Page 114 of Rhodes

That wasn't a question, even though his inflection sounds like it should be one. I don’t answer. The beach opens up in front of us. I bend down and untie my boots and roll up my pants. Reeves kicks off his flip-flops.

"You fucking called the feds about the Maybank property you told me about last week?"

I nod.

"And now Tilly hates you?"

"She doesn't know. She only knows the shit's hit the fan and her family is blaming her."

"What the fuck, Rhodes?"

"All I know is they wrote a letter to the Charleston District questioning the delineation. Apparently it worked."

The path bends. Sand starts coming up through the pavement in little fans.

"I thought if the development pressure went away, she'd have room." I don't finish room for what. He doesn't ask.

"I wasn't trying to win her the land or beat her own case. I thought I could take the development question off the table for a while and give her air."

"So what's the problem? What do you mean the shit's hit the fan?"

"The letter didn't just freeze the development. It froze everything on that property, including rebuilding the sill, and the plantings she wanted to do to recapture what they're losing. And on top of that, the leases and oyster farming have been halted, too."

Flat brown water laps at our ankles. It's low tide. The gulls pick down the wet line, taking off as we approach.

"Shit, bro. That's bad. And she has no clue it was you?"

"None. I stood in my kitchen and held her while she cried about being blamed for the exact thing I did. And I said nothing."

We stop, and Reeves looks out at the water instead of at me. He looks pissed, but not surprised by me. Somehow that's worse.

"What are you going to do?"

"I want to fix it. I don't really know, to be honest. My plan is to call him Monday to see how we can withdraw this. That's two days, though, and I have no idea how I will sit in a house with her and not tell her."

"Time could be on your side. Maybe things will settle down over the weekend, and after you pull the troops back, it will all blow over."

The gulls lift and settle.

"We should head back," Reeves says. "I want to help when the baby wakes up."

Somewhere around the twin spans, going back over the lake, I get the words into an order I can live with.

It isn't a speech. It's one sentence. I'll tell her I did it, that I made a call and it set off the review. She'll be pissed. Then I'll tell her I'm calling Monday and I'm going to undo it.

The house is dim when I come up the front steps. I turn the key slowly because the deadbolt still likes to catch. This time it doesn't, and the door gives without a sound. I keep the keys in my hand instead of the bowl so they won't jangle.

Down the hall, her door is open a crack with yellow light in the gap, and her voice comes through it low, in the shape of a phone call.

"No, I know. I'm not saying it's perfect." She listens. "Libba, I know how it sounds."

I stop in the middle of the hall.

"I've got a list. I'm calling the district office on Monday, then the trust lady, and I'm going to actually read the whole thing before I let anybody tell me what it says." She's quiet a little longer this time, and then her voice drops. "No. I know. But Rhodes is the only comfort I have in all of this."

I stand there with the keys biting into my palm. I'm her only comfort in all of this. Fuck. Monday, I'll make the call. I'll undo it before she ever has to know I was the one who did it.

My hand loosens around the keys.