Love Starts with Elle Read online

  “Deal.”

  “Elle, you here?”

  She angled back, gazing toward the kitchen door. “Jules, in the living room.” She peeked at Heath. “Rio wondered if Tracey-Love could play.”

  “Absolutely. She’s in her room.” Heath clapped his hands against his legs and stood, calling down the hall. “TL, want to go with Miss Elle and Rio?’

  A second later, the girl popped into the room, settling against her daddy, staring at Elle. Heath smoothed her hair, so coarse under his palm. “What do you say?”

  Tracey-Love melted a little piece of him every time she fastened her blue gaze with his. “C-can you come t-too?”

  Heath checked with Elle. “What did you have in mind? Can an old dad tag along?”

  “I have nothing in mind. Come if you dare.”

  He dared all right, even though Nate waited for pages. He’d spent most of last night and today researching and outlining his book. But he’d be crazy to pass up a morning with his new friend. Especially with her delicate features and spunky wit.

  “You talked me into it. TL, get your shoes.”

  A day out would help his muse uncover the rest of Chet McCord’s story. In the back of his mind, a female protagonist had started to speak. There. Call today research. Heath figured he needed to spend a day with a woman to get the groundwork for his character. Maybe instead of being the next Grisham, he could be the next Nicholas Sparks.

  He wondered how guilty he’d feel over Nate’s coronary. A relationship story? Love story? Gasp, choke, call 911.

  Heath walked out the back door with Julianne and Elle, talking about the whatevers of the day like the weather and price of gas as Rio and Tracey-Love ran-skipped hand in hand to the van.

  “Hey, girls, let’s drive in my car.” Elle waved them over. “We’ll put the top down.”

  Okay, seemed like fun. They watched wide-eyed as the top motored open. Heath helped Elle buckle them into the backseat, then slipped into the passenger side. “Where to on this lovely day?”

  The crisp lowcountry morning was already warm as the sun rose, burning away the last of the predawn dew. Elle slipped on her sunglasses and turned the key. “Seems like a day for boating to me.”

  “I’m in,” Heath said, turning to the girls. “Boating?”

  Tracey-Love joined in with Rio’s, “Yeah,” though she’d never boated in her little life. This was good for her—new experiences, new memories.

  Driving through Lady’s Island neighborhoods toward Elle’s parents’ home where her daddy docked a small boat, Heath surfed the wind with his hand. The girls chattered as the wind whipped their hair about, but Elle drove in silence.

  Let her be; she’s working through more than a busted relationship.

  Slowing, she turned into a wide, paved driveway and maneuvered a thin dirt road around to the back of her parents’ house, a sprawling two-story with a wraparound porch, thick green lawn, and a deepwater dock.

  Elle parked in the shade and led them to the dock.

  “Heath, put these on the girls, please.” She tossed over life jackets. On the boat, she checked the gas and other security thingies, Heath guessed, while he fixed up the girls and himself.

  Finally, she motioned for them to climb aboard. “Girls, you stay seated once I get you in the boat, okay?” They nodded dutifully, grinning from ear to ear. “I don’t want to feed the fish little-girl toes.”

  Tracey-Love’s eyes widened, and she shot a fearful gaze at Heath.

  “She’s just teasing, baby.” He cocked an eyebrow at her. Want to knock out the fish-food chatter?

  She winced. Sorry.

  “We’re going to see dolphin and fish and birds.” Elle tugged the tie from her hair and, angling TL around, finger-combed her hair into a ponytail.

  TL stood still, facing the far shore, chatting with Rio. But Heath? He stepped close to watch and learn.

  Elle concluded her boating instructions with a whip-twist of her hands and the tie. “If you want something, girls, just ask me or Tracey-Love’s daddy, okay? There, ready to go?”

  Just like that a neat ponytail. A miracle, a regular Houdini feat. Seemed easy enough. Ha-ha. He’d practice on TL later.

  Elle fired up the motor. “Heath, untie us.”

  He jumped to the dock, loosened the rope, tossing it into the boat, hollering, “Ship, ahoy.”

  One day he’d look back and wonder what possessed him. Surely he knew better. But instead of jumping from the dock into the boat, Heath jumped straight down into a thick, deep mound of chocolate-looking pluff mud. It slurped him like a straw.

