Summer Rental (37 page)

“You don’t fool me, Ellis Sullivan,” Julia said, yawning again. “You’re waiting for a call from garage guy.”

“Actually,” Ellis admitted, “he said he’d text me when he was leaving the club.”

Julia gave Dorie an elaborate wink. “She’s gonna have to pay for all those free drinks one way or another.”

“You’re such a romantic, Julia,” Dorie said. She grabbed Julia’s hand and tugged. “C’mon. I’ll race you for the bathroom.”

38

Alone in the kitchen, Ellis washed, dried, and put away the dishes. She smiled as she traced the faded pattern of green leaves and pink rosebuds on the delicate gold-edged china. Such a sweet gesture on Ty’s part, giving them his grandmother’s dishes.

It was nearly 2:30 in the morning. To kill time, she got a bottle of spray cleaner and spritzed all the counters. Then she swept the floor, and finally, took the damp dish towel out to the back porch to dry on the makeshift clothesline the girls had rigged up between the weathered gray porch posts.

It was still unbelievably hot and humid outside. She glanced at the rusted Sunbeam Bread thermometer tacked to the wall beside the kitchen door. Eighty-six degrees! Still, she thought, glancing up at the deep, velvet sky, the stars were so plentiful and bright this time of night. Maybe she’d take a walk on the beach while she waited for Ty. She’d read a magazine article about how summertime was the season when sea turtles lumbered ashore all along the East Coast to lay eggs, and had even seen signs on the beach warning people not to disturb the turtle nests. Wouldn’t it be amazing if she
came across a nest of sea turtle eggs? She ducked back into the house, grabbed her cell phone, and strolled down the boardwalk over the dunes.

Leaving her shoes at the bottom of the beach staircase, Ellis let her feet sink into the cool, damp sand. The tide was out. She walked to the water’s edge, letting the incoming waves tickle her ankles. She inhaled deeply, taking in the scent of salt and sun-baked sand, and started walking north, confident that she would not get lost or panicked this time.

She walked for fifteen minutes, zigzagging between the waterline and the dunes, before she saw it: two wavy, parallel lines in the sand, which crossed in a X shape, leading up to a sort of crater shape in the soft sand at the edge of a dune.

Ellis tiptoed over to the crater. The sand here had clearly been disturbed. Had she found a turtle nest? She looked back towards the water, wondering about the odd X-shaped lines, until it occurred to her that if she had indeed discovered a nest, maybe one track was from the turtle, making its way up to the dune line, and the other was the turtle’s return track to the ocean.

She knelt in the soft sand and peered down at the impression in the sand, holding her breath, as though even the softest sound might disturb what was under the sand. Should she touch it if it was a nest? And if it was a nest, and she did touch it, would that deter the mother sea turtle from returning to tend to its eggs? She frowned, wishing she knew more. She really wanted to feather the sand aside, to see if, by some miracle, there could be eggs there. She straightened and looked around, but the beach was deserted. As she looked up, she felt a drop of water on the back of her neck.

It had started to rain. Reluctantly, she stood up, brushing sand from her knees. She looked around for something to mark the nest, so that she could find it again in the morning. Finding a piece of a windbreak, she managed to wrench off a weathered wooden stake, and poked it into the sand a few inches from the nest.

“Okay, turtle babies,” she whispered, as the rain began to fall harder. “I’ll check back with you little guys later, okay?”

As she trotted back through the rain, she heard her cell phone ping, and looked down at the text message there.

I’M HERE. WHERE ARE U?

Ellis smiled, tucked the phone back into her pocket to keep it dry, and picked up her pace.

*   *   *

She was soaking wet and out of breath as she climbed the last step to the garage apartment deck. The light was on inside, and she tapped on the door. Ty opened it and laughed when he saw her bedraggled condition.

“Get lost again?” he asked, pulling her inside and out of the rain.

“No,” she said excitedly. “I was walking on the beach, and I saw these tracks in the sand. Ty, I think maybe I found a sea turtle nest!”

“Really? Cool. This is definitely nesting season. Were there any eggs in it?” He disappeared into another room and came back with a dry towel.

“Thanks.” She started toweling off her arms and her hair. “I was afraid to disturb it. I mean, I know sea turtles are endangered, and I didn’t know if it was against the law to tamper with a nest, so I just found a piece of wood and stuck it down in the sand to mark it. If it really is a nest, maybe I can find it in the morning and check it out.”

