Page 25 of Hush (The Seaside Saga #25)

THE DAY’S BEATING HIM DOWN.

And that’s a problem for Shane because the sun’s not even fully risen. So it’s a little early to be defeated.

But Friday morning, that’s how he feels while walking the old dock further down the Connecticut coast.

Defeated.

Which is why he dressed in his black twill bomber over a long-sleeve black thermal tee, olive-colored canvas pants rolled at the hem and his black combat boots. It feels like he’ll have to fight to make it through this difficult day in one piece.

Weathered boards creak beneath his booted step now. Sea damp right here on the water touches his skin. In the misty harbor, moored vessels pull on their docklines. Seagulls swoop past.

Come Monday, Shane will be walking across a Maine dock.

He’ll be boarding a lobster boat stacked with traps and coils of rope and sacks of bait.

He’ll be throwing the gaff hook and hauling up loaded pots from the sea.

The breeze will be stiffer than here. The salt air, stronger. The waters, rougher.

The Atlantic Ocean will reclaim him.

Will push his memories aside.

Will occupy his time, his thoughts, his life.

With each step down this creaking dock today, he’s one step closer to that.

To Monday.

But for now, his destination is a little shabby fishing shack.

Its shingles are faded gray. Fishing net is draped on the side of the shack.

A red tin lobster is mounted above a large paned window.

On the other side of that window, a grizzled old salt wears a flannel shirt open over a navy tee with wrinkled khakis.

His silvery hair as wild as the seas he’s fished is tied back beneath a red bandana.

Shane gives a rap on the glass, waves to his former captain, then continues on inside to Lobsterland.

When he does, every leathery wrinkle on the captain’s face rises in a genuine smile.

“Well, well. Look at you. It’s Shane from Maine,” Noah says, meeting Shane at the door and clapping his back in a warm hug.

“Noah, good to see you.” Shane takes off his newsboy cap and tosses it on a nearby table. “It always is.”

Noah agrees. And motions to an already set table.

There, Shane hangs his bomber jacket on a chairback and settles in for a hearty breakfast. Noah doesn’t disappoint, either.

He delivers plates of sunny-side-up eggs with bacon and hash browns and buttered toast. Coffee, too—lobsterman strong.

As they eat, they catch up. Noah tells him how he’s gotten started with the ghost fishing project.

He describes the pots hauled up after spending twenty years at the bottom of Long Island Sound.

“The traps are so encrusted with grime, and seaweed, and slugs, it’s hard to find the owners’ bands on them. But we eventually do—beneath it all.”

“You like being out there hauling traps again?” Shane asks while dragging a folded piece of toast through egg yolk on his plate.

“I do. It’s like I’m standing with a foot in two worlds when those traps come up.

I’m cleaning up the environment for future generations, but, man…

Seeing those ancient traps covered with years’ of saltwater detritus?

It harkens me back to the old days. I can almost hear the ghosts of long-ago captains calling out to the crews. ”

“Yeah,” Shane muses. “Like you telling me back in the day, Wake up! Move! Let’s go!”

They both laugh at that before Shane fills Noah in on his life, too. Tells him about completing the Barlow stairs. About his captain waiting for him to finish out the lobstering season in Maine. About a small win for the fishermen—the nixing of lobster gauge size increases.

“So I’m heading home tomorrow, Noah. For a long time, this time.”

While sipping his hot coffee, Noah squints at Shane. “So what’s the problem, my friend? Something’s written all over your face.”

Shane nods. Nothing ever gets past his old captain who knew him when. Knew him as a seventeen-year-old juvie punk—to now. So scooping up the last of his eggs, Shane tells Noah, “Be leaving Celia for a long time, too. ”

“That’s a tough one. She can’t go with you to Maine?”

“Out of the question. Wouldn’t even ask it of her.

” After washing down the eggs with his coffee, Shane pushes back his chair, grabs his newsboy cap from the adjoining table and stands to leave.

“So off I go. You’re my first farewell of many, Noah,” Shane says, putting on his black bomber jacket now.

“Got a boatload of them today, so I got to run.”

“Sure.” Noah, patting a napkin to his face, stands, too. “I’ll miss seeing you around these parts, my boy. Don’t you let years go by again.”

“I’ll try not to. It’s been so good seeing you again this summer. You take care of yourself, you old salt.” Shane sees something then, too. Sees Noah cross his arms and get a little choked up. Because they both know it. Years could go by before they cross paths again.

If they ever even do.

