by Vicki Hinze
Bess looked up at him, her eyes wide. “You don’t want to lose me?”
He shook his head, let her see the truth in his eyes.
“But you knew this last night. And you didn’t tell me. You made love with me, and you didn’t tell me.” She paused to steady her voice. “You don’t trust me, Jonathan. How can either of us lose what we don’t have?”
“Bess, please.” Emotionally, she was sliding away, distancing herself; he could feel it. “Please, let’s just go sit out on the cliffs and talk this out. Please.”
“I’m not ready yet. I need time to think. And Hatch is expecting us. We’ll see him, and then we’ll talk.”
“All right.” Jonathan would have agreed to anything. And he would agree to anything—just so long as she didn’t run out on him again. That, he couldn’t take. People who mattered had run out on him his entire life, and he couldn’t take losing anymore. Especially not Bess. Please, God, not Bess.
They walked on to Land’s End in silence.
The path split.
One fork dead-ended at the base of the lighthouse tower, the other led to the side door of the attached house. A gray fence enclosed a small area at the tower base and, just outside it, Hatch sat on a bench made of two concrete blocks and a plank of wood, whittling. Tiny shavings clung to his beige, long-sleeved T-shirt and blue slacks.
Hearing them approach, the bent old man lifted his head and smiled, softening his weathered face.
Bess smiled back, though her heart wasn’t in it. Looking into his wizen eyes, an odd sensation crept over her and seeped inside. Tony, I’m scared. The memory of what she’d told him that night on the stairs flooded back. She had no reason to be afraid, but she was, and she couldn’t shake the feeling, or identify its source. For some reason, anticipation and anxiety filled her. Something life-altering was about to happen; that standing-on-a-precipice feeling already had her suffering an adrenaline surge, already had aroused her fight-or-flight instincts.
“What are you whittling?” Jonathan asked Hatch.
Wood shavings sprinkled down onto his scuffed black boots. He blew at them, then held up the wood. “A gull.”
“It’s pretty,” Bess said. “We brought you some muffins from Miss Hattie.”
He cocked a brow. “Blueberry? I like her apple, but her blueberry’s my favorite.” He set the gull down then lay his whittling knife beside it, careful not to nick the bench and dull the blade. “Ready for the tour?”
Bess couldn’t do it. She wanted to leave. Now. Jonathan had made love to her, lied to her and made love to her, and she wanted to get this done and be by herself for a while so that she could get their relationship and everything that had happened settled in her mind. “Another time, Mr. Hatch.”
“Hatch. No mister. Just Hatch.” Brushing at the shavings clinging to his thigh, he sniffed. “Don’t smell like apple. Hattie’s got a heavy hand with cinnamon in her apple.”
“They’re blueberry,” Jonathan said, then passed the bag.
Hatch set it down on the bench beside him. “Didn’t figure today was a good day for the tour, so I didn’t figure on getting any muffins. Nice surprise.”
Feeling about as up for a tour as for the coming confrontation with John, Bess frowned. “Why did you think we wouldn’t want to tour—”
“Hattie called and told me about the Southern Pride and the girl you’re looking for.”
Bess’s heart picked up its beat. “Do you know anything about her?”
“It’s a distinct possibility.” He looked from Bess to John. “Done some checking, though I really didn’t need to. Memory like a steel trap.” He tapped a gnarled fingertip to his temple. “About four months after your little lady went missing, which I hear from Hattie would be about the time Southern Pride was headed up to Nova Scotia, me and Vic was out fishing. Seen signs of wreckage, though none that identified a specific craft, in our estimations.”
John had stiffened, squared his shoulders, and hung onto Hatch’s every word. “Could it have been Southern Pride?”
Hatch shrugged. “You’ll need to weigh the matter, but I’m thinking it could’ve been. We found a young lady’s body near Little Island. Coroner said she’d drowned,” he paused to make the sign of the cross, “and Sheriff Cobb didn’t have a sandmite’s shade of luck identifying her. She was eighteen, according to the coroner.”
