Sanctuary

off a couple of six-packs. Wanna come?”
    “I appreciate the offer.” There was another thud. “I’ll think about it. If I decide to come by, I’ll bring another six-pack.”
    “I wanted her to ask Jo, but you know how huffy Lex gets. Hope she will, though.” Ginny’s voice was breathless, leading Kirby to imagine she was peeling herself out of the jeans. “You seen her yet? Jo?”
    “No. I’m going to try to catch her sometime today.”
    “Do them good to sit down and tie one on together. Don’t know why Lexy’s so pissed off at Jo. Seems to be pissed off at everybody, though. She went on about Giff too. If I had a man who looked like Giff eyeing me up one side and down the other the way he does her, I wouldn’t be pissed off at anything. And I’m not saying that because we’re cousins. Fact is, if we weren’t blood-related, I’d jump his bones in a New York minute. All set in here.”
    “I’d give odds Giff will wear her down,” Kirby commented, taking out the chart as she came in. “He’s got a stubborn streak as wide as hers. Let’s check your weight. Any problems, Ginny?”
    “Nope, been feeling fine.” Ginny stepped on the scale and firmly shut her eyes. “Don’t tell me what it is.”
    Chuckling, Kirby tapped the weight up the line. One thirty. One thirty-five. Whoops, she thought. One forty-two.
    “Have you been exercising regularly, Ginny?”
    Eyes still tightly shut, Ginny shifted from side to side. “Sort of.”
    “Aerobics, twenty minutes, three times a week. And cut back on the candy bars.” Because she was female as well as a doctor, Kirby obligingly zeroed out the scale before Ginny opened her eyes. “Hop up on the table, we’ll check your blood pressure.”
    “I keep meaning to watch that Jane Fonda tape. What do you think about lipo?”
    Kirby snugged on the BP cuff. “I think you should take a brisk walk on the beach a few times a week and imagine carrot sticks are Hershey bars for a while. You’ll lose that extra five pounds without the Hoover routine. BP’s good. When was your last period?”
    “Two weeks ago. It was almost a week late, though. Scared the shit out of me.”
    “You’re using your diaphragm, right?”
    Ginny folded her arms over her middle, tapped her fingers. “Well, most of the time. It’s not always convenient, you know.”
    “Neither is pregnancy.”
    “I always make the guy condomize. No exceptions. There’s a couple of really cute ones camped at number six right now.”
    Sighing, Kirby snapped on her gloves. “Casual sex equals dangerous complications.”
    “Yeah, but it’s so damn much fun.” Ginny smiled up at the dreamy Monet poster Kirby had tacked to the ceiling. “And I always fall in love with them a little. Sooner or later, I’m going to come across the big one. The right one. Meantime, I might as well sample the field.”
    “Minefield,” Kirby muttered. “You’re selling yourself short.”
    “I don’t know.” Trying to imagine herself walking through those misty flowers in the poster, Ginny tapped her many-ringed fingers on her midriff. “Haven’t you ever seen a guy and just wanted him so bad everything inside you curled up and shivered?”
    Kirby thought of Brian, caught herself before she sighed again. “Yeah.”
    “I just love when that happens, don’t you? I mean it’s so ... primal, right?”
    “I suppose. But primal and inconvenience aside, I want you using that diaphragm.”
    Ginny rolled her eyes. “Yes, doctor. Oh, hey, speaking of men and sex, Lexy says she got a load of the Yankee and he is prime beef.”
    “I got a load of him myself,” Kirby replied.
    “Was she right?”
    “He’s very attractive.” Gently, Kirby lifted one of Ginny’s arms over her head and began the breast exam.
    “Turns out he’s an old friend of Bri’s—spent a summer here with his parents. His father was that photographer who did the picture book on the Sea Islands way back. My mother’s still got a copy.”
    “The photographer. Of course. I’d forgotten that. He took pictures of Granny. He made a print and matted it, sent it to her after he left. I still have it in my bedroom.”
    “Ma got the book out this morning when I told her. It’s really nice,” Ginny added as Kirby helped her sit up. “There’s one of Annabelle Hathaway and Jo gardening at Sanctuary. Ma remembered he took the pictures the summer Annabelle ran off. So I said maybe she ran off with the photographer, but Ma said he and his