Late into the night, without plan, without design, he reached out to her in dreams. Floating back in time to when love was fresh and sweet, and everything.
She was seventeen and leggy, with hair a tumble of fire and eyes as warm as summer fog. Her beauty struck him, as always. A fist in the heart.
She laughed as she waded in the cove. She wore trim khaki shorts and a bright-blue top that left her arms and an inch of her midriff bare. He could smell her, over the scents of salt and sea, he could smell that heady, taunting fragrance that was Mia.
“Don’t you want to swim?” She laughed again as she splashed up water. “Sad-eyed Sam, what are you brooding about today?”
“I’m not brooding.”
He had been. His parents were freezing him out because he’d chosen to work on-island that summer in the hotel rather than in New York. He’d been wondering if he was making a mistake, a terrible mistake, by being so desperate to stay on-island because of Mia.
Because the idea of being away from her month after month was both tantalizing and unthinkable.
Yet he had begun to think it. To wonder about it more and more every time he left the Three Sisters to go back to the mainland and college. He’d begun to consider testing himself by making some excuse not to come back to the island, back to her, some weekend during the semester.
Every time he left the mainland on the ferry, they pulled him back. The island and Mia. Now he was refusing to take the escape hatch that had been tailor-made for him. He needed to think it over again. Reconsider.
But when Mia had come along to his beach, he’d been too crowded with lust and longing to brood or to think about being anywhere but with her.
“If you’re not brooding, prove it.” She walked backward in the water so that it lapped at her calves, her knees, those long white thighs. “Come in and play.”
“Too old for games.”
“I’m not.” She slid into the water, skimmed through it like a mermaid. And when she surfaced, water raining from her hair, her shirt clinging seductively to her breasts, he thought he’d go mad. “But I forgot. You’re nearly nineteen. Too dignified to splash around in the water.”
She did a surface dive and streaked through the dark blue water of the cove. When he grabbed her ankle, she kicked and came up laughing.
Her laughter, as always, bewitched him. “I’ll give you dignity,” he said, and dunked her.
It was innocent. Sun and water, the bright beginning of summer, the slippery edge between childhood and the future.
It couldn’t stay innocent.
They splashed, warred, swam as sleekly as dolphins. Then came together as they always did, lips meeting first under the surface, then clinging when they burst through into air. Need rose with them, strong and urgent, so that she trembled as she wrapped herself around him. Her lips, warm and wet, parted for his with a trust and acceptance that shook him to the bone.
“Mia.” Knowing that he would die wanting her, he pressed his face into the wet ropes of her hair. “We have to stop. Let’s go for a walk.” Even as he spoke, his hands were moving over her. He couldn’t help himself.
“I dreamed last night,” she said softly. Cradled in his arms, she sighed. “Of you. It’s always of you. And when I woke, I knew it would be today.” She dipped her head back, and he all but fell into those great gray eyes. “I want to be with you, and no one else. I want to give myself to you, and no one else.”
His blood pounded for her. He tried to think of right and wrong, of tomorrow. But could only think of now. “You have to be sure.”
“Sam.” She traced kisses over his face. “I’ve always been sure.”
She slid away from him, but only to take his hand. It was she who led him out of the water and to the cave tucked into the bluff.
The cave was cool and dry, high enough at its heart for him to stand upright. He saw the blanket spread near the far wall, and the candles scattered over the floor. And looked at her.
“I told you I knew. This is our place.” Watching him, she reached for the tiny buttons running down the front of her shirt. And he saw her fingers tremble.
“You’re cold.”
“A little.”
He stepped to her. “And afraid.”
Her lips curved. “A little. But I won’t be either for long.”
“I’ll be careful with you.”
She let her hands fall to her sides so that he could finish unbuttoning her shirt. “I know. I love you, Sam.”
He lowered his lips to hers as he peeled the cotton away. “I love you.”
The little niggle of fear inside her vanished. “I know.”