“Dixie’s age,” John said in a voice that sent a tremor quaking through Bess. “Was she ever positively identified?”
Hatch rubbed at his jaw, rustling his stubbly gray whiskers. “Nope, but we tried long and hard. Not knowing who the little lady was, Miss Hattie worried something fierce. Closest I ever seen Hattie Stillman to being sick, aside from when her soldier died, of course. Said there had to be kin worried about the little lady, and until they knew what had happened to her, they’d never know a minute’s peace.” He leaned back and shook his head. “Yep, we tried long and hard, but had not a sandmite’s worth of luck. Buried her out on Little Island.”
A shiver raced up Bess’s backbone. The graves she and Jonathan had stood before just yesterday. Could one of them actually have been Dixie’s?
John’s dark brows knitted and he fisted his hand alongside the thigh of his jeans. “Why was she buried out there rather than in the cemetery behind the church?”
Bess had wondered that, too. The church had a pretty little cemetery behind it. Why the isolation of the island?
“Miss Millie insisted,” Hatch said. “The little lady had on an amulet with a ruby the size of your thumb in it. When the sunlight caught it, Miss Millie said it reminded her of the ocean view from Little Island at twilight. So,” he shrugged, “we figured the little lady would rest easy there.”
Bess gasped. “A ruby amulet?”
“Yep. Stone as big as the end of my thumb.” Hatch reached into the pocket of his worn blue pants and pulled out something shiny.
“We’ll have to have the body exhumed to be positive but, Hatch, I’m nearly certain the young lady was Dixie Dupree.”
John’s face was pasty white. In a show of support, Bess reached for his hand and laced their fingers, certain his inner turmoil matched or doubled her own. The wind tugged at his pale yellow shirt, whipped through his glossy black hair, carrying his scent and that of the sea . . . and that of rain.
Looking out onto the horizon, Bess’s heart sank. Above the angry white-capped waves, the sky was a sleety, dark blue, almost navy. She stiffened, emotionally battening down for yet another storm.
“Ain’t no need to go disturbing the dead, boy.” Hatch passed John the shiny disc, his voice low and steady.
“A doubloon?”
Hatch nodded, his wise eyes solemn.
Jonathan frowned. “What am I supposed to do with it?”
“You’re needing proof, boy, and this old man knows it. But disturbing the dead resting peaceful would upset Miss Hattie, and we try to avoid that. She’s had enough upset in her life. We do our best to protect her against suffering anymore.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Don’t need to.” He picked up his knife and gull and put the blade to the wood. “Just take that doubloon and go out to Little Island. Aaron Butler will run you out there.”
“Why?” Bess’s frightened feeling intensified, and she had to remind herself to breathe. Tony must have something to do with this. He wouldn’t want Miss Hattie upset. But how could going out to Little Island with a doubloon give Jonathan any proof that the woman who’d drowned had been Dixie?
“Because Little Island is where the little lady’s grave is, Mrs. Mystic.”
Besieged with eerie feelings, Bess didn’t bother telling him her preference for Cameron. Neither did John. He stared into the old man’s eyes, long and hard and deep.
“There are two graves there, side by side,” Jonathan finally said. “Did you find the body of a man out there, too?”
Thomas Boudreaux. Bess tightened her grip on Jonathan’s hand. Could his be the
second grave?
“No. Only the little lady.”
“Who’s in the other grave?”
“Don’t matter, in my estimation,” Hatch said in a tone warning the subject wouldn’t be discussed further. “If you’re standing facing the graves, the little lady’s is the one on the left.”
John squeezed Bess’s hand. “Thank you, Hatch.”
The old man cocked his head, stared at Jonathan a long moment, then nodded. “You go to the island, John Mystic,” he said, his voice gentle with an understanding and a grasp of the situation that went beyond Bess’s, “and you do what you’ve got to do there, then you bring that doubloon right back to me.” His voice turned hard. “Don’t take it to Seascape Inn, boy, and don’t ever mention it to Miss Hattie.”
