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“What can I do for you?”
“Me?” he asks. “Son, I’ve been blessed with loving the most incredible woman for almost forty years. I’ll be fine. I just wanna get back on my boat for a while.”
He was always happy there. Like if he couldn’t be with Mama G, his other home was the water. I know the feeling.
But I don’t like the one I have going home. My house is like nothing happened. Renie returned to her place with Nicolas. I miss them like hell, but she deserves to have her life back.
And though I thought my mama would never want to leave, she did.
“You need to get on with your life, too,” she told me the day she left. “Quit putting it off like someone guaranteed you tomorrow.”
Night rolls in. I can’t sleep. I can’t do anything that feels right. I walk outside to the empty beach yards from my house. Every time I used to come out here, on any beach on this island, particularly at night… I’d think of that one.
What’s worse is that I think of all I lost, we lost, after it. For nine years, I woke up missing Cade. I didn’t want to open my eyes to the day. I wanted to keep them closed and remember carrying her into the waves while she laughed. That always made me happy because nothing else did. Eventually, I’d roll out of bed, pop open a beer, and start my empty day. Numb. Drunk. Lost.
But like my mama’s favorite gospel song, I’m found now. I know my truth, all the happiness I can have, all the love I can wake up to.
And though I’ll never know what really happened to me that night, I don’t need to.
Because all I need to know is who saved me.
And I need to save her again, too.
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
Silhouette by Active Child feat. Ellie Goulding
The cold tile floor relieved the sticky heat on my skin. I slid down here hours ago, by my front door, and haven’t moved.
I don’t want to. I just want to lie here and let this puddle of tears grow under my cheek.
My dad needed to get back on the water, and I needed to collapse. To free what I’ve held back to be strong for Mama for so long.
She said to me, “You can cry over me at first. Just promise me you’ll laugh more and annoy the hell out of people with stories of my brilliance forever.”
A chuckle shakes my ribs at her words. It turns into another sob I can’t stop. It convulses through me, shaking my soul’s frame, and I just let it.
My hand grips the smooth tile, and I hang on to let it all go until I don’t remember anything. Until the shadows grow long across my condo from the sunset, fading to night through the windows to the ocean outside.
And I fade with the light. Just letting go. Into the darkness. Thinking of her.
“Come on.”
A husky voice wakes me. Along with hands, strong ones lifting me from the floor and into his arms.
“Come on, Candy Cade.”
I smell him, vanilla and leather. I feel his hard chest under my cheek. I wrap my hands around his neck and lace my fingers through his long hair, and I don’t need to open my eyes because I’m home.
Because he saves me, too.
“She wouldn’t mind a few tears shed.” Redix carries me down the hall to my bedroom. “But she’d tell you to take a shower too.”
“I don’t wanna,” I whimper into his chest.
“I’m not asking.” He gently sets my feet, still in heels, down on my bathroom floor. “Come on. We’re taking a shower and washing this day off you, and then we’re feeding you.”
“I’m not hungry.” I let him unzip my dress.
