Fireworks on the Beach Read online

Once everything achieves the right consistency, I tip the mushroom and herbs into the larger pan in two piles on the eggs, then sprinkle the Parmesan I’ve grated over them. I fold half the remaining eggs over one pile and half over the other, creating two steaming pockets of goodness. I add a few dashes of salt and pepper to the top of the two omelets then set them to cook a little while longer.

  Turning to the cantaloupe, I slice four generous crescent-shaped pieces and put two on each of the plates I’ve set out on the counter next to the stove.

  Turning back to my eggs, I check that they’re done and slide them onto the plates, turning off the burner. Grabbing two sets of utensils and a couple of napkins, I take both plates into the bedroom.

  Mike is just stirring as I enter. I go around to my side of the bed and sit on top of the covers. Wafting a plate beneath his nose, I murmur, “Breakfast in bed, my love.”

  He hauls himself to a sitting position, eyes traveling the work of my morning. “No coffee?” he says.

  Damn. I knew I forgot something. “I’ll get some going in a moment. But look, mushroom omelets! The resort staff did such a good job stocking the kitchen for us.”

  He grunts and shovels a bite into his mouth.

  Eyes on him, hoping to catch some trace of enjoyment traveling over his face, I take a bite from my own plate. The bite of the Parmesan cheese is perfect with the mellow mushrooms and eggs. And is there anything savory that basil doesn’t go well with? It’s a miracle herb, if you ask me.

  “I’ve been thinking,” Mike says abruptly around his mouthful of omelet.

  “Of what we can do today?” I say, unable to banish the wide grin that spreads across my face. “Me too. I thought we could maybe grab a coffee from the stand on the beach before going for a little walk along the waves, then head to Cape May for a light lunch. Maybe a swim in the afternoon, the boardwalk in the evening, and then we head back to the beach and play with the fireworks we bought yesterday?”

  Mike’s forehead is as creased as a crumpled up sheet of paper. “That’s a lot of things,” he says at last, setting his fork down.

  Something about the way he removes his fingers from the silver utensil captures my attention. I can’t tear my eyes away from the shining metal against the barely-touched food. It isn’t like Mike to pause in his breakfasting, especially when it’s one of his favorites.

  “Daisy,” he says in a timbre not unlike the one my parents’ priest uses when he’s intoning the holiest of incantations during the mass they make me attend with them every time I visit.

  “Don’t you like your omelet?” My voice is trembling when I speak. My hands too. I set down my fork, stomach suddenly turning somersaults.

  “Daisy,” Mike he says again, and this time he sounds like he’s bored, “I’d like to break up.”

  If I hadn’t already relinquished my fork, it would have clattered loudly against my plate. “What are you talking about?” I splutter, feeling the blood drain from my face.

  “This isn’t working.”

  “What isn’t?” I lean into him, pleading. “Talk with me about it, I’m sure it’s something we can work on together.”

  He meets my gaze at last, and he looks almost sorry — almost. “No,” he says, “I don’t think it is. I’m afraid I don’t love you. I need someone I can love.”

  I gasp like he’s punched me in the gut. “But — but I love you, Mike. I thought we were forever. I thought you were going to propose.”

  He laughs. He actually laughs. “Propose?” He snorts like I’ve just told the best joke. “Oh, Daisy, no. Just . . . no.”

  Mike swings his legs out of bed and gets to his feet, stretching. “I’m going to take a shower. I think it’s best if you’re gone by the time I’m finished.”

  He casts a pitying glance at me and it’s the last time he looks at me. Then he turns and strides to the bathroom, locking the door behind him.

  I sit on the bed, heart pounding, eyes blurring with tears, ears burning. Because what the hell just happened? In the space of two minutes, I went from feeling on the brink of forever to being kicked to the curb.

  A squeaking comes from the bathroom, followed by the rush of water. The sounds give life to my limbs, although not energy to my breaking heart. Mike takes fast showers, and I do not want to be here when he emerges from the bathroom. Not because it’s what he wants, but because I can’t stand to look at him right now, or ever.