“It’s a hard goodbye for me, Shane Bradford. Knew you when you were this high and so stinkin’ full of yourself.”

“Might not have survived without you.” Shane walks closer and hugs the man. “So you take care of yourself, Noah Conti. Be careful out there on the water, you hear me?”

Noah doesn’t say much. Shane can see why, too. His emotion will show. Noah just backs up and waves him away. Shane hesitates with some regret, then tips his cap at his old captain and pushes the door open. When he looks over his shoulder, he barely hears Noah’s words.

“Fair winds, my friend,” the grizzled man manages, then turns away and walks toward the lobster tank in the rear of the little seafood shanty.

** *

Shane can’t explain the feeling. It’s surreal. It’s as natural as breathing. It’s like being home again. His whole body unknots.

It all happens an hour and a half later when he feels that rise and fall of the sea beneath him.

Doesn’t matter that he’s in an old wooden rowboat in the Stony Point Beach boat basin.

All that matters is that he’s on the water.

Sea water. Salt water. Something about it feels more natural than being on land.

Elsa sits on a wooden bench opposite him. He’d first stopped at the inn and returned her kneepads and Sal’s leather tool belt. Then he hooked her boat trailer to the back of his pickup. The truck’s parked at the marina boat ramp now.

“Shane,” Elsa says as he unhitches the rowboat from its slip. “This is so helpful to me, you have no idea.”

Shane tips his newsboy cap. “Glad to oblige, Elsa.”

“I’ve got such a busy day ahead decorating the inn with Celia.” Elsa wraps her arms around her knees as she talks. “She’s holding down the fort while I’m getting this old boat on land for the winter.”

“Listen,” Shane begins then. He looks at her sitting there.

Elsa’s dressed for the brisk morning—camel-colored barn jacket over a sweater, slim jeans and hiking boots.

A silky scarf tied around her head holds her brown hair against the sea breeze.

On her double-pierced ears, gold hoops and diamond studs glimmer in the sunlight.

“You have time for one last paddle ride before we hoist this vessel out?”

“Oh, yes! What a perfect idea.” Elsa tips her head. “Where to? ”

“Have you ever seen the beach from out on the water?”

“Why… no, actually. I’ve only ever been through the marsh. But since I’ve left the inn in Celia’s capable hands, and have some time, I’d love to.”

So Shane steers the wooden boat through the narrow channel and out to Long Island Sound. As he paddles, the oars creak against the oarlocks. Ripples of salt water lap at the boat’s hull. Over and over, he sets the oars in the water and slowly pulls back on them.

And Elsa seems fascinated with this new view of Stony Point Beach.

As he paddles his way closer, she bends down, though.

“Oh, look,” she says when her foot hits something beneath her bench.

Bending, she scoops up a few pieces of sea glass.

Their dull green and yellow colors glimmer in the midmorning sun.

“Hm. These must be left over from Lauren and Kyle’s vow renewal.

They’re so pretty,” she murmurs before pocketing them.

“That’s when I first met you, Elsa. When I arrived at the inn for their original ceremony. In August.”

“Yes, and I thought you were maybe Kyle’s cousin.”

“That you did. You were also my first friend when I showed up.”

“Oh, you had a hell of a time here back then, didn’t you?” Elsa asks.

“You don’t know the half of it, Elsa.”

And for Shane, the problem is that she still doesn’t.

Doesn’t know the half of his relationship with Celia Gray.

Celia—who he also took for a paddle out to the Sound for a glimpse at the beach.

That was the night of the failed vow renewal ceremony.

A night when he helped Celia remove all the roses from this very boat.

A night when her foot tipped over the pail of sea glass and shells intended for the ceremony.

The sea glass pieces Elsa just found are surely remnants of that August night.

That night when he was beguiled by Celia Gray and her pretty hazel eyes, her soft voice, her occasional discomfort talking to him as they rowed the black waters.

No, Elsa doesn’t know the half of it.

Which, sitting across from her now, has Shane feeling somewhat like a fraud.

Elsa, his first Stony Point friend—truly—has been too kind to him to be left in the lurch.

In the dark. Wouldn’t he love to let out his and Celia’s secret.

Wouldn’t he love to clear the air—with everyone —now that he’s leaving.

Announce their relationship with a boardwalk meeting—he and Celia last to stroll the weathered planks, hand in hand, with Shane raising Celia’s hand to his lips and leaving the lightest kiss there.

Celia’s small smile. The surprise, but acceptance, from all gathered.

It could be beautiful.