“Oh, without a doubt.” He jerks his head toward the ice cream shop. “Come on.”
Beau orders orange creamsicle, while I go for the mint brownie again. Elaine insists it’s on the house, so I slip a twenty into the tip jar when she’s not watching. But Beau is.
“Shall we take our spoils to enjoy at the beach?” he asks as we get back in his police cart.
I narrow my eyes at him. “Are you trying to trick me into doing midnight beach cleanup again?”
He puts his hands up. “No cleanup tonight. I promise.”
“Good,” I say. But the truth is, I wouldn’t mind even if wediddo cleanup there. That’s why I know I have a real and growing problem: I don’t mind wading through strangers’ trash when I’m with Beau. That’s a very scary place to find yourself.
Beau drives us to the beach one-handed, and I keep my eyes on the road instead of watching him lick his ice cream. “Any word from the surveyor?” He glances at me.
“I wish. He says it’ll be at least a week before we see the report.”
Beau grimaces sympathetically.
“You know,” I say, “youcouldjust sign a document stating the property boundary runs even with the fence, but that the dock is on Sawyer land…”
He chuckles. “But it doesn’t and it’s not.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
“And you say this based on what evidence? I’d love to see it, because it would make my life a whole lot easier if we could find anything at all about it.”
“I don’t have any physical evidenceper se,” he admits as he parks in the lot in front of the beach. “But I’m pretty confident.”
“Of course you are,” I say. “You’ve been fed a steady diet of Palmer lies since you were a babe. But you’ll see the truth soon enough. Assuming we ever get that report.”
We leave our shoes at the golf cart and walk in the dark, cones in hand, to where the waves are breaking. The sand under my feet is silky soft, and whenever the waves press up against my toes, it’s pleasantly warm.
“Summer nights on Sunset Harbor are pretty hard to beat,” Beau says, as if he knows what I’m thinking.
“Better than Miami?” I ask, trying to casually work at my ice cream.
There’s a pause before he answers. “Better than Miami.” There’s something about the way he talks whenever Miami’s brought up. It’s like…reluctance, and that realization on my part revives the specter of Miss Miami. Deedee did say he was secretive about her.
“Do you miss it there?” I won’t ask my burning question directly—especially not after how much I’ve lamented the gossip on the island to Beau—but I can’t help opening up the door for him to step through. I reserve the right to push him through if I get impatient, though.
He hesitates again before answering. “I don’t miss the city.”
Relief washes over me like the water at my feet.
“It’s the people I miss,” he says. “Well, a couple in particular.” He smiles slightly to himself, and jealousy flares inside me like a bonfire doused with gasoline.
A bigger wave crashes, bringing the water to my ankles and wetting the bottom of my pants.
“Should’ve chosen this side,” Beau says, displaying the dry hem of his uniform pants since he’s farther away from the water.
“Yeah?” As soon as the next wave comes up, I kick water at him. It splashes his uniform and the little ice cream he has left.
He stares at the ice cream, then at me.
“Now it’s salted orange cream,” I say, my heart beating quickly. I’ve poked the bear.
His gaze stays fixed on me as he reaches a hand over slowly. I watch its progress warily, and my brows pull together as it migrates not toward my ice cream but toward…my butt?