  Hurriedly I throw the few personal items I’d unpacked last night back into my petite rolling suitcase. My makeup’s in the bathroom, but I’d rather buy more than ask Mike for it.

  Shouldering my handbag and hauling my suitcase from the room, I pause, looking over the aftermath — a tousled bed, two half-eaten breakfasts. An outsider would never know that this is the scene of a crime against my heart.

  Biting my lip so hard that I taste blood, I shove through the suite’s front door I’d entered so joyfully yesterday and slam it in my wake.

  I stalk down the hallway and mash the button for the elevator. I don’t know where I’m going, I just know that I can’t stay here. Anywhere is better than with a man who thinks, after five damn years, that I’m not someone he can love.

  The elevator door slides open with a gentle ding. I step into it, grateful that it’s empty. I manage to hold myself together until the doors shut, then sag against the metal wall and let the hot tears pooling in my eyes take me with great, wracking sobs.

  Dante

  The shimmering heat of the afternoon gives way to the infiltrating cool of evening, the promise of an even more refreshingly crisp night ahead. The beach empties of sunbathers and swimmers, the lifeguards go home, and I pack it in for the day.

  After tidying up the stand, I fold the wooden covers down over the opening between the counter and the rooftop, locking each one tight. Slipping the key in my pocket, I head off on my nightly ritual.

  Most people wouldn’t think a guy like me walks on the emptied beach after work. They think I’m off tagging stuff or selling drugs or some shit. Talk about being typecast.

  But for all the ways that life has fucked me, all I need to clear my head after a long day is a walk across the hard-packed sand, ocean brine lapping at my ankles.

  Tonight’s no different.

  I like working the stand. It gives me a taste of the entrepreneur life, where the only person you have to answer to is you. That’s my goal, to be able to fend for myself by myself. I’m not sure it’s realistic, and I haven’t pinned down exactly what I’d like to do yet, but ideas have been percolating in my brain.

  No matter how much a guy likes his job, though, it’s always good to decompress. So I suck in deep breaths of salty air as I meander down the sand.

  I love walking like this because I could go forever, theoretically at least. I could walk from Ocean Point to the tip of Florida, or north into Maine, provided there are no private beaches along the way.

  Which, yeah, I’m sure there are. But it’s nice to imagine.

  After I’ve gone a couple of miles and the stars are winking at me from the east, I turn from the shoreline and head across the softer sands to the dunes. I throw myself down in front of their soft swells, reach into my pockets, and withdraw the plastic-wrapped turkey sandwich with mustard and mayo and the not-quite-cold beer that I’d stowed in my pockets. I open both up and eat my dinner to the sound of the rushing ocean.

  It’s never quiet, the sea. That’s what I like about it. Whether it’s roaring like hell or purring like a kitten, the ocean is never silent, never still. It’s always alive, active, evolving.

  That’s what I strive to be — always growing, never giving up, and one-hundred percent stubbornly optimistic.

  I finish my sandwich, pressing the last dabs of mayo from the plastic wrap to my lips before balling the wrapping up and stashing it back in my pocket. I get to my feet, dusting off my ass with one hand and carrying my beer with the other.

  That’s when I hear it. It’s a strange sound, both famil
iar and not. My inability to pinpoint what I’m hearing makes me freeze, skin prickling with something between apprehension and curiosity. It’s a wet sound, but not rushing like the ocean. It’s angry, though, and hurt as hell, and it’s coming from back in the dunes.

  I know I should walk away. I should mind my own damned business and walk my ass back to my pickup, sipping on my beer all the while.

  But something in me makes me turn toward the noise and let it lead me into the dunes.

  I clamber up and down the sandy hills, the seagrass whipping at the skin of my legs not protected by my knee-length khaki cut-offs.

  After the third hill, I see what’s making the noise — something large and pink and smelling of coconuts and grass.

  It’s a person. A woman, curled up against the warm back of one of the dunes, crying.

