Safe Harbor

by Antoinette Stockenberg

  She laughed out loud. "Oh, please," she said, more than mildly contemptuous. "First you're Percy Billings, probate attorney. Now you're Sam Steadman, private eye. How corny can you get? Use a little imagination when you choose your names, at least."

  Annoyed by her reaction, Sam said, "I'm not here to use my imagination. I'm here to find Eden Walker."

  "Best of luck to you."

  "Look, Mrs. Anderson, we need to talk," he said, gripping the door frame through the open window. "This is important. I wouldn't—"

  A car behind them barked furiously at the pickup's heels: traffic had begun to crawl again. The woman—Charlotte, Holly, whoever—began rolling up her window. "I'm not a Mrs., and I don't want anything to do with Eden or her lying cronies. Go away!"

  The pickup took off with a squeal, and the guy in the Jeep behind it tried his best to run Sam down for good riddance. Sam jumped back on the curb and began jogging behind the moving traffic, waiting for the FedEx wagon to block the flow again. When it stopped in front of an insurance agency, he grabbed his chance. Opening the door of her truck, he scrambled onto the passenger seat.

  "Oh, for Pete's sake," she said. "Out, before I call a cop."

  "If you're not a Mrs., who are you?"

  "Ms. Anderson, to you. I'd make you call me miss if it didn't sound so damned virginal," she added with a defiant look.

  Compared to Eden—compared to most women—Sam thought she sounded pretty damned virginal indeed, but he declined to offer an opinion about that. "Well, who's Eric Anderson, if he's not your husband? Your brother?"

  "He's my father, if you must know," she said, staring straight ahead and shifting back in gear. "Now get out of the car." She grabbed her purse from between them and put it behind her seat.

  "'Your father! Good God. How old is he?"

  She scowled. "Sixty-two."

  "Sixty-two! Eden's thirty!"

  "No shit, Sherlock."

  "So ... Charlotte's your mother."

  "You're quick."

  "I'm sorry it had to happen to your mother," he said, as if she'd been struck by terminal disease. "I've heard she was a good woman."

  "She's not dead, you know. Thank you for your concern. Get out of the car."

  "Look, we really are getting off on the wrong foot here. Can we just begin over again?"

  Traffic stopped. Holly turned a blazing green gaze on him and said, "No beginning, no middle, no end. What has happened to me and my family is an intensely personal affair. I'm not interested in sharing our heartbreak with a lawyer, a private eye, a jealous boyfriend, a psychopathic liar, or ... or whoever you are," she said, sputtering to a halt.

  She leaned over his lap, setting his nerve endings humming with her pleasing scent, and unlatched his door. "Go."

  Not because you tell me to, no matter how good you smell, he thought. "All right, it's true. I'm not a private investigator," he said by way of a peace offering. He closed the door again. "So now you can take 'psychopathic liar' off your list."

  "Really," she said with droll surprise. "Since I've already crossed off lawyer and investigator, that leaves you a—what? Jealous boyfriend?" She looked at him intently, as if that were a real possibility.

  As if. "I'm not her boyfriend, and I'm definitely not jealous. I'll swear on a bible," he added with a fervor that sounded shrill, even to him.

  A timorous toot-toot behind them had Holly stepping on the gas again. "Well, you've got me stumped," she admitted.

  She seemed oddly mollified. Sam laid another offering at her feet, hoping to lure her into eventually confiding what she knew about Eden to him. "I'm actually a marine photographer," he said. "And my name truly is Sam Steadman. And I really would like you to keep that under your hat. If you'll have lunch with me, I'll tell you why."

  She glanced at him with interest. "Marine photographer. Not bad. After all, you're on an island. You have the hands of an artist—although who knows about the soul—and you did have a camera pack on you yesterday when you accosted me. I have to admit, the story fits you fairly well. On the other hand," she said slyly, "if I said my brother was a marine photographer—would something like that scare you?"

  "Not in the least," he answered, fairly bursting his shirt buttons. The hands of an artist. He liked that. Women had always told him he was good with his hands. He was pleased that this woman was able to see it before and not after.

