Sailing out of Darkness (Carolina Coast Book 4)

by Normandie Fischer

  “I’m so sorry. What can I do?”

  “Visit? I know he would like to see you and perhaps play a game of chess.”

  “Sounds great. I’m off to Greece, but when I get back next week?”

  “He’ll be so pleased. Any afternoon, after the nurse has had time to get him ready, and he has had a light meal. He always takes a short nap afterward, but by three he is usually alert.”

  “I’ll call you once I get back,” he said. “Oh, and by the way, did you have company when you drove north?”

  “How did you know?” He heard her surprise.

  And his own resignation. “It’s a very small world.” And getting smaller by the moment.

  “You know her? Samantha is so lovely.”

  He meant to laugh. It came out as a bark. “No, I don’t know her. But my niece works for her.”

  Martine’s laugh was real and tinkling. “I think this is perfectly delightful. I’m hoping she will visit me soon.”

  Teo ended the call, reiterating his promise to phone on his return. This really was too much. He didn’t believe in coincidence, which meant there was something going on that was just a little bit scary.

  Who was lining up the chess pieces? “God, is this you or not?”

  If it were all happening for some divine purpose, he wanted to align himself on the winning side. But if the orderer of these seeming coincidences came from elsewhere, then he wanted to steer very clear of all of it.

  How was he supposed to know?

  It was nearly midnight when he checked his e-mail a final time. There was a note from Tootie in his inbox. He clicked on the link to open the first photograph. And nearly fell out of his chair.

  12

  Teo

  A dreamscape draws him out of self,

  And he is there, not here.

  With hoisted sails and a humming engine, the beautiful little yacht Prosforo headed out of Naxos harbor. The sky and sea were both a lovely azure, the breeze easy. Teo imagined a fun day on the water.

  He took the offered helm in the interest of research, just to see how the boat handled. The skipper rubbed a forearm along his brow when Teo pushed the tiller the wrong way. He beetled his brows and made a rude arm gesture when Teo’s efforts didn’t bring the bow across the wind. As the sails slapped, the captain spit off the transom, barely missing Teo’s arm. Teo relinquished the tiller.

  And then the peaceful breeze became a nasty wind out of the mountains, and the waves grew. The captain shouted foul-sounding Greek words at a grumbling crew. Anger flashed almost as often as the boom crossed the deck.

  All Teo wanted was off. Now. He imagined they all felt that way, except perhaps the captain, who pushed and shoved and threatened the crew with death and dismemberment. Or so it seemed to Teo.

  His muscles began to ache from hours of trying to hold on and not fly out and over and into the deep, dark sea. He was sure he’d drown or at least lose his lunch, especially when one of the younger crew needed Teo to hold his shoulders so he wouldn’t fly overboard along with his stomach’s contents.

  Eventually, they made it back to the dock. As the crew made fast the lines, Teo shuffled from the deck to the dock boards and didn’t look back.

  Gripping his cane, he warily avoided cracks in the cobbles. Just a step up on a curb sent the muscles in his right thigh into overdrive.

  He had certainly discovered one thing. He was no sailor. Give him terra firma any day.

  But he did have pages of technical terms gleaned when the long-haired skipper deigned to speak English.

  Why didn’t that crew mutiny? Prosforo? Teo should have turned tail as soon as the taciturn mate said the name meant an offering to God. Like the Orthodox holy bread. Right. Teo could see it. Instead of bread, unwary clients were dashed over the side to appease some imagined sea lord.

  He shook his head. So much for sailing.

  It would be books or interviews about nautical lore for him from now on. His lips curved as he imagined writing a scene where Sophrina investigated the skipper’s overboard demise. And it wouldn’t be the crew members who did away with the man.

  The café was crowded, but he found a chair. The waiter welcomed him and took his order for ouzo and various mezethes, those delightful small plates of food.

  Wouldn’t Tootie enjoy being here with him, watching the sun dip into that brightly hued sea? That brought to mind the other she, the she who now had a name. Samantha.

