Summer's Child

He and Daria won the game. They were both sweaty and winded, and his knee throbbed, but they savored the victory, celebrating with a hug.

Zack muttered something about having let the old folks win and refused to play again, which was a secret relief to Rory, who doubted his knee could handle a second game.

He collapsed on the sand, and Daria sat down next to him to watch Zack and Kara play one-on-one. Daria’s thick hair was loose and blew around her face in the ocean breeze.

“I saw you at work today,” Rory said.

“You were up on a roof, working on a deck.”

“Oh, yeah,” she said.

“Where were you? Driving by?”

“Uh-huh.” He still remembered how she looked up there.

“I was driving back from St. Esther’s. I had an appointment with Father Macy.”

She shifted on the sand to look at him.

“You did?” There was unmasked disapproval in her voice.

“He called me,” Rory defended himself.

“Oh,” she said.

“Well, how’d it go?”

Rory sighed.

“That man does not like me,” he said.

“What makes you think that?”

“Well, he’s sure not going to give me any information about Shelly’s adoption.”

“He cares very deeply for Shelly,” Daria said, brushing her hair back from her cheek.

“He’s trying to protect her.”

“Yeah, yeah. That same old song and dance,” Rory said tiredly.

“Nobody wants me to pursue this, except Shelly herself.”

“And Shelly doesn’t”

“Doesn’t know what’s good for her,” Rory finished the sentence.

“I

know that’s the party line. I just don’t buy it. I started wondering today if you know more than you’re letting on. If you’re trying to protect someone. “

“I’m trying to protect Shelly,” Daria said.

“She’s the only one I care about.” She shut up then. Zack and Kara were batting the volleyball back and forth in an easy rhythm, and Rory grew uncomfortable with the silence between Daria and himself. She was first to break it.

“I’m going to Rodanthe tomorrow,” she said suddenly.

“Rodanthe?” He thought of Grace.

“Why?”

“That’s where the pilot lived,” Daria said.

“I got the name and address for her parents, and I’m going to pay them a visit.”

“You move fast,” he said.

“Have you spoken to them yet?” “No, I thought of calling them first, but I think a face-to-face meeting would be better.” She was staring toward the ocean, stoic determination in her eyes.

“It’s going to be hard,” he said.

“Yes,” she agreed, “but so is not knowing how they’re doing.” She looked at him.

“I’m glad you pushed me to do this, Rory,” she said.

“At least, I’m glad right now. We’ll see how I’m feeling tomorrow night after I’ve seen them.”

“Well, while you’re down in Rodanthe, say hi to Grace for me. My mystery woman.” He lifted a handful of sand from the beach and watched it flow through his fingers.

“She doesn’t know what she wants. I was wondering about that illness she had. Maybe it was breast cancer.

Maybe she had a mastectomy. “

“You mean … you… Wouldn’t you know by now?”

He was confused for a moment, then realized what she meant and laughed ruefully.

“No, I wouldn’t know. I told you, she keeps me at arm’s length.”

Daria’s eyes widened in surprise.

“Still?”

“Still. She seems to want to be with me, but she shies away from physical contact. I don’t know if she’s still got a thing for her husband, or what.”

“It must have something to do with her illness,” Daria said.

“It’s time you asked her, don’t you think?”

He dug his feet into the sand, shaking his head.

“She’s not like you,” he said.

“You don’t seem to have a problem talking about anything.

Grace is very. closed. ”” When do you see her again? “

“Saturday. She’s coming to watch the hang-gliding competition with me.

Are you going? “

“I plan to. I haven’t been for a couple of years, but I want to root for my favorite priest.”

“Father Macy’s in the competition?” Rory asked. He’d forgotten that the priest was a hang-glider pilot.

“He wouldn’t miss it,” Daria said.

Suddenly, Daria jumped to her feet and ran onto Kara’s side of the net.

“Kara, girl,” she said, “you need to learn how to rush the net.”

Rory watched as Daria gave Kara a few tips, helping her jump higher, helping her place the ball where Zack didn’t stand a chance.

“No fair!” Zack complained after missing several of Kara’s shots.

“Show me how to do that.”

Daria stepped over to his side of the net to offer him the same training.

Rory leaned back on his elbows in the sand. He remembered the other night, when he’d sat with Daria on her porch steps, acutely aware of the unrelenting anguish the plane crash had brought her. He’d had his hand on the back of her neck, and he wished he’d somehow been able to absorb her pain through his fingertips to free her from it. He hoped her trip to Rodanthe served that purpose, that it eased her guilt and brought an end to her nightmares.

Kara pounded the ball across the net, and both Zack and Daria ran for it. They collided in midair and fell to the sand. laughing. Rory laughed with them, and he knew in his heart that he was watching two people he loved.

1 he day was blistering hot as Daria drove south to Rodanthe, and the heat rose from the road in shimmering waves. She’d barely slept the night before, rehearsing what she would say to the pilot’s parents, but with the meeting looming in front of her, she found she couldn’t think about it. Instead, her mind slipped back to the evening before, when she’d played volleyball with Rory, when he’d touched her on the court. The last thing she’d needed was his help; she was now and always had been a superior volleyball player to him. But she had needed that touch. She’d hoped for it, even moving herself into positions where she thought she might find his hands on her body. And he had read her need and touched her. It had felt like a dance, but she had to remind herself she was dancing alone.

So, he and Grace still were not lovers. She kept him at arm’s length.

A smile formed on her lips at the thought. He was most likely right about Grace: she’d probably had breast cancer, maybe a mastectomy. She always wore those high-necked bathing suits. Naturally, she was struggling with intimacy, and Daria was a grade-A bitch for taking any pleasure in that fact.

She drove across the bridge above the Oregon Inlet and through the green, undeveloped stretch of land that formed the Pea Island Wildlife Refuge. A short time later, she was in Rodanthe, the northernmost town on Hatteras Island.

The houses were fewer here on this narrow strip of land, and the sense of commercialism that permeated Kill Devil Hills was missing.

Rodanthe was so small that she found the street she was looking for with little trouble. She turned onto it, toward Pamlico Sound, and parked in front of the address she’d been given. The house was older, small and yellow, fronted by a tidy landscaped yard. There were no cars in the driveway, but there might have been one in the small garage at the rear of the property. She hadn’t thought about what she would do if no one was home. Maybe she should have called first.

She knocked on the door and waited.

“They’re not home.”

She turned to see a woman getting out of a car in front of the house next door, grocery bags in her arms. “Do you know where I can find them?” Daria asked.

“Probably at their store,” the woman said.

“It’s called Beachside Cafe and Sundries. It’s straight down that way.” She pointed toward the sound.

“Make a left at the fork.”

Back in her car, Daria followed the woman’s directions to the Beachside Cafe. She parked on the street and sat in her car for a moment, debating what she should do. She didn’t want to interrupt them at work with something this weighty. Maybe she could just tell them who she was and ask if there would be a more convenient time for her to speak with them.

With that plan in mind, she got out of the car and walked inside the cafe.

The cafe was small and crowded and smelled strongly of coffee. All the tables by the windows overlooking the sound were full, and a couple of women stood near the counter, waiting for their orders, Daria supposed. A very young woman—too young to be the pilot’s mother—carried a tray of sandwiches to the diners at one of the tables. Standing behind the counter, a dark-haired man worked the espresso machine. He glanced up as Daria approached.

“What can I do for you?” he asked, his attention already back on the coffee machine.

“I’m sorry to disturb you,” she said, “I’m looking for Edward Fuller.”

He dried his hands on a towel.

“I’m Eddie,” he said. He handed two cups of coffee to the women waiting at the counter, and they carried them over to the crowded tables.

“I’m so sorry to disturb you at work, Mr. Fuller,” she said again.

“Eddie,” he repeated. “Eddie. My name is Daria Cato. I was one of the EMTs on the scene of the plane accident where your daughter, Pamela, was” -she glanced toward the tables by the windows and lowered her voice “—where your daughter was killed. I was wondering if there was a time I might be able to talk with you and your wife.”

He stared at her for a moment, then nodded.

“Sally?” he called to the waitress.

The young woman turned from the table she was serving to look at him.

“Can you handle things out here for a few minutes?” he asked.

“No problem,” Sally said, and Eddie Fuller led Daria into a room at the back of the cafe. The room was minuscule and made smaller by two large desks set against adjacent walls.

“Please” -the man pointed toward one of the desk chairs “—have a seat.”

Daria sat down. “Is your wife here?” she asked. “I was hoping to talk with both of you.”

“No, I’m afraid she’s not here right now. But I’d really like to hear what you have to say. You were there, on the scene?”

“Yes, I was. And although it’s been months, I still think about her—your daughter. I just needed to make contact with you and your wife to be sure you’re doing okay and to belatedly convey my condolences.”

With a heavy sigh, Eddie sat down himself, and Daria was distressed by the tears in his eyes. “Well, to be truthful, we’re not doing okay at all. It’s hell to bury a child,” he said, his gaze out the window.

“It’s even worse when you blame yourself for her death.”

“Why would you do that?” Daria asked, surprised.

“How could you possibly be at fault?”

He waved away the question. “Can you tell me what it was like?” he asked.

“The accident, I mean? They told us she died almost instantly.

She didn’t suffer much, did she? “

Daria chose her words carefully.

“It all happened very quickly,” she said.

“And I guess you know that the passengers reported she’d lost consciousness before the accident, so I don’t think she was all that aware of what was going on.” The lie slipped awkwardly from her mouth, but the look of relief on Eddie Fuller’s face made her glad she had told it.

“The autopsy said she’d had a seizure,” Eddie said.

“That’s why the plane went down. I’m just thankful the two passengers were all right.”

“A seizure?” Daria hadn’t known that.

“Did she have a history of seizures?” She thought of Shelly. Shelly was not even allowed to drive, much less fly a plane.

“No, that was her first, as far as I know. I never would’ve let her fly if I’d known she was prone to them. She had a condition called Marfan’s syndrome, although she never really had any symptoms of it.

But apparently one of the symptoms is seizures. ” He was quiet for a

mo n ment. When he spoke again, it seemed to take great effort.

“I always wanted to fly,” he said.

“It was a dream of mine from the time I was very small. But I couldn’t, because of high blood pressure. So, I pushed my daughter to be a pilot. I gave her model planes when she was little. A friend had a Cessna, and he took us up and would let her operate the controls.” Eddie played with the corner of his apron, rubbing it between his thumb and forefinger. “Pam was bitten by the bug. I’d made sure that she was. She got her license the day she turned seventeen. She loved it, and I loved that she loved it.”

“Is that why you blame yourself?” Daria asked.

His nod was almost imperceptible.

“You could never have predicted what happened.” She hurt for the man.

“You and she probably had a special relationship because of your shared love of flying. That sounds wonderful to me.”

“I was selfish, living vicariously through Pam,” he said. “My wife never wanted her to fly. She was always afraid something awful would happen. And she was right. She still hasn’t forgiven me for it, either.” He looked down at the apron, smoothed it across the denim covering his thigh.

“She and I… We’re not doing too well.”

“I don’t mean to be intrusive,” Daria said, “but it sounds to me like both you and your wife loved your daughter deeply, and that maybe you haven’t really been able to grieve together because… because your wife is spending her energy being angry with you, and you’re spending your energy being angry with yourself, and so neither one of you is able to heal.”

“You hit the nail right on the head,” he said.

“What about counseling?” Daria said.

“Maybe that would help the two of you.”

“We went once, but then my wife had to have surgery and she was…”

His voice trailed off as he looked out the window again. He shook his head.

“She’s just had too much to deal with. So, we haven’t been back to the counselor, and Grace wouldn’t go, anyhow. She’s too angry with me.”

Daria caught her breath. Grace? From Rodanthe? But Rory’s Grace was named Grace Martin, and Grace was not all that rare a name. Besides, Rory’s Grace was separated from her husband. Surely this couldn’t be. She looked around the room and found exactly what she was searching for on one of the cluttered desks: a photograph of Eddie, Pamela—and Grace Martin. Her mind raced as she tried to put two and two together.

“Um…” Her voice had a tremor in it.

“Your wife. Grace? How is she coping?”

“You’d have to ask her that question,” Eddie said. He did not sound bitter, only confused.

“I don’t know where she is half the time,” he said.

“She won’t talk to me. She won’t tell me what she’s thinking or feeling. We’re both pretty alone in this… not grieving together, like you said.”

He hadn’t mentioned a thing about a separation, and she needed to know.

“Have you and your wife… separated over this?” she asked.

He looked surprised, as well he should, since he had said nothing to make her think that. “No, and I sure hope it doesn’t come to that.

Though right now we may as well be. She’s staying in an apartment above our garage. I’m just hoping some time to herself is going to make a difference. “

“I hope so,” she said absently. No wonder Grace never wanted Rory to come to Rodanthe to see her.

Daria stood up.

“I’d better let you get back to work,” she said.

“I’m so sorry for your loss.”

“I’m glad you came,” Eddie said, standing himself.

“It makes me feel like Pamela had the best chance possible,

knowing somebody like you was there. Somebody who really cared. “

Daria wrote her phone number on a pad lying on the desk.

“Please call me if you need to talk again.” Or if your wife needs to talk, she should add. But of course, she could not.

Outside the cafe, Daria sat in her car, turning on the ignition only long enough to lower all the windows, not yet ready to drive. What the hell was going on with Grace? Was that why she was so pathologically attentive to Shelly? Was she trying to replace the daughter she’d lost? With a horrified jolt, she wondered if Grace might somehow know about Shelly’s role in Pamela’s death. She tried to follow that thought to its logical conclusion: Grace had somehow found out what Shelly had done at the scene of the accident. Then she plotted to meet Shelly, and now, perhaps, was planning to harm her in some way as retribution.

“That’s crazy,” she said out loud. Her imagination was running away with her. But what else was she to think? One thing she knew for certain was that Grace Martin—Grace Fuller—was a liar.

Should she tell Rory? She had to. She couldn’t keep this from him. For all she knew, Grace was simply using Rory to get close to Shelly.

Driving home in a daze, glad the route was a straight shot and required little of her attention, she tried to puzzle out, not only what Grace was up to, but what she could do about it.

She pulled into the driveway of the Sea Shanty just as Shelly walked into the yard. from the beach, and all of Daria’s protective instincts kicked into gear at the sight of her. Grace better not harm a hair on her head, she thought.

“Hi, Shell,” she said as she got out of the car.

Shelly mumbled a greeting and reached for the door, and Daria could see that her face was red.

“Shelly?” Daria started walking toward the house.

“What’s wrong?”

Shelly froze, her hand on the knob of the screen door.

“Nothing,” she said.

Daria caught up to her. Shelly had definitely been crying.

“Oh, sweetie.” She put an arm around her sister’s shoulders.

“What’s got you so upset?”

Shelly hesitated, then sat down heavily on the front steps. Daria sat down with her, her arm still around her shoulders.

“I’m afraid,” Shelly said.

“Of what?” Daria asked.

Shelly frowned. She looked down in her lap, where she was pressing her fingers together so firmly that the knuckles were white.

“That Father Sean is going to kill himself.”

Daria almost laughed. Where had Shelly come up with this one? “Why would you think that, honey?” she asked.

Shelly shook her head.

“I don’t know,” she said.

“I know it sounds silly. I just started thinking it while I was out walking.”

“Well, sometimes our imaginations can run away with us, huh?” she asked.

“Yeah. I guess.”

It was unlike Shelly to be this distressed unless she was facing a trip away from the Outer Banks.

“You know Father Macy would never do anything like that, don’t you?” Daria asked.

Shelly shrugged, her gaze still glued to her fingers.

“He’s a Catholic priest, for heaven’s sake. Shelly. He’s the last person you would expect to commit suicide.”

Shelly pressed her lips together. She looked up at Daria and forced a weak smile.

“I guess you’re right,” she said.

Daria studied her sister’s face. Her eyes were truly red, ;

her nose a bit swollen. “You don’t usually have unpleasant ^ fantasies like that,” she said.

“I know,” Shelly said.

“But I think I’m over it now.” ;

Daria laughed.

“That was quick,” she said. This was-just another of Shelly’s peculiar, wayward thoughts.

“To? morrow, we’ll go watch the hang-gliding competition, and | maybe Father Macy will win. Wouldn’t that be great?”

The weak smile again.

“Yeah,” Shelly agreed, and Daria was not at all certain her sister was “over it,” as she’d said.

She looked across the street at Poll-Rory. “I need to go have a chat with Rory.”

“He’s not home,” Shelly said, and Daria realized the S red Jeep was not in the driveway.

“Do you know where he is?” she asked.

“Yeah,” Shelly said.

“I talked to Jill earlier today, and she said that she and Rory were taking Zack and Jason out to dinner and a movie.”

Dinner and a movie. What time would he be home? She was anxious to tell him what she’d learned in Rodanthe.

Daria shaded her eyes and looked up toward the crest of the tallest dune on Jockey’s Ridge. The dune was covered by a sea of spectators, and above their heads, a hang glider dipped and turned in the air.

“How are we ever going to find them?” Andy said as they stopped climbing to survey the scene.

“I told them I’d meet them as close to the crest as I could get, so they should be watching for me,” she said.

The hang-gliding competition was about an hour into its run, and Daria had planned to meet Shelly, Chloe, Ellen and Ted when she got off work. Even though it was Saturday she and Andy had put in a couple of hours this morning. When she was ready to leave the job, Andy asked if he could go with her to the dunes. She’d readily agreed. Andy always seemed a bit lonely to her. He had friends on the crew, but he didn’t seem to socialize much with them outside of work.

“Daria!”

Daria looked up to see Rory standing near the crest of the dune, waving at her. She spotted Shelly and Chloe with him, and as she and Andy made their way through the crowd, she saw that Ellen and Ted were there as well. Zack and Kara sat a short distance away, so close to one another, that at first, Daria thought they were one person. It was a minute before she noticed Grace sitting next to Rory. Damn. She would have no chance to tell Rory what she’d learned in Rodanthe the day before. She wondered if Grace’s husband had spoken to her about Daria’s visit. Did | Grace now realize that Daria had been at the plane crash? j Or, she thought with a shiver, had she known it all along? ;

They’d saved just enough room on the sand for Daria, j but Andy managed to squeeze in between her and Shelly. 1 Daria introduced him to Grace, the only person in their | party he didn’t know, and Grace smiled warmly at him. Her husband hadn’t told her, Daria thought. If he had, surely she could not sit here looking so innocent. Grace was wearing long white pants, a long-sleeved white shirt, | white visor and blue sunglasses. She wasn’t taking any | chances on getting too much sun. ‘ “I was afraid you were going to miss Father Sean.” | Shelly leaned across Andy to speak to Daria.

“When does he go up?” Daria asked.

“I think there’s a couple more before him,” Shelly said.

The day was beautiful. There was a gentle breeze off the ocean, just enough to give the gliders the lift they needed as they performed their intricate maneuvers to the delight of the crowd. But Daria had trouble concentrating. She was aware of Grace speaking to Shelly, although she couldn’t hear what was being said.

Leave my sister alone, Daria thought. There was something creepy about Grace’s attentiveness to Shelly now that Daria knew the truth about her. And she knew Grace annoyed Shelly with her incessant questions.

She wished she were sitting next her sister, so she could save her.

“There’s Sean.” Chloe pointed to the highest ridge on the dune, where a man was attaching his harness to a glider. They were quite a distance from him, and Daria marveled at the fact that Chloe was able to identify him. Sean adjusted his helmet, tugged at his harness, and most of the crowd turned in his direction to watch him prepare for his takeoff. Grace turned away from the priest to say something to Shelly. The breeze lifted her bangs from her forehead for a few seconds, and Daria saw the unmistakable widow’s peak—the same widow’s peak that had marked her daughter, Pamela.

