Laura Drake - Her Road Home

He snatched his blue jacket from the back of the chair. “Come on, Sam, let me take you to lunch.”

“Thanks, but I’m just walking down to Jesse’s. She’ll run me home.”

There were those walls again. “Oh, come on. Carl is a great cook, but aren’t you tired of eggs and burgers by now?”

“No. Thanks, but no.” She turned for the door.

There had to be a way around her walls without pulling a muscle climbing. “You don’t want to pull Jesse away from work to drive you home, do you?”

She winced. “I’ll just call a cab.”

He strode across the room, pulled the glass door open and held it. “Don’t be silly. I know a place that serves killer crab.” He yelled, “Tom, I’m going to lunch. Hold the fort.”

She stood there, waffling.

“Sam.” He stood, watching her. “It’s just lunch. Promise.” What had made this woman so wary? Well, he intended to find out. She was like no other beautiful woman he’d ever met.

“Thanks. I guess that would be fun.” Her smile transformed her from worried waif to magazine model.

He walked ahead to open the passenger door of the Love Machine for her, then trotted around the car, opened the door and settled into the driver’s seat. “Glad you left the top down. It’s a perfect day for a ride.”

It was, too. Nick cranked a rock ’n roll station, and they cruised through town. He drove, one hand on the wheel, the other hung over the door, waving every few feet to a pedestrian who hailed him, feeling as if he were chauffeuring the homecoming queen in a parade.

Springsteen’s “Pink Cadillac” blared as they turned onto Pacific Coast Highway. Sam kept the beat with her hand on the car door, singing in what he supposed she meant as harmony, but wasn’t, quite. Well, thank God, she isn’t perfect.

The smell of hot sand and salt whipped by on the wind, and Sam pulled her hair back to keep it out of her eyes. She laughed, looking like a carefree teen playing hooky.

Ten minutes later, they passed a sign welcoming them to Pismo Beach. The town looked like a throwback to the ’60s, when surfers were gods and before the term yuppie had been coined. The small, gaudy painted stucco buildings held an odd charm, and the Love Machine fit right in.

He pulled off PCH and parked in front of Dougie’s Place, a long, flamingo-pink building sprawled at the edge of the surf, like a fat, bikini-clad woman.

He held the thick metal front door for her. “Don’t judge it by the exterior. They have the best seafood for fifty miles.”

“If you say it, I believe it. I think.” She ducked under his arm.

A jukebox belted out the Beach Boys in the corner, and the bar stretched along the wall to the left. Behind the bar, where a mirror would normally reflect liquor bottles, stood a saltwater fish tank, stretching the entire length of the back wall. It was brightly lit from above, but the back had been blacked out, so the exotic fish stood out in bold relief. Schools of small bright yellow, red and blue fish darted around the huge tank like pennants fluttering in the wind.

He led the way past the bar to a dining area, where empty tables sat, dressed in red-and-white checked tablecloths. She followed him down a step to the patio. A glass wall blocked the wind coming in from the ocean side. Red and white umbrellas touting Mexican beer shaded glass-topped tables. The patio extended to the high tide point of the surf, the waves nearly lapping its base.

“Oh, I take back everything I was thinking. This is even better than the California I heard about, back in Ohio. How did you find this place?”

“It’s a closely guarded secret. The outside is to discourage tourists, I think.”

* * *

HE LED SAM to an unoccupied sun-filled corner. At a square table he pulled out a chair facing the ocean, and settled her into it before taking the one alongside. The waitress arrived, wanting their drink order.

She ordered a glass of the house Chablis without ever pulling her eyes from the long low waves combing the beach.

He took the proffered menus and ordered a Coke, thinking how pretty her hair looked, glinting platinum in the sun. With a bit more tan, she could pass for a vacationing movie star.

“Can you give me your mother’s address, Nick? I’d like to send her a little thank-you, for the use of her car.”

To avoid her look, he opened a menu and scanned it. “My mother died, fifteen years ago.”

“Oh,” She sounded like she’d stepped in a hole. “Nick, I’m so sorry.” Her fingers touched the back of his hand. Long, elegant fingers. Soft skin. Touching him. He kept his eyes on the menu.

Don’t drag out the dirty laundry basket. Not on a first date. When he fisted his hand, her fingers hovered for a moment, then withdrew. For the best. He didn’t want her sympathy. Besides, sympathy evaporated fast given the blowtorch of his past. “It happened a long time ago. Do you want to try the crab?”

“Sure. But you’ll have to show me how. I’ve never had the guts to tackle those leg-cracker things.”

He glanced up to see if she was joking. “You’re not going to tell me you’ve never eaten crab?”

“Give me a break. Ohio isn’t exactly Mollusk Mecca, you know.”

“I guess not.” He gathered the menus, trying to hide a smile. “Crab is a crustacean.”

She waved a hand. “Whatever.”

Time to test those walls. “What’s Ohio like?” It was a bonus that he got to watch that gorgeous mouth move.

“Just about as different from this as you can get.” She looked out at the sea, squinting a bit in the glare. “California is like a teenager, all brash and full of energy. Ohio is a middle-class, middle-aged grown-up. Flat, staid and earnest.”

“Your family still there?”

She stopped, just long enough for him to realize he’d never seen her still. “My mom died when I was born. My dad died six years ago.”

“No brothers or sisters?”

“I was first, and only.” She pulled a strand of wind-blown hair away from her lips. “But my mom was it for him—he never remarried. So he had to make do with me.” She smiled. “It was lucky for me, though. In the summer he had to take me to work with him, and I learned my love of building from him. If there had been a brother, Dad probably wouldn’t have thought to teach me.”

He ignored the heat in his chest, warmed by the smile that wasn’t meant for him. “Sounds like a fun childhood.”

Her smile faded. “It sounds that way, doesn’t it?”

When the waitress interrupted, he ordered for them. She asked if Sam wanted another glass of wine. Sam looked down as if surprised to find the glass empty. She shook her head, and the waitress left.

Sam folded her arms on the table. “What about you? Where did you come from?”

“Right here, in Widow’s Grove. I thought you knew.”

She looked him full in the face, eyes round in shock. “Jesse said something about it, but I thought she was kidding. You’ve never lived anywhere else? Ever?”

“Well, my trade school and internship was in L.A., but I scooted back here as soon as I could.”

Her lips quirked. “Homesick?”

He thought about the jail cell that had been his home for six months. “More than you can imagine. Like every other teenager from a small town, I couldn’t wait to blow this place. But L.A. didn’t suit me. Too many dazzling lights. Too many people. Too many bars.” He took a sip of Coke to make himself shut up, and kicked the laundry basket full of past to a dark corner. “Why did you leave home?”

She looked out to sea so long he thought she wouldn’t answer. Maybe he wasn’t the only one with an overflowing basket.

“About a month after Dad died, I was sitting at the kitchen table drinking a cup of coffee. You know how when you’re thinking, you don’t see what you’re looking at?”