Page 3 of Ebbing Tides (The Lighthouse Duology #2)

It was just after sunset when the truck barreled through the open cemetery gate. The caretaker, Chuck Corbin, was as punctual as they came, and he’d be around in about an hour to close the old place up. But I was equally punctual, and our ships rarely passed in the night.

It was how I preferred things.

Some people relied on social interactions to fill their cup, but I relied on the quiet to fill mine.

Lido whined from the passenger seat. I remembered a time before he was in my life, when I’d go to work and permit the silence of the office and cemetery to join the weight of my grief.

I’d welcome the awful ache in my chest, allowing it to become too much to bear.

I’d welcome the punishment, the torture my loneliness brought with it.

But now, I didn’t want to spend the night in my office alone, surrounded by ghosts and the dead who didn’t bother to haunt me.

Lido brought with him a calm I could never repay him for, but I tried with my constant companionship.

He seemed content enough with that alone, but at this moment, he was anything but.

“What’s up, huh?” I asked, reaching over to scratch behind his ears. “What do you see out there?”

He answered with a low moan and a restless wriggle of his back end as he tried to wag his tail in the confines of the truck’s cab.

The sun was setting quickly— Laura’s sunsets —and out here, on the road parting the hallowed ground beneath the canopy of naked trees, the night came faster than it did in the city.

Trying to see anything was difficult, and normally, I’d brush his behavior off as him spotting a rabbit or a squirrel or something like that.

But before I could drive off toward the office, a person emerged from the trees, and I gasped, clutching a hand to my chest.

“Shit,” I pushed out on a breath as the person—a woman—waved me down. “Not a ghost.”

For the record, ghosts didn’t scare me. I just didn’t appreciate being scared, period.

I opened my car door and told Lido to calm down as I climbed out of the truck to greet the woman. Her teeth were chattering, her cheeks red and bitten by the harsh cold.

“Hey, can I help you with something?” I asked, closing the door behind me as Lido tried to clamber out. Then, for good measure, I added, “The cemetery will be closing soon.”

“Um … yeah, you can probably help me. Well, I hope so anyway. I’ve been lost out here for …

longer than I’d like to admit.” She laughed uneasily and dug into her pocket, producing a pack of cigarettes.

“Came out to sneak a smoke, started to walk a little bit, and the next thing I knew, I didn’t know how to get back to the house. ”

“House?” I narrowed my eyes before realization rushed in. “Oh, wait, you’re Chuck’s sister-in-law, right?”

She tipped her head with confusion, as if trying to recall something. Then she replied, “Oh, um … yeah, that would be me.”

I extended a gloved hand to her as I offered a kind smile. “I’m Max. I work over in the … security … office …”

My voice tapered off as she accepted my hand, and we shook quickly before she pulled back to wrap her arms around herself.

A quick assessment of her clothing, and I noticed she wasn’t at all dressed for the weather.

A baggy sweatshirt, equally baggy sweatpants, and a pair of fuzzy slippers on her feet.

I tried not to laugh—she was clearly freezing—but she must’ve been pretty desperate for that cigarette to come out dressed like that.

But more than all that, there was something there. Something in her eyes …

Something so …

Familiar .

“Max, under different circumstances, it would probably be very nice to meet you, but I am … God , I am so cold.”

Her silvery puffs of breath were illuminated by the truck’s headlights, as if to punctuate just how cold she was. I smiled and nudged my head toward the cab.

“Hop in. I’ll give you a ride.”

“Bless you.”

I led her to the passenger side and opened the door. “Lido, back seat,” I commanded, and he cocked his head with curiosity at the sight of our new friend. Otherwise, he didn’t budge. “Lido, back seat.”

Behind me, Chuck’s sister-in-law sniffed a laugh. “He’s a good listener,” she assessed quietly, sarcasm in her voice.

“Don’t let him fool you. He is.” Except, apparently, when trying to impress a pretty woman.

The thought was sudden and unexpected, and I furrowed my brow. What the hell was that? I wasn’t trying to impress her, was I? I knew she was pretty; it would be impossible to ignore that fact. But impress her? I had just met her, for crying out loud.

But why do I feel like I’ve seen her before?

“Lido.” The firmness in my tone snapped him out of his trance, and he scurried to the back seat. “Good boy.”

