The jogger kept his hands firmly resting over his junk. “I was too quick for you.”
“I could smack you right now.” Madison raised the flamingo again.
The jogger squealed and curled into a ball.
“Maddie,” Gia coaxed. “Please put down the yard ornament.”
“Should I call the police?” Darynda asked from across the lawn, raising her voice to be heard.
Gia shook her head at Darynda, waved a hand. “We’ve got this.”
Breathing heavily, Madison handed the flamingo to Gia.
Shelley snapped her fingers at the jogger. “Stop peeing in people’s bushes. If you do it again, we’re calling Beach Patrol and reporting you for indecent exposure.”
“Don’t get your panties in a bunch. It’s no big deal. I was just taking a whiz.” His eyes went flat.
“Gia.” Shelley made gimme motions with her fingers. “Hand me that flamingo . . .”
The jogger clambered to his feet. “You’re all crazy.”
“Scram,” Shelley said from the corner of her mouth. “And if I were you, I’d find another place to jog.”
The jogger took off at a dead sprint, kicking sand all over them.
“What is going on with you?” Gia asked Maddie, concerned for her sister’s mental health. Was it the stress of Grammy’s illness? Or were there more wounds seething inside Maddie that Gia knew nothing about?
“I’m tired of men feeling free to whip it out whenever they want.” Madison crossed her arms over her chest. “Without consequences.”
“You need a hug.” Shelley held her arms wide.
Madison rolled her eyes, but she let Shelley hug her.
“See.” Gia counted the hug as a win. “That wasn’t so terrible, was it?”
“Group hug.” Shelley freed one arm and waved Gia over.
Together, arms around one another, they turned and walked back to the house. On the porch, they discovered that Darynda had closed and raised the quilting frame, poured four glasses of wine and set them on the table, and opened a second bottle.
Quilting was over for the evening.
They might not have made much headway on the quilt, but they had shared a group hug and that was something. Gia would take any forward motion she could get.
* * *
FOR TWO HOURS, the four of them drank and talked and remembered.
Fun stuff. Silly stuff. Adventures they’d had. People they’d met. Stories of running the inn. Nothing heavy. Nothing sad. Nothing that stirred tension. As if they’d silently agreed upon a truce, and while the cease-fire might be tentative, for the first time since her sisters had come home, Gia saw genuine hope.
At eleven, Darynda called it a night. Because she’d had too much to drink, she took one of the guest bedrooms to sleep in.
Madison followed shortly afterward, leaving Shelley and Gia on the porch, both a little tipsy and riding the glow of what turned out to be a nice evening.
“I get the feeling something is going on with Madison. Something more than just Grammy,” Gia said, finishing off the last of the wine.
“There is.”
Gia sat up straighter, wished her head wasn’t so fuzzy. “What is it?”
“She’s been carrying around a big secret and she’s too proud to tell us about it,” Shelley said.
“What secret?”
Silently, Shelley got up, went to her tote bag, took something out. She came back and slipped a framed picture into Gia’s hands.
Confused, Gia stared at the dark grainy photograph that had been torn in pieces and then taped back together, trying through the haze of wine and the lull of the ocean to figure out what she was seeing.
When she finally realized what the picture was, Gia’s heart broke right in two.
Chapter Thirteen
Madison
MIRROR IMAGE: The reverse of an image or how it might appear if held up to a mirror.
STANDING AT THE open window of the blue room, the ocean breeze ruffling the material of her silk pajamas, Madison could see the corner of the back porch. She heard her sisters murmuring in the darkness below and thought, They know.
Thanks to May June, who liked to dig in trash cans.
It was a relief actually, that her sisters had found out and she hadn’t had to tell them herself. Hadn’t had to say the words I was pregnant, but lost the baby. Hadn’t had to listen to the useless condolences, the sorrowful expressions, the too-tight hugs.
Still, it felt lonely here, by herself.
Disconnected.
Cut off.
Severed.
Not just from her sisters, but from herself. From the bright, industrious girl she used to be. The girl with such big dreams.
What a na?ve child she’d been. Thinking she knew all the answers.
Madison put a hand to her belly, closed her eyes, and fell back onto