Sophie beat the sun to the water. Sinking her toes into the cold sand, she looks over the turbulent Atlantic and inhales the briny air. White caps catch the moonlight. Nothing but the water stirs. It reaches for land, but brought-up short, it’s always forced back from where it came.
Sophie shivers, seeing the sad mockery of her life in the waves.
Bryce was a mistake. She knew it even as he flattered her with his attentions; even as he lavished gifts on her that no other man had ever considered much less afford; even as he nimbly slithered past her defenses and assured her that the heart couldn’t lie. “This is right, Soapy,” he’d crooned to her. “Can’t you just feel it? The heart doesn’t lie.”
But the heart does lie- routinely. Deceptive pound of flesh, it lurches and swells and flops around in her chest like an opinionated brat. Inhaling the scent of salt and sand, Sophie reaches for calm; but like the water reaches for the beach, she’s always brought back to the turbulence in her chest.
She lost friends over her relationship with Bryce and gained new ones that smiled in her company and whispered as soon as she turned. She wasn’t unaware of their words.
Homewrecker: even she can’t deny that fact. She had an affair with a married man and broke his marriage apart.
But opportunistic? Gold digger? Sophie fought those accusations with separate bank accounts; separate financial lives and a pre-nuptial agreement that has left her with nothing. Still people said them.
Easy? Or, if the speaker is particularly cruel, whore: This one stings the most of all. Sophie had always considered herself a good person. Maybe she wasn’t the Virgin Mary but she’d had far fewer bedmates than her college roommate and only a couple of long-term relationships. It wasn’t enough. Her reputation was marred. She had thought that certainly her marriage would have settled the rumor mill. It hadn’t.
It shouldn’t matter, Sophie reminds herself. It shouldn’t matter what people say, what they think. It shouldn’t matter the look women give her when she walks into a room, as if it were necessary to guard their husbands. But the truth is that it does matter to soft Sophie. It hurts. And if she thought that living nearly two days away from the site of her transgressions would somehow erase the slate and give her the fresh start she needed, Jacks had proven her wrong.
Well, it’s not as if he’s the only one. Jeremy was the only member of the family that didn’t seem to need proof that Sophie wasn’t some kind of seductress. JJ looks at her as if waiting for her to break out into a spontaneous strip-tease. Savannah may smile, even laugh with Sophie, but she’s noticed her husband’s attention. It took Cheryl weeks to stop stalking Sophie every time she entered the house, no doubt wondering when she would make a play for the brother.
No, the only difference is that Jacks said it out loud. He was blunt about it. Maybe that’s somehow better, but it feels worse.
The inky blue sky greys with the coming dawn. Descending into the pale sand, Sophie scoots until she’s comfortable. Silencing the introspection, she once again considers peace- but she’s haunted.
It had been spring- the mountains blushing with redbud blooms- and Sophie had sat at the kitchen table as her mother meticulously stashed the last of the dishes they had washed.
“But I love him, Mama,” she’d said, pleading for the rounder woman to accept this.
Her mother’s grey streaked head fell with heartache. “Soapy, you’re a grown woman now. Can’t direct you as I’d like- not no more. But you mind my words, little girl. A man that cheats for you will cheat on you.”
Sophie’s cheeks had blazed with mortification. “Mama, I never said . . .”
“You didn’t have to, dove. Engaged a week after his divorce? I’m not a slow woman, Soapy- despite what you may think.”
“No, Mama, of course not. I didn’t mean . . .”
But Sophie’s mother wasn’t interested in debating her intelligence. Sitting across from her daughter with a hard expression, she’d examined her like she could see right past her skin and into her heart. “I don’t trust that man, Soapy-girl. Something’s not jarring right. If you ask me- and I’m keenly aware that you’re not- he’s marrying you to get back at his wife for leaving him. Show her what’s-for. He can catch the next pretty thing to walk through his door.” Sophie opened her mouth to argue, but her mother raised a plump hand and stopped the words in their tracks. “Ain’t much of a nevermind to me, young lady. You’ve always had a stubborn streak. Figure that you’re gonna do what you’re gonna do. But let this here conversation be your reminder. When you wonder why didn’t nobody warn ya off- this was it. This was your warning.”
That had been her last conversation with her mother in that kitchen. A month later, she and her father both died in a car accident. They hadn’t even been present to see Sophie make the worst mistake of her life. Now, sitting on this beach, she’s torn between gratitude that her parents hadn’t seen the shameful ending to this story and heartache that they’re nowhere near to cry on. Mistaken or no, Sophie had always known that she was loved.
Now there’s nobody.
She’s no one’s wife. She’s no one’s daughter.
