Love Finds You in Martha's Vineyard (22 page)

“Why?”

“Why?” He peered at her, then backed the car out.

“Yeah. Mom says that some lies make people feel better. So then it's okay.”

“Does your mom want you to lie to her?”

“No.”

“Do you want me to lie to you?”

“No.”

“Well, I feel badly for lying to Janice. The reason I did that was to get away from her. She can be awfully persistent, you know.”

“Why didn't you just tell her you wanted to get away from her then?”

“Good question.” He thought about it. “I suppose I didn't want to hurt her feelings.”

“See, Dad. Like Mom says,
some lies make people feel better.”

“Maybe it makes them feel better temporarily, Sis. But eventually the lies will only make them feel worse. Can you understand that?”

Now there was a long silence. “I guess so.”

“And they also make the person who told them feel worse,” he continued.

“How?”

“Like right now.” He turned into the traffic heading for Oak Bluffs. “I want to make good on my lie, so I'm forced to drive you to Oak Bluffs, which feels like punishment on a hot day like this, when I'd rather be relaxing on a beach or at home. And I'm forced to buy you a video game, which you know I abhor.”

“And ice cream too.”

“Yeah. Ice cream too. Although that's not so bad.” He turned and smiled at her.

“You're not so bad either,” she told him. “For a dad anyway.”

They didn't get home until after five, and he'd barely pulled into the driveway when he noticed Janice's little red car heading past their house toward town. “I'm going to return the picnic basket,” he called to Sicily.

She already had her new game up on the TV screen but nodded.

“I'll be back in a few minutes.” He grabbed up the basket after emptying it, and jogged over to the neighbors' house. His reason for returning the basket so promptly was twofold. One, he wanted to avoid Janice, and two, he wanted a word with Louise.

“There you are,” said Louise as he came up onto the porch. “Janice said you and Sicily were having a father-daughter afternoon. How nice.”

“Yes.” He placed the basket on the table by the door. “Thanks for loaning me this.”

“Did you have a good picnic?”

“Yes. It was fine. Although I was pretty surprised when Janice showed up.”

Louise peered over the top of her glasses.

“And she seemed to think I'd told you that there'd been a misunderstanding between us.”

“A misunderstanding between you and me?”

“No. I mean between Janice and me. Although perhaps between you and me too.” He cleared his throat. “Somehow Janice is under the impression that I wish to continue in a relationship with her. That last night was merely a small blip between us.”

“Well, wasn't it?”

“No.” He leaned against the porch railing. “It was more than that, Louise. The truth is, I'm not interested in Janice for anything more than a friend.”

Louise waved her hand. “Oh, that's all right. I always say the best romances start with a good friendship. My late husband and—”

“No, that's not what I'm saying,” he persisted. “I'm trying to tell you that Janice and I are worlds apart, and I don't see how that can change.”

“Oh, you're worried about her career in Boston. But, don't you see, she can pop over here as much as she likes. Her job is the sort that can—”

“I'm not talking about her job. I'm trying to say—”

“Excuse me.” Vivian stepped out onto the porch now. “I believe Blake is trying to politely say that he sees no future for Janice and him.” She looked at Blake. “Is that correct?”

“Yes.” He nodded eagerly, thankful for an interpreter.

“But that's only because they hit a rough patch last night,” Louise told her sister.

“Sometimes a rough patch is another term for a dead end.”

“Or perhaps it's only a bump in the road.” Louise stood, fanning herself with her magazine. “Now if you'll excuse me, it's getting a bit too warm out here for my metabolism.”

“I'm sorry.” Blake moved out of her way. “I hope I didn't upset you.”

She waved her hand at him. “No, no. I'll let you and Janice sort it out for yourselves. I should know better than to get in the middle of a romance at my age.”

He winced at her words.

“Don't mind her,” Vivian told him. “She often gets cranky in the heat of the day. Usually she goes and takes a nap.”