Father Macy took a few awkward steps backward with his glider. Then he ran toward the edge of the dune, the glider above his shoulders, and took off, lifting gently into the sky to the “oohs” and “aahs” of the crowd.

“Go for the gold. Father M!” someone shouted. The priest was the undisputed favorite of the locals in the crowd.

Daria felt the sun on her face as she watched the priest and his glider slip effortlessly into the sky, flying higher than any of the other gliders had flown since her arrival on the dunes. A burst of applause swept over the dunes, and people waited in anticipation for his first maneuver. But then, suddenly, his glider appeared to stall.

It hung motionless in the air, as still as the sun in the sky above them. Was this part of his performance?

“What’s he doing?” Andy asked, but before anyone could answer, the colorful triangle of fabric pitched forward, soaring toward the ground in a nosedive. Daria jumped to her feet, horrified, as the glider and priest crashed headfirst into the sand at the bottom of the dunes.

Screams and gasps erupted from the crowd, and Daria hesitated only a moment before pushing her way through the throng, running down the dune toward the priest. She was vaguely aware of Chloe on one side of her, Andy on the other. Were there other EMTs in the crowd? There had to be. Please, let there be someone here to help me.

People were huddled in a circle around the priest.

“Don’t move him!”

she called out as she slid the rest of the way down the dune on the seat of her shorts. The sand burned the backs of her thighs.

“It’s Daria Cato,” someone said.

“Get out of her way.”

Daria broke through the circle of people to reach the injured priest. She dropped to her knees next him, but knew in an instant that moving him would not make a difference, either to help or to harm. His head was twisted at a sharp angle to his shoulders. She pressed her fingers against his throat, in what she knew was a futile effort to locate a pulse. Behind her, a child began to cry.

Chloe fell to her knees on the other side of the priest, then looked at her sister. “Is there anything you can do?” she asked.

Daria shook her head.

“His neck is broken.” Her mouth was dry; the words came out in a hoarse whisper.

Chloe lifted the priest’s hand and held it between her own. Although she made no sound of weeping, tears flowed freely over her cheeks, and she prayed quietly over the fallen priest, as the wail of sirens filled the air.

Shelly sat next to Daria in the hushed stillness of St. Esther’s Church as people took turns standing in front of the pulpit to speak in soft voices, paying tribute to Father Sean. The speakers’ faces were colored blue or green or pink by the sunlight streaming through the stained-glass windows. Chloe was one of the speakers, and her face had looked beautiful in the rose-colored light. She sat in the front pew of the church with the other speakers, while Shelly and Daria sat a few pews back. Chloe had already spoken, dry-eyed, about the important role Father Sean had played in the lives of the Cato family since coming to St. Esther’s twenty-four years ago. The fact that Chloe was able to say all she did without crying was pretty amazing, but it didn’t surprise Shelly. Ever since the accident on the dunes, when Chloe had wept her heart out, she had been walking around in a daze, no emotion at all on her face. Daria said she was in shock.

Old Father Wayne was standing at the front of the church now, green light on his face, telling some anecdote about Father Sean that was obviously supposed to be funny. Some people chuckled, but Shelly had trouble concentrating on what the priest was saying. She was remembering Father Sean in her own way. She remembered that during the cooler months of the year. Father Sean was full of life and laughter.

He would tell her jokes—clean ones, of course. There was always a smile on his face. And then,

summer would come, and he would lose his smile. It happened every year. Shelly had come to expect it, to feel the arrival of summer with a certain dread. As joyful as it made her, she did not like the torment that the hot, sunny weather brought to the priest. She knew some people suffered from a kind of depression that came over them in the winter months. That was common. Father Sean had the opposite problem. And she was one of the few people who understood why.

Daria pulled a tissue from her purse and blew her nose, and Shelly rested her cheek against her sister’s shoulder and patted her hand.

“It’s all right, Dar,” she said, wanting to comfort her sister. For some reason, Daria’s suffering felt worst to her than her own. That’s the way it is when you love someone, Father Sean had said to her once.

The worst time was after Pete broke up with Daria. Shelly had never particularly liked Pete. He was too wrapped up in himself, too selfish to deserve someone as good as Daria, and he had those stupid tattoos that made Shelly embarrassed to be seen with him in public. But Daria had loved him, so Shelly could not help but feel anger at him when he ended that relationship. How dare he hurt Daria? Daria had been so devastated that she’d even quit being an EMT. It was as though she’d quit living altogether, at least until Rory showed up.

Everyone in the church suddenly moved forward to kneel on the padded benches, and Shelly joined them. She wasn’t paying attention to where they were in the service, but now that she was on her knees, she began to pray.

She prayed that Daria and Rory might somehow get together.

She prayed that she was indeed pregnant—although the thought of breaking that news to Daria was truly frightening.

When she’d finished with those prayers, she focused all her concentration on the most important prayer of all: Dear Lord, please forgive Father Scan. She repeated this over and over again, praying very hard, because she was carrying the burden of that prayer alone. Everyone else thought that Father Sean’s death was an accident.

She, alone, knew better.

J-Jaria found Rory after the funeral. He’d sat near the rear of the church and waited for her outside afterward. His feelings about the priest were mixed, and Daria was pleased he had come at all. He knew how much Sean Macy meant to their family.

Silently, Rory put one arm around her, the other around Shelly, and led them away from the church toward the parking lot. For some reason, the light, warm weight of his arm across her shoulders threatened to make her cry all over again. She breathed through her mouth to keep the tears in check.

The events of the past few days had squelched her enthusiasm for telling him about Grace, yet she knew she still needed to fill him in on what she’d learned. Shelly was with them, though; once again, the timing wasn’t right. But Shelly was intuitive.

“I feel like walking home,” she said, somehow picking up on Daria’s need for time alone with Rory.

“Are you sure?” Daria asked. She didn’t think Shelly had yet come to terms with Father Macy’s death, and she was concerned about her.

“I’m sure,” Shelly said.

“I’m fine. I’ll see you at the Sea Shanty.”

Daria watched her walk away from them, then turned to Rory.

“Do you have your car here?”

“Uh-huh. Do you?”

“Yes. But…” She looked into his green eyes. He appeared to be studying her.

“I need to talk with you,” she said. “Can we take my car and go somewhere? I can bring you back here after.”

“Is this about Shelly again? About me researching” — “No,” she interrupted him.

“No. This is something else.”

“Okay,” he said.

“Where are you parked?”

She drove across the island to the sound, and they walked onto the pier where they had crabbed together a few weeks earlier. There were children on the pier this afternoon, crabbing, fishing, and threatening to push one another into the water. Daria and Rory walked past them to the pier’s end, where they took off their shoes and sat down in their good funeral clothes to dangle their legs above the water.

Daria was not sure how to begin.

“I never got to tell you how my visit went with the parents of the pilot,” she said.

“I wondered about that,” Rory said.

“But with Father Macy and everything, we haven’t really had a chance to talk.”

She looked into the green-brown water. A crab swam just below the surface, slipping sideways through the water.

“So?” Rory prompted.

“How did it go?”

She glanced at him, then looked back at the water.

“There’s no easy way to say this,” she said, trying to warn him about what was coming.

“Only the pilot’s father was there. I met with him at a little cafe he and his wife own. And as I talked with him, I realized that his wife—that the mother of the pilot—is Grace.”

For a moment, Rory’s face was impassive. Then he slid demy seemed to understand what she was saying and turned toward her.

“Grace?” he asked.

“Grace Martin?”

“That was my reaction, too,” Daria said.

“I still don’t understand. I still don’t quite know what’s going on. She may go by the name Martin, but her husband’s name is Fuller. Eddie Fuller.”

“Her ejc-husband, you mean,” Rory said.

She shook her head.

“He referred to his wife as Grace, and then I saw a picture of her on his desk. I didn’t let on that I knew her. I asked if he and his wife were separated, and he said no. They aren’t getting along, though. She blames him for” — “Wait a minute,” Rory said.

“Slow down, will you, please? Grace is separated. Maybe he just didn’t want to admit that to you.”

One of the roughhousing young boys on the pier ran into them, and Rory told him to knock it off. It was the first sign of impatience she’d seen in him, and she knew how disturbed he was by what she was telling him.

“That’s possible,” she said.

“But I think he was telling me the truth.

He said she’s living in the apartment above their garage, because she’s angry with him about their daughter’s”— ” The Grace I know doesn’t even have any children,” Rory interrupted her again.

Daria felt exasperated.

“Rory, I’m sorry, but I’m telling you, this is the same woman. He even said she had surgery not too long ago, although I didn’t ask what she’d had surgery for. And she did have at least one child. A daughter named Pamela, who was the pilot in the plane crash. And the reason she’s so angry with her husband is that he was the one who had encouraged Pamela to become a pilot. Grace never wanted her to” “Wait a minute,” Rory said again.

“Assuming you’re right, and Grace Fuller is Grace Martin, isn’t that a bit of a coincidence that I would end up meeting her when you had been so intimately involved in her daughter’s—in trying to save her daughter?”

“Yes, huge coincidence,” Daria agreed.

“And, I’m sorry, Rory, but it’s made me wonder if maybe it wasn’t a coincidence at all.”

“What are you saying?”

“I’m not sure what I’m saying,” Daria said. A windsurfer sailed so close to the pier that she could see the cleft in his chin.

“I haven’t been able to figure this out,” she said, “but it’s made me wonder about Grace’s interest in Shelly. Maybe it was a coincidence and now she’s just interested in Shelly because Shelly is… a substitute daughter, in a way. But let’s say it wasn’t a coincidence. That somehow she knows what Shelly did when we were trying to save her daughter, and she’s planning to get… I don’t know, revenge or something.” She knew it was an outlandish suggestion and heard the doubt in her own voice as she explained it to him. “Though, how she would know, when only Pete and I knew about it, is beyond me.”

“Well, I vote for the coincidence theory,” Rory said.

“The way I met her… on the beach… she’d been bitten by a fly… I just don’t see how that could be some sort of setup or plot on her part. But obviously, she lied to me about being separated, unless she considers living above the garage a separation. And she lied about not having kids.” He shook his head.

“No wonder she never wanted me to come down to Rodanthe.”

“Can you try to find out what’s going on?” she asked.

“I mean, can you make sure that she’s not … well, nuts? That she doesn’t have some wacko plot to hurt Shelly?”

“If anything, she seems to adore Shelly.”

“Everyone adores Shelly,” Daria said.

“But not every n one pummels her with personal questions and brings her jars of shells.”

Rory drew in a long breath, then nodded.

“I’m seeing her again tomorrow night,” he said.

“I’ll talk to her then.”

In an area where a huge percentage of the residents were tourists, it was amazing how quickly rumors flew among the locals. Daria first heard the rumblings on one of her construction jobs, the day after Father Macy’s funeral. She and Andy were installing cabinets in a kitchen, while George and Billy hung a ceiling fan in the adjacent dining room, when George started talking about the investigation. His brother was a cop, so he was privy to information others might not know.

“It was such a weird sort of accident,” George said from his perch on one of the ladders.

“I mean, does it make any sense to you guys? Here, Sean Macy’s been hang-gliding for a dozen years, maybe, and suddenly he crashes.”

“It was probably just a lapse in his concentration,” Daria said. She held the base cabinet tight against the wall, while Andy screwed it to a stud.

“That’s not what my brother thinks,” George said. He left Billy holding up the ceiling fan as he ticked off the facts on his fingertips.

“First of all, it was a competition, not some everyday flight. If there’s any time Sean would have been paying attention to what he was doing, it would be then. Second, the weather was perfect.

I mean, he would have to go out of his way to crash in that kind of weather. “

“So, what are you saying?” Billy asked.

“You think someone wanted to off him?”

“They considered that,” George said, helping Billy with the fan again.

“Maybe somebody didn’t like the penance Sean gave them after confession or something, and so they tampered with his hang glider.

But the police have gone over the hang glider with a fine-tooth comb, and it was in perfect working order. “

“What do they think happened, then?” Andy asked as he backed out of the base cabinet.

“That maybe he took that nosedive into the sand on purpose,” George said. He waited for the drama of his words to sink in.

“That’s nuts,” Andy said.

“Well, there’s more.” With the fan secure, George climbed down from the ladder. “My brother and a couple of other cops have been talking to some witnesses—experienced pilots who were there. It looked to them like an intentional stall.”

“Maybe it was part of his performance,” Andy said. “Maybe he was going to” -George interrupted him.

“That other priest at St. Esther’s. The old guy, Father Wayne? He told my brother he’d been worried about Sean lately. He said Father Macy had been withdrawn and upset. He thought Sean might have been screwing… Excuse me. There’s a lady present. He thought Sean might have broken his vow of celibacy.”

Daria was incensed. How far had this rumor spread? The man had been dead only a few days, and already his memory was tarnished.

“That’s all just speculation,” she said. “And it really bothers me to hear it. Why does everyone always have to look for the dirt? Sean Macy was a really good man and a good priest. He wouldn’t have” -She suddenly remembered Shelly’s prediction that the priest would kill himself, and an eerie sense of dread filled her chest.

“He wouldn’t have what?” George prompted her to finish her statement.

“I just wish you wouldn’t spread this kind of thing around until you have some facts to back it up.”

“Don’t listen, then, Miss Priss.”

George continued talking about Sean Macy and what the cops had or had not been able to uncover, but as Daria resumed her work on the cabinets, her thoughts were on Shelly. Shelly had always been unusual in her ability to see things others could not, but she’d never before displayed psychic powers. If Sean Macy had indeed killed himself, how had Shelly predicted it?

That night, Daria sat at the picnic table on the Sea Shanty porch with Chloe and Shelly, eating cold roasted chicken and potato salad for dinner. No one was talking much; neither Chloe nor Shelly was finished with her grieving. And although Daria knew the timing was poor, she had to bring the subject up.

“There’s a rumor going around that Father Macy might have killed himself,” she said halfway through the meal.

Chloe looked up from the chicken breast she had barely touched.

“I’ve heard some rumblings to that fact,” she said, her voice flat.

Daria looked at Shelly, who kept her gaze fastened on her plate.

“Shelly?” Daria prompted.

Shelly looked up.

“What?”

“I know you thought that might happen. That Father Macy might commit suicide.”

Chloe looked surprised.

“You did?” she asked Shelly. “What would make you think that?”

Shelly shrugged and poked at her potato salad with her fork.

Daria looked at Chloe. “About a week ago. Shelly was upset, and she told me she thought Father Macy might kill himself,” Daria explained.

“I thought she was… I thought she’d misinterpreted something he’d said. Now I’m not so sure.”

Shelly began to cry. She pushed her plate away and pressed her napkin to her eyes.

“I knew he was going to do it,” she said.

“I should have done something about it.”

Daria leaned forward, her elbows on the table.

“Why on earth did you think he was going to do that?” she asked.

Shelly sat back on the bench, her nose already red from crying.

“He said he was upset with himself,” she said.

“He said he was a… sinner.”

“A sinner?” Daria repeated.

“What did he mean by that? Did he say why he thought he was a sinner?”

Shelly shook her head. “He always talked like a puzzle to me. I was never sure what he meant about things.” She picked up her fork again and poked it into the potato salad. “He asked me if I thought it was wrong to kill yourself, and I said that I thought it was. And he said, that he thought God would forgive a suicide if it was done to save somebody else.”

Daria and Chloe exchanged looks of confusion on their side of the table.

“Who would he be saving?” Daria asked.

“I think you must have misunderstood him.”

Chloe slipped off her side of the bench and moved around the table to sit next to Shelly. She rested her hand on her younger sister’s arm, and Daria saw tears brimming in Chloe’s eyes.

“I think Daria’s right, honey, and you misunderstood what Father Sean was saying,” she said.

“So, I think that what you just told us has to stay between the three of us. Understand? It doesn’t make a lot of sense, and if you were to spread it around, I’m afraid it would just fuel the fire right now.” Chloe pressed her lips together, her glistening eyes fixed on the picnic table. “The thing we need to keep in mind is that Sean was a good man. Maybe he did do something that would make him a sinner in the eyes of the Church, but not in the eyes of God, and that’s what counts. God could never think of such a person as a sinner. So, maybe you got confused in what you heard, or maybe Sean himself was confused by what he was thinking or feeling. Either way, we need to keep what he told you in this house. Okay?”

Shelly nodded, and Daria could see that she was relieved to have told them what she knew and that she’d been comforted by Chloe’s words.

Chloe stood up, leaning over to give Shelly a hug.

All three of them looked up at the sound of a car door slamming.

Across the cul-de-sac, Grace was walking from her car toward the front door of Poll-Rory. Daria wondered if she had a clue what was waiting for her inside that cottage. She fervently hoped Rory could get to the bottom of the game she was playing.

Chloe looked down at Daria, who had not yet told her what she knew about Grace.

“And how about you, sweetheart?” Chloe said to her, nodding in the direction of Rory’s cottage.

“Are you okay?”

“I’m fine now,” she said. At Chloe’s disbelieving look, she repeated to herself with a smile.

“Really, Chloe,” she said.

“I’m fine.”

Rory let Grace into the cottage. He’d been both dreading and looking forward to this moment since his talk with Daria the day before. Grace greeted him with a smile, obviously unaware that she had been unmasked. What truly lay beneath that mask, he couldn’t say, but he planned to find out in the next few minutes.

She stood inside the cottage door, and she must have seen the seriousness in his face, because her smile quickly faded.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

“You and I need to have a talk,” he said.

The apprehension in her eyes was instantaneous. “What about?” she asked.

He walked into the living room, and she followed him, but remained standing when he sat down in a chair.

“I know you’re not really separated,” he began, “and I know you had a child who was killed in a plane crash in April.”

Grace let out her breath. Shutting her eyes briefly, she sat down on the sofa. “How do you know all that?”

“Did you know that Daria was one of the EMTs involved in trying to rescue your daughter?” he asked.

The color drained from her face so quickly that he was certain she had not known. She probably knew nothing about Shelly’s involvement, then, either.

“I had no idea,” she said.

“Well, she was,” Rory said.

“And the fact that she wasn’t able to save your daughter really distressed her. It got bad enough that she quit being an EMT, and she was so upset about it, that she decided to track down your daughter’s family to speak with them about it. So, she went to Rodanthe and talked to your… husband.”

“Oh my God…” “And I guess your husband mentioned you, and Daria put two and two together and realized that you and the pilot’s mother were one and the same person.”

Grace lowered her head to her hands.

“Oh, Rory, I’m so sorry. This must all seem insane to you. I had no idea Daria was involved in that accident. That’s just a crazy coincidence. I lied about not having children because I didn’t want to talk about Pamela. It’s too painful to talk about. She was my baby.” Grace began to cry in earnest,

and Rory felt the hard edges of his heart begin to soften.

“And I only partly lied about being separated,” she said. “Daria said you live on the same property as your husband.”

Grace nodded.

“I live above the garage,” she said.

“I’d live somewhere else, if I could afford to. But right now, I can’t. If Eddie doesn’t know we’re separated, then he’s in denial.”

Her lower lip trembled, and Rory knew that Daria was mistaken about Grace’s ulterior motives. This was a woman who had recently lost a child, and she obviously did not have support from her husband in grieving for that child. Plus, she’d recently had a serious illness.

He could only imagine the emotional pain she’d been suffering. So she’d gone a little crazy. He’d been crazy after his separation, and that had not been coupled with the loss of a child. His throat tightened at the thought of losing Zack.

He moved to the sofa, sitting down next to her, close to her.

“I have one more question I need an answer to,” he said.

She pressed her lips together and nodded, waiting.

