Page 10 of Summer Reading

“Sam more than me,” Em said. “I moved here as a full-time resident when I was a baby, but your family has lived here for generations.”

I nodded. “But only part-time since I was born. My great-grandfather helped establish the Holy Ghost Association.”

Ben tipped his head to the side in silent inquiry.

“That’s the name of the Portuguese American club over on Vineyard Avenue,” I said. “My dad still belongs.”

“Your island roots run deep,” he said.

“They do. Our house was my grandmother’s and her grandmother’s before her. My cousin Dominick says that back in the day, you couldn’t throw a rock in Oak Bluffs without hitting a Gale,” I said. “There are fewer of us now since so many have moved off island to the Cape.”

“You might be just the person I need, Samantha,” he said. The intensity in his gaze made my heart stutter stop. To be on the receiving end of that blue-gray gaze was heady stuff.

“Do tell,” I said. And, yes, I am a horrible personbecause I completely forgot that Em was standing next to me. In fact, I’d have been hard-pressed to remember my own name at the moment.

“I took the interim director job, since I have the summer off from my academic research library position at MIT, primarily to do some family research over the summer,” he said. “I’m trying to track down a person who was here in the eighties.”

“That’s a bit before my time,” I said. I glanced at Em, and she nodded.

“Same,” she said. “We arrived in the nineties.”

“Who are you looking for?” I asked.

“Just some relatives,” he said. “My mother lived in Oak Bluffs in ’89 but then moved to Maine. She’s come back to the island recently, and I followed her, hoping we could reconnect but also to do a deep dive into the family history. Unfortunately, she’s not as interested as I am.”

I nodded, thinking about my brother, and said, “I’m doing something like that myself this summer. Maybe I can help.”

Ben’s brows lifted as if he was surprised by the offer. “I’d really appreciate that.”

“Not at all,” I said. “It’s the least I can do since the ‘incident.’ ” I made air quotes as I said the word.

He grinned at me, and I felt myself return his smile. Em glanced between us, pausing on me with a “you’re going to explain all this later” look.

“Excellent. Can I get your number so we can discussit some more?” he asked. He pulled his phone out of his pocket, and I was about to tell him my number, when I was interrupted.

“You have got to be kidding me,” a voice said from behind me.

I whipped around and there stood Tyler. He glanced from me to Ben and back. He looked furious.

“Seriously?” he asked. “You’re actually standing here hitting on the director of the library?”

“What? I’m not—” I protested. I should have saved my breath.

Tyler didn’t wait to listen to a word I said. He turned on his sneaker, threw his backpack over his shoulder, and stormed to the door.

“Well, hell,” I said. I glanced back at Em, whose expression was surprised yet sympathetic, and Ben, who looked mostly shocked. I threw up my hands, feeling my face get hot with embarrassment. “So, this got crazy awkward. Sorry. I’d better go catch him.” I glanced at Em. “Call you later.”

“You’d better,” she said.

I ran for the stairs, wishing the industrial carpet would swallow me whole. No such luck.

Chapter Four

“Tyler, wait!” I cried and was soundly ignored.

He was already across the parking lot and headed for the street. One part of me was so ready to let him walk home, but then I thought about my dad and Stephanie and imagined trying to explain to them that Tyler got run over by a car on his first day of robotics camp because he was miffed with me. Yeah, no.

I dashed to the SUV and hopped in. I drove across the lot and pulled up alongside Tyler. I rolled down the passenger-side window so I could talk to him. He had earbuds in and was aggressively ignoring me. Fine.

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