The Ocean Between Us

“I’m serious. I’m going to miss you, Grace.”

She knew that tone in his voice. “You’re leaving?”

“I, uh—I’m going to Washington on Tuesday. Briefing at the Pentagon. I’ll be gone a week.”

She tamped down a familiar welling of resentment. Of course he was leaving. That was nothing new, and a week’s absence was minor. But maybe what she resented was that he’d waited until she was drowsy with sex before springing it on her. All right, she thought, that was his dream. Maybe it was time to try out hers on him.

“Well,” she said, “that’s your project. Here’s mine.”

“Where?”

She grabbed her robe and slipped it on. Despite his romantic words earlier, she felt no need to put her middle-aged body on parade. She switched on the light and found the real estate brochure on the bedside table.

“The girls and I went to an open house,” she said, handing him the sheet and putting on her reading glasses. Steve didn’t need glasses yet. Of course he didn’t.

Heaving a long-suffering sigh, he scooted up in bed and scowled at the flyer. “Yeah?” he said. “So?”

She realized she was holding her breath. The brochure showed a reasonably flattering picture of Marcia’s home basking in the sun, clear sky and blue water in the distance. But she wanted him to see what she saw, a house on a bluff, surrounded by towering trees, an apron of emerald grass and a view of the sea. She wanted him to see a place that would become theirs, a place where they might sit on the deck and hold hands, watching the stars come out at night. She bit her lip, feeling foolishly sentimental. It was just a damned house. A plain-looking house owned by a widow who had spent her entire marriage there.

He scanned the information quickly and efficiently, with total absorption. That was the pilot in him, able to suck up multiple facts in moments. In a squadron ready room before a flight, he’d be handed charts and kneeboard cards. A pilot had mere seconds to memorize the code words of the day and mission specifics on a color-coded briefing card.

Yet when he lifted his gaze to her, his expression was one of total incomprehension. Clearly he needed remedial work.

Grace took the flyer from him and set it aside. She’d never understood how he could frustrate her and turn her on all at once. “Well?” she whispered, turning to nibble at his ear. “Do you like it?”

“I get the idea there’s only one right answer to that question.” He slipped his hand inside her robe.

“I want it,” she said.

“Me, too,” he agreed.

She pushed his hand away. “Really, Steve. I want to buy this house.”

He fell still. “Gracie, we’re only going to be here a couple of years. Three, max. Then we’ll be stuck with a house here.”

“You don’t get stuck with a house. You own it. You live in it. It’s where you go at the end of the day—”

“Not if you’re transferred to the Pentagon.”

His career again. She used to find it so exciting, used to look forward to each new assignment. But lately her thinking had shifted. She wanted permanence. She wanted a home. “It’s time, Steve. I need something of my own for when the kids are gone. A place we can always come back to, an anchor.”

“What if we have to sell it and it doesn’t sell? How can we take that kind of risk?”

She couldn’t help it; she laughed. “A risk-averse Navy pilot. Who knew?”

“When I’m on the job, I put myself at risk. But this could affect the whole family. The kids are going to college. Sure, Brian is headed for the Naval Academy, so there won’t be any tuition for him, but…”

Grace figured it was the wrong time to set him straight about Brian and the Academy, so she bit her tongue.

“But what about the girls?” he asked. “Even with what we’ve set aside, it’s going to be tough enough paying tuition. This isn’t the time to be taking on a big mortgage.”

“No, it’s not the time. We should have done it years ago. The down payment can come from my grandmother’s estate, and we can easily qualify for a VA loan.”

He blew out a long-suffering sigh. “If you absolutely need a house, let’s find something in our price range. This is waterfront property. It’s twice what we can afford.”

“We’ve been saving for years.”

“Look, we had a plan, Grace. We were going to wait.”

“I’ve changed my mind. I want this house, Steve. That’s what people use their money for. It’s what they save for.” She held back from pointing out that everyone else their age seemed to be homeowners, many of them on their second or third home.

He scowled at the list price. “I know you’re a genius with the budget, Grace. But a house—” he pushed the flyer away from him “—was something we always said we’d talk about…later. And this one is completely beyond our means.”

“What if I found a way to afford it?” she asked.

“What are you talking about?”

“I could work.” The idea had been simmering inside her even before her encounter with Marcia. Now a new sort of energy heated up. This was a possibility, not a daydream. Maybe she should have approached Steve differently, eased into the topic with him, but like he said, he was leaving. At the moment, he was glaring at her as though she was the enemy.

“I’m not a traitor,” she said. “This is not some wacko idea I’ve had. And I’m not talking about a part-time clerical job on base somewhere. It finally hit me today. There’s something I’m good at, and I could actually make a career out of it. I’m going to be an executive relocator.”

“A what?”

“Executive relocator—someone who helps people move. In the civilian world that’s worth something.”

“It sounds sketchy to me.”

“Don’t you dare be condescending.”

“I’m being practical. Setting yourself up for business is a long-term proposition.”

“These days a business can be run almost entirely from the Web.” She sat on the edge of the bed and hugged her knees up to her chest. “I don’t need a physical location, just a virtual presence on the Web, a voice on the phone. I’ve been doing it for years as an ombudsman, anyway.”

“I know that, Grace. You have incredible talent. Hell, I’ve seen you juggle schedules and plan a move like an air traffic controller. I’ve seen you find schools for kids with special needs, boarding kennels for dogs and parrots and drug rehab for more personnel than I care to remember. The families of the air wing need you. You’re too damned busy for a regular job.”

“Will you listen to yourself?” she said, incredulous.

“Grace, honey, I don’t want you to have to work for a living. That’s my job. I want you to be here for the kids.”

“While you were out they grew up, Steve. They don’t need me home twenty-four hours a day anymore.”

“Maybe I need you there, Grace. Did you ever think of that?”

“My God, no. I can honestly say I never did. It’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard.”

He pulled on a pair of boxer shorts and paced the room. He always got restless when something was bugging him.

She found herself staring at his chest. Between his perfectly sculpted pecs nestled a St. Christopher medal he never took off. She’d once asked him where it came from. He said someone gave it to him just before he went to sea for the first time. Now the dark hair on his chest was sprigged in gray, which she found unaccountably sexy. Why was it that he seemed to become more attractive as he aged, while she just seemed to turn soft and faded? It wasn’t fair. He didn’t need his looks. He had everything else.