She’s alone, her days etched with heart-wrenching grief, shame and disappointment. The mirror reflects back the labels everyone’s thrown on her.
Jacks jumps off the grid. Straddling the growling motorcycle, he turns westward and rumbles across the Georgia landscape, not bothering to note the scenery or even the road names. No one knows where he is; no one knows where he’s going- least of all, him.
Forget her. He orders himself. Forget the chocolate brown eyes that laugh for her when those plump lips won’t let the sound escape. Forget the soft tussle of dark curls that spill from its ponytail. Forget the plush flesh that brushed him when she passed. Forget the vulnerable woman that’s trusting his family to protect her and . . . skidding sideways, Jacks stops the motorcycle. Curses rip through his lips. The lies: Forget the lies. His father may not intend the deception but Jacks knows the truth. That little apartment over the pool house is nothing but a holding cell until the family’s hired assassin makes his appearance.
And Sophie has no idea.
No doubt his father thought that information too stressful. No doubt they hope that passports and name changes will materialize before the family choses to act. But once they determine that his Uncle Bryce’s attempts to bring soft Sophie back under his influence have failed, then the stalling game will end. Everything will explode.
They can’t even go to the police. Hell, with his family’s history this would go straight to the FBI and that would only get ugly, fast.
Jacks hits the handlebars. Raking both hands through his midnight black hair, he looks into the morning blue sky and, with a grit of teeth, sternly reminds himself that this is not the reason he’s returned to the states.
It’s not someone else he’s trying to save from the Family’s crosshairs.
It’s not someone else’s life he’s trying to salvage.
Not this time. He has his own mess to set straight.
It had been night- well past the witching hour but long before the sun was due to rise, the time of night parents corral their teenagers into their homes promising that nothing good could come at such an hour.
How right they were.
Waiting in a shadowed alcove, Jacks shifted his weight on his feet and crossed his arms over his chest. His long hair drifted away from the rubber band that’s caught the most of it, annoying him. The long hair he could cope with- hair in his face? Not so much. Young and brash, he liked the girls to see his strong features- especially his pale eyes. More than a few have gone weak in the knees for his eyes. It’s the feature that captured his wife- though it failed to hold her for very long.
Jacks growled, a low grumble of discontent low in his throat. The subject of his wife was like a hard hold on a new bruise. Even in silent thought, it hurt to consider the unfaithful trollop. Worse, it looked as if the judge were ready to award his business- his very livelihood- to her! His sweat, his hours, his connections- and the judge considered giving it to her all for a few months of marital hell!
Idiot, he berates himself. Never again. Fool that he was, he made his wife his partner. It was love. It was forever. Feeling the idiot, the very words were sneered with disgust. Damn certain he’d never make the same mistake again.
“Jackson Mancuso, you look about ready to kill someone!” A familiar voice joshes from the darkness. He expertly dodges the pools of light that would reveal his face, but Jacks doesn’t need anything more. He knows this man, trusts him- more than he trusted that farce of a woman he took as a wife.
Reflexively scanning the area to ensure that they’re alone, Jacks pulled a thick manila envelope from its hiding place against his chest. “The information you wanted.”
“Good. Good,” the middle-aged man says, taking it in hand and peeking inside before passing over the money. “Well, this ought to take care of the last of the Capo’s threatening your brother. You feeling any heat?”
Jacks shakes his head. “Completely unaware of me.”
Someone new steps into the circle of light, gun drawn. “Not completely, Mancuso.”
There isn’t a lot of time to react. The bullets were already thrown out of that gun with loud explosions, ripping through the atmosphere towards Jacks. Jacks threw his business associate into a doorway that unexpectedly flies open upon hard contact. With a loud crash, the man disappears into the relative safety of the building as Jacks pulls his small semi-automatic .44. A bullet catches his shoulder but, walking forward as he fires, he drills a half dozen holes into their threat- every bullet hitting its mark despite the gun’s rough kick.
The dead lay at his feet, the blood seeping into the gutter. Jacks glared down at him, disgusted. His hands shook from the violence they’d committed. He’d never killed before. ”You okay, Callan?”
But the man behind him cursed in long strings of foreign profanities. Turning away from the bullet holes their attacker had left in the brick behind them, he finally managed, “No. Hell, no, I’m not okay! That was my partner, Jacks! You just killed a police officer!”
Jacks’ head falls into the nest of his folded arms on his handlebars. His hair shorn military short, he’s scarred with far more than the physical reminders of the measures he was forced to take to keep his freedom- if you can call that freedom.
It’s not someone else’s life he’s trying to save this time. This time, it’s his turn.
