Solace Island

by Meg Tilly

  There’d been times when he’d thought the stress and darkness would consume him.

  But now, as he sat in the café, shielded by the leafy boughs of an ancient plum tree, he felt a weight lift, a lightness growing inside him.

  Someone I loved wasn’t trustworthy.

  It was as simple as that.

  “Thank you,” he said, bringing her hand to his lips. A light brush of his lips, as the scent of her skin, honeysuckle and tea, surrounded him like a benediction. “Thank you.”

  What Adyna, the woman he had trusted, had chosen to do, and the consequences of her actions, was not solely his responsibility. It was a burden he should no longer carry.

  * * *

  • • •

  “WHAT A CHARMING place,” Maggie said as the three of them left the Tree House. “I love how they built the café around that big ancient tree, making it the heart of the place.”

  She had an urge to reach out and take Luke’s hand in hers, to feel the comfort and intimacy of walking hand in hand. He had beautiful hands. Lying in bed last night, she hadn’t been able to stop thinking about them. How they had felt on hers. They were the way a man’s hands should be. Not soft and pampered like Brett’s. What would it feel like to have those hands on her body? The night had been restless. She wanted, longed for the heat of those strong, sure hands, with their slight calluses. Restless limbs tangled in hot sheets. She had kicked off the duvet, wet and slippery between her legs.

  “Yeah,” Luke replied. “The Tree House is one of those crossover creatures. The tourists like the whimsy of it. The locals continue to come because the food is good and the portions are generous and fairly priced. In the summer, it’s harder to get a table, especially on weekends and in the evenings. They have more tables set up along the walk, and live music.”

  “Really?” Maggie said, trying to pull her thoughts back to the present, hoping like hell he wasn’t a mind reader. “It doesn’t seem big enough to hold a band.”

  “I’ve been,” Eve said. “A really good bluegrass band was playing. It was lovely. Starlight overhead, savored with a cold glass of chardonnay.”

  “They extend a little out that way,” Luke said, gesturing toward the rear of the café.

  The three of them crossed the road to their cars.

  Maggie opened her mouth to invite him for dinner, but it was five o’clock and they had just eaten. Invite him for drinks, then, she thought, but quickly discarded that invitation as well. If she invited him over for drinks, he might think it was a blatant invitation to start using all those condoms.

  “See you around,” Maggie said, cheeks heating up as she hastily hopped into Eve’s car, strapped on her seat belt, and gave him what she hoped was a nonchalant little wave through the glass window.

  He didn’t follow suit. Just stayed there, looking at her with a bemused expression on his face. Then he leaned forward and rapped on her window.

  Maggie lowered it.

  “We on for Saturday market?” he asked, bending down slightly, his arm on the roof of the car.

  Maggie’s fingers ached to smooth back the dark lock of hair that’d tumbled over his forehead, to trace the laugh lines that crinkled outward from the corners of the lusciously thick lashes framing beautiful, soulful eyes.

  “Absolutely!” Maggie heard Eve say from over her shoulder. “We really appreciate it.”

  “Do you need me to swing by Saturday morning and help you load up?” he asked.

  “No, thanks,” Maggie said, a feeling of gratitude filling the empty cavities in her chest. “That’s a very generous offer, but we’re already taking advantage of your kindness. I know Saturday mornings are very busy for you as well—”

  “If he wants to—” Eve started to say, but Maggie cut her off.

  If she and Eve were seriously considering making this a business, then the two of them had to do as much of the work as possible. A true trial run was the only way to know whether their plan was even viable.

  “We know the drill now,” Maggie said. “Where to go, what to do. And hopefully we’ll be able to improve on what we accomplished last week.”

  “Okay, then,” Luke said, a gleam in his eyes that Maggie thought might be approval. Then he leaned forward and brushed a light kiss on her cheek. A casual kiss, that was all. A kiss between friends, and yet the feeling of his warm breath fanning across her cheek, his lips making contact with her skin, shot through Maggie like liquid fire. Every nerve ending in her body tingled long after she’d closed the window and Eve had pulled out of the parking lot and driven them home.

  Nineteen

  A LIGHT RAIN was falling. Not enough for Luke to switch on the windshield wipers for the steady slap from side to side, but nor was it enough to ignore. No, the precipitation was the pain-in-the-ass kind that required personalized windshield wiper attention.

  He glanced to the right. The Zuckermans’ kitchen lights were out. Family must still be in Hawaii with the grandparents. Frank Zuckerman was the night watchman for the Westford Harbor ferry. Was usually puttering around the kitchen Saturday mornings, making the kids breakfast before hitting the sack. I’ll set him up with a simple automated light system when he returns. Easy thing to do, and it would avoid the possibility of them coming home from their annual holiday to a ransacked house.

  Luke flicked the windshield wipers lever again, causing the blades to do a lazy sweep.

  Rain on market day meant smaller crowds and a longer time spent at the stall before everything sold.