  “Heath.” Elle dashed to the side of the idling the boat. “Are you okay?”

  “Yeah, I’m great.” Laughing, he molded a pluff mud ball and lobbed it at her. She ducked even though it didn’t come close.

  “You know you’re stuck, don’t you?”

  “What? No. I’m going to swim right out.” Heath moved to demonstrate . . . except he couldn’t move. His legs and chest were cemented into a pluff mud grave. “Um, Elle?”

  She popped her hands together as she started to laugh. “Are you stuck, Superman? Do not tell me you purposefully jumped.”

  “It beckoned me.” His expression pleaded with her. “Want to help a guy out? Laugh later.”

  Or now. Elle collapsed against the boat, her lilting laugh bouncing off the water and catching a ride on the breeze.

  Meanwhile, Tracey-Loved glared down at him with an enormous frown.

  “Hey, Tracey-Love, isn’t Daddy having fun? Elle? Still sinking.”

  Still laughing, she tossed him the rope, then nudged the boat forward, easing him gently out of the mud into the sleek water of Factory Creek. It’d been awhile since Granddad had warned him and Mark about the deep pluff mud: “Fall in and I’ll likely never find you to dig you out.” Heath had thought it was a Granddad scare tactic.

  Now, some thirty-odd years later, apparently not. Swimming to the side of the boat, he did his best to wash off, then hoisted himself aboard. His finger-and toenails were darkened with mud he’d have to scrub out later, and his hundred-dollar deck shoes would never be seen again.

  “Thanks,” he said to Elle, who hovered over the steering wheel, shoulders shaking. “So happy I could amuse you.”

  Her cackle filled the air as she pounded her palm against the top of the windshield.

  Heath sat on the cushioned bench between TL and Rio, who pinched her nose. “You stink.”

  “You don’t say?” Muddy water dripped from his shorts and shirt.

  Elle finally composed herself enough to putt-putt down Factory Creek and blast the air horn at a passing sailboat. “Hey, Mr. Crowley.”

  “Hey there, Elle. Sorry to hear about your wedding.”

  “Old news, Mr. Crowley. Look for me to open a new gallery.”

  “Never visited the old one.”

  “Then it’s time to start a new tradition.” She gave the engine another rev and an air-horn good-bye blast.

  Sitting in the sun, Heath’s wet clothes would be dry soon, though he’d have to live with the smell. Making sure the girls were seated securely, he moved forward next to Elle. “Done laughing?”

  She snorted, once. “Sigh. All good things must come to an end.” She handed him a bottle of sunscreen. “I’m sorry, you just looked so funny.”

  Heath popped open the lotion. “Think nothing of it, Elle. I’m so happy to oblige your funny bone. Laughter is the best medicine.”

  “You know it.” Elle blasted the air horn over her head. “Hey, new day and Elle GARVEY is here to stay.”

  “Heath McCORD too.” Yelling felt good. Released some much needed endorphins. “Okay, what am I doing with this lotion.”

  “Put it on the girls.”

  “Right, right.” Heath slathered Rio and Tracey-Love with white cream, feeling a bit lucky to be sailing with his three favorite girls, and that Elle’s last name wasn’t Franklin.

  When he handed the bottle back to Elle, she r
aised her sunglasses and arched her face to him. “Put some on my nose, will you?”

  Okay, a nose. Nothing sexy about a nose. He squirted a dot to his finger, then touched the tip of her slender nose. His heartbeat echoed in his ears love-ly nose, love-ly nose.

  “There.” He swallowed, dropping the lotion into the crate anchored to the side of the boat.

  She settled her sunglasses back in place. “How do I look?”

  “Lovely.” He watched her for a second, inhaling her fresh-flowers scent. If he didn’t know firsthand, he’d never guess a broken heart beat inside her chest.

  “How are the girls doing?” Elle peeked over her shoulder. “Y’all stay seated now.”

  “I don’t think Tracey-Love could be more wide-eyed with wonder if she was shaking hands with Cinderella.”

  “When you go back to NewYork, she’ll go kicking and screaming.”

  “Probably.” He propped his arms on top of the short windshield, taking in the blue sky, the bank of palmettos and scrub oaks, the eagle drifting on the current. “This is beautiful.”