He’d touched her before, and been touched. Glorious, frustrating caresses, too often hurried. Now as they undressed each other, the candles flickered into life. As they lowered to the blanket, a thin film seemed to coat the mouth of the cave, closing them in.
Their mouths met, sweet and hot. Even as her pleasure began to rise, she sensed him holding back. His fingers, sometimes unsteady, skimmed over her as if he feared she would vanish.
“I won’t leave you,” she murmured, then gasped when his mouth, suddenly urgent, found her breast.
She arched beneath him, hands stroking, body as fluid as the water that scented it. When he looked at her, her hair damp and tumbled on the blanket, her eyes clouded with what he brought her, he shuddered with power.
And made her fly. She cried out, a long, full-throated sound that rippled through him and made him feel invincible. When she opened for him, offering him her innocence, he trembled.
Through the rage of blood, the pound of need, he struggled to be gentle. Still, he saw the flicker of shock.
“Only for a minute.” Delirious, he ran kisses over her face. “I promise. Only for a minute.” Then he surrendered to the demands of his body and took her.
Her hands fisted on the blanket, and she bit back the first cry. But almost as soon as the pain began, warmth replaced it.
“Oh.” Her breath shuddered out again, on a sigh. “Of course.” She turned her lips to the side of his neck. “Of course.”
And began to move under him. She rose and took him deeper, fell and drew him with her. When warmth simmered to heat, their bodies grew slick. Clinging, they took each other.
When she lay wrapped in his arms, half dreaming, the candlelight burned gold.
“This is where she found him.”
Sam traced his fingers over her shoulders. He couldn’t stop touching her. The lazy sexual haze clouded his mind so he forgot all he’d thought of on the beach. “Hmm?”
“The one who was Fire. The one who’s mine. This is where she found her silkie, in human form, and fell in love while he slept.”
“How do you know?”
She started to say she’d always known, but shook her head instead. “She took his pelt and hid it away so she could keep him. For love. It couldn’t be wrong when it was for love.”
Basking in the afterglow, Sam nuzzled her neck. He wanted to be here, with her. He wanted nothing, no one else. Never would. Never could. Now, the realization steadied rather than unnerved him.
“Nothing’s wrong when it’s for love.”
“But she couldn’t keep him,” Mia said quietly. “Years later, after they’d had children, after she’d lost her sisters, her circle, he found his pelt. He couldn’t stop what he did. It was his nature. Once he’d found his pelt, nothing, not even love, could make him stay. He left her, went into the sea, and forgot she existed. Forgot his home, and his children.”
“It makes you sad to think of it.” He held her tighter. “Don’t be sad now.”
“Don’t leave me.” She buried her face against his shoulder. “Don’t ever leave me. I think I’d die, as she died, alone and heartbroken.”
“I won’t.” But something went cold inside him. “I’m right here. Look.” He shifted so that they faced the cave wall. Lifting a finger, he laid it on the stone. Light sparked from his fingertip and etched words in
to rock.
She read the Gaelic and her eyes misted. “ ‘My heart is your heart. Ever and always.’ ”
She lifted her own finger, carved a Celtic knot beneath the words. A promise of unity.
She turned those swimming eyes up to his. “And mine’s yours.”
Alone in her house on the cliff, Mia turned her face into her pillow. And murmured his name in her sleep.
Four
The rain, a steady, drumming splatter, began before morning. It rode on a kicky little wind that had the tender green leaves shivering and foamed the surf. Throughout the day it continued to blow and spit, until the air was raw with damp, the sea as unremittingly gray as the sky. It showed no signs of abating by evening.
It was good for the flowers, Mia told herself as she stood at the window and stared at the unbroken dullness of the gloom. The earth needed a good soaking, and despite the chill, there would be no frost to damage delicate buds.
The first fine day, she would take off work and spend hours gardening. An entire, precious day with no company, and no demands but her flowers.
That was the beauty and privilege of owning her own business.