  Whoa. Before and after what? Keep focused, pal.

  "You know what?" she said, swerving into a parking spot that had just been vacated. "I don't believe you. Out of the car."

  "Oh, for—this is nuts. I'm Sam Steadman. I shoot fishermen. With a camera. I've won awards. I have a book out, for chrissake."

  "Well, goody for you." Again she leaned over and unlatched his door.

  She smelled just as good this time. Only this time, he didn't press back in his seat to give her room. Her hair brushed against his cheek and a strand caught on his lip as he murmured in her ear, "What's the matter? Are you afraid of me?"

  She jerked back into position behind the wheel and said stiffly, "I'm not afraid; I just don't believe you. Why should I?"

  "Well, I guess I'll just have to prove I'm telling the truth," he drawled. "There's a bookstore across the street."

  "The Book Box? It's a tiny store. Who do you think you are—Stephen King?"

  In fact Sam had visited the store and been pleasantly amazed to find a copy of his book there. "Not King—Steadman. Under 'S.' "

  She threw up her hands and said, "All right. Anything to get rid of you."

  Without waiting for him, she scrambled out of the car and ducked across the creepalong traffic, then charged into the store and went directly to the art and photography shelf. She scanned it quickly, then turned to Sam in triumph. "Nothing there, Percy."

  "Oversized. Bottom shelf."

  Her brow twitched uncertainly. She dropped down, scanned the shelf, and pulled out the single copy of Men at Sea. Flipping through the pages of black-and-white photographs without pausing to look at any of them, she closed the book with a snap and handed it to him. "So you saw the book and stole the name," she said cooly. "So what."

  He turned it over and held it up. A publicity photo of him, looking suitably nautical in a dark wool sweater, stared back at her.

  Her expression didn't change, but he saw her shoulders droop a little. "So you're Sam Steadman," she conceded at last. "So what."

  "Have lunch with me," he begged, one more time. "We'll talk about Eden. Not about your dad, not about ... about all the others she's hurt, but about Eden. I promise I won't pry into your personal feelings. But I absolutely have to find her—quickly—and I need your help to do it."

  ****

  Holly looked him up and looked him down and thought, What's in it for us?

  Because that was how her mind worked nowadays. Her first instinct was to protect her mother; everything else came a distant second. The man who was standing before her clearly had his own agenda. She already knew that he was capable of lying. Was he capable of worse?

  She wanted to believe that the answer to that was no. For one thing, he had come clean—eventually—with her. For another, he was looking straight at her now, not left and right and all around as he had when he was trying to sell her those ludicrous stories.

  "All right. But just lunch. All I know about Eden won't take any longer than that. We can grab a sandwich around the corner."

  "Great," he said. "Let's go."

  They were passing the register when Holly suddenly hooked a thumb at Sam and announced to the clerk, "You have a book of his on your shelves, you know."

  Sam shrugged it off, the way men do, and then he said offhandedly, "You want me to sign it for you?"

  The young clerk acted as if the two of them were pulling off a scam of some kind. "Sign—? No. I don't think so," he said, lowering his lids in suspicion.

  Holly had to suppress a smile on their way outside. "See? He doesn't believe you, either."

&
nbsp; "Very funny. Do you enjoy making men squirm?"

  "Couldn't say; haven't had any practice at it," she admitted, and meanwhile she decided that she was enjoying it a lot. She stole another glance at Sam. He was watching her, too, with a half-smile on his lips that she found both irritating and attractive.

  They stepped inside a small, sunny café that was a cut above the usual tourist affair. It was early, so tables were still free. They chose a bistro-sized one over in a corner where they wouldn't easily be overheard by those still lingering over coffee. Sam pulled out a chair for her, a gesture that for some reason surprised Holly. He sat down opposite her and a waitress immediately dropped off two menus.

  "This was a good idea, carjacking you," he said matter-of-factly.

  "You sound as if you do it often."

  He gave her a cryptic smile and turned his attention to the menu, which gave Holly a chance to study him a little more. He had a scar—a nasty one about two inches long—on the side of his neck. Holly wanted to ask about it, but it would have been the worst possible form.