Then I turned to the woman freezing behind me. “Sorry about that. Do you need my help getting in or …”

She was standing so damn close to me that I could smell her perfume permeating the air between us. Her reddish-blonde hair was pulled back, tucked behind her ears and held in place by one of those claw-clip things my sisters had liked back in the day, and her eyes …

Huh .

Her eyes were ringed in red. She had been crying. I furrowed my brow at the question nagging at the tip of my tongue— Are you okay? God, it wasn’t my business if she was okay or not. I didn’t know her. Why would I want to ask?

“I think I can manage. Thanks.”

She smiled, her lips chapped and cracked from the cold. God, this poor woman. How long had she been wandering around this place, trying to find her way back to Chuck’s house?

Then she stepped up and reached for the grab bar by the side of the open door.

But her slippers lacked good treading, and she slipped off the step before her hand had a chance to grab the bar.

With her hands on either side of the door, she steadied herself and avoided an even more embarrassing mishap, but still, she whined pitifully.

“Oh my God,” she groaned, laying her hands over her face. “Are you kidding me?”

I bit back my chuckle. “Here, let me help.”

She looked over her shoulder as I held out my hand. I offered a sheepish smile, and she sighed with resignation, laying her hand in mine.

She climbed into the cab and grumbled an embarrassed, “Thank you,” her cheeks an even deeper shade of scarlet—a hue that pinged at a corner of my memory, as if calling to something … something far away.

What is it? What am I trying to remember?

I narrowed my eyes at the thought and closed the door in time for Lido to lay his head on her shoulder and slobber a long, wet kiss over her cheek.

Smooth, doofus. I shook my head and huffed a chuckle as I walked around to the driver’s side.

She was scrubbing her trembling hands over his face by the time I climbed in and put the truck in drive.

“You’re his best friend now, you realize,” I told her, rolling slowly through the cemetery toward Chuck’s place up on the hill.

This late at night, you couldn’t be too careful, driving through these winding roads. You never knew when a rabbit was going to hop out of nowhere, so I drove slowly, taking my time.

Or perhaps I just enjoyed the idea of having her in my truck …

as crazy as that might’ve been, considering we’d just met.

But, oh God, why couldn’t I shake the feeling that …

we hadn’t just met? She felt old to me, like someone I’d known once before, in another life perhaps.

Or maybe it had just been too long since I’d been in the presence of a pretty, nice-smelling woman.

My intentions were good, of course. I was taking her home, and that was it, but I just …

Well, let’s just say, she reminded me of someone. Something . A feeling, a spark maybe. The hope of more and possibility.

But …

“He’s such a good boy. Yes, he is,” she gushed before aiming her shy smile at me and adding, “I’m Melanie, by the way.”

Melanie.

Melanie …

A chord was struck in my heart, deep and yearning, at the sound of her name. But, no. No , she couldn’t be that Melanie. Not my Melanie—as if she’d ever been mine at all.

Chuck had mentioned his sister-in-law to me before. Recently even. She had come up for Thanksgiving.

Where did he say she was from? I couldn’t remember now, and I wasn’t sure it mattered.

He had asked if I’d be around, but I had already made plans with my sisters—reluctantly, mind you.

As a rule, I wasn’t a fan of the holidays.

Not in an Ebenezer Scrooge kind of way or anything.

I just didn’t like to make everyone else miserable.

Hell, I wasn’t even what I’d call miserable .

But for me, holidays reminded me of the times I missed and couldn’t have again, memories I’d never have the chance to create.

Of a family I’d had but lost. It was just better to pretend it was a normal day.

For eight years, I’d spent those days alone with Lido—much to Sid’s dismay, of course, but at least he respected my wishes—but I’d spent this last round of holidays with them all and Dad, considering the circumstances. I hadn’t wanted to. But …

Anyway …

“Chuck has mentioned your name before,” I commented, making conversation.

I knew someone with that name too …

I tried to conjure the image of that young woman in my mind, the one from an auto repair shop in Connecticut, and I glanced at the woman to my side. The woman in my mind was so much younger, her memory so fuzzy and faded with time, but …

No, stop. That’s ridiculous.

Melanie barked an amused laugh, and a jolt of electricity struck my chest. Excitement. Life .

“ Chuck ? Charlie is Chuck ?” She grinned, lighting the cab with mirth. “Oh my God, I bet he hates that.”

I blanched, my gut twisting. “Does he? Crap, I’ve been calling him that since …” I pulled my shoulders to my ears. “Well, probably since the first day we met. Ivan introduced us years ago, and that’s what he always called him, so I just figured …”