“Blake?” she asked with alacrity.

“No, not Blake.”

“Who?”

“It’s some guy. Taylor McClellan from Florida.”

After a pause, Carson sat up and mopped her face with her hands. “Taylor? Are you sure?”

“Yes, I’m sure. Big guy. Good-looking. Military haircut.”

She sighed heavily. “Yeah, that sounds like Taylor.”

“You met him in Florida?”

“Yeah.” Carson groaned. “Shit. What’s he doing here? I told him I had a boyfriend.”

Just hearing those words made Harper’s spirits sink further. So he was interested in Carson and had come to see if there could be anything between them. Of course.

Harper made her tone neutral. “Only one way to find out. He’s waiting in the foyer.”

“Do me a solid. Can you stall him? Talk to him. Something.” Carson flopped back on her pillows with a sigh of resignation. “I need time to get dressed.” She shook her head in her hand. “Ugh. I feel sick. The last thing I want to do is entertain.”

“I could tell him to come back.”

“No.” She sighed again. “Be nice to him. He’s pretty closed, but once he lets his guard down, he’s a nice guy.” Carson reached over to take a sip of water from a straw. She groaned softly, then turned to Harper. “I’ll be there, but it might take a while.”

“Okay,” Harper replied as nonchalantly as she could. Inside, her heart did a cartwheel. “I just need a second to wipe the soap and grime off. I’m a mess.”

She rushed into Carson’s bathroom, slipping off the rubber gloves en route. She tossed them and the filthy shirt to the floor. Her heart beat the tempo as she gave herself what Granny James called a French bath, a quick once-over with soap on a washcloth at the sink. She yanked out her elastic, raked her tangled hair with a brush till it had the luster of burnished gold, then redid her ponytail. There was no time for makeup.

Once she felt refreshed, she hurried to Carson’s dresser to open a drawer. She was appalled as usual by the hoard of crumpled clothes she found crammed inside. When they were roommates, she’d been the neat freak Felix Unger to Carson’s Oscar Madison.

“God, Carson, don’t you ever fold your clothes?”

“Hey, do I prowl in your drawers?” Carson called back with a dismissive wave. She was slumped at the side of the bed nibbling a saltine cracker.

Harper decided not to let clothes come between them. Mumbling to herself, she pulled out the least wrinkled top she could find. “Need to borrow this,” she called out as she slipped it over her head. Like most of Carson’s clothes, the aqua-colored, stretchy camisole top was snug, revealing Harper’s slender figure and small, rounded breasts.

Carson waved her hand again. “Don’t leave him out there alone.”

Harper ran to the door, then paused to take a deep, calming breath before exiting. She usually couldn’t care less about a stranger’s interest. Yet for this man, she was as nervous now as she was when at her coming out to society she was presented to the queen of England.

She opened the door and, fixing a smile, walked with studied grace back to the foyer. She found Taylor standing in the front hall, slightly bent at the waist, his hands behind his back, peering at a painting of a dock scene somewhere in the lowcountry. Shrimp boats lined the dock, their great green nets high.

“Do you like it?” she asked, drawing near. “It’s by a local artist. West Fraser.”

“I like it very much,” he replied, eyes still on the art. “It’s McClellanville.”

Harper took a step closer to study the painting, searching for details. To her, the scene could have been one of many docks in the lowcountry. “How can you tell?”

He looked over his shoulder and his eyes twinkled with amusement. “Because that’s my dad’s boat. The Miss Jenny.”

“Really?” Surprised, she stepped closer to look at the large shrimp boat with the green and white colors, huge nets hanging. “Your father is a shrimp-boat captain?”

“Was. He left the business. He couldn’t afford to operate the boat anymore.”

“Oh, I’m sorry to hear that. What happened?”

A sigh rumbled in Taylor’s chest as he put his hands on his hips in thought. “It’s been coming on for years. The local shrimpers have been hit hard by the deluge of imported shrimp, the high cost of diesel fuel, and small yields. It’s been a perfect storm. My daddy hung on as long as he could. Like the others. But . . .” Taylor lifted his shoulders as though to say What could he do?

“Is he still in the fishing business?”

“No.” Taylor looked away.

Standing so close, Harper could see the texture of his deeply tanned skin, the tiny crow’s-feet at his eyes. “Were you ever a shrimper?”

“Me?” His smile was quick and fleeting. “Sure. You can’t be the son of a shrimper without working on your daddy’s boat. I helped him from the day I could walk. So did my mother and brother. It was a family business. But I always knew I’d do something else to make a living someday. Doesn’t mean I don’t love the boat. And the water. It’s in my blood.”

“I’ve always been intrigued by the shrimp boats. As a tourist, that is. They’re such a staple of the southern waters. When I was young, I remember seeing a lot of them docked at Shem Creek. One after the other. Whenever I cross Shem Creek, I look out hoping to see one, but there don’t seem to be many now.”

Taylor crossed his arms and shook his head. “Nope. The boats are mostly all docked. For sale. It’s all restaurants and bars now. A few kayakers in the water. It’s the state of things out there.”

“I find that sad.”

“Yeah.”

Harper didn’t want to see Shem Creek become a museum of days gone by. She loved the vibrancy of the working dock. “I’ll have to see one soon, before they’re all gone.”

“If I can, I’ll take you to see one sometime.”

Her surprise at his invitation lit up her face.

He must’ve noticed because he suddenly averted his gaze and peered down the hall as though looking for Carson.

Harper felt like a schoolgirl who’d forgotten to deliver the headmistress’s message. And worse, she was acting like a schoolgirl, mooning over him. She felt a blush burn her cheeks. “Oh, I’m to tell you Carson’s on her way. She was taking a nap and she asked if you could wait. She has to get dressed. . . . It might take a while.”