The Message in a Bottle Romance Collection

by Joanne Bischof

  Nothing other than restoring a little faith within the hearts of four boys. Boys who had grown into men and decided to keep trying.

  Glancing up the dock, Jonas spotted a carriage pulling up to the front of the boathouse. Striding toward it was a prominent-looking businessman. Mr. Babcock. Jonas hadn’t seen the man since that fateful day five years ago. Having so much to thank him for, Jonas started that way. He nearly called out to him, but that seemed coarse, so he broke into a jog.

  A flash of rope whipped in front of his face, and he slammed to a halt. To his right, a middle-aged man was struggling with sails, trying to unfurl the jib and having no luck. Several children were at his feet, calling him Papa and asking when they would be able to set sail as promised.

  After glancing once more to Mr. Babcock, Jonas looked to the children’s father.

  Bent above the rolled canvas, the man glanced over his shoulder as he tugged on a line. “Let a pal borrow this last week, and now it’s a mess. I told him to take care not to flog the sails and, well…”

  Three little faces peered from their father to Jonas, looking hopeful.

  Jonas turned to see Mr. Babcock being greeted by the chauffeur.

  Maybe if he just worked fast…

  “Can I lend you a hand?” Seeing that the aft end of the sail had been pulled free, Jonas lunged aboard and bent to help. “Sounds like he didn’t furl the jib tight enough.”

  “That and a few other things.” The man gave a weary chuckle.

  Jonas worked his fingers along the length of sail, and when it was set back to rights, the man unfurled it. The winch cranked, and the children cheered.

  Jonas stepped off the boat and back onto the dock. Still trying to hurry, he wished the children and their father a fair wind. Turning, he looked to where Mr. Babcock had been standing, but the carriage was already driving down the lane, growing smaller until it turned the corner and was gone.

  Chapter Nine

  With the air all around still stained black as ink, Rosie stood on the beach. Dawn was near, she could feel it, but her heart was still a tumble as she clutched a lantern, all alone save the lullaby of waves on sand. It wasn’t until she heard the gentle rhythm of footsteps that she turned in the direction of the distant boathouse.

  The light from the lantern struck the young men. Lined up from stem to stern, they bore their boat overhead, hands gripping the hull strong and steady. They wore not their sportsmen’s clothes, but instead, slacks and buttoned shirts. A set of sleeves rolled back here or there.

  Jonas was in the middle, expression both sober and alert, and when his eyes found her, she sensed why. It was the way he bid her to walk with them—explaining in short, soft breaths, that they were going to embark from the far end of the bay where an inlet sheltered the water from any kind of waves.

  Rosie carried the lantern quietly along, and when they finally reached the end of the beach, Jonas lowered the boat in time with his teammates. He motioned her nearer, and his tanned forearm skimmed her skirt as he settled an oar into place. “Are you sure you want to do this?” He rose.

  “Yes.”

  “Then you’ll sit right here in the cox seat.”

  “Hey, we finally have a coxswain,” Oliver said.

  Rosie settled in, and Jonas helped tuck her skirts about her ankles.

  “What’s that?” she whispered.

  “It’s the person who calls out the commands. But all you need to do is hold on, all right?”

  He peered down at her with a pinch of worry. She had a sense it was for her sake and not in their abilities. That brought a surprise level of comfort. Chilled, Rosie pulled her cloak tighter. “Shall I hold the lantern?”

  “If you’d like, but the sun will be up in a few minutes so it won’t be dark for long.”

  She handed him the lantern, and Jonas set it higher up on the beach, where it would await their return. The boat wobbled as the four young men shoved it a few feet closer to the water. She nearly asked if she should help, but he’d already had her sit, so surely this was where he wanted her.

  Water splashed against the wooden shell, dampening her fingers, which clung to the edges of the long, narrow boat. Rosie pulled her hands into her lap. The young men stood talking for a few brief minutes, plotting their course toward the lighthouse, which was still lit. Ripples from the bay splashed against the bow, and three of them climbed in. Each faced backward, looking toward the shore, but it was she who beheld a blackened sea.

