Page 34 of Hush (The Seaside Saga #25)

THE CONFERENCE ROOM IS BUZZING.

Elsa thinks it’s a contagious sound. An excited sound of voices brimming with possibility.

She feels the good vibes, too. This is the best idea she’s had in a long time—attending the Connecticut Tourism Conference in Hartford.

The room is mobbed as the crowd awaits the keynote speaker.

Dressed for business—fitted black mockneck top over black straight-leg pants—Elsa unbuttons her long mahogany-brown blazer and takes a seat near the stage.

The large tote she’d brought is already stuffed with a few brochures about the local hospitality industry—of which she and Celia are a part!

As she waits for the talks to begin, her cell phone silently vibrates with an incoming text.

So she pulls the phone from her tote and reads the message from Cliff.

No goodies today? he texts, then sends a photo of the sadly empty coffee cart. Patrons have been asking. Well … Nick has.

Elsa thumb-types back. I’m at that conference I’d mentioned. All day. It’s great already!

That’s right , comes Cliff’s next text. Come by for dinner tonight? You can tell me all about it.

Perfetto! TTYL , Elsa types, then turns to the podium onstage.

The first speaker has just arrived there.

So she puts away her phone and pulls a leatherbound notebook from her tote.

After flipping to the blank pages, she starts taking notes—right away!

That’s how this conference feels. Energetic! Fun! Immediate!

Carefully, she listens. Jots a phrase here and there.

Hospitality is part of Connecticut’s economic engine .

Which means the Ocean Star Inn is, too.

Tourism provides over one billion dollars in tax revenue a year—some of which gets reinvested in growing the tourism trade.

Today’s focus? Bridge tourism and hospitality industry.

It’s all about connectivity—everyone connecting their minds and hearts to work together.

And one of Elsa’s favorite declarations—already, only ten minutes in—she jots next.

Everyone in the conference room is actually a Connecticut ambassador.

Oh, yes. She is an ambassador. Through the inn, she’ll share the goodwill and beauty and heart of her tucked-away beach community.

Elsa feels something, then. At last, she’s authentically committing to her dream.

Her beach inn dream.

And it feels really good.

She listens to the speaker introduce a panel discussion now .

Being here, Elsa’s visions and ideas start bubbling up. Heck, her pen doesn’t stop jotting, noting, diagramming.

Finally, after more than a year of feeling lost since the death of her son, she’s feeling excitement for her inn again—the same excitement Sal had when he drew up her business plan.

Who would’ve thought it? Sitting in the audience of a large conference room in the city, it’s all coming back now.

Elsa’s feeling true enthusiasm for her business—but for more, too.

For working together with Celia; for her relationship with Cliff; for living near her beloved nieces; for her life—for it all.

Heck, it doesn’t happen often—feeling this kind of zest. So Elsa’s already mentally crafting the email she’ll send later to her dear friend Concetta… It was an exclamation point kind of day!

***

It just couldn’t work.

Celia was right. When she imagined her life as a movie two months ago, she decided on the title, too.

The Nowhere Affair.

She decided it when Shane first returned to Maine after spending a couple of weeks here. A couple of weeks when he reached out to his estranged brother. To his Stony Point friends.

A couple of weeks when he got to know her , too.

But his stay was only temporary.

So was any fling, any emotion, she and Shane secretly shared during those weeks .

Thus, The Nowhere Affair . Because that’s where her time with a tenacious lobsterman led.

Nowhere.

Shane went back to lobstering. She stayed here as assistant innkeeper.

Oh, sure. Twists and turns in their lives brought them back together.

Somewhat. The busted engine of his captain’s lobster boat bought Shane more time in Stony Point.

Then there were Celia’s secret trips to Maine—a romantic one over Labor Day weekend; a heartbreaking one for Shiloh’s funeral.

And it was Shiloh’s death that kept Shane off the water—and on Jason’s stairway to the sea—this past month.

Then came her and Shane’s San Francisco liaison.

But still—here it is. The truth coming around and biting hard this time. When all is said and done? Their affair went nowhere.

If the next scene of The Nowhere Affair were being filmed today, this is how it would be handled.

It would open with a pull-back shot. And a noise, too.

The camera would be zoomed in close—focusing on Celia’s bamboo rake dragging over the leaves in her yard.

That would be the noise—that rake scraping over the earth. Forcefully. With anger, maybe.

Slowly then, the camera would pull back.

It would show a woman in her faded jeans and a fleece jacket over a simple black sweater.

Her hair is in a loose ponytail. Wisps of it have escaped already.

Also, beat-up garden gloves are on her hands.

And those gloved hands are a little aggressive with that rake.

As more wisps of the woman’s auburn hair fall with her forceful raking, and as the leaves, well, as they fly , the camera would capture it all.

Capture that the woman can’t sleep.

Can’t eat.

It shows on her weary face. Her worried face.

So she’s using that bamboo rake to get at what’s gnawing at her.

Oh, and she knows damn well what it is.

One person’s absence is getting under her skin.

Even when Shane was here—but they didn’t see each other—they always found little connections. Had small awarenesses of the other.

Stolen minutes by his pickup as she took the baby for a secluded walk along the winding beach roads.

Secret notes beneath doors.

Texted photos of the Barlow stairs.

Of Aria.

The thing is? Celia had it together. She braced for this. Accepted it. Life sent her and Shane off on their own paths.

Yes, she did accept that. Steeled herself for it.

But not for this.

Not for the feeling of missing Shane being stronger than she’d anticipated.

But it’s more than that.

With Shane gone and out to sea again, it feels like… they’re done.

Like they let go of each other—without actually saying it.

It was the only way they could get through their farewell.

By not acknowledging the end of their relationship. By ignoring it. Looking away .

The thought has Celia just stop raking.

It’s over.

She leans her rake against the front porch railing.

Takes a breath.

Wipes the back of her gloved hand across her forehead.

“You son of a bitch,” she whispers. “Making me love you.”

She pauses then, in the October morning sunshine. In the crisp salt air that she doesn’t even bother breathing deeply. What’s the use? There ain’t no cure for her Shane Bradford blues.

Instead, she goes inside her charming little fairy-tale cottage that feels more evil than happy ending today.

Her first stop? Her purse on the sofa, then Aria’s swear jar on the mantel.

A dollar bill will suffice for her whispered expletive outside.

She opens the Mason jar lid and stuffs the money in with the rest of the cash there.

Oh, lots of swearing happens around here, that’s for sure.

This peaceful, bucolic beach community belies plenty of troubles.

There’s money in that swear jar from Kyle, Jason.

Elsa, even. Everyone, no doubt, has had that jar shaken at them when some foul language passed through their lips in the near vicinity of Aria.

After closing the jar’s lid, Celia accepts the stinging reality of the morning.

She just… goes on.

Walks to the nursery to check on her napping baby.

But what the camera might film for this pivotal Nowhere Affair scene would be this. It would catch Celia’s eyes darting from the walls, to the living room end tables, to the kitchen countertops, even to the dresser top and closet in her bedroom .

Because, yes. In The Nowhere Affair , her eyes find no evidence of her secret affair. The camera would be sure to capture that.

There are no framed photographs of Shane Bradford hanging on her walls, propped on her tables.

No pictures of the lobsterman hauling traps at sea.

No framed selfies of her and Shane on the beach here.

There’s no harmonica left behind on her kitchen counter.

No forgotten sweatshirt hanging in her closet.

No watch or key ring on her dresser.

No folded menu from some private dinner at a hole-in-the-wall restaurant.

Nothing, nothing, nothing.

The camera, just like Celia herself, would find no evidence that the man was ever even a part of her life.