  Heath tried to imagine Ava standing next to him, but couldn’t conjure up her image as clearly as he could a month ago. Lately, he’d crossed a major hurdle where life had become his, not theirs.

  “Why writing and the law?” Elle ventured, watching the opposite bank. “Rio, Tracey-Love, look over there. Dolphin.”

  “Why art?” Heath dashed to the back of the boat as the girls arched over to the side. “Want to warn me next time, Elle?”

  Dolphin were rushing fish to the shore and eating them out of the water.

  “What yummy dinner, girls. Live bait.” Elle rubbed her tummy, making ummm sounds. Rio wrinkled her nose with an “Ooo, yuck, Auntie Elle.”

  A single dolphin swam alongside the boat. Heath barely hung on to Rio as she dove to “pet the fish.” The sleek-backed gray dolphin kept speed with the boat, surfacing, then diving, surfacing again.

  “H-he’s got a hole in his head.” Tracey-Love wiggled her hand trying to touch it.

  “He ’posed to.” Rio, the expert.

  “It’s his air hole, how he breaths.” Heath pulled the girls back to the bench seat. “Come on, settle back. You’re leaning too far.”

  Elle upped the throttle, lifting her chin to the light, the air raking through her unbound hair. Yeah, Heath was definitely entering in a new phase. It’d been a lot of years since another woman fascinated him.

  “What’s next for you?” he asked as she slowed the engine, nearing an unanchored fishing skiff.

  “Open another gallery,” she said over her shoulder. “And forget I was almost married.”

  Heath moved next to her. “You never answered. Why art?”

  Elle pushed her blowing hair away from her face. “My first memories are of drawing on bulletins in church, racing for the colored pencils and pictures in Sunday school. I decorated the hallways at home, the kitchen counters, even water-colored over all Mama and Daddy’s wedding pictures.”

  Heath laughed. “How old were you?”

  “Old enough to know better, but seriously, I had these new watercolors and I thought, These black-and-white’s need some help.”

  “Well, it’s hard to argue with that logic.” He squinted toward the shore thinking he needed to pick up sunglasses for himself and Tracey-Love on his next Wal-Mart run.

  “I became very acquainted with my room over the years. If you know what I mean. Spent a lot of time sitting on the bed ‘thinking about what I’d done.’”

  “That would’ve never worked for me. I’d have planned how to perfect it for the next time.”

  “This is why Daddy says all children should be girls.”

  “Well, if there were only girls . . .”

  Elle laughed. “No biology lesson necessary here, Heath.”

  “Ava and I weren’t going to have children. We were thirty-four when TL came along.”

  “What changed your mind?”

  “My wife’s feet.”

  “This I got to hear.”

  “Yeah, weird, right. But she had these really long, gorgeous feet just like her mom. We started talking about the lineage of the long, lean feet and next thing you know, we’re into a serious philosophical discussion about how our decision to not procreate is ruining our families’ heritages. Eleven months later . . .”

  Elle looked at him through dark Ray-Bans. “Why didn’t you want children?”

  “We wanted fast-track careers. Foolish. But then, it was all we knew. So what about you? When did you have the big revelation that art was your life?”

  “I went on a field trip with my art class to the New York Met and encountered a Childe Hassam painting. I was sixteen, loved art, but had never been moved before. His work brought tears to my eyes. Until then, I didn’t know art could speak. I was hooked on the idea of being a painter and communicating through colors, images, brush strokes.”

  “Do you paint? Why the gallery? I’ve been around enough galleries to know it’s time consuming.”

  She steered the boat along the curves of the creek. “After four years of college and a year in Florence, not shaking or rattling the art world, I decided I wasn’t good enough to make a living as a painter, so I funneled my love for art into a gallery. My friends swear it’s all I talked about in high school anyway.”

  “Verbalizing your back-up plan in case the real deal didn’t work out?”

  She lifted her glasses and looked at him. “Yeah, maybe. Anyway, I took my Aunt Rose’s inheritance to open the gallery. Might as well help artists who were good enough but just needed opportunity. I liked educating the public too, helping them experience what I did when I saw the Hassam paintings.”

  Elle powered up the engine and entered the Intracoastal Waterway. Heath stepped back to the girls. Rio’s wide grin was sure to be a nice gnat catcher.