“What kind of illness did you have?” It was time he knew. He was tired of her secrets and evasiveness.

She swallowed hard and a look of panic came into her eyes.

“I think I’m going to be sick.” She stood up, swaying, and he stood, too, holding her arm to steady her.

“I’ll be right back,” she said, and she walked unsteadily toward the bathroom.

He waited what seemed like a long time, and was about to check on her when she emerged from the bathroom, holding a wet washcloth to her throat. He stood up. “Are you all right?” he asked.

She offered a wry laugh.

“Oh, I’m just great,” she said, taking her seat again.

He held her hand on his knee, not caring whether she wanted him to, not caring if she had a husband, or if she had lied to him. Her palm was clammy and cool. She pressed the washcloth to her forehead with her other hand, then lowered it to her lap.

“I had heart surgery just before Pamela died,” she said, drawing away a bit to look at him.

“I have a condition called Marfan’s syndrome.

It’s hereditary and can sometimes affect the heart. Pamela had it, too. She’d just been diagnosed with it, although she hadn’t had any obvious symptoms—until the seizure she had on the plane. That’s why the plane went down. My husband always pushed her to fly. ” She suddenly looked angry.

“If it hadn’t been for him, she would have taken up some normal hobby, like softball or… a musical instrument, or something. And she’d still be alive.” She closed her eyes tightly, and the tears started again.

“I’m sorry, Rory,” she said.

“When I lied to you that first day on the beach, I didn’t know I was going to become friends with you. Or that I’d even see you again. And once the lie was out…”

“Shh.” He put his arms around her and pulled her close to him, and she did not resist. She wept against his chest, tangled up in her lies and grief. He was not certain what impact all those lies would have on their relationship. All he knew was that, right now, she needed a friend. He was more than willing to play that role.

Daria and Chloe arrived home from work at the same time, when the sky above the ocean was pewter-colored and cloudless and there was no hint of menacing weather.

“Did you hear about the hurricane headed this way?” Daria asked as she and Chloe walked onto the Sea Shanty’s porch.

“No,” Chloe said.

“That’s just what we need.”

“It’s a big one,” Daria said. In the living room, she clicked on the TV to wait for the weather report.

“It’s still pretty far out,” she said, “so maybe it’ll weaken as it nears shore. Or it might even turn out to sea. You never know, at this stage.”

“You’d better not say anything to Shelly about it.” Chloe looked at her watch.

“I just came home to change,” she said.

“I have to go back to the church to help Father Wayne with a meeting tonight.”

Chloe would be working longer hours for a while, taking on extra duties at St. Esther’s in Father Macy’s absence. Daria sat down in front of the TV as Chloe went upstairs to change.

All day, while she and Andy had been paneling a condo in Duck, she’d been wondering how Rory’s talk with Grace had gone. As soon as Chloe left, she’d go over to Poll-Rory to find out.

But, as the meteorologist was giving his uncertain report about Hurricane Bemadette, Rory knocked on the porch door.

“Daria?” he called.

“Come in,” she said, looking up as he walked into the living room.

“I

was going to come over a little later. “

Rory sat down on the other end of the sofa.

“Is that Bemadette?” he asked, eyeing the perfect white doughnut of clouds on the weather map.

“Uh-huh. She’s a monster.”

“When do they predict it will hit us?”

“They’re not sure it will.”

Chloe came downstairs and into the room, wearing a skirt and blouse in place of the shorts and T-shirt she’d had on earlier.

“Hello, Rory,” she said, her voice so cool that Daria felt irritated with her.

“Hi, Chloe.” Rory turned on the sofa to face her, his arms folded across his chest.

“You know, I’ve been hearing some rumors.” “About?” Chloe asked, and Daria cringed, fearing she knew the rumors Rory was alluding to. He would not win any points with Chloe by bringing them up.

“Some people are saying that Father Macy’s accident might actually have been a suicide,” he said.

“Had either of you heard anything like that?”

Chloe rolled her eyes. “Where did you hear that?” Daria asked.

“Zack said he heard some kids talking about it,” Rory said.

“It’s ridiculous, Rory,” Chloe said.

“And it’s not helpful to give any credence to that sort of gossip.”

“I don’t know,” Rory said.

“I think it’s kind of suspicious. I mean, he died just a few days after I spoke with him, and he’d been very upset during his conversation with me. Maybe he knew something about Shelly’s background,

and that’s why he killed himself. He wanted to take that information with him to the grave. “

Daria noticed that the tops of Chloe’s ears were red, a sure sign of anger that she had not seen in her sister in many, many years.

“I’m certain your conversation with him had nothing whatsoever to do with it,” Chloe said coldly. Her hands were on her hips, her eyes blazing. “You think everything revolves around you and your damn TV program. Probably now you’ll decide to do one of your shows on this new mystery, huh?

“The Secret Agony of Sean Macy.” ” She turned abruptly to Daria.

“I need to get over to the church,” she said.

“I

hope none of the parishioners has heard any of this slander. “

Turning on her heel, Chloe marched out the front door, slamming it shut behind her.

“Whoa,” Rory said.

“Why do I get the feeling she’s not pleased with me?”

Daria sighed, leaning against the back of the sofa. “We had a conversation with Shelly last night about the same thing,” Daria said.

“I think hearing about the rumors again was just too much for her.”

“Maybe I should go after her,” Rory said, looking toward the front door.

“Apologize.”

“I’d leave her alone right now.” Chloe’s anger was so out of character that Daria could not predict how her sister would react to Rory’s apology.

“Maybe in a few days, when the wounds aren’t so fresh, she’ll be more receptive. Right now, though, I want to hear about your visit with Grace last night.” She drew her bare feet onto the sofa and turned to face him.

“Well,” Rory began, “she’s screwed up, I’ll grant you that, but I don’t think she had a clue about Shelly being involved in her daughter’s death.” He went on to tell Daria about his conversation with Grace, and Daria listened quietly. She didn’t feel as trusting of Grace as he did.

“I felt really sorry for her,” Rory said.

“I think she just got caught up in the lies about the separation and having no kids. She told me those things the first time I met her, and she didn’t know that we were going to end up having a relationship. Once we did, I guess she figured it was easier to stick with her original story. She didn’t have a mastectomy, like we thought. She had heart surgery. She has a disease called Marian’s syndrome.”

“Pamela—the pilot—had that.”

“Yeah, Grace said it’s hereditary. She’s in a lot of pain over her daughter. I think that’s why she’s drawn to Shelly. Shelly’s close in age to her daughter. I don’t think it’s any more complicated than that.”

“I hope you’re right,” Daria said.

“It still seems like a pretty amazing coincidence that she stumbled into our little cul-de-sac.” She heard the callous tone of her words and wished she could take them back. It was obvious that Rory felt sympathy for Grace. She had not wanted that, or expected it. Why couldn’t he see that, for whatever reason, Grace was manipulating him?

“If you could have seen her last night, I think you would stop worrying about it,” Rory said.

“So,” Daria said, “where do things stand now with the two of you?”

Rory laughed.

“Funny you should ask,” he said.

“I was thinking to myself that I was an adulterer for having had an affair with a married woman. But there was no affair. Grace had made sure of that. It was only an affair in my fantasies. So, to answer your question, I don’t know.” He locked his hands together and stretched his arms out in front of him.

“I still want to see her. I’m not angry with her. I just” — A sudden noise came from upstairs, and Daria cocked her head to listen.

“I didn’t think Shelly was home,” she said in a near whisper, her heart beating a little faster.

There was a thud, followed by the sound of voices. One of them was a man’s, and Daria was instantly alarmed.

“It’s coming from Shelly’s room,” she said.

“Who could be with her?”

Rory looked toward the stairs. “Does she have any male friends?” he asked.

Daria shook her head.

“None that she should have in her bedroom,” she said.

“God, Rory, what if it’s someone she picked up? Some stranger?

She befriends everyone. What if it’s some psychopath? “

“Calm down,” Rory said.

“The likelihood of that is pretty slim. But… maybe you should go check on her, anyway.”

“I don’t want to humiliate her,” she said, looking toward the stairs, “but I’d never forgive myself if somebody was hurting her.”

“I’d say her safety is more important than her pride right now,” Rory said.

Daria stood up.

“Call the cops if I start screaming,” she said, walking toward the stairs.

In the upstairs hallway, she knocked on Shelly’s door.

“Shelly?”

There was an ominous silence from behind the door, then hushed voices and the rustling of sheets.

“Shelly, are you all right?”

She heard footsteps, and the bedroom door was opened a few inches. by Zack. Daria could see Kara in Shelly’s bed, the sheets pulled up to her chin, and she was too surprised to speak.

“I’m not Shelly,” Zack said with a sheepish grin.

“Shelly said we could use her room while she was out on a walk.”

Daria heard Rory’s footsteps on the stairs. It sounded as though he was taking them two at a time, and Zack’s grin faded. “Is my dad here?” he asked, eyes wide, and Daria nodded.

“Zack?” Rory called as he neared the top of the stairs.

“Oh, shit.” Zack started to shut the door, but Rory had already reached the hallway. He pushed past Daria to hold the door open with his hand.

“What do you think you’re doing?” he said to his son, the question so idiotic and unanswerable that Daria almost laughed. She remembered having asked the same thing of Shelly years earlier, when she’d caught her in bed with one of the sleazy guys she used to see.

“Shelly said we could use her room,” Zack said weakly.

“Well, I think you two better get dressed and get out of here,” Rory said.

“I’ll see you at home in a few minutes.” He pulled the door shut, ran his hands through his hair, then looked at Daria.

“Yikes,” he whispered, and she stifled a laugh.

She followed him down the stairs.

“I apologize for my sister’s lousy judgment,” she said.

Rory opened the livingroom door and looked up at the ceiling.

“What do I do now?” he asked, although he didn’t sound as though he actually expected an answer.

“Be understanding,” Daria said.

“Be kind. Be all the things I wasn’t when I caught Shelly doing the same thing.”

Rory smiled.

“I’ll try,” he said. He turned and left the Sea Shanty.

Treat Zack with the same kind of sympathy you so easily lavish on Grace, she thought as she watched him walk across the cul-de-sac and into Poll-Rory, where he’d wait to have it out with his son.

it was nearly forty-five minutes before Zack dared to come home, and Rory was waiting for him in the living room, still not sure what he was going to say.

“I don’t want to talk about it, Dad,” Zack said as he walked past him toward the bedrooms.

“Well, I do.”

Zack stopped walking and turned around, a look of resignation on his face, and Rory noticed for the first time that his son was nearly as tall as he was. When had that happened? “Did you at least use a condom?” Something told him that was not the best way to start this conversation, but the words slipped out before he could stop them.

“Kara’s on the Pill,” Zack said.

“A fifteen-year-old girl on the Pill?” Rory asked.

“That says something about her right there, doesn’t it?”

“Yeah,” Zack said.

“It says she’s smart and careful.”

“What it says to me is that she’s probably had a number of partners, which opens her up to all sorts of diseases. AIDS and a dozen others.

You should have used a condom, anyway. What if she’s lying to you?

What if she’s not on the Pill at all and is just trying to trap you?

And, damn it, you’re too young for this, anyhow. ” Whew. He sounded judgmental. Irrational. Hysterical. But he couldn’t seem to shut up.

Zack simply stared at him.

“What’s the problem. Dad?”

he asked. “Are you telling me you did it for the first time on your wedding night, or what?”

Be understanding, Daria had said. Be kind. With a heavy sigh, he sat down on the sofa.

“I know I’m not doing a good job of this, Zack,” he admitted.

“I’m sorry. I just worry about you, that’s all.”

“Well, you don’t have to,” Zack said.

“Yeah, I do,” he said.

“I was fifteen once, too, hard though that may be for you to believe. And I know how you can be drawn into things without thinking through the consequences.”

“I’m thinking things through, Dad. Have a little faith in me, all right?” Zack turned to leave the room.

“I think it’s time I had a talk with Kara’s grandparents. The Wheelers,” Rory said.

Zack spun around.

“What?”

“Not to tell them about what happened tonight,” he said quickly.

“Don’t worry about that. I just think I should get to know them a bit better, since you and Kara are seeing each other.”

“That is really not necessary.”

“I’d like to talk with them, anyway,” Rory said. He’d had a few short conversations with the couple this summer, reminiscing about old times on the cul-de-sac, but he hadn’t yet spoken with them about Shelly.

“Now is as good a time as any.”

“What a coincidence,” Zack said.

“You decide to talk to them right after you find Kara and me…”

“I told you, I won’t say anything about that,” Rory said.

“That’s a promise.”

“I’m going to bed,” Zack said.

“It’s still early.”

Zack looked at him suspiciously.

“You mean, you’d let me go out?”

“Of course.”

“If I go out, I’m going to see Kara.” It sounded like a threat.

“I’m sure you will,” he said.

“I know there isn’t anything I can do about that, Zack. Just… use good judgment, please. That’s all I ask.”

The Wheelers’ cottage was swarming with grandchildren of all ages the following day, but the older couple invited Rory onto their screened deck, away from the noise and clutter. Rory remembered the Wheelers fondly from his childhood. Every evening, they would stroll arm in arm on the beach together, and he’d thought of them as a kind old couple, although they must only have been in their fifties then. Now, in their mid-seventies, Mr. Wheeler was tall and lean and looked fit, while Mrs. Wheeler had grown quite heavy and walked with a cane. He did not know their first names; they would probably always be Mr. and Mrs.

Wheeler to him. “We watch you every week on True Life Stories,” Mrs. Wheeler said as she poured him a glass of iced tea from a plastic, childproof pitcher. She handed the tea to him, then lowered herself into a deck chair.

“Well, thanks,” Rory said.

“I’m sorry I haven’t stopped by yet this summer. I guess you’ve seen my son more than you have me.”

“He’s a sweet boy,” Mrs. Wheeler said.

“Thanks. He’s a good kid.” Rory took a sip of tea. It was overly sweet. “I do worry that he and Kara might be getting a bit too serious, though,” he said.

Mrs. Wheeler raised her eyebrows.

“Do you?” Rory had the feeling she knew exactly what was concerning him.

“Oh,” Mr. Wheeler said, “it’s just a little summer romance. Nothing to get upset about.”

“Well, I just wanted to make sure you don’t mind how much Zack is around,” Rory said.

“How much the two of them are together.”

“He’s about the nicest boy she’s gone out with,” Mrs. Wheeler said.

“So, no, we don’t mind a bit.”

For a moment, Rory worried about what the other boys Kara had dated had been like—and what diseases they might carry—but he put those thoughts aside.

“I’ll tell you the girl we need to worry about,” Mr. Wheeler said.

“That Bemadette. They say she’s heading straight for the Outer Banks now.”

“I didn’t know that,” Rory said. He hadn’t listened to the weather report yet that day.

“There’s still a chance she’ll veer off course,” Mr. Wheeler said.

“I

just hope we don’t have to evacuate. Remember doing that when you were a kid? “

“I think we only had to do it once or twice,” Rory said.

“I don’t remember where we went.” He supposed he and Zack would go to a hotel on the mainland somewhere, if they needed to evacuate.

“Oh, we usually end up in one of the shelters,” Mr. Wheeler said. ‘ “Cheaper than a motel, with our crew, and the kids wind up having a lot of fun.”

Rory took another swallow of tea.

“Well,” he began, “I guess you know why I’m here this summer.”

Mrs. Wheeler nodded.

“Shelly,” she said.

“That’s right. I’ve been talking to people on the cul-de- sac about what they remember. Do you two have any thoughts on who left Shelly on the beach that morning?”

“I always figured it was that Cindy girl who lived at the end of the street,” Mr. Wheeler said.

“Oh, it wasn’t Cindy,” Mrs. Wheeler said.

“She was too thin. Remember?

We talked about it back then. She was a skinny minnie. ”” Well, you were skinny back in your baby-having days,

yourself,” Mr. Wheeler said, and his wife made a sound of mock annoyance.

“Cindy preserved her figure a heck of a lot better than I ever did,” Mrs. Wheeler said.

“We see her every once in a while when we go up to Smokey’s restaurant in Corolla for the sweet-potato fries. She’s always so nice.”

Rory leaned forward.

“You’ve seen Cindy Trump recently?” he asked.

“Does she live around here?”

“Oh, yes,” Mrs. Wheeler said.

“She and her husband and kids own one of them huge houses in Corolla. Her last name is Delaney now.”

Rory made a mental note of the name, unable to believe his good fortune. He would be able to talk with Cindy after all.

“You know,” Mrs. Wheeler said, “I’d like to think of Shelly the way Sue—her mother—did—as a gift from the sea, with no parents other than the Catos. Shelly is such a sweet girl, and she gave Mrs. Cato such happiness in her last years. And Daria’s been a saint to take care of her.”

“Maybe it was that retarded girl,” Mr. Wheeler said suddenly.

“Maybe she was Shelly’s mother.”

“Hush,” his wife said sharply.

“That was Rory’s sister.”

Rory smiled.

“I’m quite certain Polly had nothing to do with Shelly,” he said, although he was beginning to wonder why he was so sure of that fact. The thought of Polly having been taken advantage of sexually, the thought of her being confused about being pregnant and delivering a baby by herself, was too horrifying to ponder.

“Rory…” Mrs. Wheeler sounded hesitant.

“Did you ever consider that your own mother might have been Shelly’s mother?” she asked.

Rory masked the shock in his face.

“No, I’d have to say my mother would be last on my list of suspects,” he said.

“Oh, I know,” Mrs. Wheeler said hurriedly.

“And you’re probably right.

But your mother and I had a lot of conversations back in the old days.

She was very upset that she’d had a Mongoloid child and she’d been terribly worried when she got pregnant with you. She was afraid you might turn out to be slow, too, especially since she was even older when you were born than when your sister came. She told me how relieved she was when you were born normal. ” Mrs. Wheeler ran her fingertip over the sweaty handle of the pitcher. ” I always wondered if maybe she had gotten pregnant again. Maybe she was so afraid that she’d have another retarded child that she”-Mrs. Wheeler shrugged ” —left the baby to the sea, thinking that was the best and kindest thing to do. ”” Do you really think that was a possibility? ” Rory was incredulous.

“I guess I thought she was just as likely as anybody else on the street.”

Why not his mother? he thought. He’d considered nearly every other woman on the cul-de-sac. But this was one direction his thinking refused to take him.

He took a last swallow of the too-sweet tea.

“Well,” he said, standing up, “I should get back to Poll-Rory.”

“Watch out for Bemadette,” Mr. Wheeler said.

“Cindy’s last name was Delaney, you said?” Rory asked.

Mr. and Mrs. Wheeler got to their feet as well.

“That’s right,” Mrs.

Wheeler said.

“And wait till you see her. She hasn’t changed a bit.”

1 think evacuation is inevitable,” Daria said. She was sitting next to Rory on the widow’s walk.

“They said there’s a high-pressure system that’s going to pull Bemadette straight toward us.”

“It’s hard to believe there’s a storm out there,” Rory said.

They were both sitting on the west side of the widow’s walk, facing the sea, and the water was calm, the glassy waves rolling toward shore with an easy, uniform rhythm. Daria had seen enough storms on the Outer Banks to know that this tranquillity was deceptive. It was difficult to worry when the air and the sea were this quiet, and she could understand how someone not familiar with the area could convince themselves the storm would veer off course and miss them. But she didn’t need the weather to tell her what was coming. She felt it in her gut, that churning apprehension she always had when a storm was heading their way. It could miss them. They might receive no more than a few sprinkles and some harmless wind. Or, the water could cover Kill Devil Hills, destroying the beaches and pulling the cottages out to sea. It was the not knowing that made her stomach chum. She needed to prepare for the worst scenario. She needed to think about lowering the storm windows, closing the storm shutters, bringing the tools up from the workshop, and most important, keeping Shelly as calm and occupied as she could.

n

“I can already feel Shelly tensing up,” Daria said.