“I didn't mean to put Louise in the middle of anything,” he explained. “But Janice thought I'd given Louise some kind of green light.”

“I did hear Louise encouraging Janice not to give up on you.” She tipped her head to one side and smiled. “But to be fair, I don't think Janice needed too much encouragement. She's already pretty much smitten with you, Blake.”

He let out a groan. “Well, I'll do my best to set her straight. What I was trying to tell Louise is the truth. I am not interested in a relationship with Janice. Besides as a friend.” He lowered his voice. “She is not my type. Not at all.”

Vivian nodded. “Then you need to make that clear to her. Crystal clear.”

“You're right.” He smiled, wishing he could confess to her that it was her own daughter who had captured his heart. Except that seemed quite premature at this stage. In due time…hopefully. First he needed to figure out a tidy way to clean up this mess with Janice. As he walked back down the path to his house, he wondered at how, in such a short amount of time, he'd managed to get emotionally involved with two women, cousins no less, after going for years without ever connecting to anyone. Maybe there was something in this fresh ocean air.

When he got home, Sicily was talking on the phone. He assumed she was talking to her mother, since that was the only person she ever spoke to on her phone, and that was surprisingly rare. So he simply nodded to her and went on into his room, where he intended to take a shower to wash off the beach sand from their picnic. He took his time and, when he finally emerged from his room, still wearing his bathrobe, he was met by a smiling Sicily.

“Get dressed, Dad,” she told him.

“Dressed for what?”

“A surprise.”

“A surprise?” Now as pleased as he was to see Sicily engaging with him, making some sort of mysterious plan that didn't involve video games, he was suspicious too.

“Yeah, Dad. Go get dressed. Now.”

“How do I know how to dress?” he tried. “Unless you give me some sort of clue as to what I'm doing.”

“Oh.” She nodded. “Just put on pants and a shirt. Nothing too fancy.”

“One more question.”

She crossed her arms across her chest in exasperation. “Just one. And make it quick.”

“Who were you talking to on the phone?”

She put one finger to her chin like Mini Me. “Okay. I guess I can answer that. It was Waverly.”

“Waverly?”

“Yes, Dad. That's all I'm saying. Now go get dressed and hurry!”

“All right.” He remembered again how Waverly had told him to trust his daughter. So he would. Besides, if she'd been talking to Waverly, how bad could it be? He hurried but picked his clothes carefully. A clean pale-blue oxford shirt and his favorite khaki pants. He combed his hair and even put on a light splash of cologne. He was just coming out when he heard Waverly's voice.

“So, are we all ready?” she asked.

“Yeah. Dad's just getting dressed,” Sicily said.

“Here I am,” he announced pleasantly as he entered the room. “What's up?”

“Don't
you
look nice?” someone else said.

He turned to see Janice standing by the door. “Wh–what?”

“Just on time too.” Janice smiled as she held up her hand with a glittering wristwatch. “Let's go.”

“Waverly is babysitting,” Sicily announced.

“Not babysitting,” Waverly corrected. “Just hanging with you and watching movies until Janice and your dad get back.”

“And you guys are going on a mystery date,” Sicily told him.

Blake felt sick. Literally sick.

“Come on,” Janice urged him. “We better hurry before the boat leaves.”

“Boat?”

“Oops.” She held her hand over her lips. “Loose lips sink ships.” Now she giggled, grabbed him by the hand, and quite literally dragged him out of the house.

A sunset dinner cruise aboard a fifty-foot sailboat through Nantucket Sound should be romantic. It should be delightful and memorable and amazing. But all Blake could do was count the minutes until this mystery date would end. He had attempted to gently put the brakes on the whole thing as Janice sped to the dock. But when he learned that the tickets, which she'd purchased online, were nonrefundable, and how she'd been looking forward to a sailboat trip forever, he didn't have the heart to ruin it for her. And there was no way he could break up with her on the boat. Not without a trustworthy life preserver in hand and a lifeboat nearby. Instead, he was coolly congenial to Janice and everyone as he silently hummed the words of “Fifty Ways to Leave Your Lover.”

