Saving Simon (Tarnished Saints Series Book 5) (20 page)

He bit off a curse and looked the other way and she saw a sadness in his eyes. He shook his head slightly and then looked back to her, taking her hands gently in his.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I would never hurt you. Ever. You need to know that.”

“All right,” she said, with a nod of her head, not understanding any of this.

“I’ll tell you all about it later, I promise, but right now we have a lot of people waiting for us at the marina so we need to hurry.”

She followed him to the car thinking there was something about Simon she needed to know. She felt as if there were a dark side of him he hid from her, and this made her want to reach out to him and comfort him and at the same time back away from him too. She hoped she found out soon what he promised to tell her, because she felt as if it was very important.

* * *

When they got to the marina, Simon was very surprised to see most the town there. There were so many cars everywhere that he had to park out at the main road and walk down to the lake with Piper.

“What are all these people doing here?” asked Piper.

“I don’t know,” he said, seeing Mrs. Durnsby standing on the docks with what looked like the whole woman’s auxiliary next to her. She had a megaphone in her hand, and was shouting out to the crowd.

“Save the marina! They want to tear it down and put up a hotel and that means most of us will lose our businesses.”

“Oh, no, she didn’t,” said Piper, and Simon realized that the woman must have roused the whole town to be here today.

“Mrs. Durnsby, please leave,” said Simon, coming up to the group of women.

“Not until we get what we came for,” the woman retorted.

“Tickets, get your tickets, six for five dollars,” shouted out Aunt Cappy, walking past him with long strands of tickets in yellow, blue, and red sticking out of her hand.

“Aunt Cappy, what’s going on here?” growled Simon.

“We’re selling tickets to help save the marina,” she said.

“Tickets for what?”

“Well, let’s see,” she said in thought, looking down at the wad of tickets in her hand. “The red ones are for boat rides with the winner of the race today, the yellow ones are for a cup of catfish chowder and a beer, and the blue ones are for the kids. We have special games that are being led by Judas’s daughter J.D. and her friend Charolette that involve guessing the amount of worms in the can to hooking paper fish hanging from a tree. And later there’ll be a knot tying contest which I’m hoping you’ll judge.”

“This had to be all your idea, wasn’t it?”

“Well, not all of it.”

“The worm game was my idea,” said little Eli tugging on Simon’s shirt. Simon hadn’t even known he was there.

“That’s right, Eli,” said Aunt Cappy with a chuckle. “The worm game was your idea and that seems to be the most popular right now.”

“Aunt Cappy, you shouldn’t have gotten involved,” Simon ground out, knowing his crazy aunt always stuck her nose where it didn’t belong.

“I can’t take all the credit for it,” she protested. “Mrs. Durnsby was the one who spread the word to the entire town as well as the vacationers, I just orchestrated the rest.”

“I’ll bet you did,” he said, storming off toward the pier where Thad was already on the sailboat and flagging him down.

“Here’s your hat, Uncle Simon, and we have everything ready for the race,” said Zeke, running alongside him, followed by little Eli who was jumping around excitedly and giggling.

Simon took his captain’s hat and placed it on his head. “Did Josh and Jake finish scrubbing the hull so it’ll help us move faster?” he asked.

“We did,” said Jake, pulling himself up out of the water with his brother right behind him. They were soaked from head to foot.

“How about Thad? Did he remove all the extra weight from the boat from things we don’t really need?”

“He did,” said Zeke, “and since I’m the best at climbing trees, I climbed to the top of the mast and adjusted the wind finder thing for you. Thad gave me directions which way to turn it.”

“Great job, land crew,” he said ruffling Zeke’s hair. “Now all we need to do is wait for Zeb to get here with his first mate and we’re ready to sail. I wonder who he chose to ride with him.”

“He asked me,” came a voice from behind him, and Simon turned to see his brother Nate putting on his sunglasses. “I hope you don’t mind, Simon, but he wanted me along to help him win the race, and since you’d already asked Thad to ride with you I figured it didn’t make a difference.”