“I don’t think she’s eaten anything all day.”

“Did you give her a hard time about letting Zack and Kara use her room?” Rory asked.

“Not too hard,” Daria said.

“By the time she got home last night, she was already getting nervous about the storm. I didn’t have the heart to upset her more.”

“Where do we go if we have to evacuate?” Rory asked. “Where do you usually go?”

“We’ll go to a motel in Greenville,” Daria said.

“As a matter of fact, I’d better make reservations now, just in case we need them. Would you like me to make reservations for you and Zack, too?” She hoped he said yes. She wanted him close by.

“That would be great,” he said.

“I guess I should get some plywood, huh? I’ve never done this before. I remember my father nailing wood over the windows, though.”

“Yes, you should. And take down the Poll-Rory sign so it doesn’t blow away. Move the porch and deck furniture inside.” She looked across the cul-de-sac at his cottage. “Put your garbage can inside, too, and anything else that might turn into a missile in the wind.”

“You’re starting to make me nervous now,” Rory said.

“I know.” She laughed.

“My stomach hurts just thinking about it.”

They were quiet for a few minutes. She could see Zack and some of the other kids playing volleyball on the beach. Rory finally broke the silence.

“I had a talk with the Wheelers today,” he said.

“Oh. About Kara?”

“Well, I skirted the issue of Kara and Zack,” he said.

“They think my son is a great guy. I’d best leave it at that.”

“He is a great guy,” Daria said. Then she realized what he had spoken to the Wheelers about.

“Shelly,” she said.

“You talked to them about Shelly.”

“Uh-huh.” Rory slouched down on the bench, his hands locked behind his head.

“You’ll be pleased to know that they weren’t much help. As a matter of fact, all they succeeded in doing was rattling me.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, Mr. Wheeler thinks Shelly’s mother was Polly,” Rory said.

“And guess who Mrs. Wheeler thinks is Shelly’s mother?”

Daria felt momentarily unnerved. What did Mrs. Wheeler know?

“Who?”

she asked.

“My mother.”

Daria laughed. The thought was bizarre.

“You’re kidding. Why would she think that?”

Rory shrugged.

“Well, she made a good point. My mother, I’m sure, was afraid of having any more children after Polly and I were born, fearing that another child might have Down’s syndrome. Mom would have been in her late forties by then, so if she had been pregnant, that would have been a realistic concern. Mrs. Wheeler suggested that my mother might have gotten pregnant and decided that leaving the baby on the beach was the way to go.”

“I don’t remember your mother all that well, but I can’t imagine her doing something like that,” Daria said.

“I don’t know,” Rory said. He unlocked his hands from behind his head, and leaned his elbows on his knees, looking out to sea.

“It’s been bothering me all day,” he said.

“She did have some psychological problems later on in her life. I didn’t think she had them then, but maybe they were already brewing. I mean, someone did it. Someone was a little crazy that night. I guess it could have been my mother as well as anyone else.”

He sounded despondent, and Daria rested her hand lightly on his back. The gesture felt awkward and alien to her, but it was the sort of thing he would do, and she knew how good it felt to be comforted that way. It was the least she could do for him—or the least she was willing to do, at any rate. She had the ability to put his doubts to rest, completely and forever, but there was no way she could tell him what she knew. “What would you do if you found out that it was Polly or your mother?” she asked.

“Would you still do the story?” “Are you kidding?” He turned his head to look at her.

“No way.”

“Then I’m asking you,” she said gently, “to remember that the woman you’re trying to expose might also be someone else’s sister or someone else’s mother, and people can be hurt by the information you uncover.”

Rory studied his bare feet. She could not see his face.

“Most likely it was Cindy,” she continued, “and she probably has a family who would be devastated by learning about Shelly. You need to” — “Oh,” Rory interrupted her, sitting up straight again.

“I found out where Cindy is.” “You did?” This was news Daria did not want to hear. “Right. The Wheelers said she lives up in Corolla with her husband and kids.”

“I didn’t know that.” Daria had no idea Cindy still lived in the Outer Banks. “Are you going to talk with her?”

“Absolutely,” Rory said.

“I’d get on it right now, if it weren’t for the storm coming up. But I figure I’d better spend tomorrow battening down the hatches.”

“Good idea,” Daria said, still shaken by the news about Cindy. It had been easy to pin the blame on Cindy when she was little more than a hazy figure from the past. Knowing that she was a living, breathing woman just up the coast a few miles was something else again.

1 he lumberyard smelled of wood and worry as Rory and Zack fought their way through the crowd. Everyone was buying sheets of plywood to cover the windows of their vulnerable homes, and Rory overheard many of them grumbling about ruined vacations, lost revenue from their rental properties and how long it was going to take to drive over the bridge to escape the Barrier Islands.

He and Zack tied the plywood to the top of the Jeep, then headed back to the cul-de-sac. The sky was still clear, the sea still calm, when they reached Poll-Rory. Across the street, Daria and Chloe were closing the storm shutters on the Sea Shanty, and Rory waved to them as he and Zack unloaded the plywood. They rested it against the side of the cottage facing the ocean, near the windows most in need of protection, then Rory went into the cottage to get a couple of hammers and some nails.

The phone rang as he was pulling the toolbox from the storage closet.

He’d left a phone message for Cindy Trump about the possibility of getting together in a couple of days, and he figured she was returning his call. He picked up the receiver. “Rory?” It was Grace. He had not spoken to her since the other night, when he’d confronted her with her lies. He was glad to hear her voice.

“Hi, Grace,” he said.

“Are you getting ready to evacuate down there?”

She hesitated.

“That’s why I was calling,” she said. “Eddie—my husband—and I usually go to a hotel on the mainland, but I can’t go with him. I just can’t.” Her voice quivered.

“Maybe it would be good,” Rory said, although he would rather she were with him. “Maybe the two of you need some enforced time together.”

“I don’t want to be anywhere near him,” she said. She hesitated a moment. “I wanted to find out where you were going to be,” she added.

“Zack and I are getting a room in a motel in Greenville,” he said.

“We’re leaving early tomorrow morning.”

“Is that … is that where Daria will be, too?”

“Yes. And Chloe and Shelly.”

“Do you think it’s too late for me to get a room there? Would you mind if I’m there?”

Maybe she was ready to talk with Daria about her daughter’s death, he thought. Maybe that’s why she’d asked if Daria was going to be there.

He didn’t want to deprive her of that opportunity. “Of course not,” he said. “But it’s so far for you to” — “I want to, Rory.”

“All right.” He heard hammering on the side of the cottage and was surprised that Zack would start covering the windows without him. He gave her the name and phone number of the motel.

“I’ll see you there,” he said.

Daria handed her hammer to Zack, and while she and Chloe held the sheet of plywood in place, Zack pounded nails into the woodwork. Rory walked out of the cottage, and she saw the surprise in his face at finding her and Chloe there.

“Hey, thanks,” he said, helping her lift another sheet of wood in place. He looked toward the ocean, and she followed his gaze. The sea was glassy and calm, and the blue sky was reflected in the water. It was still hard to imagine that something foreboding lurked beyond the horizon.

Rory shook his head.

“Are you sure we’re not wasting our time with this?” he asked her.

“Unfortunately, I’m sure,” she said.

“The storm is picking up speed as it heads this way,” Chloe said.

Chloe was merely being neighborly, coming over to help Rory with the windows. Daria knew the gesture changed nothing about her ill feelings toward him.

“I just can’t believe the ocean could get up as far as our cottage,” Zack said.

The sheet of plywood in place, Daria lowered her arms to her sides and faced Zack. “When your dad and I were little, there was a cottage right there.” She pointed to the sea-oat-covered sand where Cindy Trump’s cottage had once stood.

“A storm swept it away. It could make our cottages disappear just as easily.”

“Scary,” Zack said.

“Yes, indeed,” Daria said. Her stomach still had that unsettled, agitated feeling that always dogged her when a storm was heading to Kill Devil Hills, but she knew her anxiety was nothing compared to Shelly’s. Backing away from the windows for a moment, she stood at the edge of Poll-Rory’s porch, looking north and south along the beach.

Shelly was out there somewhere, walking. She’d grown very quiet and pensive over the last twenty-four hours, and Daria knew it was not the storm itself that terrified her; it was the prospect of leaving her beloved Outer Banks.

“Does everybody have to leave?” Zack asked as he helped Chloe lift another sheet of plywood against the cottage.

“Is that what they mean by ‘mandatory’?”

“They always say ‘mandatory,” ” Chloe said.

“But what it really means is, if you stay behind, you’re on your own.

There might be no services available to help you in an emergency. “

“Does anyone stay?” Zack asked.

“There are always people who think they’re being brave to stay behind,” Chloe said, “but they’re really being foolish. Some of the emergency workers will still be here, but even they—the sheriff’s department and the ambulances-aren’t allowed on the streets once the wind hits sixty miles per hour. It’s too dangerous.”

Daria and Rory hammered the plywood into place, and when they stood back from their work, Rory looked at her.

“Grace is planning to meet us at the motel,” he said.

She wondered if her disappointment showed on her face.

“Why would she come all the way to Greenville?” she asked.

“Well” — Rory stepped back from the window to admire their work “—two reasons, I think. One, she doesn’t want to be with her husband. And two, I think she wants to talk with you. She asked me specifically if you would be there.”

Great, Daria thought. Once on the mainland, she would have to worry not only about the fate of the Sea Shanty and the well-being of her anxious, phobic sister, but she would have to answer Grace’s questions about an accident she could not honestly discuss.

Rory must have picked up her dismay. “Maybe I should have told her not to come,” he said.

“It’ll be all right,” Daria said, and she helped Zack lift the next sheet of plywood into place.

That night they packed their suitcases, carried Daria’s tools into the cottage from the first-story workroom and brought the porch furniture inside. Shelly threw up half the night, and Daria felt nearly as sick.

Early the following morning, she sat up in bed and looked out the window toward the ocean. The waves were distinctly swollen and frothy, the sea oats blew nearly parallel to the sand, and the sky was low and thick with bloated gray clouds. Even in her room, Daria felt that shift in the atmosphere that was so hard to describe but so clearly an indicator that the storm was well on its way. The air seemed to lack oxygen; it was hard to breathe.

She dressed quickly and went downstairs, where Chloe was making a fruit salad for breakfast.

“Where’s Shelly?” Daria asked. Shelly was usually first up in the morning and her absence sent an instant chill up Daria’s spine.

“I haven’t seen her,” Chloe said.

“I told her last night that she should be ready to leave by eight this morning.”

It was already seven-thirty.

“I have a bad feeling about this,” Daria said.

Chloe looked up from the peach she was slicing.

“Maybe she’s on the beach,” she suggested.

“One last chance to gather shells before the storm.”

“I’m going upstairs to see if she’s at least packed.” With a mounting sense of dread, Daria climbed the stairs. Her knock on Shelly’s door was not answered, and she went into the room. Shelly’s bed was neatly made, but there was no sign of a suitcase. Maybe she hadn’t packed yet. Then Daria spotted the note taped to the mirror above Shelly’s dresser. She moved closer to read it.

Go on without me, it read. ‘/ be all right.

Daria and Chloe set off in one direction on the beach, while Rory and Zack headed in the other.

“If Shelly’s out here, we’ll find her,” Rory had reassured her. Daria had alerted them to Shelly’s disappearance after combing the Sea Shanty from top to bottom. She’d looked in the work room, the closets and under the beds, but Shelly was no where to be found. Pete had been right, she thought. Shelly’s judgment was atrocious. She needed more super vision than Daria was able to give her.

There were still a few hearty souls on the beach, dressed in windbreakers, their hair whipping around their heads as they stared out to sea to watch the sky darken and the water chum. Daria and Chloe didn’t speak as they walked. It was too difficult; the wind threw their words back in their faces. Even walking itself was a chore, and it distressed Daria to think that Shelly might be out here some where, expecting to weather the storm alone on the beach. But by the time she and Chloe had thoroughly scoured the beach to the south, and Rory and Zack to the north, Daria was convinced her sister was not on the beach, after all. Those few people who had been out to watch the storm’s approach had disappeared as well by then, wisely heeding the warnings to leave the Outer Banks.

She searched the Sea Shanty once again, checking the nooks and crannies, peering inside her car and Chloe’s car and Rory’s Jeep. It was close to noon, and Jill and her family, Linda, Jackie and the dogs had long since left the cul-de-sac.

Only the Wheelers remained, and they were packing up their minivan and station wagon, filling them with suitcases and kids.

Daria stood on the bare porch with Rory, a well of frustration in her chest. Her hair was thick and woolly as it blew around her face, and she tightened her windbreaker across her chest.

“You and Zack need to get out of here,” she said to Rory.

“What are you going to do?” Rory asked.

“I’m not leaving until I find her,” Daria said. She felt the quivering of her chin, betraying her worry, and Rory reached out to squeeze her arm.

“I’m not going, either, then.” He glanced down the cul-de-sac toward the Wheelers’ cottage.

“Let me see if Zack can go with them. It would thrill him, I’m sure. Then I can stay behind.”

“You really should go,” she said, although she desperately wanted him to stay.

“We might not be able to get out of here, and it could get dangerous. And won’t Grace be expecting you to show up at the motel?”

“Yes, but at least she’ll be safe. I can’t leave without knowing that Shelly is, too.” He looked toward the Wheelers’ cottage again.

“I’ll be right back,” he said.

She watched him walk down the cul-de-sac to the Wheelers’ cottage, where he spoke with Ruth Wheeler. Tears burned Daria’s eyes; she wanted him to stay so badly. After a minute, he walked back to Poll-Rory, and she guessed he was asking Zack if he would mind going with the Wheelers. She was still standing on the porch when Zack emerged from the cottage, carrying a duffel bag. He waved to Daria as he started walking toward the Wheelers’, and Rory rejoined her on the porch.

“Okay,” he said.

“I’m yours as long as you need me.”

Chloe stepped out of the cottage onto the porch. “I bet she’s holed up in one of the abandoned cottages,” she said.

“She could be right across the street, for all we know. I think we should go door-to-door.”

Chloe could be right. Shelly had done exactly that during a storm a few years earlier. She knew enough to get inside somewhere. Would she know enough to select a cottage as far from the beach as possible? It was anyone’s guess. She could be anywhere.

“If she is in a cottage somewhere, and we knock on the door, she won’t answer it,” she said.

“We won’t knock, then,” Chloe said.

“We’ll just snoop around the cottages and see if we can spot her.”

“I’ll start with Jill’s,” Rory said.

“Then let’s split up to cover the streets on the other side of the beach road.”

“Look for a light on,” Daria said as she walked into the cul-de-sac with them. She pulled up the hood of her windbreaker, holding it closed with a hand beneath her chin. It had grown so dark outside that she could barely see the expressions on the faces of Rory and her sister. Shelly was not crazy about the dark. She would turn on a light if she had sequestered herself in someone’s cottage.

Only, there were no lights on. They searched Jill’s and Linda’s cottages, then separately covered six streets west of the beach road.

Every single cottage was dark. It might as well be the dead of winter, Daria thought. There was no one around. Not even any cars. The wind literally blew her off her feet from time to time and made her eyes tear. A few shingles flew past her as she walked, along with a child’s plastic pail and the lid of a garbage can, projectiles being flung through the darkening air.

The rain had started, and it felt like darts against her face as she fought her way back to the Sea Shanty. Rory and Chloe were already on the porch, and any hope she’d had that one of them had found Shelly vanished when she saw the look of defeat on their faces. She started to cry, and was surprised when Rory put his arms around her.

“I’m sure she’s all right,” he said.

“Chloe and I thought she might be at St. Esther’s.”

Daria suddenly drew away from him. St. Esther’s!

“I was just about to call over there,” Chloe said.

“I’ll be back in a minute.”

Chloe went into the cottage to make the call, and Daria pictured Shelly hiding out in the church, where she would no doubt feel secure.

Of course that’s where she was! She even had a key. The thought of her safe inside the church was an enormous comfort.

A car turned into the cul-de-sac, and Daria walked out to meet it, hoping that Shelly might somehow be inside. She had to plant her feet wide apart to avoid being blown away as the car pulled in front of the Sea Shanty. She recognized the sheriffs-office insignia on the side of the car, and Don Tibbie, one of the deputies, struggled to open the car door against the wind. He was alone, and she knew he was most likely driving around to make sure Kill Devil Hills was evacuated.

“Daria?” he asked.

“Is that you?”

The hood of her windbreaker nearly masked her face.

“It’s me,” she said.

“Have you seen Shelly anywhere?”

Don leaned against the car, the wind tearing at his uniform.

“Don’t tell me she’s gone missing again,” he said.

“Yes, and this time we can’t find her.”

“Golly, that girl,” Don said.

“Well, you know you’ve got to get out of here now, Daria. The wind is just about too high to get over the bridge as it is. You’ve got maybe a half hour left.”

“I can’t leave without her, Don,” she said.

Don put his hands on his hips and looked past her into the Sea Shanty.

“Is Sister Chloe with you?” he asked.

“Yes. And Rory Taylor.”

“Well, you at least have to move to a higher spot,” he said.

“I want to be here in case Shelly comes back,” Daria said.

“I know the risks.”

“I know you do,” Don said.

“Look, I’ll keep my eye out for her, okay?

And I’ll alert the other deputies to do the same. “

“Thanks, Don.”

He glanced at the two cars in the driveway.

“At least get your cars to higher ground.”

She hadn’t even thought of that, a sure sign her” brain was not functioning as it should.

“Okay,” she said.

Chloe stepped onto the porch.

“Hi, Don,” she said.

“Hey, Sister,” the deputy replied.

“I was telling Daria here you folks really need to leave.”

“Was anyone at the church?” Daria asked her sister.

“No answer.”

Daria turned to Don. “Is there a chance you could check St. Esther’s Church?” she asked.

“We thought Shelly might be there. She’d probably be hiding from anyone trying to find her, though.”

“Bruce is patrolling that area,” Don said.

“I’ll radio him to check it out.”

After Don drove away, Daria, Chloe and Rory moved their cars west of the deserted beach road. They plowed headfirst into the wind and rain as they walked back to the Sea Shanty, and it took both Rory and Daria to get the porch door open. Daria knew that once they were inside, they wouldn’t be going anywhere—and that the likelihood of Shelly being returned to them that night was slim. She could only hope that her younger sister was safe, sleeping peacefully on a pew in St.

Esther’s.

They cracked the Sea Shanty windows open an inch or so, then gathered candles and a hurricane lantern in case the lights went out. Sitting together in the living room,

they watched the progress of the storm on television. The weather reporter was drenched and windblown, even though he was now stationed on the mainland, having evacuated himself and his camera crew from the Outer Banks. The eye of the storm was headed for Hatteras, the reporter said. At least Kill Devil Hills would not get the full brunt of it. Still, the swirling vortex of clouds on the weather map was spinning directly over them.

It was only the clock that told them when it was time for dinner. None of them was very hungry, and there was little food in the cottage, but Daria found some cheese and a couple of cans of soup in one of the cupboards.

“I have some bread over at Poll-Rory,” Rory offered.

“You can’t go out there.” Daria looked toward the window, where the storm shutter prevented her from seeing outside. Even so, she knew the night was black as pitch, and the sounds of the wind and the sea were ferocious.

“You’ll blow away.”

“I think there are some rolls in the freezer,” Chloe said.

They put together a dinner of cheese sandwiches and lentil soup and ate it at the kitchen table.

