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Chapter 2

Harry Steinberg’s house was big enough to give Clare Saint room to roam, and on that night, she was struggling, needing space. Fortunately, Harry was out of town on business, so she wandered from room to room, trying to make sense of the confusing feelings growing inside her.

In the years she was married to Charlie, he’d never betrayed her, she was sure of it. Their issues were more of apathy. He just didn’t seem to care about her one way or the other. Boredom set in, and on one of Charlie’s three-day work sprints before he made battalion chief, she went to a neighborhood party and met Harry. Even after she divorced Charlie, he’d never given her any reason to be jealous until now. It was the old I don’t want him, you can’t have him syndrome.

After passing them in the car, she returned to Harry’s house later to once again see them in the driveway, loading Charlie’s dogs into the back of his SUV. The girl was striking, and that probably had more to do with Clare’s jealousy. She should have figured that when he finally got the lead out and started to date, it would be with a younger woman.

The binoculars were on the hall table, and she grabbed them and went around to the terrace off the master bedroom to see if she could spy. Heart sinking, she saw that the girl had a beautiful figure with huge breasts that were obviously real, moving around under the fabric of a cheap sweater while she wrangled dogs. She gestured with her hands, animated and laughing, and watching her just made Clare tired. Even as a young woman, she never had much energy, raising her family and working full time as an elementary schoolteacher so they could continue to pay the ever-increasing property taxes on Charlie’s ridiculous house.

During the time she watched, Charlie never touched the girl. For a moment, Clare wondered if they were even a couple, but then she saw him looking at her as she spoke, and then he laughed boisterously, so unlike him, at something she’d said.

An errant tear made its way down Clare’s cheek, angering her. She didn’t love Charlie, had doubted for a long time that she’d ever loved him. What had held her to him was the idea of Charlie, his hard body the first thing that attracted her. It was at his family’s beach house in Oceanside where she first laid eyes on him playing volleyball with a group of other men obviously of Mediterranean descent, someone even spoke Italian, and she’d later learn it was their brother John talking to the matriarch of the family, Grandmother Isabella Saint.

Clare’s friend Donna wanted to join their volleyball game and boldly approached one of the women, who would introduce herself as Roberta Long, engaged to Big Mike, who at the time was lean and gorgeous.

But it was the person of Charlie Saint who’d come to the forefront of the hard bodies; when he spoke to her, his voice sent chills down her spine. That day on the beach his physical presence was intense. He was over six feet, wearing board shorts, probably the only board shorts in the group that had seen a real surfboard. Abs the quintessential six-pack, tan, muscular arms, and a faint line of black hair that disappeared under his waistband made the others’ voices sound like they were coming from underwater. The family joke was that John got the brains, Big Mike got the height at six six, but Charlie got the abs.

Out of nowhere, he looked into her eyes and asked if she was available. “Are you taken?”

Heart pounding, she shook her head, looking up at him with heavily lidded eyes. “No. I’m not even seeing anyone,” she whispered.

“I mean, are you on a team?” he asked gently.

The mortification of the misunderstanding had stayed with her for days, but she pulled herself out of it. “I am if you’ll let me play on your side of the net. I’m outside hitter of our team at school.”

“Well, step right up and take your place,” he said. “What school?”

“Point Loma Nazarene.”

“I’ll try to watch my language,” Big Mike had shouted, and the others laughed.

“No worries. I’m not entering the ministry. I go tuition-free because my mother is an employee.”

“Okay, gotcha,” Charlie said. “Are you staying here at the beach?”

“Nope, just day-tripping,” she replied. “Is this your place?” She pointed to the three-story house whose beach they were on.

“My grandparents’ place,” Charlie said, stepping forward to offer a hand. “Charlie Saint.”

“Clare Robbins.” She looked at him carefully. “You’re all firefighters, correct? I saw a piece on the news recently about your family.”

“Yeah, that was us. My grandfather retired from North County Fire District, and me and my brothers signed on, all but my brother John, who’s in medical school.”

They played a wild afternoon of volleyball, and then when the sun set, they’d built a big bonfire on the beach, the kind that aren’t allowed any longer unless they’re confined to a firepit. Closing her eyes, Clare thought about that first night with Charlie. His body belied the actual man. Charlie wasn’t particularly affectionate, and he wasn’t overly sexual, either. As a matter of fact, she didn’t get any chemistry vibes from him at all. So when he asked her to come back the next day for a Sunday picnic on the beach, it confused her.

“Is your family having a gathering?”

“Not tomorrow. Everyone is going home except my grandparents. We’ll have the beach to ourselves.”

And they did; few people were out until later in the afternoon when the beach rentals filled up again at three. Their picnic consisted of sandwiches and goodies from the local deli, and they ate and talked until it was warm enough to go into the water.

Bathing suits for women were much different in those days, and Clare remembered the one she wore that day. It had little boy-short bottoms with a full-coverage rear, and a padded top for women who were less endowed than they’d liked to be. Back then, a woman did the best she could to exfoliate with a razor, but she couldn’t be sure that a few strays wouldn’t peek out. Finally giving in to modesty, she wrapped a beach towel around her bottom until he suggested they go in for a swim.

He never acted like he was attracted to her, or that he thought she was pretty. Later, he’d tell her that the thing that impressed him was that she didn’t mind getting her hair wet.

“You go in the water, you get your hair wet,” she said, laughing after getting knocked down by a wave, water streaming down her face.

Being with Charlie Saint was an ego trip for Clare. But early on, she knew he didn’t love her like she wanted to be loved. Charlie was spare with his words, and when they had sex the first time after she came on to him, she secretly referred to him as silent fucker.

Source: www.allfreenovel.com
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