Beach Colors (20 page)

Connor slid out of his chair and squeezed past Margaux. Peg looked surprised and delighted before she turned and followed Connor to the back of the restaurant.

Nick stared after them. It was the first time Connor had willingly left to play with another child. Of course Connor knew Ceci, felt comfortable with Peg. It was a small step, he cautioned himself. But it was a step. He felt a resurgence of hope.

“He’s a sweetheart,” Margaux said.

Nick nodded. “It was really nice of you to come out with him today. He isn’t very outgoing.”

“It was my pleasure.”

Peg came back with two beige mugs of coffee.

“He’s fine. They’re watching
The Little Mermaid
. It might be hard to drag him away, so take your time.”

Nick only wished that would be the case, but he knew that when it was time to go, Connor would merely get up and leave. Sometimes he longed for a tantrum or whining or something that said Connor was a normal boy.

He’d prayed for Connor to show an interest in something or someone beyond his grandmother and uncle, but he never expected him to be attracted to Margaux. A woman who lived in the fast lane, who was a career woman, who had no children, and who was going to leave.

Maybe he should explain that it wouldn’t be good to get too close to the boy and raise his expectations. Or to raise Nick’s. When Connor had been skipping between them out in the sea marsh, they’d felt like a family. And even though Nick knew it was an illusion, he fell into it and let himself wonder.

He took a sip of coffee, put down his mug. “Connor’s mother left him with a neighbor one day and never came back.”

Margaux looked up, her face going pale. A few freckles powdered her nose, probably brought on by the sun. He imagined she used all sorts of creams and beauty products to keep them at bay. He circled his cup on the tabletop.

“That’s terrible. Is she . . . dead?”

Nick shrugged. Why on earth had he blurted that out? Now, she would expect him to tell her all about it. And for the first time in the two years since Ben had died he thought he might want to tell someone. He wanted to tell her.

“I don’t know. Frankly, I don’t care.”

“How could a mother do that?” Her hand went to her mouth. “Sorry. I’m sure there were extenuating circumstances.”

“If you call a guy on a motorcycle extenuating, then yeah, there were.”

He shouldn’t be telling her this. He hadn’t confided in anybody, just gave them the line the army gave him, husband dead, wife couldn’t cope with the stress. Yada yada.

“Connor’s father was deployed most of his life, and he doesn’t remember much about him. I visited him when he was younger. He was a normal kid. A terrible two. It was great. But now—he’s sad sometimes. But he’s happy, too.”
Like when he’s with you.

“He seemed to be having a good time today.”

Nick realized he was shredding his napkin. He dropped the remnants. “I just don’t want him to suffer any more loss.”

“Of course not.”

She wasn’t getting it. He tried again. “You’re going to be busy while you’re here.”

“And?”

Nick swallowed. “He seems to already be growing attached to you.”

“I see.” She sat back in her chair, looking hurt, and he wanted to take back everything he’d said. He’d meant to drive her away, and now that he had, he just wanted her closer.

He was afraid it was too late for Connor or him.

“You want me to stay away from him.”

Just say it and get it over with.
“I think that would be for the best.”

“I didn’t think about that when I agreed to come. He was so cute. He seduced me.”

She smiled at him and Nick felt his resolution slip as everything else picked up.

“But are you sure that’s the best road to take? He’s going to meet a lot of people passing through his life. He must know that he has you and his grandmother.” She hesitated. “Unless you’re planning on leaving, too.”

He automatically shook his head. “I won’t leave. I have too much that keeps me here.”

She smiled again but this time it didn’t send his blood racing; it was a combination of understanding and compassion and it cut right to his heart.

“Anyway. The damage is probably already done.”

“I agree, but I won’t go out of my way to avoid him. He’s a child for heaven’s sake. He won’t understand.” She looked a little sad. “I’m not much for going to Mass, and if you don’t bring him to the store, I probably won’t see him again.

“But I don’t want him to think I deserted him, too. You’ll have to think of something to tell him, that doesn’t include making me out to be the bad guy.” She stood up. “I guess we’d better be going.”