“We’re nuts to be here,” Daria said. She was thinking ahead. How would they know if the sea came up too high? Should they stay upstairs, just in case? She had faith in the Sea Shanty’s construction and foundation, yet she could still remember how the Trumps’ cottage had looked as it floated out to sea. That had been a winter storm, she kidded herself. This summer hurricane could simply not be that bad.

They had just finished washing and drying the dishes, when the lights nickered twice, then went off, plunging them into darkness.

Daria felt around on the counter until her hands landed on the flashlight, and she turned it on.

“Wherever Shelly is, she’s going to be terrified,” she said.

“Well, then maybe the next time she won’t be this foolish.” Chloe’s words sounded harsher than the tone of her voice. Daria knew she was as worried about Shelly as she was.

“Where did you put the lantern?” Rory asked.

“In the living room,” Daria said.

“Let’s all go in there. That’s where the radio is.”

In the living room, they lit the lantern and a couple of candles.

Chloe sat on the couch, and Rory took a seat in the chair next to the radio, but Daria stood by one of the windows, trying to see outside through the cracks in the storm shutters. She wished they had heard something from Don about finding Shelly at St. Esther’s. No news was bad news.

“Sit down, Daria,” Chloe said.

“There’s nothing we can do to help Shelly at this point.”

Daria sat down in a chair. Chloe was right. Worrying was not going to help.

Thunder began rumbling above the cottage, and flashes of lightning pierced the cracks in the shutters. They listened to the radio for a while through the static, but it soon seemed pointless. They were closer to the hurricane than any of the newscasters, and they turned off the radio and simply sat, listening to the storm.

The atmosphere inside the Sea Shanty grew strange. Despite the angry sounds outside the cottage, the breathless warmth inside was rare and, somehow, wonderful. Flames from the candles pierced the darkness, and despite her concern for Shelly, Daria felt her body begin to uncoil and relax.

“I’m thinking about leaving my order,” Chloe said suddenly.

Her voice sounded alien and disembodied in the peculiar air of the living room, and Daria didn’t understand.

“You mean… you’d join another order?” she asked.

“No, I wouldn’t go anywhere else,” Chloe said slowly.

“I’m saying, I would no longer be a nun. I’d ask to be dispensed from my vows.” “Chloe.” Daria was stunned. “I thought you loved what you do. I thought you loved being a nun.”

“Oh, I have. I truly have. But…! don’t think I can continue this way.”

“What way?” Daria asked.

Chloe studied the glow of the lantern, as if mesmerized.

“Sean…” She hesitated, then started again.

“Sean took his life in a misguided attempt to try to save me from temptation.”

“I don’t understand.” Daria wasn’t certain she wanted to understand.

“I’ve always had difficulty with my vow of chastity,” Chloe said bluntly.

“Poverty was no problem. Obedience was no problem.” She shook her head.

“But I’ve always had a hard time denying that part of myself. That sensual, sexual part. When I was in the convent, in my early days as a sister, I’d sometimes wake up in the morning and realize that I’d had an orgasm in my sleep, during a dream, perhaps, and I’d berate myself over it. What was wrong with me, I thought, that even though my days were filled with pure thoughts, that wretched… carnal part of me still came out at night, when I couldn’t control it.

I’d beat myself up over it. But then”-Chloe looked at Daria ” —then I began to think that my distress over feeling that way was ridiculous. I had done nothing wrong. What I was feeling stemmed from a normal, natural God-given part of myself, a part I was trying to deny existed. But it did exist. And I couldn’t make myself believe any longer that there was something wrong with that. “

Daria couldn’t speak. She had never heard Chloe talk so openly about sexual feelings. About anyone’s sexual feelings, much less her own.

She’d thought that Chloe simply did not have those longings, that she was above them somehow. She’d been wrong. Chloe was nearly forty, and had denied that part of herself all these years. The realization brought tears to Daria’s eyes, and she could feel her sister’s pain from across the room. “What did you mean when you said that Sean was trying to save you from temptation?” Rory had the courage to ask.

Chloe stared at the lantern. The thunder had receded into the distance, and only her voice filled the darkness.

“He killed himself to save me,” she said.

“No one knows this, but it’s time I said it out loud.” She let out a long sigh. Her hands were folded in her lap.

“Sean and I were lovers,” she said.

“Oh, Chloe,” Daria said.

“It started years ago,” Chloe said.

“I would see him when I came here in the summer, and in those early years, I talked to him about what it was like for me, being a nun. We talked about our vows of celibacy and chastity and how hard it was to honor them. He had as much trouble with them as I did, and that reassured me. But the more we talked about it, the more we were drawn to each other.”

Chloe’s voice suddenly broke, and Daria moved to the sofa and put her hand over her sister’s.

“I’d reached the point where I felt it was not so terrible to break that vow,” Chloe continued.

“I felt angry with the Church for imposing it so rigidly. It was a law made by man, not by God. I was able to rationalize that someone could be devoted to religious life and still be able to give and receive love with a partner at the same time. I still believe that. Completely. And so I felt comfortable about what we were doing. But for Sean, it wasn’t that simple, and so a few years ago, we stopped the physical part of our relationship. He had been in turmoil over it, and I didn’t want him to suffer any longer.”

Chloe’s voice broke again, and this time she withdrew her hands from beneath Daria’s to bury her head in them. Daria stroked her back. She looked across the room at Rory, whose face was somber in the light from the lantern.

Chloe raised her head again. “I was careful not to push him,” she said.

“I tried to be… sexless, around him. And it worked, at least until this summer. I don’t think it was anything I did, in particular, but we were drawn to each other, very strongly, and then the intimacy started up again.” Chloe wept openly now.

“Sean was torturing himself,” she said.

“He called himself a sinner—I hate that word!—and he thought he was tempting me into joining him in that sin.

He thought he was responsible for my downfall. That’s what he called it, although I don’t agree. I tried to dissuade him from thinking that way, but obviously I wasn’t successful. ” Chloe’s shoulders trembled with her tears, and Daria tightened her arm around her.

“I miss him so much,” Chloe said.

“I’m so sorry, Chloe,” Daria said.

“And I’m sorry you’ve had to keep this all to yourself.” She was worried about Chloe, not just because of what she’d revealed, but because she feared that her sister would come to regret having spoken so openly. She knew Chloe’s confession would never have been given without the protection of darkness and the peculiar atmosphere of the night.

Chloe drew a deep breath, then seemed to pull herself together. “I have a lot of soul-searching to do in the next few weeks,” she said.

“A lot of praying to do. I can’t bear the thought of no longer being a nun, but at the same time, I can’t live with the restrictions… and I can’t live with what those restrictions did to Sean.”

“How can I help?” Daria asked.

Chloe nearly smiled.

“Just be patient with my… preoccupation,” she said. Then she suddenly pressed her hands to her temples.

“I can’t believe I told you all of this,” she said. She looked embarrassed.

“I’m sorry I dumped so much on the two of you.”

“I’m glad you could, Chloe,” Rory said, and Daria was touched by the tenderness in his voice.

Chloe looked at Rory.

“I apologize for blowing up at you the other day when you suggested Sean’s death might have something to do with your conversation with him,” she said.

“I was in a lot of pain then. I shouldn’t have taken it out on you.”

“And I shouldn’t have talked to you about it right after he died,” Rory said.

“I knew you were grieving. I just didn’t realize to what extent.”

“I want to go upstairs,” Chloe said, suddenly hugging her arms across her chest. “I just want to sleep through the rest of the storm. I want to wake up in the morning and find Shelly…” Her voice broke yet again.

“I want to find her home and safe.”

“I know,” Daria said, squeezing her shoulder.

“We’ll find her in the morning, once the storm has passed.”

Chloe got to her feet, and Daria handed her one of the flashlights.

“Take this with you,” she said.

She and Rory were quiet as Chloe climbed the stairs. It was a few minutes more before Daria found her voice.

“I’m in shock,” she said in a near whisper.

“It’s very sad,” Rory said.

They were quiet for another minute, still trying to absorb all they had heard, when a sudden loud crack of thunder made them both jump.

Daria drew her feet into the couch and wrapped her arms tightly around her legs.

“God, Rory,” she said.

“Where is Shelly?”

IVain pounded against the roof and battered the plywood covering the windows. It was scary to be in a stilt house right on the bay with this storm raging outside, but Shelly was safe in Andy’s arms. He’d promised her his house could endure anything the weather threw at them, and she believed him. She always believed him.

They had made love in the pitch-black darkness, the thunder cracking through the sky outside, and now they were nestled together beneath the coverlet on Andy’s bed. They were nearly alone on the bay. Andy’s foolhardy nextdoor neighbors had refused to evacuate as well, but she guessed that these two houses were probably the only ones occupied on this stretch of water.

Andy kissed her temple.

“You know we’ll have to tell Daria soon,” he said.

Shelly stiffened against him. She had taken the pregnancy test just that morning, and the results were positive. It was no surprise to her, but now she had to face reality.

“I’m afraid to tell her,” she said.

“I know, but we have to,” Andy said.

“We really should have told her long ago.”

“She’ll try to break us up,” Shelly said.

“That’s what she’s always done before.” “Well, this time is different. First of all, she likes me and she didn’t like those other guys you were seeing. Second of all, this time there’s a baby involved.”

“She’ll probably make me have an abortion.”

“She can’t make you do anything.”

Shelly snuggled closer to Andy. It felt so good to know he would stick by her. She would not be battling Daria alone.

“Daria is the best, most wonderful sister in the world, but she’s never let me live my own life.”

“She’s never let herself live her own life, either,” Andy said.

Shelly raised her head to look at him, but it was too dark to see his face. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, she’s always had to look out for your welfare. She’s always put you first.”

Shelly shut her eyes and let her head fall to Andy’s shoulder again.

She knew that was the truth, but it hurt to think about it, to think about the sacrifices Daria had made for her. Even right this minute, she was causing problems for Daria. She knew that Daria had not evacuated the Outer Banks when she should have. She’d made Andy drive by the cul-de-sac to see if Daria and Chloe had left, and she was upset to learn they had not. It was because of her. They’d been all set to leave, but they’d stayed behind for her, even though she’d left that note telling them to go.

“I’m always messing up Daria’s life,” she said.

“But I just couldn’t leave.”

“I know,” Andy said. He’d been more than willing to ride out the storm with her. Andy was like that. He would do anything for her.

“Did you hear that?” Andy asked. He raised his head to listen. All Shelly could hear was the sound of the hurricane battering the house.

Then suddenly she heard someone yelling. Pounding on Andy’s back door, calling Andy’s name.

Andy got out of bed and pulled on his shorts. He ran into the kitchen as Shelly dressed. By the time she got into the kitchen, Andy was pulling open the back door, and his neighbor, Jim, nearly fell into the room.

“We need help!” Jim said. He wore a yellow slicker, and water poured from it onto Andy’s kitchen floor.

“They’re stuck! They’re trapped.”

“Slow down,” Andy said.

“What do you mean? Who’s” — “The boat turned over,” Jim said. He tried to look through Andy’s kitchen window, but plywood blocked his view.

“I’d tied it to the pier,” he said, “but when the water rose and the wind picked up, it looked like it was coming loose. So me and Julie went out there to tie it tighter, and we didn’t realize Jack was right behind us. The boat flipped onto the pier, and Jack and Julie are underneath it.”

“Oh, God.” Shelly covered her mouth with her hand, picturing Jim and Julie’s adorable five-year-old son trapped beneath the boat. She started toward the door, but Andy grabbed her arm.

“Get the slicker out of the front closet first,” he said.

“I’ll meet you out there.”

Shelly did as she was told, then ran outside to the pier, the wind nearly blowing her off her feet. The boat was barely visible, a great, beached whale on the pier, but she could hear the screams of the little boy beneath it. There was no sound, though, from Julie, at least none that could be heard above the howling of the wind.

“Help us. Shelly,” Andy said.

She could barely see the shapes of Andy and Jim standing at either end of the boat, trying to lift it off its victims. She ran to the side of the boat and tried to slip her hands beneath the rim. She could not budge it, not an inch, and her hands slipped off the wet fiberglass again and again. From beneath the boat, she heard Jack’s screams turn to whimpers, and she started to cry herself.

Andy ran toward her, grabbing her arm again.

“Go into the house and call 911,” he shouted.

“I’m going to go get Daria.”

Then Daria will know, she thought, but they had no choice. They needed help, and they needed it right away. She fought against the wind and rain into the house as Andy ran up the road toward his van, where he’d parked it away from the threat of the sound.

In the kitchen. Shelly tore the receiver from the wall phone. Her fingers shook so violently that she could barely press the numbers, and it wasn’t until she’d tried dialing them for the third time that she realized why her call wasn’t going through: the phone line was dead.

i f What’s that? ” Daria started at the thumping sound. She and Rory were still talking in the Sea Shanty living room, but the sudden pounding from the front porch had interrupted them. Standing up, she walked toward the door.

“Maybe one of the shutters came loose,” Rory suggested, following her.

Daria saw someone open the screen door and step onto the porch. She thought it might be Don Tibbie with news about Shelly, and her heart picked up its pace. Only when the man burst through the livingroom door did she realize it was Andy. He was shiftless; his long hair was loose and soaking wet, and water streamed over his face.

“Andy!” she said, alarmed by the sight of him.

“What are you doing here? Why didn’t you evacuate?”

“I need you and Rory.” Andy was winded, gasping for air.

“There was an accident next door to my house. My neighbor’s boat flipped over on the pier and his little boy and wife are trapped beneath it.”

Daria froze. I’m not an EMT anymore, she wanted to say, but knew there was no time for her to surrender to her fears. She ran back into the living room to get her ^j sneakers, crouching to tie them on her feet. “Did you call 9 II?” she asked.

Andy nodded.

“It’s taken care of,” he said.

“Then let’s go.” She grabbed two flashlights, handing one to Rory, then clipped her cell phone to her waistband.

Stepping off the porch was like walking into a wind tunnel.

“What’s the wind speed, do you know?” she asked Andy as they battled their way to his van. He didn’t hear her; the question was swept away by the wind. If the wind was over sixty miles per hour, they would be on their own. Emergency Medical Services wouldn’t send an ambulance into wind that high.

They piled into Andy’s old van, and the wind buffeted the vehicle as he drove out of the cul-de-sac.

“I think the wind is too high for them to send out a rig,” Daria said.

“Do you know what the wind speed” — “Listen, Daria,” Andy interrupted her.

“You need to know that Shelly is at my house.”

What? For a moment, Daria couldn’t speak. Shelly was safe. But how had she ended up at Andy’s?

“She’s at your house?” she asked.

“Why would she go there?”

“Is she all right?” Rory asked.

“She’s fine,” Andy said.

“I left her there to call 911 while I came over here.”

“I don’t understand why Shelly would go to your house,” Daria said.

“I’m sorry she put you in the position of having to… hide her, Andy.”

Andy glanced at her, then returned his gaze quickly to the road.

“It’s not like that,” he said.

“What do you mean?” Daria asked.

She felt Rory’s hand on her shoulder.

“We can talk about that later,” he said.

“The important thing right now is that Shelly is safe.” Daria had the feeling that Rory understood something she was not ready—or willing—to understand herself.

They pulled into Andy’s driveway, and Daria looked toward the pier.

Something was going on out there, she could see the light from a flashlight, but other than that she couldn’t tell where the pier ended and the sound began.

“Can you pull your car closer to the pier?” Rory asked Andy.

“Shine your lights on it?”

Andy drove over the packed sand that formed his yard, until his headlights illuminated the pier and they could see the drama playing out on its surface. The boat was upside down and fully on the pier.

Two people stood next to the boat, waving frantically at them, and although she could not see them clearly, Daria guessed one of them was Shelly.

She and Rory followed Andy out to the pier, trying to run, although it was like running through mud. It wasn’t just the wind that made Daria’s legs feel like lead; it was fear. She was afraid of what she would find on the pier. She used to meet emergencies with courage, confidence and a rush of adrenaline. The adrenaline was still there, but she’d left the courage and confidence at the scene of that April plane crash.

“The phone was dead,” Shelly screamed the words at Andy.

“I couldn’t call 9 II.”

Daria pulled her cell phone from her waistband and pressed it into Shelly’s hand.

“Go in the house and call,” she instructed her, trying to make her voice heard over the wind.

“Tell them we need to extricate two people from beneath a twenty-two-footer.” She knew they would be lucky to get anyone to respond to this call, much less the equipment they might need to extricate the victims.

“No, don’t go!” Andy’s neighbor yelled at Shelly.

“We need all of us to lift the boat.”

Daria gave her sister a little shove.

“Go, Shelly,” she said. Then she turned to the neighbor, whose dark hair was plastered to his head, his face creased with fear and worry.

“We can’t lift the boat until I assess their injuries,” she said.

“We could make things worse.” She shined her flashlight into the water. It was lower than normal. Ts the sound on its way down or up? ” she asked Andy. She knew

Stepping off the porch was like walking into a wind tunnel.

“What’s the wind speed, do you know?” she asked Andy as they battled their way to his van. He didn’t hear her; the question was swept away by the wind. If the wind was over sixty miles per hour, they would be on their own. Emergency Medical Services wouldn’t send an ambulance into wind that high.

They piled into Andy’s old van, and the wind buffeted the vehicle as he drove out of the cul-de-sac.

“I think the wind is too high for them to send out a rig,” Daria said.

“Do you know what the wind speed” — “Listen, Daria,” Andy interrupted her.

“You need to know that Shelly is at my house.”

What? For a moment, Daria couldn’t speak. Shelly was safe. But how had she ended up at Andy’s?

“She’s at your house?” she asked.

“Why would she go there?”

“Is she all right?” Rory asked.

“She’s fine,” Andy said.

“I left her there to call 911 while I came over here.”

“I don’t understand why Shelly would go to your house,” Daria said.

“I’m sorry she put you in the position of having to… hide her, Andy.”

Andy glanced at her, then returned his gaze quickly to the road.

“It’s not like that,” he said.

“What do you mean?” Daria asked.

She felt Rory’s hand on her shoulder.

“We can talk about that later,” he said.

“The important thing right now is that Shelly is safe.” Daria had the feeling that Rory understood something she was not ready—or willing—to understand herself.

They pulled into Andy’s driveway, and Daria looked toward the pier.

Something was going on out there, she could see the light from a flashlight, but other than that she couldn’t tell where the pier ended and the sound began.

“Can you pull your car closer to the pier?” Rory asked Andy.

“Shine your lights on it?”

Andy drove over the packed sand that formed his yard, until his headlights illuminated the pier and they could see the drama playing out on its surface. The boat was upside down and fully on the pier.

Two people stood next to the boat, waving frantically at them, and although she could not see them clearly, Daria guessed one of them was Shelly.

She and Rory followed Andy out to the pier, trying to run, although it was like running through mud. It wasn’t just the wind that made Daria’s legs feel like lead; it was fear. She was afraid of what she would find on the pier. She used to meet emergencies with courage, confidence and a rush of adrenaline. The adrenaline was still there, but she’d left the courage and confidence at the scene of that April plane crash.

“The phone was dead,” Shelly screamed the words at Andy.

“I couldn’t call 9 II.”

Daria pulled her cell phone from her waistband and pressed it into Shelly’s hand.

“Go in the house and call,” she instructed her, trying to make her voice heard over the wind.

“Tell them we need to extricate two people from beneath a twenty-two-footer.” She knew they would be lucky to get anyone to respond to this call, much less the equipment they might need to extricate the victims.

“No, don’t go!” Andy’s neighbor yelled at Shelly.

“We need all of us to lift the boat.”

Daria gave her sister a little shove.

