Page 4 of Lost Love Cove 4
“Basically getting the projects financed and housing developments,” Ian replied. “Like the Lost Love Cove project.”
“There are only three houses in the cove,” Matt pointed out.
“Trust me, Dick had his eye on the nature reserve that surrounds our properties,” Ian informed them.
“You sound as if you hated Delia Winters,” Carrie pointed out, her eyes narrowing suspiciously. “Why?”
“I’ve lived on this island most of my life,” Ian told her. “My parents owned a home here, and they commuted every day to their work in Key West, just like most of the residents on the island. Delia Winters…” His eyes became stormy, and Carrie could see the hate in them. “She was a bitter old hag. I once overheard my parents talking and saying that she was that way because of what happened to her when she was eighteen.”
“Okay…” Carrie frowned. “But why do you hate her so much?”
“Because I fell in love with the queen-bee’s daughter.” Ian’s words shocked the room.
“No way!” Oscar gave a low whistle. “My mom always told me that Ms. Winters’ daughter was a real nasty piece of work who hated her mother.”
“No,” Ian shook his head. His eyes softened. “Cheryl wasn’t always like that.” Carrie could see in his eyes that Cheryl Winters was Ian’s first love, and he still carried a piece of that love. “Not until…” He swallowed. “We eloped because Delia never approved of me or my family. We were considered the poor people on the island. Upper middle class. Not good enough for a Winters.”
“No, man,” Oscar exclaimed. “That’s not nice.” He glanced at Carrie. “My mom said that’s how her father and grandparents were treated on the island. My great-grandparents wereimmigrants to America and settled on the island after the man who owned our house passed away. My grandfather handled the accounting for the man, and my great-grandmother assisted around the house and cooked for him. The man had no children, and my grandfather became the son he never had. The man left everything, his entire legacy, to my great-grandfather, who passed it on to my grandfather, who passed it on to my mother.” He scratched the back of his neck. “Though the man was very wealthy…” he shook his head sadly, “my mother and grandfather’s family were still treated like outsiders and the help.”
“That’s horrible,” Carrie said, her heart going out to both of them even though she knew she shouldn’t. She turned back to Ian, knowing there was a lot more to his story about Cheryl Winters. “So you and Cheryl eloped…” She gestured with her hands for him to continue.
Ian drew a breath that sounded rough in his chest. He stared at his cuffed hands as if he could read a past there he would rather not say aloud. When he finally spoke, his voice was quieter.
“We were eighteen,” he said. “Cheryl and I thought we could outrun the world. We took the ferry one night with two backpacks and borrowed money. We crossed to the mainland, found a justice of the peace, and married with two strangers as witnesses. I thought it was the happiest I would ever be.”
He paused. The fire popped in the grate. The storm tapped at the windows with a lighter hand than before.
“Four days later,” he continued, “Delia’s private investigator found us. He was polite, which almost made it worse. He put Cheryl in a car with one of Delia’s assistants and put me in another. We were returned to Sunset Keys like packages withthe wrong postage. There were no raised voices. No scenes. Just the feeling that a wall had dropped between us and we were on opposite sides of it.”
Carrie watched him closely. His eyes had lost their edge. Grief softened his features and made him look older and more honest.
“What happened next?” she asked.
“My parents met me on the doorstep. They didn’t shout either. My father said we had shamed the families. My mother cried. The next day, they drove me to a recruiter and signed the papers. I wanted to stay and fight for Cheryl. I wanted to go to her house and drag her away again. But my father said I was to be a man, not a boy, and a man keeps his word. So I swore an oath to the Navy.”
“You learned to sail there,” Matt said, not unkindly.
Ian nodded. “Yes. I had grown up on the water, but the Navy taught me to respect it. I learned seamanship and navigation. I learned what it means to trust the person beside you when everything goes wrong at two in the morning and there is no land in sight.” His throat worked. “I wrote letters to Cheryl during those first months—every week. I mailed them to her mother’s house and to the post office with general delivery. None came back. None were answered. Then my parents wrote to me and said Cheryl had gone. She had a new man in her life, and this time she’d left her mother’s house for good. I believe Delia’s people searched for her, or so my parents said, but Cheryl had vanished. After that, I stopped writing and tried to be a good sailor so the ache would not swallow me whole.”
Carrie felt the slight shift in the room as even Andy’s guarded expression softened a degree. Oscar stared openly, his earlierdefiance tempered by the simple human story unfolding before him.
“How long were you in the Navy?” Carrie asked.
“Five years,” Ian said. “When my last enlistment ended, I applied for college on the G.I. Bill and was accepted. I told myself it was a clean start. I studied business because I thought it would keep me out of trouble. That’s where I met Trevor and Dick.” He glanced at Carrie, as if asking permission to speak his friend’s name. She gave a single, steady nod. “Trevor was brilliant at big pictures,” Ian said. “He could see a barren lot and imagine a hospital where families were born and healed. He could stand in a blighted block and sketch a grocery store that would anchor a neighborhood. Dick knew money and how to talk to it. His family had been in real estate for generations. They had sold their company and retired at a young age. Dick had capital and connections. I had an obsessive love for coastlines and properties with potential, especially for clients who wanted to charter and then stay. We spent nights talking until we had a plan, and then we gave it a name. Key Developments.”
“I didn’t know that there were three partners in the company,” Carrie said.
Ian nodded. “Dick put in a significant portion of his inheritance and lined up additional financing. Trevor used his trust fund, which he had kept mostly untouched. I sold my parents’ house on the island after they died in a storm during my third year of college. It was the worst call I ever took. A charter boat found them after the weather shifted. There was nothing to be done. I sold the house because I could not bear to sleep under that roof alone, and because I believed putting the money into our company would make their sacrifices matter.”
“I’m sorry, Ian,” Carrie said, her voice soft as her heart melted for the man. He’d lost so much at such a young age.
He looked at the fire rather than at anyone’s face. “We worked hard. We fought sometimes. We made something real. Then we bought the lots in Lost Love Cove when they came up. I can remember that day well.” He gave a mocking snort. “It was one of the days I was not on a charter and was in the office. Dick flew into the offices all excited as he’d finally gotten Delia Winters to sell a few plots of her land. Trevor had visited the island a few times to see me and my wife, as we were renting there. Trevor and I decided we wanted to buy the property. It would be a great investment. Dick was going to wait until he could talk Mrs. Winters out of her property to sell it to him.” He shook his head. “So, Trevor and I invested heavily in our new plots, and we built here. My kids…” his voice trembled, and his eyes misted over. “They were both born here, and the years blurred in front of us.”
“You and Trevor were friends?” Carrie’s brows shot up. “I really didn’t even know there was a third partner.” She gave him an apologetic smile. “To be honest, I barely even knew Dick.”
Ian nodded. “Lori and Erika are good friends. They even worked together as agents in the company for years.”
Lori had not told Carrie everything about her day-to-day work in Florida, but that had been their rule for years. When they visited each other, they left the grind of their jobs in Boston and Key West, and spoke of children, recipes, book club drama, and the way the tide combined with the wind to make mornings feel different in each town.
