by Hope Ramsay
“It’s okay. Better for me to go check the mooring lines than to risk damage to your beautiful boat.”
“You’ll need to tie up the mainsail and take down the jib. Do you know how to do that?”
“I can figure it out,” she said, squaring her shoulders in false bravado. “I have a little bit of experience on a sailboat. Don’t worry. I’ll take care of it.” She turned toward the stairwell.
He didn’t want her to go alone, and her “little bit” of experience worried him. Now that he’d found her, he didn’t want anything bad to happen to her.
Hearing her story made him want to wrap her up in soft cotton and make sure no one ever hurt her again. The feeling was so fierce.
He followed her toward the stairs, issuing instructions. “You’ll find a couple of bumpers in the stowage compartment under the seats. Put them between the hull and the dock. And—”
“I’ll be fine,” she said stoically as she started putting distance between them.
“Be careful,” he shouted after her. “If it starts lightning, get off the boat. Okay?”
She didn’t answer him.
* * *
By the time Jessica reached Bachelor’s Delight, the wind had freshened and the clouds had gone dark and ominous. As she was putting out the bumpers between the hull and the dock, the rain began to fall in gray sheets, getting into her eyes even though she’d raised the hood of her foul-weather jacket. She did her best to ignore the occasional flash of lightning, pushing Topher’s warning aside. Instead, she counted the beats between the flash and the thunder. The storm, for all its fury, was still miles away.
She had just wrapped the last bungee cord around the mainsail when Topher came limping down the path, moving faster than she thought possible. He clambered aboard and shouted at her in a commanding voice that she immediately resented. “Go back to the light.”
She didn’t budge as he pulled himself up on the foredeck and started disconnecting the jib. She’d be damned if she was going to leave him here alone. He could get swept off the deck and drown.
Her heart hammered the whole time Topher stood out there on the slippery deck, while visions of the wind blowing him overboard played in her mind.
But he proved amazingly steady, like the calm eye of a hurricane. Like the strong but gentle man who’d just held her up in her worst of all possible moments.
The myth was so seductive. She could feel desire rising up in her. After so many wounds, so many empty years, was it truly possible to find a soul mate?
No. She didn’t believe that crap. He wasn’t some long-lost part of herself who could see inside and know her true self. He was just Topher Martin, the one-time captain of the football team.
But this Topher, the scarred man, was a great deal more complicated than the boy had been. And something about him drew her like a moth to a flame.
The analogy was apt because a girl could get burned thinking the thoughts that were filling her head as he stood there defying the wind and the rain.
He finished his task and turned toward the cockpit, spying her there. “Why the hell are you still here?” he yelled into the wind.
She could hardly tell him that she’d been hanging around in case something bad happened to him and he needed to be rescued. So she threw all caution to the wind and said the first outrageous thing that came into her mind. “I was watching you be all manly and stuff.”
He stopped moving, that blue eye catching her gaze and holding it as a deep, unwanted surge of awareness flooded her. Oh, she was such an idiot.
“We should get back up to the lighthouse,” he said in a gruff voice as he hopped down into the cockpit. “You run ahead. I’ll be along in a minute with supplies.”
He headed down the ship’s ladder.
“Supplies?” she called down to him. She could just see him moving around in the galley.
“That storm looks like it might take a while to pass. Now get your ass back up to the light.”
He looked up at her with that single cobalt eye. She’d just been commanded, and as always that tone of voice brought out her inner rebel.
Daddy had done his best to slay that rebel, but she still lived. It was that rebellious girl inside her that insisted she befriend Colton a second time despite the never-ending gossip, who had walked away from a steady job to risk everything on her own business, who still showed up weekly for tea with Granny in hopes of, one day, getting an apology.
So she didn’t hop to Topher’s command. She held her ground even though the rain was doing its best to soak through her jacket and an icy trickle was inching down her back.
He was pulling stuff out of the small refrigerator and off a pantry shelf. He turned, seeing her at the top of the ladder. “What the hell? Go get out of the rain.”
“But I can help. I’m not some weak female, you know. I’ve had trouble in my life, but I have survived.”
“Me too.”
“What?”
“I’m fine, dammit. I don’t need your help, either.”
She blinked. Maybe this wasn’t about her following orders. Maybe this was about him feeling competent.
Whoa. She needed to get out of her own way. And his too, evidently.
“Okay. But—”
“What?” He glared.
She refrained from telling him to be careful. But deep inside, she earnestly hoped that he would be. Because she was worried about him.
She cared about him.
And that’s why she turned and headed up the path to the lighthouse. The rain was coming down horizontally by the time she made it back. The interior was dark now that the storm had closed in.
She was drenched. Completely soaked from the thighs down and definitely damp even where the jacket was supposed to protect her. A chill crept over her, but she stood by the door waiting for him.
It was a good ten minutes before a gray shape loomed out of the rain, moving with an uneven gait. He was carrying a bright-orange duffel bag over his shoulder, and he looked like a sailor coming home from a long voyage.