“You did the right thing,” Ty said approvingly. “Did you notice what mile marker the nest was near?”

“It was at number seventeen,” she said proudly.

“I’m sure it’ll be fine,” Ty said. “I’ll call the Sea Turtle Patrol hotline and let them know you found it, and they’ll cordon it off and monitor it. Sometimes, if they find a nest in a high-traffic area, they’ll even move it to a safer place, where it won’t get disturbed.“

Ellis’s face glowed with excitement. “We could go back now, couldn’t we? And just shift the sand a little, to see if there are any eggs?”

He gestured towards the deck. “In this rain?”

She looked out the window and saw that the rain was coming down in sheets now.

“Oh,” she said, sounding deflated. “I guess maybe not.”

She looked down at the floor, where a small puddle of rainwater had formed beneath her feet, and shivered.

“You’re cold,” he said, and he ducked into the next room. When he came back, he was holding a faded, navy blue terry cloth bathrobe.

“Here,” he said, handing it to her. “You’re soaked. Get out of those clothes, and I’ll put the kettle on. And,” he said, sternly, “don’t give me that look. I’m not gonna jump you, for God’s sake. I’m not that kinda guy.”

Ellis laughed despite herself. “How do you know I’m not that kind of girl?”

“Some things you just know,” Ty said.

She went into the adjoining room, his bedroom, and closed the door. She looked around with interest. The walls here were the same bleached-out cedar as the exterior of the apartment. The wooden floors were painted battleship gray, covered with a faded red-and-white-striped rag rug. The bed was a double with a lumpy mattress, but it was tidily made up with a quilt of blue-and-red patchwork stars. A standing fan in the corner stirred the air in a desultory way.

Ellis stripped off her wet clothes. She went into the adjoining bathroom, found another towel, and finished drying herself off before folding herself into the oversized bathrobe, inhaling its perfume of aftershave. The bathroom was tiny, with a scarred linoleum floor, a miniscule wall-hung sink, and a commode. She gazed into the cloudy mirror and fluffed her damp hair, finger combing it away from her face. She squeezed a dollop of Ty’s toothpaste onto her index finger, and scrubbed her teeth as best she could.

Tonight, she thought, shivering in anticipation. She placed her wet clothes on the towel rack, belted the robe snugly, and padded barefoot out into the living room.

“Here,” Ty said, handing her a heavy china mug. “I don’t have any milk or anything. How about some honey?”

“Honey would be good,” Ellis said. She watched as he pulled a plastic bear-shaped bottle from the shelf of the Hoosier cupboard and drizzled honey into the cup. And before she could stop him, he added a healthy slug of Jack Daniel’s from a bottle he had standing on the counter.

“Hot toddy,” he said, handing the cup back. He picked up his own mug, and steered her towards the sofa.

She sat down and took a sip of the steaming tea, enjoying the sweet burn of the whiskey. Ty sat beside her. She propped her bare feet up on a coffee table made from a battered ship’s hatch, and snuggled into his arms. The robe slipped open at the hem, but Ellis decided she didn’t care. Tonight.

“Long night,” Ty said, as he yawned.

“Long day. All that drama with Julia burglarizing Madison’s room. I really thought she was gonna tear Julia limb from limb,” Ellis said. “I think maybe we’re okay now, though.”

“Good,” Ty said, yawning elaborately again. “I saw you guys dancing together. It looked like you were having fun with the Electric Slide.”

Ellis blushed. “It was all those Pucker-Uppers you kept sending over.”

“Just trying to keep the ladies happy,” Ty said nonchalantly.

She turned and looked at him. “You did.” After a moment she said, “Ty?”

“Hmm?” He kissed the top of her head, and they yawned in unison.

“This is kinda nice,” Ellis said, after a long, companionable silence. His hand found its way inside the neckline of the robe, and he was stroking her bare collarbone. She closed her eyes, savoring the warmth of his skin on hers. This, this was what she’d been missing all these years. She felt warm and safe and … cared for.

“Mmm-hmmm,” Ty said. “Ellis?”

“Mm-hmm?”

“Do you think this could be our do-over date?”

“Kind of a weird date, don’t you think?”

“Yeah, but it’s nicer than our first one.”

“That’s true.” She put her head on his shoulder and yawned sleepily.