“Go, Shelly,” she said. Then she turned to the neighbor, whose dark hair was plastered to his head, his face creased with fear and worry.

“We can’t lift the boat until I assess their injuries,” she said.

“We could make things worse.” She shined her flashlight into the water. It was lower than normal.

“Is the sound on its way down or up?” she asked Andy. She knew that during the first hours of hurricane, the sound could nearly empty itself, only to come back with a ferocious roar and serious flooding.

“Up,” Andy said.

“That’s what flipped the boat,” the man said.

The rising tide could be either good or bad, Daria thought. The higher water might lift the boat from the pier and free its captives, but it could also make their work far more difficult.

She dropped to her knees, shining her flashlight beneath the boat. The tiny boy, pinned beneath the center of the boat, let out a wail when the light hit his eyes, and he reached toward Daria with his one free hand. She slipped her fingers into his.

“Where do you hurt?” she asked him.

The boy only cried in response to her question. It looked as though the frame of the short, angled front windows was across his chest, probably breaking some of his ribs, and she could see a gash on his thigh. A small amount of blood had pooled on the pier beneath his leg.

She squeezed the boy’s hand.

“I’ll be right back, honey,” she said.

“I

want to check on your mommy. “

She crawled on her stomach toward the stem of the boat where the woman was pinned. She could not quite reach her, but managed to get her arm under the boat far enough to touch her fingers to the woman’s throat, where she felt for a pulse. Beneath her fingertips, the pulse was faint and irregular, but at least the woman was still alive. How she was pinned, though, Daria couldn’t determine. If her legs were crushed and they raised the boat from her body, she could die within seconds.

But they had little choice at this point. They had to lift this boat, or both the woman and her son would perish beneath it.

“They’re both alive,” she shouted as she slipped from beneath the boat and raised herself to her knees. Rain whipped against her face, and when she spoke, the three men leaned close to hear her.

“You guys try to lift the boat enough for me to pull them out, okay?” She saw Shelly running from the house toward them.

“What did they say?” Daria called to her.

“It’s too windy, they said. If it dies down, they’ll send an ambulance.”

“What do they mean, it’s too windy?” Andy’s neighbor said.

“They’ve got to send one!”

“Right now,” Daria said to the man, “put your energy and your anger and your fear into lifting this boat. Come on. Shelly. You can help, too.”

She had seen it before, even in herself, that superhuman strength that coursed through otherwise normal men and women in the moment of crisis, so she wasn’t surprised when the three men and Shelly were able to lift the boat by a few inches. Daria dived beneath it, grabbing the little boy and pulling him clear of the boat. “Can you hold it up another minute?” she asked as she scrambled toward the stem for the woman.

“It’s coming down!” Andy yelled.

“Get out, Daria. Get out!”

Daria quickly retreated from beneath the boat just as it rocked back onto the pier. It caught her right index finger, and she stifled a scream. Her finger would be badly swollen and bruised within minutes, but that injury was nothing compared to what this boy and his mother were enduring.

She felt torn between attending to the boy and trying to extricate the mother, but the light of her flashlight on the boy’s pale face told her how desperately he needed her attention. The pressure of the boat must have been serving as a tourniquet of sorts, and now the blood gushed freely from his leg.

“Shelly!” She tore off her windbreaker.

“Come here and press this against his leg.”

Shelly knelt next to the boy, her hands over the windbreaker.

“Press hard,” Daria said.

“Really hard. It’s the only way to stop the bleeding.” She turned back to the boat and positioned herself near the stem.

Rory grabbed her shoulder.

“You can’t go under there again,” he said.

“It’s too hard for us to hold the boat up. You nearly got crushed last time.”

“You just have to hold it up longer.” She dropped to her knees and realized she was kneeling in several inches of water. Panic coursed through her. The sound was rising far too quickly for comfort.

“On the count of three!” Rory shouted.

“One … two… three.” Daria saw the hull of the boat rise up in front of her. She dived beneath it, grasping the woman’s clothing with her hands and tugging backward, but suddenly the water poured over the woman’s face, trapping her.

Drowning her. Daria found herself in the middle of one of her nightmares. She could not truly see the woman’s face, could not see brown eyes or a widow’s peak, but in her mind the woman became the young, dying pilot. Thrashing with her arms beneath the boat, she reached for the woman’s clothing once more. Water splashed into her own face just as she was taking a breath, and she had to let go, choking and coughing. Someone’s hands were on her, pulling her out from beneath the boat, and she gagged as she struggled to catch her breath. In an instant, a wall of water swept onto the pier, lifting the boat, and Daria saw Rory plow beneath the stem, pulling the unconscious woman to safety before she was dragged into the sound.

“Get them off the pier!” Andy said, and Daria saw that Shelly was already doing that, carrying the little boy in her arms, through the rising water on the pier, to the driveway and away from the sound.

Daria struggled to get to her feet, and could only do so with Andy’s help. Rory or the husband, she wasn’t sure who, carried the woman to the driveway. Daria ran after them, moving as quickly as she could through the water on tremulous legs. She knelt down next to the woman, feeling again for a pulse.

“There’s blood everywhere, Daria,” Shelly called to her from the side of the little boy.

“I’m pressing hard, but it’s not stopping.”

The woman had no pulse, nor was she breathing.

“I know CPR,” Rory said. He was suddenly kneeling on the other side of the woman.

“You take care of the boy.”

Daria called to Andy.

“Do the compressions, Andy,” she said. Andy had never been put to the test, but she knew he could do it; she’d taught his CPR class.

“Rory can do the breathing.”

She ran over to the boy, who was unconscious, but breathing. Shelly’s hands were covered with his blood, and Daria said a quick prayer that the boy had no blood-borne diseases.

“We need to get them to the trauma center,” she said. She was wondering exactly how they were going to do that when she heard the sweet call of a siren somewhere on the other side of the wind.

“Thank God,” she said out loud.

“I hear a siren!” Andy’s neighbor said. He was sitting near the boy, looking dazed and helpless.

Within a minute, the ambulance pulled into the driveway. It was staffed by only one paramedic—Mike—and an EMT, who was driving. But it didn’t take long before they had the woman intubated and the boy bandaged, and both of them, placed in the ambulance.

“Rory and I will go with them in the rig,” Daria said to Andy.

“You take Shelly back to the Sea Shanty, please.”

“No,” Shelly said.

“I’m staying with Andy.”

Daria turned to Andy.

“What’s going on?” she asked.

“There’s no time to talk about it now,” Andy said. He was pushing her toward the ambulance, but Daria held her ground.

“Tell me,” she said. “Shelly and I have been together for a couple of years,” Andy said.

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. She was afraid you’d try to break us up if you knew. Okay? Now get in the ambulance.”

Daria backed away from Andy, stunned.

“Daria?” Mike called from inside the rig.

“Let’s go!”

With one more glance at her sister, she turned and ran toward the ambulance.

JUaria walked out of the treatment room in the nearly empty trauma center. Rory, who had been waiting on one of the chairs in the hallway, stood when he saw her.

“They’re going to be all right,” Daria said, walking toward him.

“Both of them?” Rory asked.

Daria nodded. The woman had not looked good in the ambulance, but after two hours in the treatment room she was breathing on her own and alert enough to ask about her son.

“Thank God,” Rory said, and he drew her into a hug. Daria closed her eyes, resting her cheek against his shoulder for a moment before pulling away.

“You’re soaking wet.” She brushed her hand over the damp front of his shirt.

“How can you tell?” he asked.

“So are you.”

Her wet clothes clung to her body, but she had not given them a thought until this moment. Suddenly, she felt cold.

“There’s nothing more we can do here,” she said.

“Woody—the EMT—said he can give us a ride home.”

She sat in the passenger seat of Woody’s car, barely noticing how the wind pushed them around on the deserted roads. Shingles and twigs flew against the car’s windows, and she didn’t even blink when they hit the glass in front of her face. Woody and Rory were talking, about the storm or the trauma center; Daria didn’t know or care. She felt shaky and strange. She still hadn’t absorbed all that Chloe had told them earlier that evening—that conversation seemed like a bad dream from weeks ago. And then there was the revelation about Shelly and Andy. She did not truly know either of her sisters.

Woody let them out in front of the Sea Shanty. At least two of the porch screens were torn, flapping wildly in the wind like a trapped bird.

Rory leaned close to her ear.

“I should check on Poll-Rory while I’m out here,” he said.

Daria stared at the front door of the dark Sea Shanty, not wanting to go inside, not ready to explain the past few hours to Chloe, if she happened to be up.

“I’ll go with you,” she said, shouting above the wind.

Rory nodded. He put his arm around her and they plowed their way across the cul-de-sac.

Inside Poll-Rory, the darkness was disorienting, and the wind groaned and whistled. Daria stood in the living room, feeling lost and cold.

The storm had brought frigid air with it, and she shivered in her wet clothes. Her sore finger throbbed. Rory tried the switch for the overhead light, but the power was, of course, still out.

He shined his flashlight toward a cupboard at the rear of the room.

“I

have a lantern in that closet,” he said.

“And matches in the drawer in the kitchen. Why don’t you take care of that, and I’ll find us some dry clothes to change into.”

He disappeared into one of the bedrooms, and, by the weak, yellow beam of her own flashlight, Daria found the lantern, checked the oil and lit the wick. In a moment, Rory reappeared. He handed her a bundle of soft fabric and pointed toward another bedroom.

“Why don’t you change in there. There are towels in the bathroom.”

The wet clothes stuck to her body like a thin layer of cold plaster.

She peeled them off, underwear and all, and hung them over the shower rod in the bathroom. Rory had given her one of his sweatshirts, either navy blue or black, she couldn’t tell which in the fading glow from her flashlight, along with gray sweatpants that were way too large for her. She put the clothes on over her bare skin, tried unsuccessfully to run her fingers through her wet hair and walked into the living room.

Rory, too, was in sweatpants and sweatshirt, standing in the middle of the room, holding the lantern. He smiled at her.

“Feel better?” he asked.

“Physically,” she said, sitting down on the sofa.

“But I’m… still pretty shaken up by everything that happened tonight.”

“How about something to drink?” he asked.

“Power’s out, so I can’t make anything hot. There’s iced tea. Wine. Beer.”

“Wine.” She rested her head against the back of the sofa and closed her eyes while he carried the lantern into the kitchen. A moment later, he handed her a glass of wine, and she took several sips from it before placing it on the coffee table.

Setting the hurricane lantern next to her glass, Rory sat down near Daria on the sofa. He looked toward the boarded windows, which rattled in the wind.

“I have a feeling there’s still more to come,” he said.

“I wonder what part of the storm is over us now?”

“We’ve been spared, so far,” Daria said.

“Let’s hope it continues that way. Iwish Shelly weren’t right there on the sound, though.” She looked at Rory.

“Why have my sisters kept their lives secret from me?” she asked, hoping Rory didn’t hear the catch in her voice.

“I

thought I knew both of them so well. I thought I knew everything about them, that they loved me and trusted me and knew I’d be there for them, no matter what. I failed them somehow. And I feel. betrayed and hurt and just plain confused. “

Rory rested his arm across the back of the sofa and touched her shoulder with his fingertips.

“Well, Chloe could hardly tell anyone what was going on with her and Sean Macy,” he said.

“And Shelly…” He looked away from her, toward the dark ceiling, as if this was difficult for him to say.

“I remember you telling me that you were pleased she wasn’t involved with anyone. And you told me you put an end to a couple of relationships she’d had. So, I don’t think it’s surprising that she would keep this relationship from you.”

Daria lowered her head. She wasn’t certain what she would have done had she known about Shelly and Andy. While she didn’t think she would have tried to end their relationship, she no doubt would have intervened to make sure that Andy treated her sister well.

“I thought Shelly was content with her life,” she said.

“I thought she wanted nothing more than long walks on the beach and stringing shells for her necklaces.” How could she have wanted so little for her sister?

“I

thought I was giving her everything she needed. I didn’t know she needed more than what I could provide. I bet she was actually seeing Andy some of those times she told me she was out walking. “

“Well,” Rory said, “from the little I saw of them together tonight, it seems that Andy is taking good care of her.”

Images from the pier suddenly flashed into her mind:

the little boy reaching for her hand from beneath the boat;

the woman’s face as the water threatened to pull her under.

“I’m glad you went with me tonight,” she said.

“That mother and son wouldn’t have survived without your help. I think, somehow, we were meant not to evacuate. If we had, they would be dead.”

“Whew,” Rory said with a shudder.

“I hadn’t thought of that.” His fingers touched her shoulder again, lingering there a moment, and she wanted to move closer to him to receive more.

“I thought you were incredible,” he said.

“I know you must have been afraid, since you haven’t worked as an EMT for a while, but you sure didn’t let it show. I couldn’t believe the way you just dived under that boat to get the little boy. You weren’t even thinking about yourself. was more afraid for you than you were for yourself, I think. Then when the water washed over the woman…” He shook his head.p>

“I thought it was going to drag all of us out into the sound.”

Daria smoothed a tear away from her cheek with her fingertips, and Rory must have known she was crying, because he moved closer, putting his arm around her shoulders.

“Did it remind you of… Grace’s daughter?” he asked.

“Seeing the woman go underwater like that, when she was trapped by the boat?”

It touched her deeply that he was thinking of that, that he understood so well. Lowering her face to her hands, she let the tears come.

Rory stroked her hair, letting her cry for a minute, then pulled her into his arms. She felt his warmth and strength, the seductive comfort of his embrace. They were quiet for a moment and, as her tears abated, she became aware of the pressure of his arm against the side of her breast, bare beneath the sweatshirt. The sensation was delicious and provocative, and before she had time to think, she lifted her head from his shoulder and found his mouth with her lips. She felt his surprise; for a second, his body stiffened. Then he reached between their faces with his fingers, drawing back from her to look into her eyes, to touch her lips. In a moment, he was kissing her again, this time with a fever she had not expected. Impulsively, she straddled him, catching her breath when she felt his erection, already hard, already teasing her, from beneath the layers of soft fabric that separated them. His hands stroked her back through the sweatshirt, and she was the one to pull the shirt over her head and drop it to the floor. But he needed no more invitation than that to take over—to lay her down on the sofa, finish undressing her, cover her body with heated kisses. He slipped inside her and rocked with her in the lantern-lit darkness, until her body burned and the howling of the wind was forgotten.

She lay next to him, naked, afterward, and he reached over her to lift pieces of their clothing from the floor and lay them across their bodies, rubbing her arms and back through the fabric to warm her.

Brimming with love for him, she turned her head to press her lips against the warm, quick pulse in his neck.

“Do you realize how long we’ve known each other?” Rory asked.

“I think I’ve known you longer than anyone else, outside my family.”

Daria smiled. “Who would have guessed back when we were kids, pulling crabs out of the bay, that we’d be lying here like this right now?” she said.

“I admired you back then, just like I admire you now. You were so strong and self-confident. I always felt as though I was in competition with you, even though you were younger than me. You were the best at everything. You caught more crabs, you could cast your fishing line the farthest, you could wallop anybody at volleyball and build the highest sand castle on the beach. You were something else.”

He gave her a squeeze.

“You still are.”

She felt his lips press against her temple.

“I had an agonizing crush on you back then,” she said.

Rory laughed. “You did?” he asked. “I had no idea. 7 had a crush on Chloe.”

“Chloe?” Daria repeated in astonishment.

“She was so much older than you.”

“Yeah, well, I had big dreams,” Rory said.

“And now she’s a nun.”

Daria laughed.

“I have to admit, she was never really my type,” he said.

“She was just such a… knockout. It was the yearning of an adolescent male for the best-looking girl on the beach.”

Daria was quiet, thinking that some things never changed. Rory was still attracted to the best-looking girl on the beach: Grace. But she didn’t want to think about Grace just then. Surely what Rory now knew about Grace, not to mention what had just passed between him and Daria, had changed his feelings.

Rory suddenly squeezed her tight, letting out a long sigh.

“I hope what we just did wasn’t a mistake,” he said.

The comfortable warmth she’d been feeling turned suddenly to ice. What did he mean? It was anything but a mistake to her.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

“I’m not sure what got into me.”

“I kissed you first,” Daria said.

“Remember?”

“Well, I’m sure that we were both just responding to what an emotional night it’s been. Let’s not let it harm our friendship. Okay?”

The pain she felt was physical, in her throat, in her chest. He didn’t have a clue what this had meant to her. He could rationalize it all away. She sat up and pulled on the sweatshirt and pants, feeling his eyes on her, his hand on her back, and she wondered if he felt the icy tension coursing through her muscles.

“Well, Rory,” she said, standing up.

“This may have been nothing more than a response to an emotional evening for you, but for me it was something much more. I’m in love with you. Haven’t you figured that out yet?” Without waiting for his response, she turned and left the cottage, running as fast as the wind would let her across the cul-de-sac to the Sea Shanty.

(jfrace stared out the motel window, and her eyes ached from trying to pierce the darkness and the rain. Where was Rory? Where was Shelly?

She was certain she’d heard Rory correctly when he’d told her the name of the motel where they were planning to wait out the storm. She’d checked and rechecked the name and number. Every time a new car pulled into the motel parking lot, she followed it with her eyes, hoping, hoping. She wondered if some how she had missed them, and they were in the motel, after all, maybe just down the hall from her. She would have loved to call the front desk and ask if Rory Taylor ^ had kept his reservation, but she couldn’t. She wasn’t alone in the room.

“Do you want any of this?” Eddie’s voice came from behind her, where he was sitting on the bed. She glanced over her shoulder at him. He was eating chow mein from a carton.

“No, thanks.” She returned her gaze to the window, although by now she knew her vigilance was futile. For one reason or another, they weren’t coming. Dear God, let Shelly be all right.

Eddie finished the chow mein and put the empty carton on the nightstand. 5:

“Grace,” he said, “you’ve been standing at that win dow all night. Who are you waiting for?” He spoke so softly that she barely heard him above the sound of the storm. There was no accusation in his voice, only the gentle question.

“No one.” She walked over to the chair at the side of the room and sat down, giving up.

“Just watching the storm,” she said. It had shocked her to discover that Eddie had followed her all the way from Rodanthe.

She’d been angry at first to find him at her motel-room door, but now that she realized Shelly and Rory weren’t coming, she was glad she was not alone. Eddie had said nothing about why she had picked a motel so far from Rodanthe, and she’d offered no explanation. Now he shifted his position on the bed, and she knew that he wanted to talk.

He leaned toward her.

“I love you. Grace,” he said.

“And I need to know what’s going on. I’m worried about you. If it’s another medical problem, we’ll work it out. Please let me in on what’s troubling you.”

He was pleading with her, and she felt cruel.

“It’s more than Pam,” Eddie said. “It has to be. Why are you so secretive these days?

Where are you spending so much of your time? “

Most men might guess that a woman so preoccupied, so absent from home, was having an affair; but Eddie knew better. He knew she had nothing to give anyone right now.

“I’m all right, Eddie,” she said.

“I don’t want to talk about… me, or about anything, really. I just want to go to sleep. And I can’t sleep with you.” Her voice broke on the last word. The thought of lying next to her husband in bed was unbearable. Because she hated him. And because she loved him.

“I’ll ask them to bring in a cot,” he said, reaching for the phone.

After a silence-filled half hour, a housekeeper rolled a cot into the room. Grace undressed in the bathroom, and when she returned to the room, Eddie was already beneath the covers on the cot and had turned out the light.

“I love you,” he said once she’d gotten into bed, and

Grace squeezed her eyes shut, pretending the clamor of the storm had swallowed his words before she’d had a chance to hear them.

