A Stranger on the Beach. Michele Campbell

kid and first realized that the world could be beautiful. So, yeah, the robe and the table and the view of the ocean had moved him this morning. But it was the woman who made the real magic. Caroline. She was his good-luck charm, come to rescue him, and he loved her for it. Hell, he plain loved her, as she sat there laughing, her skin glowing, tendrils of golden hair curling around her face.

      “I haven’t had this much fun in a long time,” she said, and he leaned down to kiss her on the mouth.

      They’d had sex in the shower, then fallen back into the big bed, with the down comforter, and done it for a long time. Every position. He made her come three times, screaming like a banshee. She was starved for it. Then they slept till noon, and he woke up with her tangled in his arms, her hair cascading onto his chest, and he thought, This is what I’ve been waiting for. He loved this place, this house, this woman—completely. It scared him how much. He was almost embarrassed to think it, but meeting Caroline felt like destiny. The bad times were a trial, a test that he must’ve passed, or how else would he have graduated to this incredible reward.

      He lived it again in his mind. Watching her sleep. How she woke up and smiled. And how they made love again, till his cock was raw, and his heart so full that he didn’t know how he could ever pay her back. He’d worked as a short-order cook before the bartending gig. He learned at the halfway house, and he was damn good at it, would’ve kept at it except it was hard work and the pay wasn’t as good as tending bar, where he made mad tips. But cooking was one way he could thank her. He was hungry anyway, after all the sex. When he offered to make breakfast, she lit up at the idea, and they wound up down here in the kitchen with Aidan standing at the fancy stove.

      “You like your eggs scrambled or fried?” he said.

      “Mmm. Scrambled. Thank you for taking care of me. You make me feel good, Aidan.”

      “Yeah, I noticed,” he said, and she blushed adorably. In the misty morning light, she looked like a girl, like they could have been the same age.

      He got out a pan and took the eggs from the giant Sub-Zero fridge. Even the eggs were magical here. Blue-green beauties from the organic farm, they shone like jewels. He cracked one into a bowl. The yolk was vivid orange, and Aidan thought, Take me out in a box, I’m never fucking leaving this place.

      He brought plates to the table. She smiled up at him, grabbed his hand, kissed it, and he thought about having sex with her again. But this thing between them was more than sex. He didn’t want her to think of him as just some stud. He wanted to get to know her, and for her to know him. Well, not everything about him, not yet. He’d be nervous telling her about his past. He would start with the good things, and there were good things. He’d make her see.

      He turned on the burner, and the blue flame was beautiful to him. Scrambled eggs and toast—simple, you’d think, but he had a special technique involving butter and a long, slow cook over low heat that made them extra creamy. He took his time, humming as he worked, enjoying the feel of her eyes on him. When the eggs were perfect, he carried the pan over to the table and turned them out onto her plate.

      She took a bite and closed her eyes, savoring.

      “Mmm. These are the best eggs I’ve ever had,” she said.

      He served himself, sat down and tasted. He couldn’t disagree.

      “I’m all right at a couple of things,” he said, ducking his head modestly.

      “All right? More like amazing.” She raised an eyebrow suggestively.

      Now it was his turn to blush. But he couldn’t stand it if this was only about sex for her. People refusing to take him seriously was the story of his life. He wanted more from Caroline, and she kind of owed him, didn’t she? After the way he took care of her last night. Maybe she didn’t owe him love, or even gratitude, but she owed him respect. He hoped she wouldn’t turn into some stuck-up bitch, or he’d be really sad. He ate his eggs in silence, staring down at the plate, until she teased him with her bare foot on his leg.

      “Cat got your tongue? I didn’t take you for the silent type,” she said, nudging him playfully. Her toes were painted the color of blood.

      Her legs where they emerged from the bathrobe were perfect and shapely. An hour ago, those legs had been wrapped around his neck. He could take her back to bed and make her beg for it. He had power here. He needed to be more confident, and not be cowed by her beauty or her money.

      “I’m feeling cooped up,” he said. “It would be nice to get outside. What if we went for a walk on the beach?”

      “Oh.” She put her fork down. “That’s not such a good idea.”

      Figures, uh-huh. Should he be surprised if she was like everyone else?

      “You’re embarrassed to be seen with me,” he said.

      “No. If I was, would I have been hanging all over you in the bar last night?”

      “Maybe. You were pretty drunk.”

      She leaned toward him, taking his hands and looking into his eyes. “Stop it, okay? I want to be with you. I want us to go places together. Just not right in front of my house where my neighbors can see. I’m married, you know.”

      He had this funny buzzing feeling in his head. He got it sometimes, like a warning bell, a bullshit detector. Was she playing him somehow? But she was saying all the right things. Things he wanted to hear.

      “All right. Where, then?” he asked.

      “What about your place? I’d love to see where you live.”

      He turned away, so she wouldn’t see how her request unnerved him. The two of them lived in different worlds, and he’d been ignoring it, hoping she would, too, or better yet, that she hadn’t noticed. He was working on changing his situation. Taking her to that shithole would blow the illusion, would make her see him for someone he wasn’t—or someone he was, but only temporarily, because of a string of rotten luck that she was going to help him reverse.

      “Ah, it’s messy. You know, guy living alone, and all,” he said.

      That was a lie. Aidan was a neat freak who cared for his few possessions meticulously. He did his laundry at the Wash N’ Go every Monday like clockwork, and never left a dirty dish in the sink. But his run-down studio apartment near the edge of town wasn’t much better than an SRO, with a hot plate and a mini-fridge standing in for a real kitchen, and a cramped bathroom with a cheap plastic shower. The furniture consisted of a sofa he got for free off Craigslist, a plastic table and chairs from Walmart, and a twin bed from his mother’s attic that smelled like piss and mothballs. Aidan’s paycheck went to his clothes and his car, the restitution payments from his conviction, and the rent. When he got done with all that, he was so broke that he scrounged his meals at work.

      Caroline would hate him if she knew how he really lived, and he’d hate her right back for knowing. He was already walking that thin line with her, the one between love and hate. He loved Caroline, but he hated city people. They were the reason guys like him couldn’t live in this town anymore. Coming in with their millions, buying up every shotgun shack to build their mega-mansions. Gramps saw how it was going and sold, but that was years ago, and the land changed hands two or three times since then. It made the speculators rich, and Aidan and his brother never saw a penny. Then Caroline came in like a queen, riding in her golden carriage. Aidan was the guy running along behind, cleaning up the horse shit. If she didn’t know that, he wasn’t about to enlighten her by letting her see his crappy apartment.

      “I know somewhere better,” he said. “A place you would never find on your own, that’s really special. Come on, get dressed, I’m taking you out.”

      14

      “Where are we going?” I asked.

      “You’ll see,” Aidan said, his mouth set in a hard line.

      We were in my car, speeding along the main road. Aidan was driving.