  I feel like I’ve stumbled onto something private. I’m walking on sacred ground but I haven’t been invited. I ease back a few paces — and fall flat on my ass, dropping my beer, the liquid rolling down the dune.

  The woman’s head snaps up, eyes aflame.

  My jaw drops, because I recognize her. It’s the woman from the stand, the one who came to see me yesterday hanging on the arm of some douchebag.

  It’s the woman with whom I wished to share something that I can never have, something that’s wholly impossible.

  It’s impossible that she would ever leave that man, or that he would ever leave her.

  And yet here she is, alone and red-cheeked, the light quickly dying around us, her cheeks stuck with sand in the places where tears have run.

  “Are you okay?” I breathe.

  Eyes wide and glued to mine, the woman nods, slowly. Then with a shuddering sigh, she alters course and shakes her vehemently, blonde hair dancing over her shoulders.

  “Do you need help?” I ask, feeling like I’m holding my breath.

  I let it out in a long sigh when she nods.

  “Okay,” I croon in the gentlest voice I can summon, “let’s get you out of here.”

  I steal to her side and, pausing to give the woman room to protest, slide my arms around her and help her to her feet when she does not.

  “I’m Dante Johnson,” I say, offering her a smile, “from the —“

  “Fireworks stand,” she finishes in a voice that’s as thick as it is small — a voice that wrings at my heart. “I remember.”

  I don’t know how to meet this brokenness, so like a dumbass I fall back on humor. “I’m not surprised you remember. I am quite famous,” I say like I’m confiding a great secret, then wink.

  It works. It shouldn’t, but it fucking works. She laughs. “I’m Daisy Beckett,” she says.

  “A pleasure. Now, why the hell are you all the way out here on your own with,” I glance over her shoulder at the indent she made in the dune and the items beside it, “a handbag and a rolling suitcase? That must have been a bitch to drag through the sand.”

  She gives a sharp, humorless laugh. I get the sense that this is not a sound she often makes. “It was. It really was.” She shakes her head, pushing her hair back from her face. “I just needed to get away.”

  “Are you safe?” I ask slowly, heart skipping when her eyes fly to mine. “I mean, is someone after you?”

  That same bitter laugh rips from between her luscious lips. “No. Quite the opposite.”

  “So the man you were with . . . ?”

  She shakes her decisively. “He’s finished with me.”

  “I’m so sorry,” I murmur, even though I’m really, really not. It was plain to see what kind of an asshole that man was. She deserves better.

  “Did you know,” she speaks like she’s looking to me for absolution, “I thought he’d brought me down here to propose? I feel like such a fool.”

  “You’re not,” I say just as decisively as she shook her head a moment ago. Then, after processing her words, realization sweeps over me. “Wait, he brought you down here — so you’re not a local?”

  “No, I’m from thirty minutes upstate.”

  “He brought you down here . . . and abandoned you?” I can’t keep the incredulity from my voice.

  She nods. “I must be a real drag, right, for him to do something like that? And after five years together too.”

  Without thinking, I take her hands and envelope them in mine. “No,” I say fiercely, eyes blazing, “don’t think that for a second because it’s not even a little true.”

  Her mouth dangles. “Really?”

  I nod, a single curt shake of my chin. “I’ve barely spoken with you twice, but it’s plain to see that you’re a fucking angel. That man must be a goddamn fool to let you go.”

  The light’s fading, but I can still see her blush. I could get used to making her blush. “You truly believe that?”

  “I do.” I glance behind me where the moon is making its ascent in the east. “I also think that we should get you out of here. It’s almost nighttime. You shouldn’t be on the dunes anyway.”

  She cringes at my words, making me immediately regret them. “Oh no, I’m not? I didn’t know.”

  “It’s okay, I just don’t want you getting into trouble. Can I walk you back down the beach?”

  “That would mean a lot to me.” She pauses, and when she speaks again, the tears have returned to her voice. “But I don’t have anywhere to go. I can’t go back to the resort, and I have no car to drive home.”

  “We’ll figure something out,” I promise, squeezing her hands in my larger ones. “Okay?”