She tried not to think about anything—not about Shelly or the storm or about Eddie lying nearby. Yet her mind would not cooperate, and the memory of the modeling job in Maui came to her, quick, sharp and unbidden.

She remembered every miserable detail, even the sun-bum. In the mirror above the marble-topped vanity, her shoulders glowed a fiery red. It was a good thing that day had been the final shoot, because her skin would not hold up to another day of Hawaii’s burning sun. But that was not the only reason she was anxious for this job to be over.

She had made great strides in her modeling career, garnering enough attention and positive commentary at the age of seventeen that she’d been hired for this photo shoot in Hawaii, along with three other models from Brad’s agency. It was her big chance, and she’d been thrilled with the opportunity. Right from the start of the trip, though, she knew she was in trouble.

She’d sat with Brad on the plane. It was always that way. The other models would hang out together, while she would be with Brad. The girls were jealous of her relationship with the head of the modeling agency, and they treated her coolly. She’d learned to stick close to the only person who cared about her—Brad. He was kind and tender, and although he told her repeatedly that he was in love with her, he never pressed her for anything more intimate then a warm embrace. Although his restraint confused her, she was grateful for it. She didn’t know how she would refuse someone who had done so much for her.

They had flown first class, of course, and the other models sat near them in the plane. The girls had bantered among themselves, talking openly and loudly about bing ing on sweets and throwing up, about sex and drugs. But the thing that had disturbed Grace most was that Brad had joined in the conversation.

She was shocked to realize that he, too, used cocaine and popped pills. Somehow, he had kept that sickening fact hidden from her, but it was obvious that with these three more experienced models, all of whom seemed to know him well, he felt comfortable showing that side of himself. She’d felt small, scared and alone on the plane, and that feeling had only worsened during the five days in Maui. The only time she’d felt comfortable and confident was in front of the camera’s lens.

She slathered moisturizer over her sunburn and slipped into a short black dress with spaghetti straps for the party Brad was throwing in his suite that evening. She would have preferred to stay in her sumptuous hotel room and read for her last night in Maui, but she knew that part of her success as a model was dependent on her making an appearance at events like this one. She would cut out first chance she got.

By the time she got to Brad’s suite, it seemed that everyone was already high on something, and she felt nearly overcome by her social awkwardness.

“There she is!” Brad said as he moved through the crowd toward her. He held her by the shoulders and kissed her cheek, and she smelled the alcohol on his breath, although she guessed that alcohol was not all he had ingested.

She plastered a smile on her face as Brad moved her through the crowd, his arm around her waist. He introduced her to people and poured her a drink she knew she wouldn’t touch. She interpreted the gaze of the other models as envy and disdain and the stares of the photographers and makeup artists as critical. The suite was smoke-filled;

the music was too loud. She wondered how long she would have to stay.

“Come here,” Brad said, guiding her over to the side of the room.

Joey, one of the photographers, was there.

“How’s my favorite model?” Joey asked. His eyes were glassy.

“Okay,” Grace said. She had thought that Joey was kind of cute. He had long, curly blond hair and pale blue eyes, and she’d felt some attraction to him the day before when he’d taken pictures of her on the beach. But now the glassy-eyed look, the small white speck of chip dip at the corner of his lips, turned her off.

Brad suddenly flattened his hand against her stomach. The pressure was not intense, but the gesture was intimate and took her off guard. She tried to gently remove his hand, but he only laced his fingers between hers and pressed closer to her, kissing her cheek. “Brad,” she said, feigning a laugh as she tried to pull away. She couldn’t budge, though, because Joey was pressing against her from the other side. He leaned over to nuzzle her neck, his blond hair tickling her chin. She was sandwiched between them, unsure how to extricate herself. “Guys.” She managed another weak laugh, as though amused by their attention. The truth was, she felt trapped. She was pinned against the wall by two men who were slobbering on her. Her head throbbed with the loud music and her throat burned from the smoke. She felt betrayed by Brad, who until this moment, had treated her with nothing but respect, but she tolerated their antics until Joey raised his hand to her breast. Instinctively, she flailed against their arms and stepped away from the wall.

Brad quickly took her hand.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” he said, slipping his arm around her waist again.

“Come here,” he said.

“Come with me.”

He walked with her into his bedroom, which was shut off from the party, and she pulled in a breath of clean air.

“It’s better in here, huh?” he asked.

“I’m so out of it tonight, I didn’t realize how bad it was out there.” He took both her hands in his and looked into her eyes.

“Grace,” he said, “you know I love you, don’t you?” The scent of alcohol on his breath was nauseating.

“Yes, I know.” It came out as a whisper. She had a terrible feeling that he was finally going to ask her to sleep with him.

“Listen to what I’m going to tell you. Please. I’m on some medication, for a condition I have,” he said.

“And it makes me… impotent. Do you know what that means?”

“You can’t have sex,” she said.

“That’s right.” His jaw was tight.

“One of the shitty cards life dealt me. So this might sound kind of… kinky to you, but the way I get off is…” He winced, and she thought he looked embarrassed.

“What I’m trying to say is, I want you to have sex with Joey and let me watch.”

She gasped.

“No,” she said.

“You’re crazy.” She started to walk away from him, but he caught her arm.

“I’m begging you, Grace,” he said.

“I barely know Joey,” she said.

“And even if I was in love with him, I still wouldn’t let someone watch.”

“I know, I know. I know you’re not that kind of girl.” He smoothed his hand over her hair.

“Sweet Grace,” he said, and she thought she saw tears in his eyes.

“Please, Grace. I haven’t asked much of you, have

I?

“

He hadn’t. Up until now, he’d been nothing but generous and loving toward her.

“And I’ve done a lot for you. Grace,” he said.

“I’m asking you to do just this one thing for me.”

She tried to remember how cute Joey had looked on the beach the day before, with the sun in his hair, and the way he’d grin when she’d strike just the right pose. She closed her eyes, blocking her most recent image of him: the glassy eyes, the sloppy mouth. She was seventeen. Practically no one her age was still a virgin. Even Bonnie had done it a few times. What could it hurt?

She opened her eyes and looked at Brad.

“All right,” she said.

“But … the lights have to be really dim.”

Brad smiled.

“You’re a good egg,” he said.

“Wait here.”

She sat down on the bed. Her hands were damp and clammy, and she pressed them against her dress to dry them. What was she doing? She thought of all Brad had done for her. He’d paid for her classes. He’d charmed her mother into accepting her modeling. This was not such a huge favor. It was time she knew what it was like to make love to a man, anyhow. This just wasn’t the place—or the way—she’d expected to do it.

In a few minutes. Brad and Joey walked into the room. Neither of them said a word to her. Brad nipped off the lights, leaving just one dresser lamp burning, then sat in a chair in the corner. Joey instantly began unbuttoning his shirt, walking toward her.

She stood up and reached behind her back to unzip her dress, but Joey turned her around with a hand on her shoulder.

“I’ll do that,” he said. He lowered the zipper, then slipped the spaghetti straps from her shoulders. As her dress fell to the floor, Joey pulled back the covers on Brad’s bed. Then he reached behind her back to unfasten her bra, glancing briefly at her bare breasts before lowering her panties.

“Hop in,” he said.

She did as she was told, glad to be covered over. Joey unbuckled his belt, unzipped his pants and lowered them to the floor, along with his shorts. She caught a glimpse of his penis, which looked impossibly huge, as he climbed into the bed next to her. When he kissed her, she shut her eyes, wondering if that speck of dip was still in the corner of his lips.

It lasted only a few minutes. Joey was not rough or mean, but he was mechanical and she felt nothing except fear and humiliation. She yelped when he entered her and gritted her teeth against the pain, praying that he would be quick. He was. When he was finished, he raised himself above her, smiling to the air, not to her. He climbed off her and out of the bed and dressed in silence. As he walked out of the room, Grace turned to look at the chair where Brad had been sitting. It was empty.

She dressed quickly and escaped from the suite without seeing Brad, without even looking for him. Once back in her own room, she took a long bath, too numb even to cry. She was in her robe, ready to get into bed, when someone knocked on her door. She froze.

“Grace?” It was Lucy, one of the other models. Not Brad. Not Joey.

Breathing a sigh of relief, she opened the door a crack, and was surprised by the look of concern on Lucy’s face.

“Are you all right?”

Lucy asked.

Why would she ask her that? Did she know what had happened? Grace felt her cheeks bum.

“I’m fine,” she said.

Lucy folded her arms across her chest.

“You know, you’re one of us now,” she said.

“What do you mean?”

“This is the way Brad pays off his debts,” she said.

“His debts?”

“He owed Joey for the coke. You were the payment.”

“I … don’t understand,” she said, although she was afraid she did.

“Yes, you do, honey,” Lucy said.

“And you’d better get used to it.”

Humiliated and enraged, Grace quit the agency the moment she returned home. Facing her mother with that decision was almost worse than facing Brad. Her mother was furious, and Grace did not dare tell her what had prompted her leaving. Both her mother and Brad tried to coerce her into sticking with her fledgling career, but she ignored their pleas.

Within a few months, she knew she was pregnant with the photographer’s child. Bonnie was the only person she told. She began to dress in loose, sloppy clothes, and everyone wondered what had happened to the beautiful, stylish model. But Grace no longer cared about her modeling career. She had something better: the child who was growing inside her. Finally, someone to love who would love her back, for herself, and who would not want anything more from her than that.

J-Jaria pried the molding from around one of the screens, while Chloe mopped seawater from the porch floor. They had not spoken yet that morning, not about anything important at any rate, as though they both knew they still needed time to shift from the emotions of the night before into this bright, new day. Their energy went into the physical work of cleaning away debris from around the Sea Shanty and opening the storm shutters. Daria had told Chloe about the rescue the night before at Andy’s cottage, and she’d told her that Shelly was there and safe. But she’d said no more about it—and she’d said nothing about her time with Rory.

Across the street, she could see Rory removing the sheets of plywood from his windows. He waved. She waved back, a tightness in her throat.

Chloe finished her mopping. She set the mop in the bucket and put her hands on her hips.

“How about a break?” she said to Daria. They had been working nonstop since dawn.

“Good idea,” Daria said.

“You want some lemonade?”

Chloe nodded, and Daria walked into the kitchen for the drinks. She was going to have to tell Chloe about Shelly. Now.

They moved the picnic table back onto the porch, and Daria set the glasses of lemonade down on it and took a seat. She was surprised when Chloe sat next to her and put an arm around her shoulders.

“You’re as troubled as I am this morning, sis,” Chloe said, giving her a squeeze.

“I’m hoping it’s not because of everything I told you last night. Maybe I shouldn’t have burdened you with all of that.”

Daria’s heart broke for her sister, and she turned to embrace her.

“I’m glad you could tell me,” she said, “and so sorry for all you’ve been through.” She pulled away, and moved to the end of the bench so that she could look squarely into Chloe’s eyes.

“But to be honest, Chloe, that’s only part of what has me upset this morning.”

Chloe reached forward and held Daria’s hand in her own.

“What is it, then?” she asked.

“A couple of things,” Daria said. She looked quizzically at her sister.

“Don’t you think it’s strange that Shelly was at Andy’s last night?”

Chloe nodded. “Yes, but I suppose she somehow knew he was still in the Outer Banks and figured he’d be a safe person to stay with.”

“It’s more than that,” Daria said.

“They’ve apparently been seeing each other for a couple of years.”

Chloe’s eyes were wide.

“Andy and Shelly?” she asked.

“A couple of years? Didn’t you ever pick up on anything between them?”

“Not at all,” Daria said.

“You’ve seen them together. They act as if they barely know each other. Now I realize their behavior was calculated to keep us from suspecting anything.”

“Do you think he’s taking advantage of her?” Chloe asked.

Daria shook her head. “That was my first thought, but Andy’s not like that.” She shrugged.

“Although, right now I’m not sure I know either of them. But I think Andy’s a good person with good values, and I have to admit that,

from the little I saw of them together last night, there seems to be a mutual caring between them. I’m just upset that they’ve kept it from me all this time. Andy and I work together nearly every day, and he never said a word. “

“They’re afraid you’d break them up, don’t you think?” Chloe asked.

Daria sighed.

“I didn’t know I was considered such a shrew,” she said.

“You’re not a shrew,” Chloe said.

“You’re just one of those women who loves too much.”

“There’s something else.” Daria couldn’t believe she was going to tell this to her sister.

“Spit it out,” Chloe said.

“L.-Rory and I made love last night.”

Chloe winced. “Oh, Daria, why did you do that to yourself?”

“It was an emotional night, and…” No use offering excuses.

“I just wanted him,” she said.

“I still do.”

Chloe looked through the now-screen less porch windows toward Poll-Rory. They could hear Rory working on his cottage windows, but he was around the side and invisible from the porch. After a moment, Chloe turned her | gaze back to Daria.

“Well,” she said with a rueful smile, “who am I to cast stones?” Her gaze suddenly shifted toward the beach road.

“Is that Andy’s van?” she asked.

Daria saw the van turn into the cul-de-sac. She stood up as Andy drove into the Sea Shanty driveway. He walked around the car and opened the passenger-side door for Shelly, and Daria was moved by his chivalry.

Shelly got out of the car, and for the first time, Daria realized how perfectly matched they were, physically at least, with their long blond hair and tall, slender bodies. She held the door open for them as they walked onto the porch. “Julie and her little boy are at the hospital in Elizabeth

City,” Andy said.

“Jim says they’re going to be okay. Thanks for coming over, Daria.”

“I’m relieved to hear that,” Daria said. She glanced at Chloe.

“Why don’t you two have a seat?” She motioned toward one of the picnic-table benches.

“I explained to Chloe that you’ve been seeing each other, but I think we’d both like to… have a better understanding of what’s going on.”

Andy and Shelly sat down as a unit on the bench, holding hands. Shelly looked nervous, and Daria felt sorry for her. Still, she was angry with both of them for their dishonesty.

“It’s just like I told you last night,” Andy said.

“Shelly and I have been seeing each other for two and a half years. I apologize for not telling you, Daria. I tried a few times, but you always started talking about how Shelly needed to be protected from men, and I was afraid of what you’d say. Or what you’d do.”

Chloe had brought two rockers onto the porch, and Daria lowered herself into one of them. Her mind raced back over the previous two years, hunting for clues she might have missed. She could remember a few conversations with Andy in which he’d talked to her about Shelly’s need for more freedom. She’d told Andy he didn’t know Shelly well enough to understand.

“I’m really angry with you, Andy,” she said, leaning forward.

“You lied to me.”

“No, I never lied,” he said.

“I just never said anything about what was going on.”

“Shelly is… she’s vulnerable,” Daria said.

“Do you know what that means?” She was not sure either of them understood the meaning of the word.

“She needs to be protected.”

“Not as much as you think,” Andy said.

“I can take perfectly good care of myself,” Shelly finally spoke up.

“You worry too much about me, Daria.”

“Besides,” Andy added.

“I wouldn’t let anything bad happen to her. I love her. I” — “If you’d known about me and Andy, you would have tried to ruin it,” Shelly interrupted him.

“You ruined things with my other boyfriends.”

“That was different,” Daria said.

“No matter what you think. Shelly, those guys were going to hurt you.” Was that true? she suddenly wondered. Had she really known those two young men well enough to know that about them?

“There’s something else you need to know,” Andy said. He glanced at Shelly. “Shelly is pregnant, and we’re going to get married.”

Chloe groaned, and Daria felt her patience snap.

“I thought you weren’t going to let anything bad happen to her,” she said, unable to mask the sarcasm in her voice.

“It’s not a bad thing,” Shelly said.

“I’m happy about it. I want to have a baby. And I want to marry Andy.”

“You can’t have a baby,” Daria said.

“Shelly, sweetheart, I’m sorry.

You’re just not able to take care of a baby. You’ll have to . consider options. ” She would have suggested an abortion, but found she couldn’t with Chloe sitting right there. Chloe might be a rebel where the Church was concerned, but Daria knew she was still passionately opposed to the idea of abortion.

“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves, here,” Chloe said.

“How far along are you. Shelly?”

“Not very,” Shelly said.

“She’s only missed one period,” Andy said.

“But she’s not having an abortion.”

“Well, we have time, then,” Chloe said.

“Time to look at your options and figure out what’s best for both of you and the baby.”

Chloe continued talking, impressing Daria with her calm, supportive approach. Daria knew enough to stay out of the conversation, because right now she was not thinking clearly. Her mind was torn between what was going on here on this porch, and the sound of Rory working on the windows across the street. How did Rory feel this morning? What was he thinking?

Soon Zack would return with the Wheelers, and soon Grace would swoop down again on Poll-Rory. Her one sister was grieving an illicit affair and facing the end of her life as a nun. Her other sister was pregnant with a child she couldn’t possibly raise herself. And neither sister had seen fit to confide in her.

And she felt, suddenly, very much alone.

1 he muscles in his arms ached when Rory went inside the cottage after taking the plywood off the windows. He could have waited to do it until Zack came home and could help him, but he’d been anxious to get some sunlight back into Poll-Rory. The cottage had sustained very little damage in the storm, and he knew he’d been lucky. There were some bare patches on the roof where he would need to reshingle, and a piece of driftwood blown up from the beach had torn a chunk from the siding, but other than that, Poll-Rory was relatively unscathed.

The answering machine blinked from its perch on the kitchen counter.

The phones must be working again; the electricity had come on sometime before he’d gotten out of bed that morning. There were two messages, the first from Zack, telling him he would be returning to Kill Devil ^ Hills that afternoon. The second message was from Cindy Trump.

“Are we still on for today, Rory?” she asked.

“I don’t know if you’re back yet—I assume you evacuated. But I’m around, if you still want to get together. You don’t need to call. Just show up when you can. I’ll be here all day, mopping up.”

He’d forgotten his appointment with Cindy, but he was pleased by the reminder and the fact that she was able to meet.

Just as he clicked off the answering machine, the phone rang. He picked up the receiver.

“Rory?”

“Grace,” he said.

“I’m sorry if you went to the motel and I wasn’t there. We ended up not evacuating.” “I wondered what happened,” Grace said. “I was just hoping all of you were all right.”

“We’re fine,” he said.

“It seemed like a horrendous storm when it was over our heads, but at least here on the cul-de-sac, it didn’t do too much damage. Are you in Rodanthe? How is it down there?”

“Some of the cottages close to the water really took a beating,” Grace said.

“But our… my house is fine. So, why didn’t you leave?”

“It’s a long story.” It seemed as though all that had occurred the night before had taken days to transpire, not mere hours.

“Shelly was afraid to leave the Outer Banks,” he said.

“So when it came time to evacuate, we couldn’t find her.”

“Oh my God,” Grace said.

“Where was she? Is she okay?”

“We searched everywhere, looking in abandoned cottages and all over the beach. We finally had to give up. Daria was really upset.”

“I can imagine.”

“The power went out and the phones weren’t working.” He remembered listening to Chloe’s confessions in the darkness. He would skip over that part.

“Then Daria’s coworker, Andy, suddenly showed up to tell us that his neighbor’s boat had flipped up on the pier, and a woman and little boy were trapped beneath it. So, Daria and I went over there to help.” The image of Daria throwing herself beneath the boat to save the child was still fresh in his mind.

“And that’s where Shelly was.

It turns out she and Andy have been involved for a while. “

Grace was silent for a minute, probably trying to absorb all he had just said.

“Involved?” she asked.

“You mean, dating?”

“I don’t know if dating is the right word,” Rory said.

“But they’ve obviously been more than friends. We didn’t get to talk about it much because things were too crazy over there, trying to extract the people from under the boat and getting them to the trauma center.”

“Are they all right?” she asked.

“They were, last I heard,” Rory said.

“Rory… could we get together tomorrow? Up there?”

