“So,” Casey continued, “before we hear about this incredible adventure of yours, let’s talk a little more about you first. Your book jacket said you’ve been a taxi driver, a drug runner and a boat captain. Tell us more about that.”
Paul laughed. “Well, like a lot of writers, I’ve done a lot of things other than writing. We’re all waiting for that first novel to be published and we do what we have to do in the meantime.”
“But a drug runner?’ Casey asked with a laugh. “What was that all about?”
“Well, I was a charter boat captain in the Caribbean for many years, and you know, someone asked me to make a delivery to another island one day and I needed the money. That was a short-lived career but yes, I don’t hide it on my resume.”
Casey laughed and looked admiringly at Paul. He was handsome in an interesting sort of way—an intelligent sort of handsome. He had a short beard and brown wavy hair that he tucked behind his ears. His was slight and slim but definitely on the sexy side. He looked like he could find his way around a boat.
“So, you grew up in London,” Casey said, “and have lived in quite a few countries. Tell us more about your childhood. I want to know what childhood memories inspire a man to sail a boat across the ocean alone.”
“Independence,” he answered, “is kind of my moniker. I wear it proudly. I guess anyone who would sail a boat long distances alone would have to have an independent streak, be comfortable with himself and his abilities. I grew up in London, although I’m American born. My father was a diplomat. I had an interesting life. We traveled a lot as a family and spent summers in Mallorca. The independence probably came about as a result of my parents. They were every bit the socialites and weren’t around much. I guess you could say they were part of the martini set so prevalent in the lives of diplomats back in the 1950s and 60s. My sister and I kind of raised ourselves in some respects, but always in a beautiful or interesting setting.”
Casey guided Paul into his story and spent a lot of time having him describe his rescue and what it was like to watch his beloved boat disappear into the waters of the Atlantic as he motored away on the container ship that had picked him up.
“Did it cross your mind that you might not make it?” she asked him. “I mean, don’t you think it was sheer luck a boat was in the vicinity to pick you up? What was Plan B?”
Paul laughed again and scratched his chin.
“You know, it took a while for the boat to sink. It didn’t happen in fifteen minutes. It actually took hours. It was a slow leak and I kept trying to patch it until it became apparent that it was a losing battle. I had plenty of time to radio a distress call. I knew my bearings and I was in a high traffic lane on the Atlantic. I guess you could say I knew it wasn’t my time to go just yet. I planned to survive on my life raft until someone came along to get me, but yeah, my mayday call went out early as the boat began to sink. I’m not sure if that’s luck, but I’m certainly grateful that I’m here today to tell the story.”
By the time Casey wrapped up the interview, they were feeling very comfortable with one another. She liked this man even better than she did when she was reading his book, and it came through in the interview.
“That was really terrific,” she told him when she turned off the tape.
“You are really terrific,” he said, a bit of flirtatiousness evident in his voice. He’d noticed she wasn’t wearing a wedding ring, although he’d spotted a picture of her daughters on her desk.
They talked for a bit, feeling friendly and enjoying one another’s company.
“Hey, I’m staying with my aunt in Falmouth,” he said. “She’s got plans for this evening, so I was wondering if you’d like to have dinner with me tonight.”
Casey paused for a moment, a bit incredulous. Besides work and raising her girls, nothing very interesting had happened in her life in a long while. She wasn’t accustomed to pleasant surprises.
“Why not?” she said. “I live in North Falmouth, so yeah, let’s get together. I can be ready around 8:00.”
She gave him her address and walked him to the door of the newsroom.
“You know,” he said as he turned to walk out the door, “I’m really looking forward to this.”
“Me too,” she said.
When Mark called later to relay some things he needed done for the next morning’s newscasts, he’d asked how the interview had gone.
“Very interesting,” Casey answered. “He’s a very interesting man.”
‘But the real question is,” Mark asked, “can he score you a job in New York?”
“No,” Casey teased back. “But if I ever decide to become a drug runner, that’s a different story.”
*****
When Paul Neal arrived in his rental car at 8:10, she was waiting for him upstairs. She yelled out to him through the open screen on the front porch and told him to come up the stairs.
“What an interesting place,” he said as he walked in. “It has serious beach-y charm.”
He looked up at the high ceilings and the long railing upstairs that overlooked the first floor. Casey’s books took up an entire side of the room, stacked in ceiling-height bookshelves.
“Ah,” he said. “I see you’re a reader. I like that in a woman.”
He strolled over to the shelves and surveyed her titles. “And you have good taste in authors,” he said.
She poured him a glass of wine and they sat on the porch, looking out at the trees. He spotted some sailboats in the harbor in the distance and rattled off the types of boats he saw.
“You know,” she said. “You’re really the perfect combination of salty and well-read, but you’ve also got a touch of Indiana Jones in you. I like that.”
He smiled, admiring the spray of freckles across her nose, afraid to look at her too long because it was easy to get lost in her big blue eyes.
She’d made reservations at the Chart House, an ocean-side restaurant that looked like a well-heeled yacht on the inside.
It was a beautiful July night and the side of the restaurant facing the ocean was open so that the tables spilled out onto the patio. They ordered mussels in a white wine sauce with garlic and chopped tomatoes and big crusts of chunky bread. The candlelight lit their faces.
He ordered them a bottle of crisp Chardonnay and they toasted their interview together.
“I hope everyone who listens runs out to buy your book,” she said.
“Thanks to you, they probably will,” he said. “You’re good at that…interviewing people. You are remarkably bright.”
They chatted over heaping plates of fried clams and tartar sauce and she was struck by how open he was about everything. He told her about finding his ex-wife’s diaries on the boat as he sailed across the ocean and how heartbreaking it had been to learn her true feelings.