“I brought stuff,” he said in a breathless voice that telegraphed how hard the climb had been from the dock. He dropped the big bag to the slate floor, and then he pulled off his dripping-wet jacket and limped to the first of the stairs, where he sat down hard.
She didn’t say a word. Instead, she tackled the duffel, which turned out to be one of those waterproof bags with a fold-over top and a buckle.
She clawed her way into it with icy fingers and found a couple of blankets on the top and a collection of Clif Bars and soda cans on the bottom.
She pulled a blanket from the bag and wrapped it around her shoulders, then carried the second one over to Topher.
He was soaked, despite his jacket. Water slicked his hair and spiked the lashes of his eye. He stood up as she approached.
His high-performance sailing shirt accentuated the planes and angles of his chest. Maybe he was just getting back to an exercise regimen, but there wasn’t an ounce of fat on the man. He had a sinewy, wiry look to him.
The sudden desire to cook him a steak dinner came over her, along with other desires she didn’t want to acknowledge. What the heck was wrong with her?
She studied his scars and eye patch while emotions tugged at her. A moment ago, he’d proven that he was strong enough to withstand a storm. Strong enough to hold her up while she poured out every toxic memory and emotion that dwelled behind her protective barriers.
He could seduce her. He could confuse her. He could see through her, and that was frightening.
And yet, when he took a step toward her, bringing much-needed body heat with him, she just wanted to rest her head on his shoulder.
She wanted to surrender to that strength. To the kindness she’d somehow found in the most unlikely of places. To his gentleness.
She stood there, rooted to the floor as he approached. She ought to run as fast as she could, but she couldn’t move.
And when he cupped her cheek
in his hand, she leaned into the touch, which warmed her from the inside out as no blanket could.
When it finally arrived, his kiss was firm and unhurried. He lingered on her lips for the longest time before delving inside. It was a luscious kiss that made her bones go watery until he backed away and strung smaller kisses across her cheek and down into the hollow of her neck. The brush of beard against skin sent a cascade of shivers down her back.
The touch of his tongue along her collarbone was so deliciously warm that she let go of an inarticulate hum in the back of her throat and buried her nose in his damp hair, where the scent of vanilla and rain leaped from his too-warm skin.
But when she expected him to move on with his seduction, he backed up.
No! Don’t go. Come back to me. Finish the job. She wanted to scream the words at him, but his kiss had stolen her ability to think, to speak, to do anything but stand there and feel, while the wind battered the lighthouse and the rain drummed on the copper roof way overhead.
* * *
He stopped himself. She wasn’t like the other women in his life. The ones who had flocked to him before he’d been injured. Or like Marla, the woman he’d been engaged to when he’d wrecked the Ferrari.
Those women had come to him because he was a football star, because he had money. He’d never had to work to attract a woman. And even though he’d never been a player like some of his business partners, he’d never had to work at seduction.
And that was the thing. He didn’t want to seduce Jessica. God only knew, he was the last man on earth she would want to spend time with. No. He wanted her to come to him of her own accord.
It was a stupid thought. An impossible thought. But he was the champion of impossible thoughts these days. Impossible to think he could live out here alone when he’d just proved to himself that maybe he could.
Impossible to build a house like Granddad wanted, and yet Jessica had a vision that his grandfather would have loved. He would build his house. It wasn’t so impossible.
So why not think that this woman, who had good reason to blame him and everyone else at Rutledge High for a vicious rumor that had deeply hurt her, could find enough forgiveness to see him?
Not as some kind of monster. But as a man who was beginning to believe that she was the one. The one he’d always been meant to find. What he felt right now was nothing like he’d ever felt for Marla. Marla hadn’t been able to look at his scars. She’d walked away when he’d needed her most.
Jessica cocked her head, her gaze fixed on his left side. What was she thinking? Was she like Marla? Did she think he was a monster?
But then she did the unexpected. Jessica traced one of his scars with her finger, her touch electric as it slid over his damaged skin. He flinched back, not in physical pain, but in shock.
“What?” she whispered.
Don’t mock me, he wanted to say, but only the word “don’t” came out of his mouth.
“But they are part of you.”
“Not my better parts.”
She pulled her hand away, and for an instant he thought she might say something. He yearned for her to say anything that would signal that she wanted the same thing he did.
But she didn’t speak. She turned and paced with rigid shoulders back to the duffel bag. “I’m starved,” she said, pulling one of the Clif Bars from the sack.
“You want one?” She glanced over her shoulder.
“Yeah.” He was hungry, but not for food.
She tossed one of the bars in his direction. He caught it and then retreated to the bottom step, sinking down on the hard iron while he ate.
He waited, watching her fold the duffel into quarters and then use it to insulate her butt from the cold flagstone floor. Would she say anything about what had just happened?
Or would they pretend it hadn’t happened at all?
Maybe pretending was better than hearing her say that she wasn’t interested. Or that she could never forgive him for repeating stupid stories about her.
But maybe he could make amends in his own way. He could certainly exact revenge on the guy most likely to have started that rumor. He had that much within his power.
And best of all, she would never have to know that he’d been the instrument of Caleb Tate’s downfall.