  His anise-flavored drink, potent and clear before ice and water clouded it, flowed in small sips, wakening his senses. Its murkiness seduced both his brain and his memory. He ran a finger around the glass’s rim as he stared at the milky white substance. Ice cubes floated in the liquid until they melted.

  Like images that appeared until they didn’t.

  A grimace contorted his expression. Hadn’t her image, her face, been designed for his use?

  He lifted the glass, toasting the air. His facial muscles relaxed, and he sipped. He’d probably already consumed too much, but who cared. Medicinal, that’s what this was.

  But, no. He was pazzo. Not that he wanted to be mad. He just figured that’s where he’d landed. His own rabbit hole.

  He shifted in his chair, sipped again, and decided he should have been a poet, a breed synonymous with mad capers. The image had appeared—when it appeared—ostensibly as some story’s heroine. And yet no story came. Or, rather, no story in which she fit. Then, suddenly, she wasn’t a character who needed naming, not one who needed taming and plotting. Suddenly, she was a real person, and one he saw in a photograph. A woman from North Carolina who was now staying in Reggio, his town. A woman he was supposed to meet.

  And, yet, one he already had.

  Pazzo.

  Or puppet. Perhaps that was it: a puppeteer with an odd sense of humor managed the strings, and Teo Anderson danced.

  In that photograph, imagination and reality merged. And he didn’t know what to do with either. Because how could he meet a woman, one who had shown up in his visions, and pretend he was seeing her for the first time?

  He pictured the scene. “Hi, how are you?” he’d say with his hand extended. “We’ve met in those waves out there. On that very beach. And also over there, on those rocks. Oh, and you were crying.”

  She’d consign him to hell if he spouted such a line. And he’d think he needed a psychiatrist’s couch once again.

  He licked his lips. He’d figured out how to drink ouzo on that trip to Lebanon. Its slight licorice flavor went well with these mezethes. He broke off a piece of cheese pie, tyropitakia, scooped up an olive from a small plate, then took a forkful of skewered lamb. The lamb held hints of rosemary. Mint flavored the yogurt. He bit into another olive and sighed. Yes, Tootie would enjoy the food, the town. And what if she brought her boss?

  What would that be like?

  He hadn’t a clue, because now that his dream had found flesh, that was all it was. She hadn’t beckoned him into her world. And there was no way he’d be able to write her. It was crazy. Why had any of it happened?

  He didn’t read many fantasy novels or science fiction. He was an educated man, a literary man. Was he having a breakdown, some leftover bitterness or unresolved anger that pushed him past sanity? He’d seen plenty of angry people when he’d practiced law.

  Perhaps he should order another ouzo. There was half a plate of lamb left. And if he were going crazy, what did intoxication matter? He hadn’t taken a sip of Scotch in two years. Not that he had ever been a drunk, but he had frightened himself, knowing he could have graduated. He allowed himself that glass of wine with dinner. No more, and yet here he was, tempted over the limit by an absurd Greek drink.

  Would he be more insane with the alcohol, or would he merely become a wandering lunatic who appeared perfectly sane?

  This mess smacked of too many coincidences. Val would roll her eyes and say he was striving too hard to make things work if he submitted a storyline with half the puzzle pieces lined up like this.
It was almost as if a deus ex machina, god of the machine, had dropped into his life—and not into his literary one. He was a puppet. She was a puppet. They were all puppets of the one who pulled the strings.

  Now, if the god at work was God, that was fine. God was supposed to work in a benign fashion for everyone’s good. Right?

  But what if it weren’t God-Jehovah? What if it were some force that was out to get him?

  That thought provoked one of his grosser laughs. What, did he feel persecuted?

  “Well, wouldn’t you?” he asked the air. “You saw it back there.”

  He was talking to himself.

  Of course he was. Everyone else spoke more Greek than he had on hand.

  Perhaps in Aegean Travesty, Sophrina could meet a man slightly off-kilter. Or perhaps Sophrina could fall down the rabbit hole herself and wander dizzily for a while.