“So, that would make this, like, our third date, if you count the first do-over.”

“Whatever.”

Her eyelids drooped, and he gently removed the mug from her hand.

A lifetime later, she stirred, and turned her head because the sun was shining in her eyes. She stretched luxuriously, and then, startled, sat up.
She was stretched out on the sofa, with the blue-and-red patchwork quilt tucked around her, and sunlight was streaming in through the slats of the wooden blinds.

She walked to the bathroom, washed her face, and squeezed another line of toothpaste onto her finger and applied it to her teeth. The clothes she’d peeled out of the night before were laid out on a wooden bench at the foot of the empty bed, still damp. She shrugged. So much for her big plans for last night. What a dud she was. Tightening the belt of the bathrobe, she went back to the living room. The computer was on, and there was a stack of papers and books beside it.

Ellis opened the screen door to the deck. Ty was looking out at the ocean, his back to her, with the wind blowing his sun-streaked blond hair. His baggy white boxers rode low on his lean, tanned hips, and his bare shoulders gleamed in the sunlight, muscles rippling just beneath the skin as he lazily raised his arms and did a full stretch. Oh God, he was so gorgeous. She could see the outline of his butt through the thin white cotton of his boxers, and she was so aroused, and so surprised by how aroused she was, it took her breath away. And then he turned, caught her watching him, a
nd his lips did that slow, secret-smile thing. Just for her.

“Mr. Culpepper?” Ellis said.

“That’s me,” Ty said, opening his arms. “What can I do for you?”

“I’m sorry about last night,” she said, snuggling up to his bare chest. “Please don’t take it personally. It was all that booze. I can’t believe I just passed out on you like that.”

“Entirely my fault,” Ty told her. “But I think I know how you can make it up to me.”

He took her hand and led her into the bedroom. “I’m gonna need that robe back,” he said, stretching out on the bed.

“Right now?”

He nodded solemnly. “Afraid so.”

Her fingers fumbled as she tried to unknot the belt. Damn it! She could do this. She’d been ready to do it last night. Why was she so nervous now—in the daylight? She had done it before, hadn’t she? Ty tugged at t
he belt and pulled her down till she was sitting on the edge of the bed beside him. “Allow me,” he said. “I have some experience with this type of thing.”

“I bet you do.”

He had the grace to blush. “I meant, it’s my robe. That’s all. It was a high school graduation present.”

“From Kendra?” She regretted it the minute the words were out of her mouth.

But Ty seemed unfazed. “No, from my nana. Mrs. Culpepper.”

“Ohhh,” Ellis said.

Ty unknotted the robe and slipped it from her shoulders, running his hands down her shoulders, to her bare hips, pulling her closer. He cupped her breast in one hand, lowered his head and kissed it delicately. Ellis shivered, and he gathered the other breast and did the same. Was this really happening, at last?

He looked down at her and smiled. “You’re beautiful, you know that, Ellis Sullivan?”

She shivered again, and felt suddenly shy. “You’re just saying that.”

“No,” he shook his head. “I’ve thought it since the first time I spotted you the day you moved in here. You’re gorgeous. Especially now. Especially naked. Naked, you’re a goddess.”

She laughed, and then his face grew serious. He pulled her down beside him, and his lips found hers. But then his hand inched lower, touching her between her legs with feather-soft stokes, and she grew dizzy as her body remembered long-forgotten pleasures. He touched her, and she arched up to meet him, and her body throbbed in a way she was sure it had never done before.

Ty flicked his tongue across her nipple, and she heard herself gasp. She trailed her fingers down his chest, lightly, lightly, until they rested just below the waistband of his boxers. She felt him shudder, and she slid her hands down his hips and effortlessly rolled the boxers down to his ankles. He kicked them free of the bed, rolled to one side, and fumbled for something in the nightstand beside the bed.

He held the foil-wrapped package so she could see it. “El
lis Sullivan, are you usually the kind of girl who does this on a fourth date?” he asked, his gray-blue eyes twinkling.

“Not usually,” she told him truthfully, taking the condom from him and ripping the foil. “But in your case, I’m willing to make an exception.”

39

Ellis was relieved to see that the red van was gone. She unlocked the front door and tiptoed into the house. She’d almost made it to her bedroom when Julia’s bedroom door opened and she popped her head out.