Troubles in Paradise (Paradise #3)(65)

It’s something to do. Only locals can roll. Irene can’t roll. The Invisible Man couldn’t roll. Huck’s luck has been so damn awful this week that it’ll surely take a turn soon. Why not now?

He throws the dice. Three threes, five, six.

“The pot is over a thousand bucks,” the bartender says. “Nobody’s won since before Christmas.”

Josephine sings “Do You Know the Way to San Jose,” only she changes “San Jose” to “Coral Bay.”

“I love that woman,” Rupert says.

“You love a lot of women,” Huck says. Part of him wishes he were built this way, but he isn’t. He loves Irene. I love you, Irene, he thinks and he throws the dice one last time. Two fours, two ones, and a six.

The bartender sweeps up his money. Rupert says nothing but Huck can sense him wanting to blurt out I told you so.

“Heard you and the Invisible Man’s wife are shacking up,” Rupert says.

“You’re behind on your gossip. She moved out.”

“Any fool off the street could have told you that wasn’t going to work,” Rupert says. “There’s too much tangled up between you.”

Huck wants to tell Rupert he knows nothing about it but he doesn’t like to bicker with Rupert, and also the phrase tangled up feels like a bull’s-eye. Huck and Irene have always communicated on the level. But beneath all that was a mess both of them had willfully ignored—because neither of them had created it. Those diaries must have been salt in a wide-open wound. Huck should never, ever have showed them to her. It must have seemed like he wanted to hurt her, when the truth was, he assumed she was so strong and resilient that Rosie’s words wouldn’t matter.

Why would they matter when she has me? Huck had thought. He was there for her day in, day out, waiting, adoring, offering whatever support and encouragement she needed. Wasn’t that enough? Why did the events of thirteen years or six years or two years earlier matter?

Huck spins his finger at the bartender. Another round—more shots, more beers. He found a way to get Irene the letter, ingeniously, or so he thought. He hasn’t heard from her. Yet.

“You’re right,” Huck says to Rupert. “It was never going to work.”



Josephine takes a break and comes to sit between them. Onion rings arrive, compliments of the kitchen. Huck admires them—fat, golden, glistening with oil, stacked on a dowel like so many rings in a game of quoits. (Did he eat any? He couldn’t say. He might have waited for them to cool and then forgotten about them.)

Another beer.

Rupert says, “Jojo, you have any lady friends you could introduce to Huck here?”

“I hear Huck’s taken,” Josephine says, but Huck is saved from explaining that he’s not, because it’s time for her second set.

“Let’s get out of here,” Rupert says. “I’m late for Sadie.”



Huck follows Rupert around the road in Coral Bay over to Skinny Legs. The place is crowded but there are two bar stools empty in the corner—how is this possible? Rupert must have called in on the way.

They take the seats; Huck orders a margarita with salt. Rupert says, “Who are you, Jimmy Buffett?” He asks for Cruzan Gold over ice. Heidi is bartending. She’s in the weeds but she takes one glance at Huck and Rupert and says, “How ’bout a couple of burgers, fellas?”

Burgers, yes, sure. There’s a band playing songs that Huck doesn’t recognize and a bunch of kids in their twenties dancing. Tourists, spring-breakers. Huck and Rupert are geezers in this crowd but it doesn’t matter, they’re having fun, Heidi is taking good care of them. Huck feels a hand on his back and he turns to see Sadie. She pulls Rupert up out of his chair, and he claps a hand on Huck’s shoulder, which is his way of saying he won’t be back, please cover the check, Rupert will get him next time.

Fine, fine, Huck thinks. Good for Rupert. Sadie is Huck’s favorite of the women anyway.

He should leave—but it’s been so long since he’s been out like this and it’s working like a tonic against the ache in his heart. He orders a beer in an attempt to sober up.

He sees a familiar-looking blonde across the bar. She’s one of the mothers from the Gifft Hill School, he figures out that much, though he couldn’t in a million years come up with her name. She’s waving at him like crazy, and he raises his beer in a way he hopes says, Yes, I see you, please don’t come over here.

The band plays one last song, and when it’s finished, the bar empties out somewhat. Finally, Huck can hear himself think.

Heidi comes over and says, “Woman over there wants to buy you another drink. Beer?”

“Please,” Huck says. “Which woman?” He assumes it’s the Gifft Hill mother whose name he can’t remember or never knew in the first place.

“Behind you,” Heidi says.

Huck turns to see a redhead in a pale green dress sipping what looks like a painkiller over at the side bar. She’s by herself, gazing out at the people drinking on the back deck. Is that who Heidi means? Well, yeah. She’s the only woman behind him.

The beer arrives. Huck takes a swallow, then checks behind him again. The woman is gone.

Huh, he thinks. Strange.

A second later, someone takes Rupert’s stool. It’s the redhead in the green dress. “Good evening, Captain,” she says.