fall Read Free Page B

taught me to be accountable.”
    “You were a child.   Children aren’t accountable like adults.”
    “Life isn’t always easy,” Cullen told
her.   “And I’m not one of those
people that needs to punish people for what they did decades ago.   My father has paid for the things he did
to me.   He’s on the run.   He’s never going to be safe again, not
for the rest of his life.”
    “But why do you help someone who’s so
selfish?” Ivy asked.   “He doesn’t
deserve your help, Cullen.”
    “It’s not that simple,” he told her.   “Please, don’t make me defend my
decisions about him.   It is what it
is.”
    She nodded, but she couldn’t help once
again thinking about Cullen giving his father more than two million
dollars.  
    Even if Lucas was a jerk, the FBI still believed
that Preston Sharpe was a real threat.
    And maybe, just maybe—they had a
point.
     
    ***
     
    After a little while longer lounging in
bed together, they decided to get up and do something.
    Ivy and Cullen both showered.   Cullen went and used the outdoor shower,
and Ivy used the master bath.
    Later still, they walked to a nearby clam
shack that served fresh clams and sat at a little old picnic table and ate
together, watching the boats in the harbor.
    Nearby, other people were also
eating.   Families with small
children, an old retired couple, a group of construction workers with dirty
jeans and work boots.
    The breeze cooled her skin and the smell
of salt water was in the air.
    She could taste the salt.
    The sun was bright flashing yellow and
the sky was blue, almost as if it has been colored with pastels.
    Let
me always remember this ,
she told herself, as Cullen grinned, dipping his clams in the tiny paper
container of tartar sauce while he cracked jokes.
    It was as if he’d become the man she’d
always known was lurking inside him.   A happier version of Cullen Sharpe.   Gone was the intensity, the rigid control freak, and in its place was a
man at home in the world and at ease with his life.
    Seeing him like this gave Ivy more
pleasure and happiness than she ever could have imagined.
    “You know, I kind of dig this marriage
thing,” Cullen said, dipping the last clam in its tartar bath and then popping
it into his mouth and chewing.
    “Oh, do you?” she laughed.   “That’s a good thing.   Because we’re going to married for
life.”
    “You’re not getting rid of me that
easily,” Cullen told her.   “I know
the line is ‘til death do us part’ and all.   But I’m going to revise our contract and
make sure that death is covered as well.   I don’t want you dating some new guy in heaven.”
    Ivy giggled.   “Please.”
    “Please yourself.”   He grabbed her hand and then stood up,
took their trash and threw it in a nearby bin.   “Want to walk the beach?”
    “You don’t have to ask me twice,” she
said.
    And so they did walk the beach together,
and she took off her shoes and held them, feeling the fine sand between her
toes, and they got close enough to the water to let it drift over their feet as
the waves came in.
    “It’s cold,” she shivered, as each wave lapped
over her feet.
    “Don’t be a baby,” he said.   “This is warm.”
    “Not to me.   I like my water to be hot tub
temperature.”
    “This is mother nature, not a damn hot
tub.”    
    They held hands and kept walking the
beach.
    Up ahead, birds strutted, pecking at
little specks of food that only they could see.   A few children were busy building up sloppy
sandcastles that were doomed to be washed away within minutes.
    Ivy took a long, deep breath and let it
out.   “I feel like I’m dreaming,”
she said, after a moment.
    Cullen glanced at her, still walking, his
fingers interlaced between hers, their arms lightly swinging in sync with one
another.   “At least it isn’t a
nightmare.”
      “No, definitely not a nightmare.”   She gave him a look and felt her cheeks
flush slightly.
    “You might not