  “I think Rio has the need for speed.”

  Elle glanced back. “More?”

  “More.” Rio yelled, clinging to the top rail while Tracey-Love clung to Heath.

  Elle steered the speeding boat across the water. Rio giggled. Tracey-Love gripped the sides of Heath’s shirt tighter. He had some work to do with her in the confidence arena.

  A strange sensation swirled in his middle. Carefree. He settled back, squinting in the sunlight reflecting off the water, thinking of Ava without pain, musing over his book, liking the idea of creating memories with Tracey-Love. And discovering Elle.

  ELEVEN

  May tenth. Black Saturday. It should’ve been white and pink with beautiful lilies and stringed music.

  And Elle wearing a white gown.

  “We’re going shopping.” Julianne stopped by mid-morning, tugged away Elle’s covers. “Then the entire family is meeting at Sara Beth’s for a barbecue. Let’s go.”

  “A family barbecue? Are we roasting my failure? Come on, Julianne, I can’t stand the pity looks.” After a great week of prayer with Miss Anna, and the carefree day of boating with Heath, Elle woke under a cloud.

  “Get up, Elle. Celebrate today. Live it. Don’t let disappointment win.”

  “Bye, Jules.” Elle had already planned her day. Sleep for a while on her right side, then turn over and sleep on her left. Tomorrow, she’d get out there and start living.

  “Elle, get up.”

  Shoot fire, Julianne had brought the big gun: Sara Beth.

  Elle peeked over the edge of her quilt. “Hey, SB.”

  “In the shower, little sister. Mary Jo and Candace are waiting.”

  “I suppose there’s no chance of y’all just turning and leaving, closing the door behind you?”

  SB and Jules stared at her with their arms crossed, lips pressed into lines of disgust.

  “I guess not.” Elle shoved off the covers and headed for the shower. Afterward, she came out dressed completely in black— black bra, black panties, black jeans, black top, and if she could find them, her black flip-flops.

  Sara Beth rolled her eyes, sighing.
“Lovely, Elle.”

  Julianne laughed. “Come on, Black Bart, let’s go.”

  By nine o’clock that night, Elle had had enough of enduring the day and yearned for the quiet solitude of her studio. She wanted to fall asleep and wake up with everything Jeremiah behind her.

  Her sisters had done a wonderful job of keeping her distracted and laughing. She’d love them forever for it.

  At Sara Beth’s house, Daddy and SB’s husband, Parker, barbecued up some tangy ribs. The aroma made Elle’s mouth water, but her stomach posted a No Trespassing sign.

  The family was overly cheery, avoiding all talk of love, relationships, weddings, and Jeremiah. Even Elle, for that matter. No one ventured, “What’s next?” Or “Do you have any plans.” And she was sort of ready to answer those questions.

  Mama passed by once in a while as Elle sat in the deck chair and squeezed her arm. “You’re being so brave.”

  Is there any other option?

  Elle suffered more from feeling unanchored than abandoned.

  When Parker organized a backyard volleyball game under the lights, beyond the bright-blue eye of the pool, Elle slipped out and drove home with her windows down, the warm velvety night clearing the heat from her mind.

  She allowed herself one Jeremiah thought. Are you thinking of me?

  In the almost-plan, the photographer would be packing up as the Beaufort Inn reception died down. She’d have danced in Jeremiah’s thick arms as the new and only Mrs. Jeremiah Franklin.

  The thought made Elle shiver.

  Pulling up to the cottage, she parked inside the garage with a quick glance across the yard before hitting the stairs. The porch was lit and she heard the faint hint of music. Strolling across the grass, Elle stooped at the porch door and peeked through the screen. “Having a party?”

  Heath leaned around the back of the iron rocker. “Hey, Elle.”

  She open the door and stepped inside, motioning to her old boom box, folding into the rickety Adirondack chair. “Where’d you find that old thing?”

  “Over in the corner, hiding under a thick layer of dust.”

  Elle laughed as she slid closer to Heath, aligning her chair with his. “I’ll bet. I’m surprised it even works.” Through the trees and Spanish moss, she saw the moondrops floating along the water’s surface. “Sometimes I still picture you jumping in the pluff mud and—”