LITMIR.BIZ

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inside. She lingered there, close, and he wondered if she felt any of the same longing that kept him immobilized in that spot of sand, his arms clasping her to him. She tipped her mouth upward, the tiniest fraction of an inch nearer, and he was drawn as if by a powerful tide to close the gap, until she took a breath and stepped away.

      “Thanks,” she said, tucking some hair behind her ear. “I don’t have enough extra clothes to get these wet.”

      “Uh, sure.”

      He fisted his hands on his hips, trying to breathe some sense back into his brain. She gazed out at the rolling surf and he stood there like a big, dumb block of stone, unsure what to say.

      Had he really been about to kiss her? His own lack of control disturbed him.

      “Come on, Unco,” Tracy called against the wind. “There are some cool shells over here.”

      Relieved, he joined Tracy and Bear, scouring the beach and trying to leave his inexplicable behavior behind him.

      Candace joined them, seemingly unruffled.

      He found a perfect sand dollar, gingerly extracting it from the sand and handing it to Tracy with all the solemnity of a king bestowing a royal favor.

      She took it, wide-eyed. “It’s not even chipped or anything. I’m gonna put it in my jar with the shells Daddy found me.” She continued, kneeling now, to search out more treasures tossed up by the sea.

      Candace pushed the hair from her face as she joined them. “Rick took her to the beach just before he deployed for the last time. She was only two, so she doesn’t remember, but he found some beautiful shells and put them in a jar for her.”

      “That was real nice.”

      She knelt next to Tracy. “Baby, I know you don’t remember, but Daddy said you were the best shell finder in all of California.”

      Marco saw moisture sparkling against Candace’s lashes.

      “When we get home, I will show you a picture of you two at that beach, okay?”

      “Okay, Mommy.” Tracy put the shell in her pocket and raced with Bear down the sand.

      Candace continued to stare after the two. “I keep reminding her, but they’re my memories, not hers.”

      The words rang with sadness, making Marco feel even more of a heel for his earlier impulse to kiss her. “I’m sorry.”

      “He was a great dad. He never was the kind to ‘take her to play,’ he always played right along. First in the ball pit, the water, the ‘tiny tot’ days at the park. He would sure have loved doing these things with her now.”

      The things that Marco was doing, making memories with another man’s child. And suddenly he was infringing again, inserting himself where Candace clearly did not want him to be. How would he feel if his child had no memories of her father? If all that love and devotion had been erased from a kid’s life by a roadside IED? But it wasn’t all erased, not as long as Candace was around to keep Rick’s memory alive for his little girl.

      Marco walked away a few paces and left them to their treasure hunt, Candace, Tracy and the missing spot where Rick should be.

      On their way back to the house to prepare for their courthouse visit, Marco made sure to hang back a pace. The waves rolled in and out, their ceaseless rhythm scouring away any trace of a human presence.

      Keep the distance, he reminded himself, and everything will be just fine.

      * * *

      Candace dressed in slacks and the nicest blouse she’d packed, and restored her beach-blown hair to order. The prickling in her nerves was not due to the courthouse visit—she felt completely secure with Marco and Dev’s security measures—but with what had happened on the beach. Her mind was under control; Marco was a friend, protecting and helping. But her feelings were another matter.

      Something inside her had wanted to lean forward and receive what she imagined might have been a kiss from Marco. But that could not be, Candace told herself sternly. What was she doing, thinking about kissing another man, any man? Especially in light of the obvious problem that Tracy did not remember her father?

      But I can fix that, Candace thought, throwing up a prayer to God. Please don’t let Rick vanish from Tracy’s life like he vanished from mine. And as for thoughts of kissing Marco, those would be banished from both her mind and her emotions.

      Bolstered, she kissed Tracy and Angela. Brent arrived and met Dev, who offered a handshake. “Heard you were a puddle jumper.”

      “Rescue swimmer,” Brent said, quirking a smile.

      “You any good?” Dev inquired.

      Brent laughed. “Next time you’re drowning in twenty-foot seas, I’ll rappel out of a helicopter and show you just how good I am.”

      Dev gave him a respectful grin. “All right, then. Hold down the fort, Coastie.”

      “I will, and you drive safely, okay? No falling off your motorcycle or anything.”

      When the bantering was finished, Marco got into the truck and they drove away toward the county courthouse. Candace didn’t see where Dev had gone, but she knew he was there somewhere, watching.

      Like Rico’s men?

      Marco was silent for the whole trip, probably just as well. She’d make it clear that she didn’t want any deeper connection with him than she already had, and didn’t want Tracy to bond with him any more than she’d already done.

      Candace thought of Tracy’s joy when she spent time with Marco, and her stomach pinched with guilt. She recalled the school plays he’d attended and even a classroom tea, cramming his giant body into a first-grade-sized chair. Every year for her birthday he carved her a tiny wooden bunny to add to her collection, a reminder of an orphaned rabbit they’d tried to save. Was it wrong to put distance between Tracy and a man she loved? But it was not right to allow Rick to be replaced in her heart or Tracy’s.

      Candace clasped her hands together and prayed, once again, for God to help her be both mother and father to her daughter. Relaxed, she drifted off until the slowing of the truck roused her. “I didn’t know I was that tired.”

      Marco got out to open the door for her, but she hopped out first. She meant to say thank you, but he was propelling her toward the courthouse, his hand on her back.

      They passed through the metal detectors and Candace had her purse searched. The precautions were comforting. There was no way Jay Rico would try anything in a heavily secured government building, and besides, he had no way of knowing she was here.

      After forty-five minutes of waiting in a small conference room, during which Marco sat still as a statue and Candace paced, checked her phone, drank some water and paced some more, a sturdy woman with a neat bun entered.

      “I’m Mandy Livingston, assistant to the district attorney. I’m sorry, but he’s still in court, so I don’t think he can meet with you today. But we can go over the particulars, okay?” She shot a look at Marco. “Would you mind waiting outside, sir?”

      He hesitated, and Candace thought he might resist, but she nodded at him.

      “I’ll be right outside the door.”

      Livingston started in and Candace was again lost in that horrible time four months before, reliving the shooting, the cold expression on Kevin Tooley’s face as he aimed his gun out the car window and murdered a young man at the gas station.

      “Why did he do it?” she blurted.

      Livingston looked surprised. “Tooley?” She paused. “From what we can gather from our snitches, the victim threatened to go to the police with information about a car Tooley stole.”

      “What do you know about Tooley’s background?”

      She cocked her head. “Why is this of interest?”

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