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“Thanks. Though I’m not sure about the shoes.” She grimaced as she looked down. On her good foot she was wearing a white tennis shoe. She didn’t trust herself in anything else – walking with one good leg was hard enough, trying to do it in sandals was asking to fall over.
“They go with the dress perfectly,” Ember said, grinning.
“I got you both a drink.” Lucas came up to join them, carrying two bright pink cocktails, balancing them in his hands as he gingerly walked from the bar further along the boardwalk. “I saw Brooke over there, too. She’s getting a hotdog for Nicholas, but said she’d be over to join you in a minute.”
“How are the fireworks looking? Is it safe?” Ally asked Lucas, smiling at him as he passed her the drink. As a firefighter he always saw the danger in everything. The fireworks were probably going to kill him.
“I took a look at the set up. It’s as good as it gets,” Lucas said, his voice serious. “They’re setting them off from boats out in the ocean, so hopefully that will lessen the risk.”
Ember glanced at Ally, widening her eyes. Ally stifled down a grin. Lucas was a great guy – funny, kind, and strong as hell, which came in handy when you were a woman living on your own. He was always doing favors for Ember’s friends – helping them out with home improvements, lifting things that were just too heavy for them. When he wasn’t at work, that was.
His seriousness about safety was kind of endearing, even if she and Ember did giggle about it occasionally.
“And how are you doing?” he asked her, glancing down at her cast. “Any news on when it’s coming off?”
“It’s a couple more weeks until my next appointment. Then they’ll x-ray it and decide what to do.”
“How about the elevator? You got news on that?”
“It’ll be another five days before the right part is in the country,” Ally told him. “After that, it’s a matter of how long it takes the engineer to fix it.”
“So you’ll be staying with the hot coffee guy for at least another week,” Ember said, not bothering to hide her grin. “Sucks for you.”
“Hey,” Brooke called out to them, running up from the shoreline. “You made it.” She threw her arms around Ally, giving her the tightest of squeezes. “I’m so glad you’re here.” Brooke looked back over her shoulder to the ocean. “I can only stay a minute. My mom’s keeping an eye on Nick and you know what that means.” She wrinkled her nose.
Brooke’s mom was more at home in high society than at the beach. With her beautiful clothes and perfectly coiffed hair she rarely went near the ocean, claiming the salty air was so bad for her complexion.
Ally hugged her back, so happy to see her friends again. Though they caught up most nights either on Facetime or by messaging, she’d missed being able to spend time with them.
“Ally.” A thick, weathered voice came from her left. Lorne was standing there with his wife, Marcie. “I didn’t think you were coming.”
She smiled at the old man, her heart warming even more at the sight of him. She wasn’t kidding w
hen she said she thought of him as a second father. Leaning forward she hugged him just as tight as she’d hugged Brooke, then gave his wife a kiss on the cheek. “I decided to get out of the house. It’s getting claustrophobic there.”
And lonely, she thought to herself.
“How are you feeling? That ankle giving you any problems?”
Ally took a sip of her cocktail, letting the fruity liquid wash over her tongue. “Nothing that a couple of drinks won’t fix.”
Lorne laughed. “That’s my girl.” He lowered his voice. “Have you heard from your dad recently?”
Ally blinked. Her dad? No, she hadn’t heard from him. She hadn’t even thought of him for days. Not since that afternoon with Nate and the kiss they’d shared on the beach. Her mind had been too full of her current problems to think about her old ones.
“Oh.” She covered her mouth with her free hand. “He’s still blocked in my phone.” Her eyes widened with shock. In all the craziness she’d forgotten to unblock him. Yes, she was still angry at him, but she was also an adult. She’d never intended to ignore him for too long.
“That explains why he keeps calling me to ask how you are. I couldn’t understand why you hadn’t told him about your ankle.”
“He knows about my accident?”
“I didn’t realize it was a secret. He’s worried about you, Ally. I know you’re angry with him, but you should at least listen to what he has to say.”
Lorne was right. As angry as she was at her dad, she could hear him out. He’d given up a lot for her over the years, she owed him that. “I’ll unblock him when I get home.”
“You’ve always been a good girl.”
“It doesn’t mean I’ve forgiven him,” she told him, her voice thick. “It’ll take more than a few phone calls for that.”
