” he said.

“Yes. One little bit at a time.”

“What has it shaped you to be?” he asked.

She had to think. They paused to lean on a wall, look out at the great silver expanse of ocean stretching all the way to Scotland. “A woman who trusts herself. Who's getting to know her own heart. And who loves the people in her life very much. How about you?”