  “Do not be afraid,” Rosie whispered to herself—the plea like a tattered ship’s flag, one that heralded both glory and danger. She was not in this water. Not drowning. She was safe and all was well. Do not be afraid. A cry of heart, she repeated it over and over as her hands set to trembling.

  Dexter gave a final nudge then lunged aboard. The tall, lanky redhead sat nearest her and had given the boat just enough of a push to slip it out away from shore. Behind him sat Oliver, who she now knew as Jonas’s cousin. Just behind him was Jonas and at the farthest end of the boat, the lad they called Oakes, roguish enough to already be known by name among the maids. But it was Jonas and he alone who stole Rosie’s attention.

  He spoke some kind of starting command. His oars, resting on the edges of the boat, turned ever so slightly.

  Like a well-oiled machine, six other oars followed suit. A thrill pulsed through Rosie. Should she hold on? When Jonas called out, “Pull,” the boat lurched forward, and she gripped the edge to steady herself.

  However did they manage this? Still one moment, then speeding across the water the next. A small wave splashed the bow, and a few stray drops struck her, cooling her skin, which was flushed with anxiousness now that they skimmed toward the frothy, churning bay.

  “Pull.” Jonas’s voice kept a smooth rhythm with the oars. “Pull.”

  Or maybe it was the other way around.

  “Pull.”

  Oars angled forward.

  Rosie sat as still as she could and braced herself when another fading wave—cushioned by this inlet—sloshed against the bow of the boat, lifting the creaking wood onto its arcing surface. Though not harsh, this vessel was slim and lean, sides so low that some of the water sputtered over the edge. Cold seawater misted her skirt in splotches, dampened her boots. Fear settling about her, Rosie slammed her eyes closed, and above sounds of wood and men and sea, she searched only for the cadence of Jonas’s voice. Finding it, she clung to his gentle words. Clung to the way his commands were leading this crew out into the open, vast water. Though waves didn’t crash here, they rolled in, gusty and sure, making their task a heavy-laden one.

  Jonas fell silent, his words replaced by the heavy breathing of four men—a different kind of rhythm—but just as steady. Out here, just as comforting.

  She probably should have kept her eyes closed past the waves, but suddenly, she was awash with the thrill of this—the power of a vessel on the sea. Something sparked in her heart—her memory.

  Something that loved this.

  Even as she opened her eyes, tears stung. Rosie grasped for the answer. The truth behind this sensation, but all she saw were those long, quiet corridors in her mind. A hush as if a secret lay waiting and if she searched hard enough, long enough, she would find it. It was a strange uncertainty, but one that felt as if it ended in hope.

  Suddenly, Rosie realized that the faintest traces of dawn were lighting the sky behind her; she could see the blooming of sunrise on glistening oars as each rose as one, wet and dripping from the water before plunging below. In perfect, practiced time, the young men dipped wooden blades. Tugged with a grunt. Then tipping their oars flat, pulled them back again, only to twist wrists and dig paddles beneath the glittering surface. Sunrise danced along it all.

  “So now,” Dexter panted. The freckle-faced man tipped his head toward her. “A good…” His voice was lost to a gasp for breath. “Coxswain knows all…” He panted again. “The right cues.”

  Eyes wide, Rosie nodded.

  �
�What you can do…” He grimaced at the pull. “Is tell us what a good job we’re doing.”

  Despite the fact that he looked near exhaustion, a smile tipped up the side of Jonas’s mouth.

  “Or…” Dexter breathed through the words. “Tell us how we can…” He grunted as he tugged his oar back. “Improve.”

  “You’re all doing wonderfully,” Rosie said, wishing for words to express this feeling.

  She caught Jonas’s eyes over his teammate’s shoulder. Jonas’s gaze was on her, and so very focused. As if it was she and she alone who was empowering him to dig and pull and dig and pull. The look was so settled, so unabashed and unmoving, that she dipped her head, overwhelmed.

  Awash with a yearning she had no right to feel.