The occasional privilege helped balance out the weight of responsibility. Of business, and of magic.
She had a dozen things to do in the store that day. It didn’t matter that she’d slept poorly, tossed in her dreams, or that her mood was so low she’d wanted nothing so much as to bury herself under the blankets. The fact that she’d considered it, even briefly, had been sufficiently appalling to get her up and out.
Then she’d forgotten, and she never forgot anything, that Nell and Ripley were coming to the house. At least they were a distraction, something to keep her mind off her memories and dreams, unwelcome intruders into the disciplined order of her life.
He’d snuck into her dreams. The bastard.
“Would you rather do this another time? Mia?”
“What?” Frowning, she looked up. Blinked. By the goddess, she wasn’t even paying attention to her distraction. “No, no. Sorry. The rain’s making me edgy.”
“Right.” Ripley slouched in her chair, hooked a leg over its arm. There was a bowl of popcorn in her lap, and she popped pieces in her mouth quickly, carelessly. “Like it’s a weather pattern that got under your skin.”
Saying nothing, Mia walked to the sofa, curled up. Tucking her bare feet under the spread of her skirt, she flicked a finger at the stone fireplace across the room. The logs burst into snapping, sizzling flame.
“There, that’s better.” She plumped one of her velvet pillows as if she had no concern other than her own comfort. “Now, Nell, what did you want to talk to me about before we discuss our plans for the solstice?”
“Get her.” Ripley gestured with her wineglass, and dumped a neat fall of popcorn in her mouth with her free hand. “Sounds like the chairwoman for some ladies social club.”
“Not so far off. Club, coven. But anytime you want to take charge, Deputy Fife—”
“Okay.” Nell held up a hand for peace. It seemed she was always calling for peace when Mia and Ripley spent more than ten minutes together. There were times when she thought it would be simpler to just knock their heads together. “Why don’t we move beyond the insult portion of our program? I wanted to say that I thought the first meeting of the cooking club went well.”
Mia steadied her temper. Nodded. She leaned over, contemplated the glossy purple grapes she’d arranged on a pale green dish. Selected one. “It did. It was a terrific idea, Nell. I think we’ll find it brings business into the store, and the café. We sold a dozen cookbooks that night, and a dozen more since.”
“I was thinking after we give it a couple of months to see if interest holds, we might want to plan a combination event with the book club. Maybe around Christmas. I know that’s a long way off, but—”
“But it never hurts to plan,” Mia finished and, nipping into a second grape, leveled a smirk in Ripley’s direction. “There are a number of novels that have food playing a major role, and some even have recipes. We might suggest one for the book club, then the cooking club could prepare the dishes. Everybody has fun.”
“And you sell books,” Ripley pointed out.
“Which, oddly enough, is the primary function of Café Book. Now—”
“There’s something else.”
Mia paused, lifted an eyebrow at Nell. “All right.”
Nervous, Nell pressed her lips together. “I know selling books is the primary function, but, well, I had this idea a while ago. I’ve been playing with it in my head, trying to see if it would work, or be worthwhile. You may think it’s out of line, but—”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake, Nell.” Out of patience, Ripley shifted in her chair and set the bowl of popcorn aside. “She thinks you should expand the café.”
“Ripley! Would you just let me tell it my way?”
“I would, but I don’t have a week to spare before I get home.”
“Expand the café?” Mia interrupted. “It already takes up nearly half the square feet on the second level.”
“Yes, the way things are now.” After shooting Ripley a hot look, Nell turned back to Mia. “But if you took out the windows on the east side, added a terrace of, oh, say six feet by ten feet, used atrium or sliding doors leading out to it, you’d have more room for seating, and the benefit of alfresco seating in good weather.”
Because Mia said nothing, just lifted her glass from the table, Nell rushed on. “I could extend the menu here and there, adding more entrée selections for a nice, casual dinner during the summer evening hours. Of course you’d have to take on more help, and . . . and I should mind my own business.”