  He raised his glass and toasted Sophrina, the only safe thing in this world of his. She would travel with him by ferry back to Piraeus tomorrow, away from these rocky paths where they searched for murderers.

  A last sip, and he pushed the glass aside, paid his bill, and stepped out into the cobbled street for the short hobble around the corner to his room.

  Amazing, wasn’t it, how a chance photograph could be the death knell of an idea? How odd that she had seemed so in need of him. He knew that a world full of otherness surrounded the flesh-woman. As he had his own packed world of people and obligations, everywhere or anywhere he wished to go.

  He woke to darkness and a ticking clock that sounded loud in the otherwise silent room. A bathroom visit, a return to bed, but no sleep came. He rose again, followed his feet in their course to the room’s small table, where he sat and pondered...nothing.

  He didn’t want to lose his hold on sanity. He no longer found the idea of an apparition that looked like a real woman the least bit appealing. An apparition was a spook. A something he wanted no part of.

  If it were spiritual, which he had already decided apparitions were, then he wanted it gone. Or explained.

  And the only one who could explain it was the fellow they called God.

  Fine. Teo ran fingers through his hair, yanked on a longish lock. He had used that amorphous naming thing again.

  All right. He called him God.

  “God.”

  The word, the name, sat heavily on a tongue that rarely used it. Sure, he had thrown it out pejoratively, but whenever he had asked for a clue or two, there had been silence. Only, right at this moment in time, God seemed to be the only one who could help him come close to understanding.

  The only one who could keep him, Teo, sane. Who could explain enough for Teo to find peace amid the contradictions and odd happenings.

  “Please?”

  He stared into the darkness, waiting. But all was still. Only his breath uttered sound in the noiseless room.

  13

  Samantha

  If you’ve not flown with wind or words,

  If music hasn’t captured you,

  If beauty doesn’t set you free,

  Then maybe it’s not meant to be,

  And maybe you should stay there.

  Hormones were such absurd things. One minute, she was drowning; the next, she felt sane and in control of herself. Maybe she should see a doctor, get a prescription or an herb or something to combat the edginess, the physical cravings.

  But when it was over, she forgot the horror. Until the next month.

  She climbed the coast road, high above the shore. Villas perched on the slopes toward the sea sat hidden by high stone fences or iron gates camouflaged by evergreens. She occasionally glimpsed an elegant garden or a patio overlooking a private cove and imagined living in one of the villas. And then she imagined the cost.

  Her calves felt the pull of uphill walking, but exercise was supposed to be good for stress. Perhaps it would keep her young.

  The rhythm of the sea and life in Reggio began to seep into her psyche. Today, she could smile at the noise of scooters changing gears around curves in the road, at the shouts of school children and vendors for whom whispers or subdued voices seemed unknown.

  Turning back to the beach, she picked up her pace. Soon, her shoes left the concrete and dug into rough sand. She stripped them off and rolled her jeans, dipping her toes in water as she strolled its edge. The small waves swelled at her feet and then receded, in and out, constant in their ebb and flow. She stared at the impressions she made as the water carried sand into them, sand it had sucked out moments before.

  And she flashed to a memory of Jack extending his hand, offering to sail with her. His friendship had flowed into her emptiness, swelling around her until she lay heaped on the sand. But as the waves of need had receded, she’d coughed it out— him out—and had finally begun to breathe again.

  What had been, what might have been, and what could never be sometimes whispered on the wind, yet in the midst of her sadness, she spied patterns, old and new, the new yet to be created from pieces of the old. She longed for absolution. Barring that, she longed for forgetfulness.

  Suddenly self-conscious, she stopped and glanced around to make certain no one else stood near enough to hear her thoughts or see her tears. If she didn’t hold herself in check, if she let any of this loose, the tears she swiped from her cheeks would flip right over into hysteria. And wouldn’t that bring on a crowd?

  She turned from the water, hurrying toward the rocks, where she sat and dusted off the sand before slipping her feet into her shoes.