Chapter Sixteen
The weather on Monday afternoon had turned soggy. So Ashley found herself sitting inside the small seating area of Bread, Butter and Beans across the table from Peggy Fiedler, the executive director of the Moonlight Bay Conservation Society, who looked nothing like Ashley expected.
Peggy wore her gray hair pulled back into a low bun and gazed at Ashley above the rims of a pair of half-moon reading glasses tethered to her neck with a beaded chain.
Her cheeks were round and pink and her eyes, a sharp, lively blue as they inspected Ashley. “So you want me to stop this project,” Peggy said in a froggy voice, suggesting that she’d been a lifelong smoker.
“I do. Don’t you have concerns? Harry Bauman told me you were opposed to most development,” Ashley said.
Peggy laughed, her eyes twinkling. “Did he say that?”
“He said you were a force to be reckoned with.” Although Peggy didn’t look like anything of the kind. She looked like a sweet grandmother.
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“So? Can you help me?”
“I get the feeling you’re not exactly interested in conservation.”
“I care about rising sea levels as much as anyone. I also have other reasons for stopping this project.” Ashley leaned forward. “For one thing, the house he wants to build is going to be a monstrosity. I found the architectural renderings in the cottage. I took some photos of them.” She pulled out her cell phone and handed it to the activist.
Ashley had taken the photos yesterday when she’d sneaked into the cottage after church, while Topher had been playing catch with Jackie on the lawn. Guilt wormed through her.
She’d given up trying to keep Topher and Jackie apart. For one thing, their growing relationship seemed to be good for both of them, their mutual interest in Captain William Teal notwithstanding.
Her guilt intensified while Peggy studied the images on her phone. “This looks like the castle at Disney World.”
Ashley nodded and warmed her suddenly cold hands around her coffee cup.
“Why didn’t you start with the fact that he wants to build a theme park castle out there?” A note of outrage filled Peggy’s voice.
“I know. He’s a bit misguided.”
“Misguided? It’s insane.”
Ashley put down her coffee cup. “Look, I don’t want him to become a laughingstock for building a silly castle out there. The truth is, I care a great deal about Topher. I’m hoping it won’t take much opposition to dissuade him.”
Peggy gave her another sharp look. “Well, it won’t take much to convince people to oppose a project like this. Can you send me the photos?”
“Sure.” Ashley picked up her phone and emailed the photos to Peggy, who finished her cappuccino in one big swallow, leaving a milk mustache on her upper lip.
“I’ll be in touch,” Peggy said, wiping her mouth and reaching for her purse.
“Uh, it might be best if we weren’t in touch. You know?” Ashley said.
The woman stood up, slinging her big leather bag over her shoulder. Her twinkly eyes turned icy. “I do know, but you have to realize that your cousin is going to figure out how we got these photos. You can’t really avoid being involved.”
Ashley’s heart squeezed. “I guess.”
Peggy gave her a long, hard look, the grandmother vibe vanishing. Ashley wouldn’t want to get into a fight with this woman. “Well, the die is cast,” Peggy said before she turned and headed through the door, leaving Ashley alone.
She stared into her almost-empty cup for a moment, lost in guilty memories of a time, long ago, when she and Timothy, her oldest cousin, had been mean to Topher. She remembered Gran
dmother scolding her about how kindness was a virtue.
Was she being unkind? No. Her motives were pure, even if her methods were a little off the straight and narrow. This gambit would work.
It would be just what Topher needed to realize how futile it was to run away from the world. And once he gave up on this idea of building on Lookout Island, maybe she could suggest that he buy a house in town.
She finished her coffee and checked her watch. It was getting toward three in the afternoon, and she needed to get back to the inn. It was still raining as she left the coffeehouse, but not quite as hard as it had been. She opened her umbrella and headed up Tulip Street in the direction of Harbor Drive.
As she walked, the wind kicked up again, and the rain got heavier. Off to the west, the clouds were darkening. The weatherman said to expect thunderstorms all day. She quickened her pace, the wind playing games with her umbrella.
The rain was beginning to fall again in earnest when she reached the traffic light at the intersection across the street from the library. The traffic light caught her, and she was forced to stand there, her feet getting wet, as she waited.
When the light finally changed, she dashed across the street, stepping in ankle-high water that sloshed through her shoes. Just as she reached the other side of the street, her darling child, dressed in his yellow rain slicker, came bouncing through the library doors in the company of Rev. Micah St. Pierre.
“Jackson Howland Scott,” she said, rounding on her son, “what in the Sam Hill are you doing here? You told me you were hanging out with Topher this afternoon.”
The two culprits stopped in their tracks, hand-in-the-cookie-jar looks on their faces.
She turned on the minister. “And shame on you for encouraging him when you know how I feel about Rose Howland’s letters.”
Just then, before either of them could explain themselves, a sudden gust hit, tugging at Ashley’s umbrella and turning it backward.
“Damn,” she swore, struggling to get the umbrella to turn right-side out. But before she could accomplish that, the skies opened in a deluge, and Micah pulled her under the protection of his own big, black golf umbrella.