Carolina Girl by Patricia Rice Read Free Book Online

the flash of temper in her
eyes and the way her mouth pulled flat when he irked her. Much better to keep a
temperamental woman like that at a distance.
    He almost walked through the turtle path before he saw it.
He assumed it was a turtle path from the immensity and oddness of the way the
grass bent and the sand rippled. He traced it back to a hollow in the dune, but
there all traces of the path had been methodically brushed away. Intrigued, he
circled the hollow. Maybe he ought to research turtles on the Internet. What
kind of creature emerged from the sea to lay and abandon eggs in isolation? How
many of them were there? What did they look like?
    And how would they survive with a shopping mall on top of
them?
    Grinding more enamel off his molars, Clay stalked back to
Cissy. She regarded him without expression, simply waiting for him to pick up
the basket of grass before leaning on her cane and heading back the way
they’d come. He didn’t see how a nearly invisible woman like this
could be related to the firestorm that was Aurora.
    “Whaddayuh think, McCloud? See anything out
there?” Jake bellowed as they returned to the clearing and the shack.
    “Interesting,” he admitted, assisting Cissy up
the stairs and setting the basket on the porch. “But that’s not
helping me figure out how to stop the state from buying it all up.”
    “Nah, you’ll have to talk to Aurora about that.
She’s got her head in all those bigwig circles, but she didn’t seem
to think you were interested.”
    Well, he wasn’t, really. She wanted the state to keep
all the land and develop parks and “small businesses.” He thought
the state should leave nature alone. He didn’t see any meeting ground in
between. Maybe he ought to ask Jake how Aurora’s plans dovetailed with
free fishing, but he didn’t want to start a family argument.
    Clay smacked a mosquito nibbling on his forearm, then swiped
his forehead with the bandanna he kept in his back pocket when riding the
Harley. “Aren’t there zoning meetings or something where you can
protest this kind of thing? What about environmental laws? I can’t see
where I can help with any of that.”
    Jake swigged from the glass of iced tea Iris had given him
earlier. Wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, he shook his shaggy head.
“You know how to work them computers. That’s more than anyone else
around here. Aurora can tell you what to do.”
    Like that would happen in this century. Deciding it was high
time to get out of here before they asked him to walk on water, Clay straddled
his bike and kicked back the stand. “I can write the EPA, I suppose. But
you can’t stop progress. It’s gonna happen one way or
another.” He wouldn’t tell them that he was trying. He’d had
enough of public failure.
    Sitting in her porch chair, efficiently weaving dried grass
into a tight circle that would create another of the art-quality baskets
adorning her porch, Grandma Iris intruded upon their discussion. “My mama
was a Bingham ’fore she married. My brother Billy lives just the other
side of town. I’m sorry to say, but he’d sell his soul for a bottle
of ’shine. Aurora says all the state gotta do is buy Billy’s share,
and they can go to court to sell all this. You give the man Billy’s name,
and this time next year, this gonna be mud and bulldozers.”
    Oh, yeah, lay the blame on me. Thank you so very much,
Aurora Jenkins . There was no doubt left in Clay’s mind that there was
only one Aurora in this damned town, and he’d better have a talk with her
before she had half the populace out to tar and feather him.
    If this quiet old lady was one of the Bingham heirs he was
hunting, the park was a hell of a lot closer to a done deal than he’d
thought.
    He hated it when the anonymous names on his computer came
attached to real people.
    o0o
    Trailing into the cluttered front room of his beach cottage,
Clay wrinkled his nose at the mess and began pulling off his shirt. Maybe it
was