  Rosie closed her eyes and felt the force of the boat and the way it glided smoothly and quickly. A breeze moved gently past her face, stirring her hair, and for the first time in a long time, she felt free. Something warm puddled against her neck—rays of a rising sun. She had felt it soft at first, but now it was stronger, brighter. Her eyelids fluttered open, and the sun brightened their faces, their strong shoulders. The water glittered.

  “Where is this dock?” Oakes called, sounding winded.

  Jonas—his eyes still on Rosie—spoke evenly. “Do you see it?”

  Rosie craned her neck. “Nearly there.”

  “Anything else?”

  It was as if he was willing her to remember. To hold on to this seed of a memory and let it take root. Rosie set her mouth, tried to soften the soil of her mind and cling to the traces of thought she had the other night while watching this very bay.

  It was right there. Lowering her hand, she let her fingertips trail into the water. Breathed in the sweet, salty brine of this bay.

  It was right there.

  The call of seagulls snagged her attention, and she looked upward. There, near the lighthouse, stood Mr. Graham. Her grandfather. He tossed a handful of crumbs out over the water, and seagulls swooped and dived to catch them. It was a glorious flash of white feathers and bird cries.

  Realizing the boat was no longer gliding, Rosie looked to Jonas. His oars rested in an easy position, and the young men spoke to one another, gently turning the wooden shell toward the small dock that rested against the cliff base. Rosie shifted to peer past four sets of shoulders, and it was there that she spotted it. The weathered boards that made up the quaint dock from her childhood. Jonas and Dexter reached for it, pulling them all nearer.

  She nearly stuck out her hand to graze the faded wood but was suddenly pierced with uncertainty. Fear.

  Why was she afraid?

  No one—including herself—had ever known how she’d gotten into the water.

  And the wondering that quaked her was feeling like she’d wanted to be in the water. Had wanted to sink below the surface. That something had frightened her there. Someone else—a stranger she didn’t know. The reason why she was found in the bay at dawn.

  A little girl without breath in her lungs until one of the fisherman helped her along. Coaxing her back from heaven’s gates and into the Coronado sunrise. So near death that her brain hadn’t wanted to work right. Not only with the loss of so many memories and understandings, but also with the inability to use her right leg and her right hand—both of which had slowly recovered with great practice.

  A new kind of tears stung her eyes, and the hand that she finally pressed to the boards of the dock was unsteady.

  Dexter climbed out and knelt. Reaching out to her, he gripped her beneath the arm. His other hand held one side of her waist as she stood and stepped onto the wooden platform. Flashed through her mind was the sensation of wearing boots much smaller than the ones she wore now. The cliffs seeming higher, the world around her larger. Of hitting the water hard and fast and sharp and sinking deep.

  And so much fear.

  A shudder coursed through her, and still holding on, Dexter must have felt it, too, in the way he glanced down.

  “Thank you,” she said softly.

  The memory vanished as quickly as it had come. Rosie stood several moments without speaking. Just glanced around, trying to pull it back—but—nothing. Nothing more.

  Her gaze skimmed from the young men to the bluffs rising above them all, where sandy clay was the bed for thick, dry shrubs. Wildflowers bloomed, and dusty earth shifted wherever lizards darted about on the steep, rough slope. Narrow, weather-beaten steps spliced into the hillside, meandering upward as they rose toward the sky. Made of stone, they were crumbling in certain places, and even as Rosie clutched up the front of her skirts, she hesitated.

  A hand was to the small of her back, and she knew it was Jonas before he spoke. Could feel it in the surety of his touch, the gentle placement of his hand. “Can you make it up those stairs okay?” He surveyed the bluffs, and though the climb was perhaps twice that as the one to the observatory, there was no railing.

  “Hey, look at that.” Oakes pointed to something at his feet. “It says Rosie.” Oakes knelt and fingered worn letters that had surely been carved years ago. R–O–S–I–E. The young man regarded her, then his friends.

  Rosie glanced to Jonas, who held her gaze. Pushing aside her cloak, she climbed the first stone step, then another and another. Each embedded into the sandy bluffs. Upward they all went, Jonas never less than a step behind her, his hands at her waist the few times she stumbled.