Fortunately, Janice made friends easily. Amongst the ten or so other couples aboard the cruise, she managed to find some individuals with business or political connections. So, all in all, or so he hoped, the evening wasn't a complete wash. But the drive home was silent. Blake had opted to drive, since Janice had been drinking, and he considered trying to gently let her down, but he was worried that in her slightly inebriated state, she might fly off the handle. And driving with an emotional woman, he knew from experience with his ex-wife, could prove dangerous. Therefore, he said nothing. But words like “slip out the back, Jack…make a little plan, Stan…” continued rumbling through his mind.

“Thank you for a very interesting evening,” he said stiffly as he parked her car. He'd driven her back to her mother's house and was about to hand her the car keys but thought better of it.

“Yes, I suppose it was
interesting,”
she said sarcastically. Then, as she got out of the car, he slipped the keys under the driver's seat. Hopefully she'd figure it out tomorrow.

“If you're not busy, I'd like to talk to you tomorrow, Janice.”

She brightened. “Really?”

He nodded with a somber expression. “See you tomorrow then.” Now he turned and hurried down the trail. He felt a mix of emotions. On one hand, he was extremely relieved to be home—and still in one piece. On the other hand, he was slightly enraged at whoever had set up the ridiculous mystery date, and he meant to get to the bottom of it.

He tiptoed up the steps to his porch, peering through the screen door to see that Sicily and Waverly were in the kitchen, working on something together. It was one of those kinds of scenes, so sweet and homespun and quaint, that he wished he had a camera handy. Instead, he decided to simply linger awhile as he filmed it in his head. Of course, he felt somewhat guilty for overhearing the soundtrack of this particular movie. But nothing and no one was going to budge him now.

“My mom doesn't know how to make brownies,” Sicily was saying.

“Oh, she probably does. All you do is read the directions on the box. In fact, you could probably do it yourself, Sicily. You know how to read and mix things. You did most of it yourself tonight.”

“Yeah, but you put in applesauce instead of oil,” Sicily pointed out.

“To make the brownies healthier.” Waverly took the bowl over to the sink. “I think healthy is always better when it's yummy, don't you?”

“Uh-huh.” Sicily was licking a wooden spoon like it was a lollypop. “How come you don't have kids of your own, Waverly?”

Waverly paused from rinsing the bowl. Turning off the water, she just stood there, like she was trying to think of something.

“I'm sorry,” Sicily said quickly. “I shouldn't be so nosey, huh?”

“No, it's fine. But remember I told you how my husband died about four years ago? So unexpected. And, well, we'd been planning on having kids but never had the chance.”

Now Sicily dropped the wooden spoon in the sink and wrapped her arms around Waverly's waist from behind. “I'm sorry.”

“It's all right, sweetie.” Waverly turned around, and Blake thought he saw tears in her eyes as she hugged his daughter back. “Knowing someone like you is about as good as having my own kid.”

Blake couldn't believe he was actually tearing up right now. But he was. And no way did he want Waverly or Sicily to see him like this. How would he begin to explain himself? So he soundlessly backed away from the screen door, crept down the porch steps and away from the house, and sat on an old log bench on the edge of the beach.

As he gazed out toward the Sound, which shimmered in the light of a half moon, he wasn't even sure why their simple yet heartfelt conversation had cut him to the core like that. But it had. Maybe he was overreacting due to the fact he'd been about to go in there and let them have it for aiding and abetting in tonight's
misery
date. But the weird thing was that he no longer felt angry at them. Mostly he felt as if his eyes had just been opened. Oh, he'd already suspected that Waverly was the real deal. He'd been hoping to get better acquainted with her, but he'd been trying to straighten this thing out with Janice first. More than ever he was determined to cut Janice loose. Then he planned to do whatever it took to win over her cousin.