  Normally, he preferred clear skies for Saturday market, but this morning, when he woke up, it was with pleasure that he had noticed the faint pitter-patter of the rain blowing against the window. A slower market day meant more time with Maggie. She would be working, he would be working, but there would be downtime between customers when they could talk and get to know each other better. Perfect, really, since she was recently out of a long-term relationship and hesitant about testing the waters. The rain tapping on the roof of the tent would create a feeling of intimacy. Maybe she would get a little chilled. Standing outside on a rainy day for hours on end could cause the damp to settle into one’s bones. She might need to snuggle against him for warmth, and he would wrap his arms around her and breathe her in.

  Luke smiled at the direction of his thoughts. He shook his head. “Jesus,” he said, “you’ve got it bad.” And hearing the words out loud made the smile on his face and the feeling in his chest expand.

  He glanced in the rearview mirror. Yup. The tarp covering his breads was securely in place. He knew it was. He had tied it. The tarp had never come loose, and yet, whenever there was rain and the tarp was called for, he would check more than once on the ride over. A puff of a soundless laugh escaped his lips. Luke shook his head. You’re like a worried mother hen, he thought.

  What was it about her that called to him so deeply? Yes, she’s beautiful, and smart, and sexy as hell, he thought as he swung the truck onto Rainbow Road, but she’s more than just that. It was a gradual process of getting her to let her guard down, like the slow unfurling of a flower.

  He glanced at his watch. It was 7:32 a.m. He was running a little early. Hadn’t planned it that way, but perhaps it was for the best. It took a bit of spatial creativity to organize the usual number of breads and such in half the stall space. Everything needed to be displayed, but in smaller quantities. Asiago cheese buns and sourdough-pesto-Parmesan twists would have to share a basket, instead of each having their own. Rustic French and the multigrain round would need to coexist as well.

  Luke approached the school zone and shifted down. It was Saturday and school was out, but there was sports practice on the field. Wonder what time Maggie and Eve will show up. If last Saturday had been any indication, they’d trundle up around ten or ten thirty in the morning. Maybe even eleven, without him helping with the loading.

  * * *

 
; • • •

  MAGGIE ENJOYED THE surprised expression on Luke’s face when he pulled into the parking lot at 7:36 a.m. and saw that she and Eve were already there. “Hey there, sleepyhead,” she called as she got out of her car and headed over to his. “’Bout time.”

  Eve stayed put in her rental car. She had an Adele CD playing full blast. Adele was singing about love lost and mistakes made and Eve was singing along full tilt as well. Adele had just finished the first chorus, and Maggie knew for a fact that Eve would never, ever shut Adele off midsong. “She’s an artist,” Eve would say, “and I’d never disrespect her that way.” She didn’t have that compunction with any other songwriter as far as Maggie was aware. Just Adele.

  Luke got out of his truck, and Maggie suddenly felt shy. Like she was in high school standing against the gym wall, hoping Robbie Miller would ask her to dance. He never had. Of course, he had been two grades above her and not aware of her existence.

  Sometimes she’d felt as if she were a ghost drifting through the school halls, lonely and invisible to most of the other students. Every once in a while, Eve would pass with a group of her friends, laughing and joking and surrounded by boys. Her sister would wave or blow Maggie a kiss. Sometimes one of Eve’s friends would smile as well or pat her on the head as if she were a cute but awkward puppy with overly large feet. Then they’d whoosh past, smelling of lip gloss, buoyant with secrets and after-school plans.

  Luke didn’t walk around to open the tailgate right away. Maggie couldn’t tell for sure, with the truck between them, but he was holding on to the doorframe and appeared to be stretching his leg.

  “Are you okay?” she asked, heading around the truck where she could see him clearly. He was stretching.

  “Yeah,” he replied, straightening, his voice gruff.

  “What happened to your leg?”

  “Old injury,” he said with a shrug. “Acts up when there’s a shift in the weather.” He made his way to the back of the truck with a barely noticeable hitch to his stride, but it was there, and a concern.

  He unlatched the tailgate and started to unload the vending canopy. He was definitely favoring his leg. Maggie grabbed the back end of the duffel bag that contained the tent and poles and helped slide it out.

  “I can manage,” he said.

  “I know you can,” Maggie replied, “but so can I. I’m stronger than I look.”

  He opened his mouth to argue, but she cut in. “Please. Let me. It’s important that I do my fair share.”

  They carried the canopy to his allocated site. Luke had been right: it wasn’t that heavy and was easy to assemble, but Maggie was glad she had insisted. She enjoyed the cozy camaraderie of working with him side by side.

  Eve showed up and started staking the ties down, while Luke and Maggie returned to the truck and got the folding tables. As they returned to their site with the tables, she noticed that he was walking easier. No hitch now, so that was good.

  “You looked surprised to see us this morning,” she said.

  “I knew you were coming,” Luke said. “Just didn’t expect to see you this early.”

  “Early?” Maggie glanced at her sister, and they both started laughing.

  “What’s so funny?”

  “Oh . . .” Maggie bent and unlatched the metal table legs. “When we were teenagers, working part-time at our parents’ construction business, our dad was a great believer in the early wake-up call.”

  “Five a.m.,” Eve chimed in. “Now, that’s early. Dad marching into our bedroom, blowing that damned bugle!”