“I can be extremely selfish,” he said, “and I saw that in her journals—how it had affected her. It was hard coming to terms with the part of myself that isn’t very nice. I had a lot of time to contemplate it.”
He asked her about herself next, how she’d come to live on Cape Cod.
“I basically married Cape Cod,” she said, explaining how she’d fallen in love in college with a man from the Cape. “He made it clear from day one that he was never going to live anywhere else.”
“You don’t sound as if you’re happy here,” he said.
“No, not really,” Casey answered. “Once Robert and I divorced, I realized how limiting the Cape could be, especially for a single woman. There’s not a lot of options for a roving reporter. I’m here for my daughters. They deserve to be close to their father. They didn’t ask for this divorce.”
“Can I ask what happened to your marriage?”
“He’s a functioning workaholic,” Casey explained. “He owns a chain of restaurants here and spends a lot of time at them, understandably. The thing is, his eateries are really successful, so it’s hard for him to admit that he has a problem setting his priorities.”
They each ordered a slice of key lime pie and watched as the sun set in the west. Casey was enjoying herself. It had been a long time since she’d been out on a date, but this man was extraordinary. She didn’t run into a lot of men who had such varied and interesting backgrounds.
He reached across the table as they enjoyed one last glass of wine. He took her hand and looked into her eyes.
“You know,” he said, “I’m really enjoying your company.”
“Me too,” she responded, a small smile and the tilt of her head revealing her shyness.
“I’m here for a few days doing book signings. I’d love to see you again,” he said.
“Okay, Captain,” Casey responded. “I’m on board with that.”
*****
When Casey walked into the newsroom the next morning, her steps were a little lighter. She seemed to be off in her own little world from the minute she sat at her desk.
“Why the big smile this morning?” Mark asked.
“No reason,” Casey responded, looking through a stack of news copy. “Or…it might have something to do with the big date I had last night.”
“Dish,” Mark said, hoping to hear the details.
“That book author I interviewed yesterday asked me out to dinner last night. We went to the Chart House.”
“Well, it’s nice to see you joining the human race,” Mark said smiling. “You’re all work and no play most of the time. Are you going to see him again? If you do, you better make plans soon because it looks like Hurricane Betsy is coming up the coast. Take a look at the forecast.”
He plopped the marine forecast down on her desk, showing the eye of the storm heading right for the Cape.
“It’s going to be a mess around here for weeks if that storm hits,” Mark said with a big sigh. “Plan to live in the newsroom for at least a week.”
Casey read the forecast and saw that the first winds of the storm were due to hit on Saturday or Sunday—tomorrow or the next day.
Mark agreed he’d cover the first few days and that Casey could come in on Tuesday to work the cleanup efforts. She’d be off until then.
After the 4:00 news was finished, Janette beeped in on the intercom to tell her that Paul Neal was on the phone. Her heart fluttered a bit as she picked up the call.
“This is Casey Larson,” she said out of habit.
“The invincible Casey Larson,” Paul said, happy to hear her voice. “Do we still have plans for tomorrow?”
“Yes, I’m looking forward to it,” she said. “What did you have in mind?”
“It’s a surprise,” he said. “I’ll pick you up at noon tomorrow.”
Casey called Robert to let him know about the hurricane forecast and explained she’d have to stay at the radio station for a few days if the storm hit. Robert agreed that the girls would stay with him. He’d probably be closing down the restaurants anyway if it looked like Hurricane Betsy was going to make landfall in the next few days.
As Casey drove home, she noticed people were beginning to make preparations. The marinas were bringing boats in from their moors and people were boarding up the windows in the front of their homes. She remembered that Paul was due to fly out of Boston on Sunday and she made a mental note to tell him to come up with another plan just in case.
For most people who lived along the coast, hurricanes were just one of the realities of life that had to be dealt with. Not many hurricanes made it to Cape Cod, though. It’s too far north, so most of the predictions about their landfall came as warnings. Casey wasn’t worried just yet.
What she couldn’t know was that Hurricane Betsy would be the backdrop of the two most romantic days of her life.
*****
When Paul picked her up the next morning, she was waiting on the steps for him. She was wearing a blue sundress that complimented her light brown hair and blue eyes, and she held a duffel bag with things she thought they might need for the day’s outing: sunscreen, bottled water, a blanket and a bag of trail mix.
“You look beautiful, Casey,” he said as she hopped into the front seat. “I think of you as a hidden gem just waiting to be discovered on the Cape.”
Casey blushed, pleased with the compliment but knowing that that she’d remain a “hidden gem” until the girls grew up and moved away. She’d never uproot them and steal them away from their father. She wanted them to have both parents in their lives, knowing that was best for them. Robert was a good father to them, even if his priorities sometimes got in the way.
“Where are we going, Captain?” she asked, smiling and happy to see Paul was still as attractive as she thought he was.
“I’m bringing you to a special place I used to go to as a boy when we visited my mother’s sister. It’s called The Knob and it’s a beautiful spot to spend the day.”
When he’d parked the car, he took her by the hand and led her down a shady path that eventually turned uphill, bringing them to a long, sandy inlet that ended with an upward climb to a small hill.
“I see why they call it The Knob,” Casey said. She was delighted. It was a sweet spot on the beach, and best of all, no one else was there.
They found a small patch of beach and Paul took a blanket out of his canvas bag. Then he produced the makings of a picnic, with cheese and crackers, chicken salad, a tray of cut-up vegetables, and a container of blueberries.
“You put on quite a show,” she said.