“I didn’t say that.” Mia leaned back. “But it is a complicated idea. There’s zoning, and building codes. Then there’s cost, and the ratio of profit projection against that cost. The potential loss of business during that kind of remodel.”
“I’ve, um, looked into it. A little.” With a quick, sheepish smile, Nell pulled a stack of papers out of her satchel.
Mia stared, then sat back with a long laugh. “You’ve been busy, little sister. All right, let me look it all over, think about it. It’s intriguing,” she murmured. “More seating, entrée selections . . . I imagine, if successful, it would nip into the hotel’s dinner business, at least during the season.”
At Mia’s small, satisfied smile, Nell felt a wave of guilt. “There’s one more thing. We had Sam Logan over for dinner,” she blurted out.
Mia’s smile slipped away. “Excuse me?”
“You had that rat bastard at your table!” Ripley popped out of her chair. “You fed him a meal? Did you at least poison him while you were at it?”
“No, I didn’t poison him. Damn it, I didn’t invite him, Zack did. They’re friends.” Nell sent Mia a look filled with misery and guilt. “I can’t tell Zack who he can or can’t invite to the house.”
“Just let Booke try asking some traitorous son of a bitch to leach off us.” Ripley bared her teeth as if she was ready to take a bite out of her new husband whether he had the thought or not. “Zack always was stupid.”
“Now, just a minute.”
“He’s been my brother longer than he’s been your husband,” Ripley shot back. “I can call him stupid, especially when he is.”
“There’s no point in this,” Mia said quietly and drew both Nell’s and Ripley’s attention. “No point in casting blame or in recriminations. Zack’s entitled to choose his friends, and to have them in his home. That’s nothing Nell should feel guilty over. What’s between Sam and me is between Sam and me, and it doesn’t affect anyone else.”
“Doesn’t it?” Nell shook her head. “Why didn’t anyone tell me he was one of us?”
“Because he’s not.” It all but exploded out of Ripley. “Sam Logan isn’t one of us.”
“I don’t think Nell was implying he’s a girl,” Mia said dryly. “Or even an islander. Though, of course, since he was raised
here he’ll always be considered an islander.” She waved her hand as if brushing that aside. “The fact that he has the gift has nothing to do with us.”
“You’re sure of that?” Nell demanded.
“We are the three.” In the stone hearth, flames rose and snapped. “We make the circle. It’s for us to do what must be done. Just because some—what was that lovely term of Ripley’s—oh, yes, just because some rat bastard has magic doesn’t change anything.”
Deliberately calm, she stretched out her hand for another grape. “Now, about the solstice.”
She wouldn’t let it change anything. She would do what had to be done, alone or with her sisters. But she wouldn’t allow anyone into their circle. Or into her heart.
In the deepest part of night, while the island slept, she stood on her cliffs. The cold rain poured and the black sea lashed at the jagged rocks as if it would, in one night, wear them to nubs. All around her the irritable wind swirled, snapping at her cloak until it billowed up like wings.
There was no light, no relief from the black except the single circling blade from the white tower behind her. It cut over her, the cliffs, the sea. Then left her alone in the dark again.
Fly, the canny voice whispered. Fly out and let go, and it will all be over. Why do you fight the inevitable? Why would you live with the loneliness?
How many times, she wondered, had she heard that voice? How many times had she come here, testing herself against it? Even when her heart had been shattered, she’d come. And had won. She would never give in.
“You won’t beat me.” She felt the cold as the dirty fog slithered over ground and rock. Felt it like icy fingers wrapping around her ankles, where it could tug, and tempt. “I’ll never give up.” She raised her arms, spread them wide.
And the wild, whirling wind she called tore the fog to tatters.
“What’s mine I serve and protect and keep.” She lifted her face to the rain, let it wash over her like tears. “Whether I wake or whether I sleep, to what I am I will be true in what I say, in what I do.”
Magic poured into her and pulsed like a heart.
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