“Why should I mind?” Simon asked sarcastically. “I just taught you everything I know about sailing while we were down in the Caribbean and now you’re going to use it against me by riding in a faster boat with Zeb.”

“How do you know their boat is faster?” asked Piper from next to him.

“Because the Catalina is a smaller boat with a faster hull speed than my South Coast, that’s why. And now Zeb has stolen one of my prodigies. The odds are stacked against me, Pippa.”

“I didn’t steal anyone,” said Zeb walking up the pier to join them with his wife, Cat on his arm. He wore a white captain’s cap just like Simon, and that irked him already. “I just took the leftovers after you chose Thad over Nate.”

“That’s right,” said Nate with a nod. “Thad was your first choice, not me.”

“That’s not fair,” said Simon. “You know I more or less took Thad under my wing and watched over him for most his life. Of course I was going to choose him.” He looked at his brother Nate who had always gotten along with Zeb better than him anyway. “No offense, Nate.”

“No offense taken, Simon.”

“I’m sure to win now,” said Zeb with a smile. “I’ve got not only a seasoned sailor with me, but also my good luck charm, Cat.” He kissed his wife and they made googly eyes at each other almost making Simon want to vomit. Marriage had sure changed Zeb.

“How is she a good luck charm?” asked Simon, figuring any woman on board would just slow them down and be a huge distraction.

“I figure since the boat is a Catalina and that’s also my wife’s name, that I’m a shoe-in to win,” explained Zeb actually sounding as if he believed all this nonsense he was spewing forth. Either that, or he was only trying to roil Simon before the race, pushing the fact in his face that he had a wife and Simon didn’t even have a real girlfriend right now. He took that as an unspoken challenge, and Simon was never one to back down from a challenge.

“Oh yeah?” said Simon. “Well, you’re not the only one with a good luck charm. I have one too.”

“I know,” said Zeb, “you have your little whistle.”

“That’s not what I’m talking about.” Simon felt his anger rising at the way his brother was purposely provoking him. He knew exactly what he was doing. “I’ve got my good luck charm, Pippa!” He reached out and put his arm around Piper and pulled her closer.

“Then if she’s such a good luck charm,” said Zeb, “put your money where your mouth is.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” growled Simon feeling like he’d just taken the bait and the shark was about to attack.

“Let’s up the ante a little.”

“Up the ante?” asked Simon. “We don’t even have an ante. The only ante here is going to be Aunt Cappy.”

“Cute, bro, but you know as well as I that you can’t back down from a challenge, so just agree already. We’ll both bring our good luck charms with us and each of us gets to choose something of the others to keep if we win.”

“Okay, I’ll take your Mercedes if I win,” said Simon, figuring that would shut him up and he’d renege on the deal.

“Fine, if you have something worth it in value for me to take if I win.”

“Fine? Come on, Zeb. You know I don’t have expensive toys like you do. Just forget the whole thing.”

“Well, I’ll tell you what. I’ll give you a break, brother,” Zeb said, holding up his arm to show Simon his watch. “I know you always had your eye on my Rolex. I’ll put it up on the block and you put up that damned whistle you always wear around your neck that means the world to you for some odd reason. Then, we’ll have ourselves a deal.”

“You mean this?” asked Piper, grabbing the whistle from the chain around her neck and holding it up for him to see.

“Yep, that’s the one,” said Zeb.

“No,” said Simon with a quick shake of his head. “Not that.”

“If you’re so sure you’re going to win, that what difference does it make?” asked Nate, and Simon knew he was still ticked at him for choosing Thad to be his first mate over him.

“He knows he’ll lose and that’s why he’s not going to do it. Come on, Nate. Let’s go show him how it’s done,” said Zeb, turning to go to his sailboat.

Simon couldn’t stand the baiting anymore. He knew Zeb was only doing it to try to distract him, and that he should just walk away, but he couldn’t. He’d always won competitions to Zeb when they were growing up, so why should this be any different? He wasn’t about to back down on a challenge and have Zeb bringing it up to embarrass him at every family function or party that he threw.