  After a moment, she nods. “Okay,” she whispers. And then, in a stronger voice, “Thank you, Dante.”

  I heft her suitcase onto my shoulder and grin. “It’s no problem at all. When a man sees a damsel in distress, there’s just one thing he can do.”

  “A gentleman,” she corrects as she grabs her handbag. I’m both surprised and delighted that she leans into me a little as we set off. “Plenty of men would’ve walked away. But not a gentleman. And that’s what you are.”

  My grin grows so wide that I wouldn’t be surprised if it split my cheeks open. I don’t mind, though, because Daisy just gave me a compliment to be proud of. I feel like a million bucks.

  “Come on,” I say, offering her my hand as we climb out of the dunes, “follow me. Let’s get you somewhere safe.”

  Daisy

  On the way back, Dante and I discuss my options. There are a couple of open motel rooms up the shoreline a short way, and there’s also an available room at Seaside Resort. The former sound too seedy, and the latter too expensive.

  Dante’s looking up AirBnbs on his phone as we walk along the beach, my luggage balanced effortlessly on his strong shoulder. He calls out fresh options as he finds them, but all I can think about is how kind this man is.

  I’m the idiot who dragged her suitcase all the way down the beach, through the sand, sweating like a pig, instead of looking up places to stay when it was still daylight. I’m the one who cried the day away. Any person would be well within their rights to leave me to my own dumb devices.

  Not Dante. With his easy smile and kind eyes, he takes me on like my problems are his problems, like we’re in this together.

  I didn’t know men like him existed.

  And now that I do, I find that I don’t want to be so quickly parted. I don’t want to go stay in whatever motel happens to have an unwanted room open.

  I want to stay near Dante and his beautiful face and the warmth that seems to emanate from him.

  I don’t know how to tell him that, though. And the lights of Seaside Resort are getting closer all the time.

  At that moment, my stomach growls. Loudly. I’m glad night has descended because my face is so hot with embarrassment that it must be as red as a beet.

  Dante turns to me at the sound. I steady myself, ready for him to poke fun at me. Mike would’ve, and did, often.

  “Want to grab some dinner when we get off the sand? My treat,” he asks.

  My mouth falls open
with shock while my chest suddenly feels like it’s too full and might burst.

  Because Dante didn’t mock me. Instead, he offered to take care of me.

  A stranger.

  My reluctance to leave him grows all the stronger. I soothe myself with the knowledge that I get to linger over dinner with him before we part.

  “Sure,” I say, wondering if he can hear the shy smile playing at my lips. “I’d love that.”

  “I know just the place,” he says. “Locals only. I mean, not officially, but no tourists ever go in there.”

  I don’t miss the words he does not speak: It’s safe. Your ex won’t be there. You can relax and be yourself without fear of seeing him.

  “Sounds perfect,” I say, and mean it.

  “Do you mind if we drive? My car’s in the lot under the resort.”

  I shake my head. “I don’t mind at all.” I have no desire to walk more than I have to on an empty stomach after hiding in the sand all day, probably sunburned to a crisp.

  “Great,” he says. His smile is so bright that it gleams through the darkness at me, a beacon of hope on a day rocked by storms.

  Dante

  I feel like I won the damn lottery.

  I mean, it’s bullshit that Daisy went through what she did with that asshole.

  But his loss is my gain. Even if the gain is a walk along the beach and dinner with the sweetest, loveliest woman I’ve ever met.

  We’ll part ways after we eat, but I’m going to enjoy every minute that we’re together. But I won’t leave her side until I’m sure that she’s safe from the dick that did her so wrong.

  We wind through the maze of the resort’s underground parking garage in silence, our footsteps echoing off the concrete. When we get to my pickup, I easily lift Daisy’s suitcase from my shoulder into the back before opening the passenger door for her. I buckle in behind the wheel and we set off.

  “How do you feel about bar food?” I ask as we leave the resort compound and drive north toward the boardwalk. The neon lights of the shore in summertime flash by on either side, the ocean just visible beyond them to the east.