Page 76 of No Judgements

“Come on. What harm will one drink do?”

Of course I was tempted. How couldn’t I be? A good-looking man whom I’d come to like and trust and, okay, maybe lust after a little was asking me to his home for a drink.

And what a home! Mother Nature seemed to be pulling out all the stops to apologize for her misdeeds the daybefore, making this sunset as dramatic and beautiful as any she’d ever created. The evening breeze was as fresh and cool as the afternoon had been hot and oppressive. Even as I stood there, trying to decide what to do, the wind tugged playfully at my hair and sent the sound of all four of Drew’s dogs’ eager barking down toward me. They seemed to be crying “Come on up! What are you waiting for? We miss you, Bree! We want to play!”

“Fine,” I said, and lowered the kickstand of my scooter. “But only one drink. Then I really have to go.”

“Great!” He looked as delighted as a kid who’d just found out he was having ice cream for dinner. “You think the view looks good from down here, wait until you see it from up there...”

He wasn’t wrong. The view of that scarlet sun slowly sinking toward the sea, unbroken by any man-made structures, was breathtaking, and I was reminded once again of why I’d found it so hard to leave Little Bridge. I really hadn’t meant to stay as long as I had. It wasn’t only because of the people—who, quirky and odd as they often were, were also some of the kindest and most giving I’d ever encountered. It was also because of the sheer natural beauty of the place, the unspoiled ocean views and skyscapes that even now I felt myself itching to paint.

It didn’t hurt that Drew had let out the dogs—who’d greeted us with near fanatical delight—and that they were now running up and down the beach after the yellow tennis balls that Drew was tossing them from the deck. This was upsetting the flocks of birds, causing them to riseindignantly from the clusters of seaweed strewn across the sand every time they came near. This actually made the vista even more special—at least to me.

“Okay,” I said, laughing, as Drew expertly threw his seventh ball. “You really do have a good life here.”

“You haven’t even seen the best part yet.” He disappeared into the house, then reappeared a moment later holding a bottle of red wine and two wineglasses. “I’ve been saving this for a special occasion.”

I glanced at the label and could not help feeling impressed. It was a small-batch California cabernet that Caleb favored, and claimed was hard to find.

I’d never have expected to see such a thing in Little Bridge, particularly in Drew Hartwell’s home.

“What?” I asked in a teasing tone as he began opening the bottle with a corkscrew he’d also brought from inside. “The famous Drew Hartwell drinks something besides beer?”

“Well,” he said, after pouring a generous amount into my glass, “like I said, it’s a special occasion.”

“And what’s that?”

“I finally got Bree Beckham over to my place to have a drink.” He raised his glass to clink mine.

I pulled my glass away, refusing to toast something so ridiculous. “Oh, right. You never even knew who I was until the night of your aunt’s hurricane party, even though I’ve been serving you breakfast every day for months.”

“That,” he said, taking a reflective sip of his wine, “is untrue. For part of that time I was unavailable.” The ghostof Leighanne rose silently between us. “And for the rest of that time, you seemed... preoccupied.” I took a sip of my wine, not wanting to think about my own ghosts. “But the truth is, I’ve had my eye on you for some time. I was never quite sure what was going on with your hair—”

I reached up instinctively to touch one of my pink curls. “What?”

“—but I like it. It brings out the brown in your eyes.”

“Is this your thing?” I asked. “Is this what you do? You bring girls out here and give them expensive wine on your fabulous deck during amazing sunsets in order to seduce them? And then you insult them?”

He grinned. “God’s honest truth, you’re the first. Is it working?”

“I’ll let you know. What was your shtick before you had the house? You’d drive your truck into town and park at some different lucky lady’s house every night?”

“What?” He looked genuinely baffled.

“That’s what everybody says. They say they used to see your pickup in front of a different house every morning.”

Comprehension dawned, and he laughed. “Yeah, of course! Those were the homes where I was doing carpentry work. I usually had a couple of beers with the home owners after. I wasn’t going to risk a DUI driving back home later. I’d usually just grab an Uber, or sometimes I kept my bike in the back of the truck and rode it home. Better to be safe than sorry.”

I blinked, shocked at how something so innocent hadmorphed into such a lurid rumor. Then again, Little Bridge was a very small town, and its residents loved to gossip.

“What about Leighanne?” I asked, carefully.

“WhataboutLeighanne?”

“What was the deal with the saltshaker? I was standing right next to you in the café when she threw it at you.”

“Oh, that.” He sighed and looked toward the sea. “Yeah, that’s the thing about this place. People either get it or they don’t. You get it. Leighanne never did.”