Her dad seemed mortified. “I never did that!”
Pastor Harris seemed to be enjoying himself. “Maybe not, but my point stands. No matter how he presents himself, your dad wasn’t perfect.”
With that, he turned and started up the drive. Ronnie watched him go, amused. Anyone who could make her dad squirm-in a harmless way, of course-was someone she definitely wanted to get to know a little better. Especially if he had stories to tell about her dad. Fun stories. Good stories.
Her dad’s expression as he watched him go was inscrutable. When he turned back to her, however, he seemed to have reverted to the dad she knew, and she remembered again that Officer Pete had been here only a couple of minutes earlier.
“What was that all about?” she asked. “With Officer Pete.”
“Why don’t we have breakfast first? I’m sure you’re probably starved. You barely had any dinner.”
She reached for his arms. “Just tell me, Dad.”
Her dad hesitated, struggling to find the right words, but there was no way he could candy-coat the truth. He sighed. “You’re not going to be able to go back to New York, at least until you’re arraigned next week. The store’s owner intends to press charges.”
Ronnie sat on the dune, less angry than frightened at the thought of what was happening inside the house. It had been an hour since her dad had told her what Officer Pete had said, and she’d been sitting out here ever since. She knew her dad was inside talking to her mom on the phone, and Ronnie could only imagine how her mom was reacting. It was the only good thing about being here at all.
Except for Will…
Ronnie shook her head, wondering why on earth she kept thinking about him. They were already over, assuming that they had ever really begun. Why had he been interested in her? He’d been together with Ashley for a long time, which meant he liked her type. If there was one thing she’d learned, it was that people didn’t change. They liked what they liked, even if they didn’t understand why. And she was nothing like Ashley.
No discussion, no debate. Because if she was like Ashley, she might as well just start swimming toward the horizon until all hope of rescue was gone. She might as well end it now.
Still, that wasn’t what bothered her most. What bothered her was her mom. Her mom was no doubt hearing about the arrest, since her dad was on the phone right now. The idea made her cringe. Her mom was blowing a gasket, no doubt screaming. As soon as she hung up with Dad, she would probably call her sister or her own mom and spread the news about the latest horrible thing Ronnie had done. She was into rehashing all sorts of personal stuff, usually with just enough exaggeration to make Ronnie seem as guilty as possible. Her mom always neglected the nuances, of course. In this case, the most important nuance was that she hadn’t done it!
But did that matter? Of course not. She could feel her mom’s rage, and the whole thing made her sick to her stomach. Maybe it was a good thing she wasn’t going home today.
Behind her, she heard her dad approach. When she glanced over her shoulder, he hesitated. She knew he was trying to figure out whether she wanted to be alone, before he gingerly took a seat beside her. He didn’t say anything right away. Instead, he seemed to be watching a distant shrimp trawler anchored near the horizon.
“Was she mad?”
She already knew the answer, but she couldn’t help asking.
“A little,” he admitted.
“Just a little?”
“I’m pretty sure she Godzilla’d the kitchen while we were talking.”
Ronnie closed her eyes, imagining the scene. “Did you tell her what really happened?”
“Of course I did. And I made sure to tell her that I was certain you were telling the truth.” He put an arm around her shoulder and gave her a hug. “She’ll get over it. She always does.”
Ronnie nodded. In the silence, she could feel her dad studying her.
“I’m sorry you can’t go home today,” he said. His tone was soft and apologetic. “I know how much you hate it here.”
“I don’t hate it here,” she said automatically. Surprising herself, she realized that as much as she’d been trying to convince herself otherwise, she was telling the truth. “It’s just that I don’t belong here.”
He gave her a melancholy smile. “If it’s any consolation, when I was growing up, I didn’t feel like I belonged here, either. I dreamed about going to New York. But it’s strange, because when I finally escaped this place, I ended up missing it more than I thought I would. There’s something about the ocean that just calls to me.”
She turned toward him. “What’s going to happen to me? Did Officer Pete say anything more?”
“No. Just that the owner feels like she has to press charges, since the items were valuable and she’s had a lot of problems with shoplifting lately.”
“But I didn’t do it!” Ronnie cried.
“I know,” he said, “and we’ll work it out. We’ll find a good lawyer and take it from there.”
“Are lawyers expensive?”
“Good ones are,” he said.
“Can you afford that?”
“Don’t worry. I’ll figure something out.” He paused. “Can I ask you something? What did you do that made Blaze so mad? You never told me.”
Had her mom asked, she probably wouldn’t have answered. Nor would she have answered her dad even a couple of days earlier. Now, she couldn’t see any reason not to. “She has this weird, scary boyfriend, and she thinks I was trying to steal him away from her. Or something like that.”
“What do you mean by weird and scary?”
She paused. At the water’s edge, the first of the families were arriving, loaded with towels and beach toys. “I saw him last night,” she said in a low voice. She pointed down the beach. “He was standing over there while I was talking to Will.”
Her dad didn’t try to hide his concern. “But he didn’t come any closer.”
She shook her head. “No. But there’s something… off about him. Marcus…”
“Maybe you should keep your distance from those two. Blaze and Marcus, I mean.”
“Don’t worry. I wasn’t planning to talk to either one of them again.”
“Do you want me to call Pete? I know you haven’t had a good experience with him…”
Ronnie shook her head. “Not yet. And believe it or not, I’m not mad at Pete at all. He was just doing his job, and actually, he was pretty understanding about the whole thing. I think he felt sorry for me.”
“He told me he believes you. Which is why he talked to the owner.”
She smiled, thinking how nice it was to talk to her dad like this. For an instant, she wondered how different her life would have been had he never moved away. She hesitated, scooping up a handful of sand and letting it sift through her fingers.
“Why did you leave us, Dad?” she asked. “I’m old enough for the truth, okay?”
Her dad stretched his legs out, obviously buying time. He seemed to be wrestling with something, trying to figure out how much to tell her and where to begin, before he started with the obvious. “After I stopped teaching at Juilliard, I did every show that I could. It was my dream, you know? Be a famous concert pianist? Anyway… I guess I should have thought more about the reality of the situation before I made the decision. But I didn’t. I didn’t realize how hard it was going to be on your mom.” He fixed her with a serious gaze. “In the end, we just sort of… drifted apart.”
She watched her dad as he answered, trying to read between the lines.
“There was someone else, wasn’t there,” she said. Her voice held no inflection.
Her dad didn’t answer, and his gaze fell away. Ronnie felt something plummet inside her.
When he finally answered, he sounded tired. “I know I should have tried harder to save the marriage, and I’m sorry about that. More sorry than you’ll ever know. But I want you to know something, okay? I never once stopped believing in your mom, I never once stopped believing in the endurance of our love. Even though it didn’t work out in the end the way you or I wanted it to, I see you and Jonah and I think how lucky I am to have you as children. In a lifetime of mistakes, you two are the greatest things that have ever happened to me.”