Read Online Swimming Lessons by Mary Alice Monroe - Free Book Online Page B

boats that dated back fifty years or more. She tried not to eavesdrop but she caught that the other man was Ethan’s Uncle Will and the woman was his Aunt Martha and that Ethan was catching hell for missing church and not visiting his mother in the past few weeks.
    His father, Stuart, was quiet in comparison to his sister and her husband, but his affection for Ethan was nonetheless obvious, as was the pride shining in his dark eyes. It was clear to Toy that the apple didn’t fall far from the tree in the Legare family.
    Ethan, while never boisterous, was as relaxed as she’d ever seen him. He clearly enjoyed being with his family. Smiles came readily, as did the laughter.
    Then her name was called and she was brought into the room. Introductions were made and hands were shook. They couldn’t have been nicer or more welcoming and she pretended she didn’t see the suggestive eyebrow wriggling of Uncle Will to Ethan as he nodded her way. She ducked her head and took a swallow of her horrid coffee. There was a matchmaker in every crowd.
    She was spared more chit chat when a gruff looking man with a cap over greasy hair shuffled over to poke his head in through the doorway.
    “The Miss Peggy’s coming in!”
    “That’ll be us,” Stuart said and set down his coffee.
    Immediately they filed out of the cramped office into the fresh, salty air. Toy lagged behind. Ethan looked back over his shoulder and catching her eye, waved her closer. When she caught up, he bent close to speak softly in her ear.
    “That wasn’t so bad, was it? No head chopping or bruises?”
    She turned to him “Why didn’t you tell me they were your family?”
    “And spoil all the fun? Nothing I love more than to drop the bomb that I come from a long line of shrimpers after listening to a tirade from a Turtle Nazi.”
    “I owe you one.”
    He replied with a look that, had it not been Ethan, she would have sworn was flirtatious.
    The long wooden dock was lined with tall cement pilings, and to these a line of boats, some seventy footers, some but twelve, were tied with thick, coiling rope. She read their names aloud as she walked by Carson Elizabeth, Explorer, Tina Maria, Captain Andy, Miss Charlotte, Miss Georgia.
    “Most of the fishing boats are named for women,” he explained. “Wives, daughters, mothers, sweethearts. It’s an old tradition, meant to bring good luck to the men while they are away at sea.”
    “Do you have a boat?”
    “Nothing big like these. Mine’s about eighteen feet and just for fun.”
    “And do you have a name for it?” she asked, shamelessly prying.
    “The Wanderlust.” He cast her a slanted glance.
    “Suits you,” she replied.
    Her attention was diverted by the sixty-two-foot Miss Peggy as it slipped into its watery square of real estate along the dock, growling and churning the waters. With the hanging nets on each side of the boat, she thought they looked like folded butterfly wings. The Miss Peggy was an old girl. White paint peeled from the wood and up close Toy could see the dread rust on metal. But she was still a graceful swimmer and slipped into her space as easily as a younger, smaller fishing boat.
    Two men in jeans and white rubber boots climbed out off the high boat to the dock far below as nimbly as ship rats. On board, a wiry, weathered woman with dark gray hair pulled back in a ponytail waved them off, calling out something in a heavy drawl that Toy couldn’t make out. While one of the men bent to tie the ropes, the other, a short, bald, barrel-chested man, came straight for Ethan and sucker punched him in the belly.
    Toy gasped as Ethan doubled over. Until she realized that he wasn’t grimacing in pain but laughter. The two men clung to each other, delivering velvet gloved punches like boxers in the ninth round while around them, the other men chortled, enjoying their antics.
    “Don’t mind them,” Stuart said to Toy with a good natured grin. “They been fools since they were