It Wasn't Always Like This - Joy Preble Page 0,16

Emma liked that about her. But Charlie’s dad would go on talking, even as Charlie shook his head, embarrassed.

“Fountain of Youth, my ass,” was Art O’Neill’s usual response, but he would laugh with the rest of them. “Do you ever see any of these folks? No. Whatever the truth is, it’s dead and buried with them.”

None of this made Emma want to kiss Charlie any less. Charlie was not his father, any more than Emma was her mother, and thank goodness for that. But Frank Ryan always seemed stumped by one particular detail. He didn’t mention it much. Emma wondered if he’d add any details tonight in honor of her birthday. According to his grandmother, the secret of the location of this mysterious Fountain of Youth had been passed on only to Montoya girls. At some point, one of them bore only a son.

So the chain was broken. The family secret died. If there really were a Fountain of Youth, none of them would be f inding it anytime soon. Emma hoped that this impossibility would one day make Charlie’s father shut up. That hadn’t happened yet, and she doubted it would happen any time soon. Certainly not tonight.

“Once upon a time,” Frank Ryan began, keeping his voice low and ominous, “there was a man named Juan Ponce de León.”

Charlie edged his chair closer to Emma’s. Under the table, his hand slid over hers. His skin was warm, and she felt a tingle. Across from them, Mrs. O’Neill stopped bouncing Simon on her lap and arched a brow. Emma pointedly ignored her. Charlie’s f ingers laced with hers.

“And King Ferdinand of Spain sent him on a mission,” Frank was saying. The tale of Juan Ponce de León was one of his favorites, especially the parts that took place right here in St. Augustine. “It was a long and dangerous sea voyage. Juan Ponce de León was only thirty-eight years old.”

Emma rolled her eyes. Only thirty-eight? That was ancient.

“No wonder he wanted the secret to youth,” Emma muttered under her breath.

Charlie squeezed her hand. His thumb wandered to the center of her palm, making gentle circles.

She whispered in his ear, “If Grandma Ester was alive, she would die from boredom right now. You know it’s true.”

“Es verdad,” she and Charlie both said at the same time.

Charlie bit his lip, trying not to laugh. He turned beet red.

“Es verdad,” she breathed again in his ear, teasing.

“Shh,” Charlie whispered furiously. But he leaned in. His soft earlobe met her lips.

Something in Emma’s tummy went f izzy. He was a bold one underneath all his quiet, that Charlie Ryan. His father was still yammering away.

“Juan never found the fountain . . .”

This part of the story always made Emma sad. That a man would risk life and limb to travel across the ocean for something that he never achieved, never could achieve—because of course, what he was after didn’t exist.

“Everyone thinks they know Juan Ponce de León. But they don’t.”

Emma straightened in her chair. This was new. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Charlie’s jaw tighten.

“Juan Ponce de León didn’t f ind the fountain because he never planned on doing so.”

“But wait, everyone says—” Emma began, and then shut her mouth as everyone turned to her, even Charlie. But it was true. Everyone did say that the whole reason Juan Ponce de León sailed to the New World—bringing the Ryans’ supposed ancestor, Hernando de Escalante Fontenada, with him, only to get shipwrecked and wind up with the Calusa tribe—was to f ind the Fountain of Youth. That’s why their families had a business! Tourists f locked in small clumps to the small, burbling stream by the river a few miles from the center of town. The huckster who ran it swore it was the real deal: the one Juan Ponce de León had discovered. People dipped cups in the water and everything.

Charlie’s father waved a hand dismissively at her.

“It’s the girl’s birthday,” her own father protested.

“The world remembers Juan Ponce de León for something he didn’t do,” Frank Ryan said, suddenly speaking in his normal voice. “For a place he didn’t visit. Yes, that’s right. He never came here to St. Augustine. Not ever. That was King Ferdinand’s dream, not his. You can’t f ind a dream that isn’t yours. You have to want it enough, and Juan didn’t. He’d found the Gulf Stream, not that those royal bastards gave a damn.”

Maura O’Neill narrowed her eyes at the salty language.

Emma frowned.