  Above them the brightening sky churned with seagulls, the crumbs all gone. And it was there in the shade of the lighthouse that her heart stood waiting in an old black coat and sailor’s hat.

  Chapter Ten

  Jonas didn’t know when he’d taken hold of her hand, but it was near the top of the cliff.

  The place where the steps were the steepest, the most crumbled. Where he’d edged around her to pull her up.

  Rosie clambered up the two remaining stones then brushed dust from her skirt. Jonas stood beside her and glanced back to be sure that the others were all right. Oliver and Oakes were right behind, and having tied off the boat, Dexter followed a few paces lower.

  Jonas thought to let go of Rosie’s hand but she released his first—a shade of pink brightening her cheeks. With a look of composed determination, she glanced around the dusty, shrub-laden yard that surrounded the lighthouse before striding toward the old man with the basket of bread. Graham’s gray-blue eyes were filled with the sober honor of welcoming the lost home. And those eyes were trained right on Rosie.

  Dipping his head in greeting, Jonas walked onward. If his friends noticed the fact that they were but meters from being able to see down the other side of the bluffs—their goal—they didn’t let on. They seemed too awed by what was right before them. So different than the del’s refined landscape, this was broad and flat. Humble. Sunlight glowed off a gravel path, and dried shrubs quaked in the sea breeze, wildflowers lilting about on their stems. A weathered skiff with peeling gray and blue paint sat at the far end of the lot, and a lizard seemed rather fascinated by the polish on Dexter’s boots.

  The yard that spread from one end of the broad bluff would have seemed desolate if it weren’t for the lighthouse. Little more than a square cottage that looked to be whitewashed a few years ago, it boasted a smattering of small, dark windows, and was the sturdy base for the cupola that rose from the roof. Rimmed with an iron railing, the glass panes were no longer aglow, for above that, a dim blue sky was feathered with the pink of early dawn.

  Standing just outside the gate was the keeper of it all. His gray, wiry beard brushed the collar of his shirt, which peeked out from beneath a worn and weathered coat. His eyes were jolly and his cheeks lifted in a smile. “It’s not every day that a fine vessel pulls up to my dock bearing precious cargo.” Those smiling eyes glanced back to Rosie. “I’m mighty glad you lads got your sea legs under you.”

  Rosie introduced each of them.

  “Good morning, Mr. Graham. A pleasure to meet you,” Jonas said.

  A friendly nod, then Abner
glanced to Oakes, Dexter, and Oliver in turn. “How about some breakfast?”

  He led them up the gravelly path, his steps slow so they kept their own the same. Rosie fell in stride with her grandfather, resting her head on his shoulder for a silent moment. At the door, Abner pushed inside, and they followed. The house smelled of pipe smoke and coffee—all softened by the salty breeze that whistled through an open window. Split up the middle by the stairwell that rose to the light tower, the right side of the house held a small kitchen and the left, a parlor. Filled with windows, the snug parlor was flooded with morning glow. A rocker sat in the corner, draped with a faded quilt. Seashells lined the fireplace mantel above flames that crackled and popped. A rolltop desk looked scattered with unfinished business. Ink drops splattered the floorboards just beneath.

  While Jonas’s friends filled that room, Jonas stepped into the available space of the kitchen. The pantry door hung open, showing a small barrel of potatoes and a crock of mounded butter.

  Abner offered a round of coffee, and everyone accepted except for Rosie.

  “A cup of tea for you?” Abner asked.

  At her soft thank-you, he moved a copper kettle to the top of the stove, and she plucked cups from a nearby cupboard. Next she assembled a tray with cream, sugar, and spoons. Jonas joined his friends in the parlor, and Rosie followed. Soon after, Abner brought over the coffee percolator to where Rosie had lined up cups. Abner filled each one with dark brew, his granddaughter at his side. Each task looked so comfortable, so compatible between them that Oliver and Dexter settled onto the sofa as if this were their home as well. Oakes wandered around the small room and paused to study an old map that hung on one wall.