“That whole thing about the will,” Carson interjected, feeling the need to defend Mamaw. “It wasn’t bribery as much as desperation. She was only trying to get us all to stay. She’s old. She’s not got that much time left. And we’re all she’s leaving behind.”

“I thought about that tonight,” Harper said in a darker tone. “I may have learned the difference between an ultimatum based on love and one based on selfishness.” She plucked at her shirt. “Damn my mother,” she said, her heat gaining fuel. “She treats me more like a lackey than a daughter. A lackey with no talent. She doesn’t have any faith in me. Sometimes, when she looks at me and she gets this look of distaste in her eyes, I know she sees my . . . our father.” Harper laughed bitterly. “And we all know what she thought about him.”

Carson said nothing.

“I can’t work for her anymore,” Harper declared, her eyes flashing. Then, as though the ramifications of that statement had just hit her, her shoulders slumped and her face fell. “The problem is, I don’t know what I want to do instead. I’ve always been the good little girl who did what she was told.” She tossed a pebble into the water.

“But not anymore,” Carson said in an effort to bolster her sister.

Harper lifted the corner of her mouth. “Not anymore. I’m done being her servant.” She looked up and held Carson’s gaze, as though daring her to believe her. Carson had no reason not to believe her and pulsed a message of support.

“So here I am,” Harper said. “I guess I’m not much different from you, Carson. I’ve nowhere else to go.”

Carson felt a rush of sympathy for her sister. She looked out over the black water. At the tip of the pier, a soft green light pierced the blackness. It blinked on and off, on and off, with a reassuring consistency.

When Carson turned back, weaving slightly, she wore a wry grin. “In a crazy way, I’m glad,” Carson told Harper. “It’s nice not to be all alone in the lifeboat.”

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Dora was sitting in the living room enjoying a peaceful afternoon of reading when she caught sight of Harper walking down the hall to Mamaw’s room. Dora was surprised to see her dressed in white shorts and a T-shirt rather than the usual black garb New Yorkers always wore. She glanced up at the grandfather clock and saw that it was already past three o’clock. Wasn’t Harper supposed to be on a plane for New York?

Dora marked her place in the book and set it on the sofa. Rising, she quietly made her way to Mamaw’s room, pausing at the door. She heard voices and strained to listen. She couldn’t quite make out what they were saying, but it sounded like Harper might have been crying. Curious, Dora took a measured step farther into the room, cringing as the floorboards creaked beneath her foot. Easing forward, she peeked around the door. She saw Mamaw sitting in her easy chair, framed by her beautiful windows. Pink roses in a crystal vase sat on the table beside her. At her feet sat Harper, her head in Mamaw’s lap, while Mamaw lovingly stroked Harper’s hair.

Carson was late for her meeting with Blake.

She refused to call it a date, grabbing her bag from the car. It was a windy day in the lowcountry. Bad for surfing, but good for kiteboarding. The fluctuation in wind made Charleston a go-to location for water sports. On any day one could ride the waves.

She followed the winding beach path bordered by an impenetrable barrier of groundsel shrubs. This barrier was home to countless animals and birds and a major source of food and shelter for the migrating monarch butterflies. A small green lizard scampered across the path and a young couple passed her going in the opposite direction. They nodded their heads and smiled in neighborly acknowledgment. Station 28 was on the northern end of the island near Breach Inlet, where swimming was forbidden due to hazardous currents. Though it wasn’t officially zoned for kiteboarding, the locals quietly understood that this area was designated for the wild aerobatics of the fast-moving kiteboarders.

The shaded path opened up to a wide spread of sunny beach. Beyond, the Atlantic Ocean caressed the shoreline in foam-tipped waves. Carson stepped into the sun and stopped, taking it all in and grinning from ear to ear. She’d not been to the beach since the shark incident. She’d missed the punch she felt every time she saw the infinite vista of sky and water. She’d missed the feel of sand between her toes.

But on this beach, the sky exploded with colorful kites! Eight years back there had only been three or four kiteboarders skimming over the water. Today she counted at least thirty kites. She laughed, thinking it looked as though an entire flock of enormous, brightly plumed birds were catching thermals over the ocean.

A happy sight, and it filled her with excitement that she was going to learn the sport. Carson felt like skipping across the beach, she was so thrilled. But she strolled at a leisurely pace to stand with the other rubberneckers along the shore watching the practitioners of the popular new sport. Some of the kiteboarders were far out, hydroplaning across the water, catching air and doing breathtaking turns and lifts of their boards. Some were struggling closer to shore, just learning how to maneuver the kites and getting in the way. And still more were on the beach, pumping air into their kites and laying out long tether lines, or waiting in a queue to go out.

Carson loved surfing—was good at it. But she’d long been curious about trying her hand at this new sport that would allow her to surf the air rather than the waves. She preferred solo water sports. Out on the water you needed a buddy, but the rider caught the wave or the wind on her own. Every day was a fresh attempt at soaring. She smiled to herself, wondering if she shouldn’t start applying that approach to all aspects of her life.

Holding her hand over her eyes like a visor, she scanned the beach for Blake. She noticed a man covered in tattoos glancing at her repeatedly, usually the warning sign that a pickup line was coming. She picked up her bag and began walking in the opposite direction. Across the beach she heard calls—“Launch!” “Good wind!” “What size kite is that?”

A tall, slender man caught her eye. He was holding on to the bars of his kite while at the other end of the long tether lines another man was assisting, lifting the arcing blue kite into the air. The man in the harness had a swimmer’s body, broad at the shoulders and slim at the hips. Sinewy muscles strained as the kite caught the wind. A beautiful body, she thought with her photographer’s eye, symmetrical and tanned. Something about the way his dark curls fell over his forehead made her look closer, squinting in the sunlight.