He was standing off to the side, away from the crush of arriving and departing passengers, and she was still shocked at her reaction to the sight of Nate Milas. She felt lighter, younger, newer, happier. Nate Milas was not responsible for all of this. But he was definitely one of the better byproducts of her reinvention.
She picked up the pace, walking toward him. And then he did it. He opened his arms and she walked right into them.
“Hey!” he said, holding her closely, kissing her, stirring up a passion she’d forgotten she was capable of. “I missed you.”
“I missed you, too,” she said. “Like, for the past twenty years or so.”
“Is that all?” They laughed together, he rubbed his cheek against the side of her face, and she reached up and rubbed the stubble there, although she’d only been gone four days. “Getting kind of gray here, aren’t you, mister?”
“There’s nobody else I’d rather go gray with,” he said.
They walked arm in arm to the golf cart, loaded her bag, and then they were off.
“How did everything go?” he asked.
“Pretty well. The bankers I talked to in Wilmington seemed fairly open-minded. They want to see architect’s renderings for the new shops, but the fact that I have tenants already signed up seemed to go a long way.”
“What did Parrish think about the plans for her shop?”
“Parrish is Parrish. She made some tweaks to the drawings, which I’ll admit were genius, and then she signed off. I think she’s really excited about Parrish Interior Concepts. No more lawyering!”
“I saw Billy this week,” Nate said.
“You did? I thought he wasn’t allowed to have visitors yet.”
A week after the hurricane struck, Billy Nolan and his lawyer, Ed Godchaux, paid a visit to the Baldwin County District Attorney. Billy offered a detailed confession about the real circumstances surrounding the death of his AA sponsor Calvin Peebles, and in return he was given a two-year sentence in a low-security residential diversion center in Southpoint. One condition of his sentence was to enter treatment for alcoholism, another was to perform two hundred hours of community service.
“I didn’t visit him at the center,” Nate said. “I saw him on the island, with a public works crew, clearing storm debris from the east beach.”
“How did he look?” Riley asked. “Did you get to talk to him?”
“He looked good,” Nate said. “He’s grown a full beard, put on a little weight now that he’s not drinking, but I gather he’s working out. He was excited because he’s going to start giving piano lessons to kids in the after-school program at the youth center.”
“Did he say he’s heard anything from Scott?”
“I didn’t ask, but I don’t see how he could have, since he’s not allowed visitors or phone privileges for two more months,” Nate said. “How about you? Did you see Evelyn?”
Riley nodded. “I stopped in Edenton and stayed with her last night. I thought maybe I could convince her to come back with me for the weekend, but she’s just not ready yet. Losing Roo was a bigger blow than any of us realized. She wasn’t just Mama’s sister-in-law. She was her sister, really. Her best friend, her sparring partner. All of that. Life on Belle Isle is not going to be the same without Roo. For any of us.”
“I ran into Sheriff Shoe at Onnalee’s this week,” Nate said. “We had a cup of coffee together. He told me they were finally able to get a crew over to the Shutters, after the last of the oak trees downed in the hurricane were cleared away. The golf club was right where Roo said it would be. They were going to send it off for fingerprints, but he said there wasn’t much question that she was telling the truth.”
“No,” Riley said. “She was pretty definite about what she’d done. And very definite about why. I can’t help but wonder if she started putting an exit plan together as soon as she saw the first hurricane warnings.”
“The sheriff said that with the storm surge and the winds, he thinks it’s unlikely her body will ever turn up. But the fact that they found the golf cart, parked there near the wildlife sanctuary, by Pirate’s Point, with her fingerprints all over the steering wheel, leaves very little doubt, in his mind, anyway.”
“It would be nice to have some closure,” Riley said, “at least for Maggy’s sake.”
“Will you ever tell her that Roo confessed to killing Wendell?”
“I think she’s already guessed,” Riley said. “And maybe she’s forgiven Roo. She doesn’t talk about her dad as much, but she’s still grieving. I think being here on the island, where she feels close to both of them, helps a little.”
“Annie’s loved having Maggy around the Mercantile after school this week,” Nate said.
“Your mom is a doll to step in and help out with Maggy,” Riley said.
“She’s been dropping pretty big hints that this could be her only shot at having a grandchild,” Nate said.
Riley smiled and looked away, and then back at him. “You said you’d give me a year, remember?”
“When did I say that?”
“Last month. Right after the hurricane when I called to ask for a do-over. You said you’d give me a year to be single before pressing me for an answer.”
“But it was retroactive to May, right? From when you technically became single.”
Riley nodded. “Okay, May. I’ll give you my answer then.”
“And then we wait a decent interval to get married. I’m thinking at least a day,” Nate said.
“Some people would say it’s pretty presumptuous of you to think you know what my answer will be,” Riley warned.
“A lot of people would say that,” Nate agreed. “A lot of people would say you’re way out of my class. I know Evelyn would.”
“She’s coming around to the idea of us, I think. The fact that Maggy changed her mind has a lot to do with that.”
“But she’s never going to feel about me the way she felt about Wendell,” Nate said matter-of-factly.
“It’s so complicated with Mama. She’s always believed my daddy was infallible—if he picked Wendell for his only daughter, then Wendell was the one. Even when she was presented with the truth of who he really was, she was still in denial. And then there’s the fact that you’re now the majority owner of most of the available real estate on the island her family developed. That’s still a hard fact for her to swallow. Even when I point out that it was all Wendell’s doing, she still can’t quite accept it.”
“She’s never forgiven me for that deb-ball fiasco,” Nate said ruefully. “Hell, I can’t forgive myself. It was the absolute low point of my college career.”
“I’ve been meaning to ask. Not that it matters anymore, but why did you get so drunk that night?”
“I was pre-gaming with my frat brothers, and the more I thought about facing your mother, and all her fancy country club friends, the more intimidated I got, and the drunker I got,” Nate said.
“What’s important is that I’ve forgiven you,” Riley said. For the first time since they’d left the ferry dock, she looked around at the passing landscape. They’d already passed the village and the road that led to her cottage. “Hey, where are you taking me? Much as I’d love to indulge in a little afternoon delight with you at your cabin, I really do need to pick Maggy up at the Mercantile and take her home. We’ve got some catching up to do.”