  “He was in the military when he was younger,” Maggie told Luke with a grin. “We’d get the long reveille version if we were slow getting up—”

  “If I was slow getting up. Maggs was the goody-two-shoes and would always leap out of bed, whereas I—”

  “That’s because you had a social life,” Maggie said with a chuckle. She turned to Luke. “We’d get the short version if Eve managed to stagger out of bed.”

  Eve flung an affectionate arm around her shoulder. “She was such a little suck-up.”

  “I liked going to work with them. It was exciting.”

  Eve rolled her eyes and grinned. “I rest my case.”

  * * *

  • • •

  LUKE WATCHED THE two sisters, their heads thrown back, laughing and talking. He could feel the closeness, the love they had for each other and their parents. It was radiating off them like a force field. And he found a part of himself leaning toward them, longing for that stability and warmth. Wishing he’d been able to provide that for his little brother: a normal home, with a mom and dad, and the opportunity to learn a family business inside and out.

  He and Jake had managed to survive the steady stream of dysfunctional men their mom paraded through their apartment in her “hunt for a man.” They’d looked out for each other and kept the crazies at bay. It was a full-time job, but they had managed to craft a family of two out of the chaos of their broken home.

  Maggie turned and looked at him, her smile like sunshine. “You look so serious. What’s on your mind?” she asked.

  “Nothing much,” he replied, stuffing down memories of the past. They had no relevance to his life now. “Let’s get set up. Then we can grab some coffee before the hordes arrive.”

  Twenty

  MAGGIE DROPPED A lump of butter into the hot pan and swirled it around, then added two chicken breasts, dragging them through the melted butter so they wouldn’t stick before she released them. She was focused on cooking, but she was thinking of Luke, too. How his slow-blooming smile transformed the stern features of his face and pushed back the traces of sadness that lingered just below the surface. At the market, she had found herself trying to find ways to call his smile forward, with amusing stories from her past, observations about people passing by.

  Her feet ached a little, from running around baking late into the night, and she was a bit sleepy, too. She had needed to get up a few hours later and bake some more, then stood out in the damp weather and sold their goods. She was tired, but deeply content.

  She now understood why Luke had fallen asleep and missed their first not-a-date. Her bed was definitely calling.

  However, her sister had a craving for Maggie’s chicken with mushrooms, cream, and Madeira sauce. It tasted fancy, but it was relatively easy to make and always made Eve so darn happy.

  “That was so frigging amazing!” Eve crowed, uncorking a chilled California chardonnay. “You baked way more than you did the first week and we still sold out!” Eve poured the wine and handed Maggie a glass. “There were people who bought from us last week. I recognized a few faces, didn’t you? Repeat customers!” She clinked her glass against Maggie’s and took a long sip. “Yum. Nice and crisp with undertones of apple and honey.”

  Maggie took a sip.

  “Good, huh?” Eve said.

  Maggie nodded, smiling at her sister, loving her so much. “Thanks for insisting I come here,” Maggie said. “It’s been wonderful. Exactly what I needed.” She reached over and clinked her wineglass against her sister’s. “To Solace Island and sisters.”

  As she took another sip of her wine, Maggie could feel herself unwinding and yet, for a second, a wistful feeling of sadness crept in. Two weeks of their vacation were already gone. Only one remained.

  “To staying,” Eve said, lifting a questioning eyebrow. “To never going back.”

  Maggie laughed. Her sister sometimes had this freaky ability to know what she was thinking. “That’s crazy,” she said as she sprinkled some salt and pepper over the sizzling chicken breasts. “Even if we did decide to stay, we’d have to go back.” She picked up the halved lemon from the cutting board and squeezed the juice into the pan. “Our stuff’s back home, our apartments—”

  “Actually, it’s more cost effective not to go back. Waste of a good plane t
icket, and we’d have to spring for another ticket to fly here again. Trust me,” Eve said, “if you return, that old life will suck you back in. I know. I’ve wanted to stay here before. But I dutifully go back to do the right thing. Wrap things up. Give notice at my job. And what happens?”

  “I don’t know—what?” Maggie said, because clearly Eve was waiting for a response.

  “Absolutely nothing,” Eve said, smacking her hand down on the counter. “I’m gonna have Carmen box up my stuff and ship it out, because if I go back to Brooklyn, suddenly that’s the reality. This becomes a misty, pleasant dream that recedes as time passes and loses its importance. I get caught up with busyness and pointless things, and before I know it, another five years have flown by, and I have nothing, nothing to show for it.” She plucked her wineglass off the counter, walked over to the window, and stared out. “No,” she said, shaking her head, still staring out the window. “I’m not going back.” As if she were taking a vow. Eve turned and looked at her. “What about you?”

  Maggie was tempted to keep her mouth shut. Would prefer to just enjoy the evening, a glass of wine, a good meal, and a job well done.

  However, silence might be taken for acquiescence, and she wasn’t sure what she wanted to do. “I haven’t decided,” she said.

  “What’s to decide?” her sister said, slight impatience creeping into her tone. “It’s a no-brainer.”