Peg went to fetch Connor, they said goodbye to Deke and walked across the tarmac to the parking lot. The sky was full of stars, but Nick didn’t call attention to them. He just wanted to get Margaux and Connor home as soon as possible before he lost his resolution and begged her to stay.

He dropped Margaux off at the marina, then backtracked to his mother’s house to drop off Connor. If she noticed that it meant an extra trip for him, she didn’t say. Just thanked him for dinner, said goodbye to Connor, and walked across the street to the house.

He hoped to hell she’d be gone before he returned.

I
t was harder to walk away than she expected, Margaux thought as she walked up the steps of the old Victorian. She was sad and disappointed at Nick’s decision to keep Connor from her.

On their way back to town, Connor had fallen asleep, his head pillowed against her arm. She had to force herself not to touch him, draw him closer, protect him against the bumps in the beach road. They arrived at Le Coif much too soon. Connor had roused enough to hug her and give her a sticky kiss before she thanked Nick for dinner and got out of the truck.

Nick didn’t look too much happier than she did. He didn’t even make a pretense of walking her across the street. She felt for him and knew he was doing what he thought best. He should probably find someone to marry and give Connor a real mother.

He drove away before she even reached the steps of Le Coif.

She unlocked the front door and tiptoed across the Elvis rug to unlock her new studio. She really didn’t want Linda pumping her with questions about her “date” with Nick and Connor.

She turned on the light and blinked against the glare. The first thing she saw was her “ocean” dress.
From the mouths of babes,
she thought, and sat down at her drafting table. She would design a dress the color of the salt marsh at sunset. It would be her memory of one fun afternoon with a boy and his uncle.

Several hours later, she heard the front door open and close. Heels clicked across the foyer.

“Holy moly,” squealed Linda. “What happened?”

Margaux whirled around. Linda was wearing black leather pants that molded to her figure like paint. A cowl-neck sweater was covered by a poncho of red, white, and green stripes.

“You look like the Italian flag,” Margaux said on a laugh.

“Yeah, well you try riding around on the back of a Harley at night. I wanted to make sure anybody coming up behind us saw me before they hit me, ya know?”

“I hadn’t thought about that,” Margaux said. “Good choice.”

“Thanks. So how come you’re working and the chief’s upstairs by himself?”

“Oh, is he back?” Margaux asked innocently. She’d heard him go up the stairs hours ago, but she’d pushed him out of her mind and kept working. “I was working.”

“I can see that.” Linda came into the room and walked along the row of sketches Margaux had pinned on the line.

“Where’s the Harley-riding hunk?” Margaux asked.

“Hell, I wore him out and came home to paint my toenails.” Linda grinned at her. “He gets up at six to get to work. Thanks and no thanks. I’m going to bed. He wore me out, too.” She yawned a jaw-popping yawn. “Don’t work too late.”

“I’m almost ready to leave. Go on to bed. I’ll lock up.”

“Yuh-huh.” Linda waved and climbed the stairs to her apartment.

Margaux finished her last sketch, a pantsuit that reminded her of driftwood. She had gotten so carried away that she’d stopped editing herself as she went along. Now, as she looked at the line of new designs, she wondered if they were really couture or just “craftsy.”

She was too tired to make a judgment tonight. Tomorrow would be soon enough, when she had a little distance from them. She felt they were right, but she’d learned to bury that feeling when it came to bringing a project in on budget. In the back of her mind, she knew these new designs were one-of-a-kind couture and she couldn’t afford that now. But she was determined to follow it through.

Because Margaux Sullivan had a dream, and come hell or high water, she was going to recapture it.

Thirteen

M
argaux didn’t see Nick for the next three days. She delved into work with a vengeance, creating design after design. Each time she hit on a polished silhouette and combination of colors that felt right, she rendered it on a large sheet of sketch paper and pinned it on the fishing line.

The weather grew warmer. She noticed more cars in the driveways at Little Crescent Beach when she drove home at night. Flea market posters appeared around town. Summer was upon them, but the creative juices were flowing and Margaux didn’t dare stop in case they dried up.

She got up early and stayed late. She forgot about her life on hold, the career she’d lost, the money she owed, the husband who betrayed her, everything except the work. She lived and breathed design. And by the end of the week she had the skeleton of a new M Atelier line.