  No matter. He caught her staring. "Fight," he said simply, and went back to his menu.

  The thought of a knife slicing into the side of his neck, her neck, any neck, sent a shiver of fear through Holly. "I hope it was in self-defense from a mugging," she said faintly.

  He looked up again. "Not exactly."

  "Oh. Well! The grilled turkey breast looks good."

  "Yeah." He flipped the menu over. "No red meat, of course," he said in mild disapproval.

  He probably liked it raw. What was she doing there?

  "You know, I have a really full day planned," she said with carefully feigned friendliness. "So your questions would be—?"

  "They don't serve alcohol, either? I could use a beer."

  Holly glanced at the watch on his wrist. "It's ten forty-five."

  "Aren't you the kind who like their elevenses?" he asked, lifting an eyebrow.

  "I'm not the kind who likes being asked if I'm the kind," she shot back. "So suppose we get on with this ... this inquisition." By now her mood was as edgy as his.

  "All right," he agreed. He folded his arms across the green metal tabletop and leaned his chiseled features half a foot closer to her face. "How did you meet her?"

  Wanting only to to get the interview over with, Holly said, "She took a job at one of the galleries that carries my work. I'm a folk artist."

  "Whirligigs?"

  "Among other things. One evening the gallery hosted a charity event, and my parents came. Eden was there, all ... bubbling and all," Holly said in distressed recollection.

  She could still picture Eden so well, a dazzling straight-haired blonde in a short red dress who had stolen the show. Afterward, Holly and her mother had talked about how quick Eden was, how knowledgeable about how many things. How friendly. How gracious. How flattering and self-effacing at the same time, what a killer combination that was. Neither she nor her mother had been able to believe that Eden was unclaimed.

  Holly's father, as was his habit, had said little—a soft grunt here, an easy shrug there. It wasn't surprising. Eric Anderson always seemed to be a million miles away. A boundary dispute, an important closing, a zoning snafu: those were the thoughts that generally occupied his mind.

  But not on the night of that show.

  "That first night, Eden told us she was staying with a friend and looking for a place on the island to live. I remember how charmingly desperate she was, even offering to rent one of the bunks on my father's boat. I remember how we all laughed."

  Holly wasn't laughing now. "I have a long-term lease on a house and barn on Lake Tashmoo," she continued. "A few days after the show, the tenant who was subletting an apartment above the barn from me suddenly moved off the island. I offered the place to Eden. It seemed so reasonable at the time, but it turned out to be the worst mistake I've ever made."

  "If that's the worst thing ..." Sam murmured.

  She shook off his sympathy and went rushing on. Her need to tell him her trauma ran deep.

  "Eden took me up on my offer. For the first week or so she spent a lot of time with me, showing up with takeout, watching me work, tagging along on yard sales. My parents liked her; they invited her over for a cookout one evening and took her sailing with us. Then suddenly she was never around. I used to wish—I actually used to wish—that I could see more of her. I actually missed her.

  "There were a couple of nights when I worked really late in the barn—until three, four in the morning," Holly went on. "I knew Eden wasn't upstairs. I knew the island's nightspots were shut down for the night. I knew she didn't have a boyfriend. I knew my father was spending more overnighters on the boat than usual. And I knew that my mother was becoming tense and on edge.

  "I just didn't know," Holly said with a long, mournful sigh, "how to put all of those pieces together. In my wildest dreams..."

  She couldn't go on; it was too painful to think of the havoc that Eden had wreaked on her family.

  A waitress came and took their orders, which allowed Holly to pull herself back from the brink of tears. So much, she thought, for keeping their heartbreak private. She resolved to stick to the facts.

  Sam waited until the help was well away before asking his next question. "Did Eden have any visitors?"

  "Just people I know, a couple of waitresses from town. Eden worked at the Café Latté for two or three days before landing the job at the Flying Horses."

  "Did she get any mail?"

  "I don't think so; it would have been in my box. Why do you ask? What are you after?"