  She was absurd. Waves of need receding?

  Melodrama City, here she came. Her need hadn’t receded. She still longed and she still wanted and she still felt needy enough to open that door again if Jack knocked from the other side of it.

  What had finally gotten through and pushed her out of Beaufort hadn’t been anything receding. It had been a bleeding gut.

  She climbed the rocks that barred her path, stopping to perch just above the lapping waves. There she raised her fist out over the water. Opening her fingers, she imagined releasing Jack to the water and the wind, releasing her hopes and her need, as if they were ashes that could float and dissolve and become one with the sea.

  Forgive me.

  When a chill crept through her jeans from the damp rock, she headed slowly back to Le Stelle, the bar that fronted the public beach, and ordered un espresso, trying to slur the words together as an Italian would.

  The barman handed over the dark brew. She tore open a packet of powdered creamer and added a spoonful of sugar. The first time she’d committed this sacrilege, she’d seen him grimace. His hand had swooped to grab the used creamer packets as if they were offal, before he’d wiped up the mess.

  “Grazie,” she said.

  He returned a facial shrug that involved his lower lip and his eyebrows, accompanied by the odd sounding “Beh,” which could mean anything—or nothing. Of course, if he stocked a pitcher of cream, she wouldn’t need the packets. Cappuccino, sì. Caffè con crema, no.

  Other than a few men sipping their morning caffè as they stood at the bar and one hiding behind a newspaper at a nearby table, the place was empty. Sam set her cup down and pulled out a chair. The newspaper lowered.

  She recognized the face from the grainy image on the back cover of his books. He nodded. She nodded back. They smiled.

  “I haven’t yet had the pleasure,” he said, “but Tootie did send me your photograph.”

  “You’re Uncle Teddy.”

  “Yes, though perhaps Theo or, as here, Teo?” He waved at a chair across from his. “Won’t you join me?”

  She picked up her cup. “Thank you.”

  The smile stretched his lean face, tucked in the lines, and brightened his eyes. “Tootie said you’d stopped in Reggio.”

  She winced. “I didn’t know you lived here. I made a friend—”

  “Yes, I know. Martine. I put two and two together.”

  Sam didn’t know what to say. “Tootie?”

&n
bsp; “She happened to mention that you were here because of a new friend from Portofino. I had a reason to phone Martine, and she said she’d come north with you.”

  Sam frowned. She did the math on the too many coincidences and didn’t like the answer. “A friend of yours,” she said on a sigh.

  “Of long standing. Her husband, Tonio, has just come out of the hospital.”

  “Oh, I’m glad he’s better. I haven’t spoken to Martine yet, but someone who seemed to be a housekeeper mentioned the word ospedale in conjunction with il signore. I made the leap.”

  “Ah.”

  “It’s a small world.” She sipped, staring at the dregs of her espresso. What could she say? “I hope you don’t think...” This was so difficult. He must be imagining all sorts of things. “I mean, really, I didn’t know.”

  “If you had, I’d be flattered.” His lips quirked.

  He was laughing at her. Her hands flew to her reddening cheeks. “But I didn’t. Really. At least, not consciously.”

  His fingers appeared to rest negligently on the table, relaxed, at ease. She slid hers to her lap so he wouldn’t see them tense.

  “Whatever brought you here, I’m delighted,” he said, still with that hint of amusement. “And Martine will be very pleased if I take you to visit her. She asked me to stop by sometime to play a game of chess with Tonio.”

  At the mention of chess, some of Sam’s tension dissolved, taking with it the heat from her blush. He couldn’t think too badly of her if he’d suggested a visit to Martine.

  “Thank you.” She unclasped her hands and smoothed them over her thighs. To change the subject, she said, “Tootie told me you went to Greece. How fun that must have been.”

  “Gorgeous place. Have you traveled there?”

  “No, but I’d love to sail the Aegean.”

  “Hoh, I did, and it was appalling.”

  “No! Why?”