Grace called and invited her to meet her and Bri for a drink.

“I can’t.” Margaux moaned. “I’m up to my eyeballs in work.”

“Rain check?”

“You bet, and then I’ll have something to show.”

She hung up and went back to work.

That night when she heard Linda’s last client leave, Margaux chose four of her latest designs and went across the foyer to the salon.

“It’s alive. It’s alive,” Linda intoned.

Margaux plopped down in one of the salon chairs. “If you have some time, I have some questions.”

“I got the time, but I gotta sit down.” Linda plopped down in the seat next to Margaux. “Okay. Lay ’em on me.”

Suddenly nervous, Margaux spread out the four sheets. “I’ve been working on some new designs. These are just a few examples of what I hope will be my new line.”

Linda whistled. “Yowza. Yowza.”

“Here’s the thing. It’s not just the design. It’s the fabric. I’ll be able to find some decent base fabrics maybe, but some of them will probably have to be hand-dyed or hand-painted. At first anyway. I thought maybe you could give me some advice. I know dyeing hair isn’t the same as dyeing fabric, but—”

Linda splayed out her hand. “Hey, my parents met in Haight-Ashbury. I wore tied-dyed clothes to elementary school. In the summers we sold my mother’s batiks out of a Volkswagen van. But that was before Brooklyn. Thank God for Brooklyn. So stop babbling and give ’em here.” She didn’t wait, but spread the sketches out and began to scowl at them.

“Hmm,” said Linda. “Hmmm.”

“Is it even possible to do? Too expensive?”

“Doable. Depends on what you think is expensive. Definitely time-consuming.”

“I’d need a small business loan, which I might not be able to get.” Margaux sighed. “God knows my credit isn’t worth crap right now.”

Linda didn’t comment.

“Or I could just send out some sketches and try to sell the designs.”

“Yeah, if you want them to end up as knockoffs in Walmart.”

“I don’t.” Margaux drummed her fingers on the table. “I could do a few mock-ups, hire some models, take some video footage, and try to get someone to hire me and my new line.”

“You’d become a staff designer again.”

Margaux rested her chin in her hands. “Pretty much.”

“That’s like me renting a chair in a salon somewhere.”

“Yeah, I guess it is. But I’m getting ahead of myself.”

“Not the worst place to be. Why don’t you just get started and decide later?”

“And that’s the next problem. Where do I find a place with water and a heat supply. Vats for dyeing, a place to dry the fabric. Hell, I’d need a whole damn workshop, which I no longer have.”

“Sounds to me like what you need is a kitchen. I just happen to have one of those in back.”

“Where would you bake your cookies? I’ve been living on them in case you haven’t noticed.”

“Hell, I got a kitchen upstairs. It’s tiny and I’d have to work off all those calories going up and down the stairs all day.” She shrieked. “Oh God, I might get skinny again.”

Margaux laughed outright.

“I got a shitload of work tomorrow. Saturday’s always my big day. But I’m done by five. You go to Hartford or New Haven or wherever you can get some swatches of fabric and some dye and we’ll give it a whirl.”

“Sounds like a plan.” Margaux stood up. “I’ll run some tests and take it from there.”

But as she walked across the hall to her studio, she began to have second thoughts. She went in to consult with Linda about dyeing processes and came out with a list of supplies long enough to fill an entire page of her sketchbook. And she wasn’t at all sure she was doing the right thing. She needed a second opinion. She picked up her phone.

“Hi, it’s me.”

“Hi,” Grace said.

“Are you guys still on for tonight?”

“You change your mind?”

“Yeah, I need a second opinion or maybe an intervention.”

“Great. I’ve got nachos and a bottle of Pinot Grigio. Second floor. 2B.”

“I’m on my way.”

She grabbed her bag and walked to Grace’s apartment complex, a brick building built in the late 1800s. Her front window overlooked the street. The space was well lived in, comfortable with legal briefs piled on every surface.

“I bring a lot of work home,” Grace explained as she carried a tottering pile of papers into the bedroom.

Bri was sitting on an overstuffed plaid couch, her long legs tucked beneath her, and sipping a glass of white wine.