“I’ll call her doctor at home first. Back in Bloomington.” She grabbed her daypack, slipped it on, and picked up Christina from the boardwalk. Just then she noticed that a small crowd had gathered to watch the drama. “He’s fine,” she said to everyone. “We’re good.”
She turned to go, took one step, and stopped. Evelyn slowly spun around on her squeaky sandals and sought out Clancy. He stood next to his colleague, hair dripping and his uniform clinging to every plane and swell on his gorgeous body, concern in those deep blue eyes, jaw set tight. In that moment she saw all of him—the fourteen-year-old she’d loved, the beautiful man he’d become, the quick-on-his-feet lifesaver, decorated police officer, and Eagle Scout, if only in a manner of speaking. It made her smile.
God, how she wished they’d met again under more normal circumstances.
“I truly thank you, Chief Flynn. For everything.”
She walked away, Christina’s head on her shoulder, both of them weighed down with seawater. She knew in her heart that she’d blown it. Not only had she failed to provide even the most basic safety for Christina, she’d made a spectacle of them both. As soon as they got back to the Sand Dollar, she would examine her niece to make sure she didn’t need medical attention. If she did, so be it. Christina’s health was the most important thing. But the ruse would be over the second doctors discovered she was a girl.
Evelyn would turn herself in.
But if her niece seemed okay, then Evelyn would get her in some dry clothes and start to pack. Either way, they needed to get off this island and go . . . somewhere. Anywhere but here.
* * *
Clancy strolled through the small parking lot and entered the Bayberry Police Department through the back door. As with every other moving part in this nineteenth-century building, finesse was required to get it to function as intended. Clancy jiggled the key while simultaneously lifting upward on the knob and the thick wooden door finally opened.
He took a moment to close his eyes and appreciate the relief of central air-conditioning flowing down the narrow hallway. The evening had turned hot and muggy and rain was in the forecast for tomorrow, which always threw Island Day organizers and vendors into a tizzy. Only minutes ago, an artist had called Clancy’s cell phone to express her disdain for the weather report.
“Isn’t there anything you can do about this?” She sounded completely serious. “As you might imagine, my origami creations don’t fare well in a downpour, and I forgot to bring my plastic rain shields with me from the mainland this year. Does the police department have extras?”
On one hand, Clancy was pleased that Island Day merchants felt comfortable coming to him with their questions and concerns—small-town cooperation was what had made the event so successful over the years. Unfortunately, he had to tell the owner of “Mâché Madness” in Provincetown that the police department didn’t stock rain shields for vendor tents and hadn’t yet found a way to control the climate.
She groaned in frustration and hung up on him.
“You’re two minutes late, great leader.”
Clancy chuckled as he moved through the open doorway of the department’s conference room. “Yeah, sorry about that, Officers.”
Deon raised both his eyebrows. “First day and you already look like you got a beat-down.”
Clancy nodded. “I did, indeed. Chip, you ready with roll call?”
“Yes, Chief Flynn.”
As Chip read aloud every name on the beefed-up police roster, Clancy checked his laptop for bulletin updates. But his mind wasn’t on police work. It was on the lovely, and inexplicably familiar, Cricket. After all the drama at the dock that afternoon, he decided he needed to know a little more about the standoffish visitor. It was simple enough to find out she was staying at the Sand Dollar, and that’s where he’d start in his quest to dig a little deeper. Once he was caught up on paperwork.