  "What about phone calls? Did she have a phone put in?"

  Holly shook her head. "She had a cell phone; I never needed to know the number. What did she do, Sam? You can't just ask questions without offering answers." She watched him closely, this brown-eyed, brown-haired man who had breezed into her life without so much as a how-do-you-do.

  Sam had propped his elbows on the table and was tapping his clenched hands against his lips as he stared at the perforated design in the metal tabletop. If he was waiting for Holly to go pouring out her heart about Eden again, he was sadly mistaken. She had said all that she was going to say until he told her why, exactly, he was in such hot pursuit of the woman.

  "Are you a secret admirer?" she asked out of the blue.

  "Is that what this is about? Is she some mystery woman that you saw from afar and simply have to have?"

  He looked up from his revery. "Are you nuts?"

  Holly slumped back in her chair. "It was just a thought."

  And a crummy one at that. She realized that she didn't want him to be smitten. It would reinforce the notion that Eden was a femme fatale—and femmes fatales, Holly knew, never surrendered their victims in one piece. Ever the optimist, she still had hope that her father would emerge from the episode sadder and wiser—but in one piece.

  "Eden has something that doesn't belong to her," Sam said at last.

  "Yeah. My father."

  "Something else. It has great value."

  "Sentimental, or monetary?" Holly asked, sitting up with interest.

  He shrugged. "Both, once, but monetary now."

  It was a confusing answer, but at least the man was talking. She said, "Is this thing yours?"

  He shook his head.

  "But Eden did steal it?"

  He shrugged. "I'm convinced."

  "Are you going to tell me what it is?"

  "Nope."

  "Are you going to tell me who it belongs to?"

  "Nope."

  "Well, then I'm wasting my time here, aren't I?"

  She stood up to leave, but he caught her wrist.

  "Sit down, please. You promised to help."

  It wasn't exactly a request. Holly found herself sliding back down onto her chair and wishing she had her Mace, "Fine," she said warily. "But that Jack Webb routine isn't going to get you very far in your inquiries."

  "Let me worry about that. I need to know where
your father would be likely to sail the Vixen."

  Holly tossed her hair back and said, "With Eden aboard? The China Sea, for all I know. Obviously he's going to want to cruise somewhere off the beaten path."

  "And if he were staying on the beaten path?"

  She let out a bored sigh—a teenager being grounded would let out just such a sigh—and said, "The Cape. The Elizabeth Islands. He might go through the canal and Down East; he loves Maine, and it is August, after all."

  "Does he have a favorite harbor?"

  "The same as everyone else," Holly said, watching their food arrive. "Hadley."

  "Which you can only get to by boat, if I'm not mistaken."

  Holly pulled her hands back daintily to give the waitress room. "Isn't that usually the point? To get away from the madding crowd?"

  She stared at her chicken salad with real confusion. It was eleven in the morning, for pity's sake. She'd just got up from breakfast. She gave Sam a look shot with frustration and renewed hostility, then said, "Are we done here?"

  "Not quite," he said, returning the look exactly. "Tell me where I can charter a boat."

  "Excuse me? You're going to pursue them by boat?" She laughed at the sheer absurdity of it.

  Sam ignored her reaction and asked another question: "Did Eden clear out of the apartment completely?"

  By now Holly more or less hated the man. "She cleared out, all right. Just as I'm about to do." She stood up and unhooked her bag from the back of the chair.

  "Hey," he said, much more mildly this time. "Aren't you going to eat that?"

  "I am not hungry," she said through gritted teeth.

  "Well, I am," he answered, slicing through his turkey breast.

  "Are you?" Holly picked up her knife and picked up her plate, then scraped the contents of hers onto his. "Bon appétit, in that case," she said, and she spun on her heel and walked out.

  Chapter 5

  Under a moody gray sky, Holly bicycled past blue-petalled chickory and green blades of dune grass, searching for her mother's car.

  She had headed out early for her parents' big, white house, intending to bring her mother up to date over breakfast about Sam Steadman and his mysterious mission. But she arrived to find the white picket gates flung open and her mother's Volvo gone.