Priorities, Reality: it’s a rough chastisement. There’s nothing he can do against the mafia. He might as well fight the ocean.
Turning the large bike back to its right course, Jacks sternly resumes his escape. He’s got to get away from this place- now- before he doesn’t something truly stupid.
Having ceremoniously witnessed the creation of another day, Sophie turns away from the sun-kissed water and brushes the sand from the curve of her backside to trudge back to the empty condo building. Jen had been right. The beach is nearly deserted this weekend. Thick clouds rolling in on the horizon are the only explanation anyone needs- the cold rain had peppered the sand on-and-off all day yesterday- but Sophie didn’t come for company or adventure.
“Well, good morning, to ya, ma’am,” a friendly shop owner greets as she passes. The years have worn his features in like the leather of a favorite pair of shoes. Whiskers shade his chin and a ball cap covers a haphazard mop of wiry grey hair.
Checking her watch, Sophie confirms that it is still obscenely early. “Open for business?”
“Yes, ma’am,” the wrinkled old sea dog announces with a kind smile. “Gotta be up with the sun if ya want to catch the good ones!”
Sophie looks over the empty beach and back to the proprietor, her confusion obvious. There are no customers to be ‘caught.’
“Fish, ma’am,” he chuckles.
“So you sell bait then?” She asks, leaning around the threshold to peer into his small shop.
“We sell a bit of everything,” he boasts. “If we don’t have it, you don’t need it.”
Sophie softly hums a thoughtful sound and timidly enters a dimly lit sanctuary heavily influenced by testosterone. She had left her apartment to come here hastily and timidly admits. “Well, there are a few things I need . . .”
“I’m sure I’ll have it,” he brags again, following her into the dim store. “And if I don’t, well, we’ll snitch it from the old Lady upstairs and pretend the cat had done hid it again.”
Sophie laughs- a genuine laugh. Through the store’s glass windows, the yellow sun hovers over the watery horizon. Light reflects off the water, like its reaching for her.
It’s a sign of hope. Even now, after the death of her marriage, warm emotion fills her. The newborn day offers only optimism- no mistakes yet.
Maybe there’s a second chance out there.
Turning back to the warm man with the densely creased smile, Sophie returns to the common business of buying toiletries with an uncommon resolve-- because certainly there’s a second chance . . . and this time, she’ll do everything right.
Last night had haunted Jacks with new night terrors. Gone are the battles and comrades that bled or died in his sight. In their place is a plush kitten of a woman, engrossed in her laptop or her book, then- in the space of a blink- the eyes stare vacant, the mouth lolls open and her blood drains onto parched Earth or a hard wooden floor or a featureless carpet, depending upon which scenario his brain choses to repeat.
Sitting on the edge of his bed, his head cradled in his hands, Jacks tries to force the images away. He’s seen too much death. It wouldn’t be a disappointment if he spent the remainder of his days suffering from long periods of sheer boredom, watching things grow.
But, no, there’s got to be a damn damsel in distress. Body and soul, the woman fits the role, too. Those voluptuous curves demand a man’s attention.
His phone rings and Jacks answers it absently. “Bernini.”
“Heard you were in town. Ready to do business?” Bernini has what he needs- he has the proof that will clear Jacks’ name. With that, he can come home.
“Yeah,” Jacks croaks, sounding hoarse. “When do you want to meet?”
Some details are discussed before Jacks disconnects, then, levering himself up off another hotel bed, Jacks leaves for Atlanta. No one said he had to go home. Maybe he’ll just stay away- out of sight, out of mind. God knows he doesn’t need his over-active conscious screaming at him again. No woman is worth the trouble, especially the kind of trouble the mafia would bring down.
Not this time, he chants. He’s done his good deed. He protected his brothers- even when they fought like hell against his efforts.
Screw them all- it’s his turn.
The weekend had been exactly what the doctor ordered. Sand, surf, thunderstorms and a thick Tricia Fleming novel brought her a little closer to the woman she was before her heart was guilelessly given away; but one has to return to reality sometime. There's work to be done- especially now. Money always seems in short supply and she's already missed a day of work this week. So, back at the Mancuso estate, Sophie lifts the single duffle bag out from her trunk and starts back towards the small apartment over the pool house.
“Excuse me, Mrs. Mancuso?”
Sophie turns to the sound of her married name, a little surprised to hear it here, especially from a man she doesn’t know. “I go by Ms. Amando now,” she corrects, her eyes warily jumping between the two men in dark suits.
“Of course,” one of the men agrees, sounding pleasant. “Ms. Amando, I’m Agent Callan from the FBI. Come with us. We have some questions.”