For the first time, he didn’t feel enthusiastic about seeing her. His mind was still on Daria. He winced when he remembered her telling him she was in love with him. Those words had taken him by surprise, and he’d felt guilty, as though he’d used her by making love to her. He’d thought Daria was the type of woman who could not be used, who would never do something she did not have completely under her control. She seemed invulnerable—so independent and strong and self-sufficient—that he hadn’t seen the need in her for anyone, much less for him. His body had responded with instant arousal when she’d kissed him, and he had not considered stopping himself. He’d treated it almost like one more activity with his old friend, like crabbing or fishing. He hadn’t realized that, for her, it meant much more than that. He shouldn’t have let it happen. Yet, it had been so damned good. And he knew he would rather spend tomorrow afternoon pulling crabs out of the bay with Daria than spending time with Grace.

“Why don’t we talk again tomorrow,” he said.

“See how our schedules pan out.”

She hesitated once more.

“All right,” she said.

“But I [eally would like to come up there.”

“We’ll talk then,” he said.

“And I’m sorry again about landing you up at the motel.”

He hung up the phone, and stared at the receiver for a minute before getting up and walking to the front door. There was one more woman he needed to apologize to this afternoon.

Chloe was on the front steps of the Sea Shanty, sweeping away the eelgrass that the storm had brought to their door.

“Looks like you lost some screens,” he said.

Chloe barely glanced at him.

“Yes,” she said.

“But that’s about the worst damage that was done, fortunately. To the cottage, anyway.” She darted her eyes in his direction again, and he had the feeling she knew what had happened between him and Daria the night before. Maybe, though, it was just his imagination—or his guilt—at work. Maybe she was simply alluding to the trauma suffered by Andy’s neighbors. Or more probably, to the embarrassment she herself had suffered when she’d admitted to him and Daria about her affair with Sean Macy.

“Is Daria in?” he asked.

“She’s up in her room,” Chloe said.

“Would it be all right if I went up?”

“Why not?” Chloe said.

“I guess there’s not much mystery left between the two of you, huh?”

Ouch.

“Chloe…” he began, not sure what more he could say.

Chloe sighed and leaned on the broom.

“Don’t listen to me, Rory,” she said.

“It’s just that my sisters are getting jerked around right now, and it’s upsetting me.”

“I’m not jerking Daria around,” he said. “What would you call it?” she asked. “In spite of the fact that you’re involved with someone else, you have sex with a woman who loves you dearly, who would do anything for you. I’m not excusing Daria’s behavior, but at least her motivation was noble. She did it because she’s crazy about you.”

He didn’t know what to say, so he said nothing, just walked past her into the cottage and up the stairs.

The door to Daria’s room was open. She was sitting cross-legged on her bed, architect’s drawings spread out in front of her. He knocked on the open door, and she looked up.

“Hi,” he said.

“Hi.”

“I thought I’d come see how you’re doing,” he said.

She bit her lip and lowered her eyes to the drawings, pushing them around with the tips of her fingers. He walked across the room and sat down on the edge of the bed, rescuing her hand from its futile wandering across the drawings and holding it on his knee.

“I’m sorry, Daria,” he said.

“I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

“It wasn’t your fault,” she said.

“I started it. I shouldn’t have done that if I wasn’t prepared to accept the consequences.”

“You know I care about you, don’t you?” he asked.

She uttered a small laugh, and he knew his words sounded pale, meaningless and, he feared, patronizing.

“I didn’t know how you felt,” he said.

“And … it caught me off guard when you told me.” There was more he wanted to say. He wanted to tell her he needed time to sort out his feelings for her, to figure out why, if she were to kiss him at that moment, he would do it all over again. But he knew it wouldn’t be fair to say that to her right now.

It would only ease his burden and add to hers.

She looked at him squarely.

“Shelly’s pregnant,” she said. And then she began to cry, drawing her knees up to her chest and burying her head against them.

“Oh, no.” He wanted to pull her into his arms to comfort her, but remembered that was how things had gotten out of control the night before. Instead, he held her ham tighter.

“What is she going to do?”

“I don’t know,” she said.

“She wants to marry Andy and have the baby.

I just can’t see it. “

“How… pregnant is she?” He thought of Shelly’s slim figure.

“She must not be very far along.”

“Only a matter of weeks,” she said.

“So there’s time to ” “Yes.” She sighed, as though tired of the discussion.

“There’s time.”

He hesitated.

“Look,” he said.

“I’m on my way up to Corolla to see Cindy Trump. Why don’t you come with me?”

She shook her head. Tears still streamed down he cheeks, and he reached up to smooth them away with thi back of his fingers before standing up.

“I’ll see you later,” he said.

“Take care.”

The beach road was littered with shingles and shutter;

and the branches of small trees. Water pooled in spots, and traffic was thick with people returning to their homes and vacations. The landscape of Corolla was washed clean, its huge houses sprawling from the road to the sea. These were true houses up here, not cottages.

Many of then. could be considered near-mansions.

He followed the directions Cindy had left on his machine and found her house on, of all things, a cul-de-sac He parked in the driveway, and had to skirt an uprootec tree as he walked to her front door.

Before he had a chance to knock, the door was opened, and there stood Cindy Trump in an orange bikini, looking very much as she hac twenty years ago.

“Rory!” She stepped back to let him in and gave hirr a hug. “I can’t believe it,” she said. “You look even bet lei than you do on TV.”

“Thanks,” he said.

“And you haven’t changed a bit.” The trite words were the truth. Of all the people he’d met from the cul-de-sac that summer, Cindy had changed the least. She was tan, slender, blond and still did a bikini justice. She reminded him of some of the women he knew in Hollywood, and wondered if she’d paid a visit or two to a plastic surgeon or if she’d just been lucky with her genes.

She led him out to the stone patio behind her house and handed him a glass of iced tea.

“Sorry about the noise,” she said, pointing to the house in the lot behind her, where workers were repairing storm damage on the roof.

“It’s usually very quiet here.”

Rory looked at the house under repair and was reminded of the day he saw Daria working on the roof. All of these workers were men, but in his mind’s eye, he was seeing Daria up there, and he felt that same rush of desire that had gotten him into trouble the night before.

“Did you evacuate?” he asked as they sat down at a glass-topped table.

“No,” she said.

“We’re back so far from the beach, and nothing’s going to blow this house away.”

He was glad she didn’t ask him if he had left the Outer Banks. He didn’t feel like recounting last night’s events yet again.

Cindy was a chatterbox. She told him about her husband, who sold real estate, and her two boys, who were just entering their teens. They commiserated for a few minutes about teenage boys, while Rory explored her face for hints of Shelly. There were none. The blond hair, he had to admit, was about it.

He explained the reason for his visit: he was researching Shelly’s past, trying to uncover her parentage.

“So,” he said, “who do you think Shelly’s mother might have been?”

Cindy laughed, crossing one long brown leg over thi other.

“Why, me, of course,” she said.

“Isn’t that wha everyone thought?”

He smiled. “Well, you were the right age and your cottage was nearest to where she was found,” he said, as i those were the only reasons she’d been under suspicion.

“You’re being very kind, Rory,” she said.

“Cind^ Tramp. Wasn’t that what the kids called me?”

“Perhaps some of them,” he said diplomatically, but h< could tell from Cindy’s smile that her skin was quite thick “Well, I can assure you that I was not Shelly Cato’i mother. I have to admit, though, it was probably pure lucl that it wasn’t me. I look back now and shudder over the kind of girl I was. I’m glad my kids are boys instead o girls. I would lock the girls up.”

“I’m tempted to lock Zack up myself, sometimes,” h< said.

“It was probably just a tourist, Rory,” she said.

“That’:

why the police never came up with a suspect. Al though. ” She wrinkled her nose, looking out toward th ocean.” Although? ” he prompted her.

“I’ve always had a nagging suspicion,” she said. ” really hesitate to say this. I hate to speak ill of anothe woman. I know how it feels.”

Rory leaned forward, thinking that Cindy had truly no changed: she was still a tease.

“You can’t tell me that much and not tell me what you’re talking about,” he said “I always thought it was Ellen,” she said.

“You’re member Ellen? The Catos’ niece?”

He nodded.

“Well, I don’t know how well you remember her, bu she was pretty loose with the boys.” Cindy shrugged “Not as loose as me, I admit, but still… She could of nasty. Do you remember that?”

He remembered it very well. He’d been exposed to it only a few weeks ago.

“There was something mean about her. One time, my aunt and uncle were visiting us. They had two little kids, my cousins, and my brother and I were going somewhere, so they hired Ellen to babysit for them.

Well, she smacked one of the kids around pretty viciously. The little girl had a couple of bruises on her arm. I know my aunt and uncle spoke to Mr. and Mrs. Cato about it, and probably to Ellen’s mother, as well. That was the end of it, as far as I know. But I think about that incident from time to time. There was no denying that Ellen had been abusive. I could see her leaving a baby on the beach and not giving it another thought. “

Now that she said it, so could he.

“Ellen doesn’t look anything like Shelly, though,” he said.

“Well, I haven’t seen Shelly since she was tiny,” Cindy said.

“But I remember she had brown eyes. Very light hair, but big brown eyes, like Ellen’s.” Cindy suddenly sat up straight in her chair and looked toward the sky.

“Don’t go by what I’m telling you, Rory,” she said.

“It’s a big stretch from hitting a child she was baby-sitting to leaving a newborn to die on the beach.” He sensed her trying to backpedal and knew that speaking her hunch out loud had made her uncomfortable.

“I was probably right with my first guess. It was most likely a tourist. Maybe if you do a show about it, that person or someone who knew her will come forward with the truth.”

“Maybe,” he admitted, but he was still thinking about Ellen, about how she was always trying to interfere in Daria’s parenting of Shelly.

“How is your sister?” Cindy changed the subject. “Polly? I remember her so well. She was the first mentally retarded person I ever really got to know. I liked her a lot.”

Her words touched him.

“She died a few years ago,” he said.

“Oh, I’m sorry, Rory. How unfair. You know, m;

strongest memory of you was of your devotion to her. “

“She was special to me.”

“It wasn’t just Polly,” Cindy said.

“You were al way so nice to everyone. Remember that boy who couldn’ catch any fish, and you” — “Yes, yes.” His claim to sainthood. “That was unusual for a boy, to be so sensitive to other people. If I’d had to predict what you would have become I would have guessed a social worker.”

“A social worker!”

“Yeah, think about it. That’s really what you do on Tm Life Stories, isn’t it?” she asked.

“I always get the feelin your heart breaks for the people whose stories you tell 01 your show. I bet some viewers think it’s an act, but any body who knew you when you were a kid would know that you’ve always been a sucker for people in need.”

He thought suddenly of Grace. He’d been a sucker, al right, seduced by her neediness. Was that why he’d beei drawn to her?

It had been the same with Glorianne. He remembered what his ex-wife had been like when he first met her, how unsure of herself she’d been, how desperate to find some one to lean on.

And then there was Daria, who didn’t seem to nee< anyone at all. He’d been so smitten by Grace’s beauty, s< seduced by her need for him, that he’d failed to see thi loving woman standing right in front of him.

“Cindy,” he said, abruptly standing up, anxious now t( get back to Kill Devil Hills. “I have a feeling you just di( me a big favor.”

Uaria came home from teaching her EMT class that night to find Rory waiting for her on the Sea Shanty steps.

“Isn’t it a beautiful night?” he asked as he got to his feet.

She hadn’t noticed. She’d gone through her class in a fog. Everyone had wanted to talk about the hurricane and the real-life drama that had played out on Andy’s pier, easily the most exciting rescue of the night. She’d tried to shift the discussion to the need for emergency readiness during the heart of a storm, but no one was interested.

Instead, they wanted to know how she’d gotten two people from beneath an overturned boat, with the sound rising and whirling around her feet. Supergirl, they thought, was back.

Now she looked up at the sky and saw that it was filled with stars.

“Come out to the beach with me,” Rory said. He was carrying a blanket.

“There’s a meteor shower tonight. We ican watch the sky.”

j Her heart was saying yes, her head, no.

“I don’t think fo, Rory,” she said. } “Come on,” he pleaded.

“Just for a while.”

Against her better judgment, she walked with him out [the dark beach and helped him spread the blanket on e sand. She lay next to him, and the instant her head uched the blanket, three stars sailed across the sky. “I told you it would be worth it,” he said.

How did he think she could simply lie there with r after what had happened the night before?

“How was your visit with Cindy?” she asked. “Interesting,” he said.

“She looks just like she did b;

in the old days. Even had on a bikini. “

“Did she shed any light on your story?”

“Oh, she has her theories, just like everyone else.”

“What are they?”

“She has kind of a crazy one,” he said.

“Don’t lau Her primary suspect is your cousin Ellen.”

Another white diamond, this one with a tail, shot acr the sky, but Daria barely registered its existence. She too stunned by what Rory had just said. “What makes think that?” she asked.

“Well, first of all, I got the sense that Cindy could stand Ellen, so this probably needs to be taken with a gr of salt. She said that Ellen once baby-sat for Cindy’s co ins, and she apparently hit one of the kids a few tiff. That made Cindy think that Ellen was capable of dump a baby on the beach. Seemed kind of a stretch to me.”

Daria shut her eyes. This was it. Time for the tn “Cindy’s very perceptive,” she said.

“What do you mean?” he asked.

“I mean she’s right. Ellen is Shelly’s mother.”

Rory sat up abruptly, turning to look at her, and ;

could barely see his face in the darkness.

“Do you kn this for certain?” he asked.

“Have you known all along ” Shelly wasn’t the only thing I found on the beach t morning,” she admitted. ” I also found a pukka-shell ne lace that I knew belonged to Ellen. It was lying on beach right next to the baby. ”” My God, Daria. Did you ever tell anyone? ” he ask ” No one,” she said.

“I was horrified to realize t Ellen could have done such a thing, but she was fam and she was also one of the older kids. I wouldn’t dare say anything to anyone about her.” “Did you ever talk to Ellen herself about it? Does she know that you know?”

She turned her head to look at him.

“I’ve never said a word to anyone, until now. Ellen doesn’t have a clue that I know. It’s one of the reasons why I have such a hard time tolerating her. She’s always trying to tell me what to do with Shelly, and she makes me feel as though everything I’ve done with her has been wrong. But I don’t believe she really cares about Shelly; sometimes she’s even cruel to her. And she’s a rotten mother to her own two daughters, as far as I’m concerned.”

Rory stared out at the ocean, his arm resting on his knee, and she could only imagine how he felt about her having kept this from him.

Reaching up, she touched his shoulder.

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner,” she said.

“I simply didn’t want you to find out. I didn’t want anyone to know.”

Rory lay down again and let out a sigh.

“No one will know, Daria,” he said.

“Revealing the fact that Ellen is Shelly’s mother can bring no good to anyone, least of all Shelly. I’ll just have to be satisfied that the mystery is solved for me, personally.”

Daria’s eyes burned with relief.

“Thank you for understanding,” she said.

“Come here,” he said, slipping his arm beneath her shoulders and pulling her closer.

“No, Rory,” she resisted.

“I can’t go through that again.”

Rolling over, he propped himself on his elbows and looked at her. ‘ “Remember when I told you that I saw you working on a roof?” he asked.

She nodded.

“Well, I didn’t realize it was you at first,” he said.

“All I knew was that I wanted the woman who was up there. I wanted her bad.

When I realized it was you, I was sort of shocked that I could have those feelings for you. I’d al ways thought of you more like a kid sister. “

“I know you did,” she said. “This has been a wonderful summer, even without get ting a story for my show,” he said, “because I’ve gotten to know you again.” He smiled at her, and she couldn’t resist reaching up to touch the tips of her fingers to his lips. He turned his head instantly to kiss her hand, then looked at her again. “Our old pal Cindy and I had a little chat this afternoon that opened my eyes,” he said.

“You were right about me being a caretaker. Glorianne needed that. Grace did, too. You don’t.

And I think it’s time I broke out of that role. Time I had an equal partner. I’m not quite sure how to run a relationship with someone as strong, if not stronger, than I am,” he said, ” but I’d like to try. If you’re willing, that is. “

That made her smile.

“I love you, too, Daria,” he said.

“The feelings snuck up on me when I wasn’t looking. I’m sorry I was so blind.” He pulled her close to him, and this time, she gave no thought to resisting.

jr ace found Rory at his cottage, where he was repairing some of the siding that had been damaged by the storm. She had come without calling, afraid that if she’d called first, he might have told her he was busy, and then she would have no opportunity to see Shelly. It had been too long since she’d seen her.

Rory spotted her as she walked toward him.

“Hi.” He stood up, and she knew she’d surprised him.

“I was out all morning and didn’t have a chance to call,” she said, “so I hope you don’t mind that I just stopped by.”

“No,” he said.

“I’m just about finished up here. Why don’t you wait for me on the porch?”

“Okay.” She turned and walked around the cottage to the front steps.

From Poll-Rory’s porch, she studied the Sea Shanty. There were no cars in the driveway; Daria and Chloe were probably at work. Shelly might be at work, as well. She hoped not; she had no good reason to stop by | St. Esther’s today.

After a few minutes, Rory walked up the steps and sat near her on the porch.

“I’m glad you’re here, actually,” he said.

“I wanted to talk with you.”

His voice was so serious that her heartbeat quickened. There’s no way he could know, she told herself. No way. Unless maybe. Could he have somehow found the nurse?

“What about?” she asked.

“Well, it’s a bit awkward,” he said.

“I need to tell you that, over the past few days, I’ve come to realize that I care about Daria as more than a friend.”

It took her a moment to understand.

“You mean… you’re in love with her?” she asked.

“Yes.”

She could not help but smile, despite the implications of that news for herself. Daria and Rory. She had certainly never thought of them as a couple, but it made very good sense. They were a team.

“I’m glad for you,” she said.

He leaned over to take her hand.

“Thank you,” he said.

“I wasn’t sure how you’d feel about it.”

“I can’t blame you for that,” she said.

“I haven’t exactly been an open book with you, have I?”

“No,” he admitted.

“You haven’t.”

“Well, I’ve enjoyed the time you and I spent together, but I think it’s really good that you and Daria found each other.” She kept the smile on her face, but inside, her heart was twisting. She no longer had an excuse to come to Kill Devil Hills or to see Shelly. She’d hoped that somehow she and Shelly could have developed a bond that would transcend her need for a relationship with Rory, but that had not happened. And now, she’d run out of time.

“I guess I won’t be seeing you again, then, huh?” she asked.

“You don’t need to be a stranger,” Rory said, although he had to know as well as she did that there was no point in her visiting Kill Devil Hills again.

She struggled to find a way to shift the conversation to Shelly.

“It must make Shelly happy, that you and Daria are together,” she said.

Not exactly a seamless transition, but it was the best she could do.

“I don’t know if she knows yet,” he said.

“Daria and I just came to this conclusion last night, and I think Shelly was at Andy’s.”

“Oh, yes, what’s that all about?” she asked.

“Apparently, they’ve been seeing each other for a couple of years. And Shelly is pregnant. They want to get married, but Daria’s worried about” — “She’s pregnant?” Grace leaned forward. The rapid heartbeat again. Her doctor would have a fit if he knew the stress she was putting herself under.

“How far along?”

“Not far,” Rory said.

“You’ve seen her in her bathing suit.”

“She should probably have some prenatal testing, shouldn’t she?” Grace proposed.

“I mean, given her… you know, her… the brain damage.”

“But brain damage isn’t inherited,” he said.

“There’s no reason to think her baby wouldn’t be perfectly normal.”

He probably thought she was an idiot.

“Oh.” She smiled, trying to make herself look sheepish.