“Why?”
“Because I said.” His expression shifted to enigmatic, his tone uncompromising. “Either give me your word or leave here without that coin and don’t ever come back. Those are my terms.”
Bess silently urged Jonathan to give the man back the doubloon. To turn and leave and not come back—to forget all this. Now. Before whatever was about to happen, happened. Her honed instincts were pounding out a distress signal, a warning more dire than any she’d ever felt before. But in her heart, she knew he wouldn’t do it. Her instincts screamed that, too, just as they screamed that Hatch’s little lady was indeed Dixie Dupree. And Bess held no illusions as to what this new development meant.
With this trip to the island, Jonathan would end his six-year search. He would fulfill his promise to Elise by solving the case. He’d no longer feel like a failure, which meant he’d no longer feel the need to prove his worth by controlling Bess. And that meant he’d no longer need her.
Their relationship would be over.
He’d leave here.
He’d leave her.
This time, forever.
The magic was strong, but not strong enough to hold him. And in keeping the news of the station sale to himself, he’d proven to them both that the magic was what they had together. The magic, but nothing else. Nothing . . . more.
Jonathan stood rigid, his jaw as hard as the cliffs. “I accept your terms, Hatch.”
Inside, Bess crumbled and cried and begged him not to do this. Prayed for a miracle that would keep him from taking Hatch’s doubloon. But miracles didn’t happen for people like her. She knew it. She’d learned that lesson six years ago. Just as she’d learned that, regardless of how painful, acceptance is positive growth. And so outwardly, she slid behind her protective mask, appearing passive and accepting.
Like before, she’d mourn losing him, alone.
Chapter 15
John stood on the pier facing Bess, his back to the angry ocean, to the wall of fog seeping inland and enshrouding them to Aaron Butler who busily readied the boat.
She looked devastated, her eyes filled with so much pain it wrenched John’s heart. “I should be elated. I’ve worked a long time for this. Instead, I—”
“You’re grieving,” she said in a deadpan tone, distant and pulling farther away. “I’m grieving, too.”
He nodded, longing to reach out and touch her, to beg her to not hide from him behind that cool cashmere facade. The moment he’d taken the doubloon from Hatch, she’d summoned it back into place—and John had begun grieving. He didn’t know how to stop this. How not to lose her again.
If the woman buried on Little Island proved to be Dixie, irony would have come full circle. For years, he had been obsessed with solving this case. For Elise, yes. But also for him and Bess. She’d walked out on a failure. A failure who couldn’t crawl to her and ask her to come back. But a success could ask her to come home. If he solved this case, then he’d have earned the right to ask her again to be his wife. To hold his head up and walk back to her as a man she could be proud to call her husband.
Or so he’d thought.
Now, looking at her pain-filled eyes, at the resignation in her bowed head, in the aura of loss surrounding her, he grieved, just as she’d said, because he knew their situation was hopeless. He’d lost her again. She didn’t trust him, and he couldn’t blame her; he’d lied to her. Yes, out of fear of losing her, but still he’d lied. He hadn’t trusted her either. She’d been right about that. And without trust, what did they really have?
The magic.
Beautiful. Special. But not enough.
Santos calling her no doubt had brought him sharply to her mind, reminded her vividly of their relationship. She didn’t love him, but she cared for him. Him, she trusted. From him, she accepted gifts. Things were different for her with John. She likely regretted their agreement and them making love. Likely had decided, just as he had decided, that the magic wasn’t enough. God knew, she deserved more. She’d loved him then. Not now. Then.
She couldn’t love Santos. Or could she? She had changed. When she’d believed Santos had bought the station, she’d turned to John for comfort. He loved her, and yet he’d betrayed her, hurt her. And, from the look in her eyes now, he didn’t stand a prayer of being forgiven. Ever.
His eyes burned. “You’re not coming with me, are you, Bess?”
“No, John, I’m not.”
John not Jonathan. His heart sank.