“I’ll do it!” Simon blurted out before he could talk himself out of it, and already regretted falling for Zeb’s little game. “Pippa, get on the boat. We have to show my stuffed shirt of a brother that his place is behind a desk and not behind a sail.”

“Simon, I can’t go with you on the boat. I don’t want to,” Piper said as Simon took her by the arm and led her down the pier. People shouted all around him, urging him on, and when he looked back to the marina he was surprised to see a van pull up that said WVBC TV on the side, which was the local cable news team for the entire area of Van Buren County. The cameramen jumped out with video cameras in their hands and started filming.

“Sweetheart, don’t freak on me now, please. Not with all these people watching and the camera crew here.”

“There’s a TV station here?” she asked, turning to look.

“Come on. The wind is picking up and I smell rain in the air. If we don’t hurry it’s going to start storming before we get to the other end of the lake.”

“Storming?” Piper looked up to the sky, but it seemed to be a beautiful day. The sun shone brightly, though it was quite windy and there were a lot of big white clouds in the sky.

“I can’t let my lawyer brother beat me in a sailboat race with all these people watching,” Simon told her. “What will people think when an ex-Navy officer who also works on a cruise ship loses to someone who sits on his ass all day in a suit?”

“So this is all about your ego, isn’t it?” she asked as he got to the side of the sailboat and prepared to board.

“It’s more than just that,” he said, his eyes dropping down to the whistle around her neck.

“It has something to do with this whistle, doesn’t it? You really don’t want to lose it to him do you?”

“No, I don’t.”

“Then why did you put it up as part of the bet?”

“I didn’t. Zeb did it because he knew it would push my buttons. He has always known how to control me by getting me mad. I don’t think straight when I get mad, Pippa. It’s always been one of my weaknesses.”

“So I’ve noticed,” she said, thinking of how angry he seemed to get, especially when it had anything to do with her father.

“You have no idea of what I’m talking about so don’t even try to sound like you understand.”

“Well, maybe if you told me, I’d know.”

“You come with me on this race, and I swear I’ll tell you anything you want to know about me.”

“Anything?” she asked, considering it though she was scared out of her mind.

“Anything at all.”

She fingered the whistle and wet her lips with her tongue looking back to all the people by the marina cheering them on. Then she looked over to Zeb standing by his boat holding Cat’s hand waiting for his brother’s answer. Cat looked so calm and cool and Piper knew racing on a sailboat wasn’t anything she really wanted to do either.

“Cat, are you really going?” she called out to her new friend.

“Yes,” she said. “Zeb wants me to, so I am going with him.”

“But you’re pregnant. It’s not safe, is it?”

“Pippa, she’s not going to get hurt, and neither are you,” Simon said. “I’ll make sure of it. I promise.”

She didn’t want to disappoint Simon but she just couldn’t do it. Her hands were already sweaty and her heart was beating a mile a minute even thinking about being on such a small boat in the middle of the lake. She’d never liked water to begin with, and now that she’d almost drowned, she feared going on a boat that sat that close to the water. And in a race no less. She was about to tell him she wouldn’t go with when she heard little Eli talking to Zeb.

“Uncle Zeb, can I play with your whistle as soon as you win it from Uncle Simon?” he asked.

“Of course,” said Zeb. “You can all play with it, what the hell do I care? It’s only a whistle.”

She looked over to Simon then and saw him staring intensely at his brother. Then she looked back to Zeb and he smiled at her and tipped his hat. It was skipper’s hat very similar to one Simon was wearing today. Zeb was a lawyer and had no business wearing a hat like that, and she started to feel sorry for Simon. Zeb was obviously just trying to roil him up, probably hoping to distract him just like Simon had said. Simon’s face darkened and she saw danger within his eyes. His jaw was clenched again and when she reached out for his arm, his muscles felt like rocks.