Bess’s heart shattered. She fisted her hands behind her back, praying she wouldn’t humiliate herself further by crying in front of him now. “You going out there, well, it closes this chapter of our lives.” A repulsive shudder trying to deny the truth rippled through her. She stiffened against it. Acceptance was positive growth. She must accept. “All that’s left is for us to go ahead with the divorce—”
“But we made love, Bess.”
“No, John.” Lord, how that truth hurt. “I thought we had, but it wasn’t honest. It wasn’t making love.”
He stared out at the water, his eyes as turbulent as the violent waves crashing against the shore. “It was for me.”
“We have to be realistic.” The wind tugged at her hair. She pulled it back from her face and held it with her hand. “We tried and we failed. We have to accept that and to go on our separate ways.”
His jaw went rock hard. “We can work this out.”
“No, we can’t. There’ll always be a case, John.” She’d always rank second. He’d always omit telling her whatever might bring them discord. There was no trust. There was magic, but no trust.
“We can,” he insisted.
“All right, maybe we can.” She looked him straight in the eye. Arguing with him wouldn’t work, but proving her point would. “When do I meet your parents?”
The color drained from his face. “You don’t.”
She’d expected it, and yet the flat-out denial stung. It stung, then burrowed in and hurt deeply, filling her with a pain so fierce and forceful that she feared she’d stagger and fall to her knees. Ashamed. “That’s why we can’t work it out.”
“Mr. Mystic?”
John turned. “Yes, Aaron?”
“Boat’s ready. We better hurry if we’re gonna beat the storm.”
John looked from Aaron to the thunderheads swirling ever closer, then back to Bess, his expression torn. “Tell me you’ll be here when I get back. Tell me—”
Her heart breaking, she raised her hand.
He pressed his to it, palm to palm. “Please, Bess.”
The temptation burned so strong, so strong she almost gave in to it. But that would only delay the inevitable. Only prolong the intense pain that would demand its due before the healing and acceptance could again begin. He knew it, just as she did, and one of them had to be strong enough to do what was best for both of them. One of them. Her. But once more, once more, she had to have the words. “I loved you.”
He swallowed hard, his Adam’s apple rippling his throat. “I loved you, too.”
She drew the words in, deep into her heart, where she could always cherish them. Then, burying her emotions more deeply than ever before, she shored up her courage, stepped back, and lowered her hand, f
isting her fingers into her palm to hold his warmth to her a moment longer. Her chest went tight, her muscles stiff. Her heart numb. “Good-bye, John.”
Resignation burned in his eyes, settled over him, dark and oppressive, and he lowered his hand. “I’ll miss you, Bess,” he said softly, his eyes bright.
She’d miss him, too. God, but would she miss him, too.
He paused to look at her, then blinking hard and fast, he turned and stepped into the boat. “Let’s go, Aaron.”
Bess stood on the dock, demanding her feet to stay planted to the planks and not run after him. She laced her arms tightly over her chest, as if trussed they could hold inside the pain exploding in her. The fog thickened, and with it came the first sprinkle of rain. Blinking against the pelting drops, she held her gaze on John, praying he’d turn around and come back. Praying that just this once he’d put her first.
He didn’t look back.
The tears in her heart welled, sheening in her eyes.
If you want him, then you’ve got to fight for him, Bess.
Tony. How like him to sense her in trouble and to come. She blinked and thought back. He always had. Since his first phone call to the station, whenever she’d needed him, Tony had been there. “I can’t fight for him, Tony.”
Why not?
The rain came harder and faster, and still she stood there on the pier, looking out at the fog. The storm outside paled to the one raging within. The boat was now only a vague outline on the horizon, and its image was dimming. “Because if I do,” a sob tore from her throat, “I lose him . . . and me.”
I don’t understand.
“He doesn’t love me, Tony. He desires me, but he doesn’t love me. He can’t because he doesn’t love himself.”
He wants you to be proud of him, Bess. Is that so wrong? For a man to want to be respected and admired by a woman who means so much to him?