by Nora Roberts
She tipped them back up. “I don’t think so. I think I’d prefer using those pretty feathers and whatnot.” She glanced at him again. “So, do you know your father’s secret waffle recipe?”
“Nope. He didn’t trust me with it. He figured out pretty fast that I was a disaster in the kitchen.”
“What kind of bribe would work best on Phillip?”
“You couldn’t worm it out of him with a Hermes tie. It only gets passed down to a Quinn.”
They’d see about that, she decided, and tapped her fingers on her knee. She continued tapping them when he pulled into the lot beside the old brick building. She wasn’t sure what reaction he expected from her. As far as she could see, there was little change here. The trash had been picked up, the broken windows replaced, but the building still looked ancient and deserted.
“You cleaned up.” It seemed like a safe response, and it appeared to satisfy him as they got out of opposite doors of the car.
“The dock’s going to need some work,” he commented. “Phillip ought to be able to handle it.” He took out keys, as shiny as the new lock on the front door. “I guess we need a sign or something,” he said half to himself as he unlocked the dead bolts. When he opened the door, Anna caught the scent of sawdust, mustiness, and stale coffee. But the polite smile she’d fixed on her face widened in surprise as she stepped inside.
He flicked on lights and made her blink. They were brilliant overhead, hanging from the rafters and unshaded. The newly repaired floor had been swept clean—or nearly so. Bare drywall angled out on the near side to form a partition. The stairs had been replaced, the banister of plain wood oiled. The loft overhead still looked dangerous, but she began to see the potential.
She saw pulleys and wenches, enormous power tools with wicked teeth, a metal chest with many drawers that she assumed held baffling tools. New steel locks glinted on the wide doors leading to the dock.
“This is wonderful, Cam. You do work fast.”
“Speed’s my business.” He said it lightly, but it pleased him to see that she was genuinely impressed.
“You had to work like dogs to get this much done.” Though she wanted to see everything, it was the huge platform in the center of the building that pulled her forward. Drawn on it in dark pencil or chalk were curves and lines and angles.
“I don’t understand this.” Fascinated, she circled around it. “Is this supposed to be a boat?”
“It is a boat. The boat. It’s lofting. You draw the hull, full size. The mold section, transverse forms. Then you test them out by sketching in some longitudinal curves—like the sheer. Some of the waterlines.”
He was on his knees on the platform as he spoke, using his hands to show her. And still leaving her in the dark.
But it didn’t matter whether she understood the technique he described or not. She understood him. He might not realize it yet, but he had fallen in love with this place, and with the work he would do here.
“We need to add the bow lines, and the diagonals. We may want to use this design again, and this is the only way to reproduce it with real accuracy. It’s a damn good design. I’m going to want to add in the structural details, full size. The more detail, the better.”
He looked up and saw her smiling at him, swinging her sunglasses by the earpiece. “Sorry. You don’t know what the hell I’m talking about.”
“I think it’s wonderful. I mean it. You’re building more than boats here.”
Faintly embarrassed, he got to his feet. “Boats is the idea.” He jumped nimbly off the platform. “Come take a look at these.”
He caught her hand, led her to the opposite walls. There were two framed sketches now, one of Ethan’s beloved skipjack and the other of the boat yet to be built.
“Seth did them.” The pride in his voice was just there. He didn’t even notice it. “He’s the only one of us who can really draw worth a damn. Phil’s adequate, but the kid is just great. He’s doing Ethan’s workboat next, then the sloop. I’ve got to get some pictures of a couple of boats I worked on so he can copy them. We’ll hang them all in here—and add drawings of the others we build. Kind of like a gallery. A trademark.”
There were tears in her eyes when she turned and wrapped her arms around him. Her fierce grip surprised him, but he returned it.
“More than boats,” she murmured, then drew back to frame his face in her hands. “It’s wonderful,” she said again and pulled his mouth down to hers.
The kiss swarmed through him, swamped him, staggered him. Everything about her, about them, spun around in his heart. Questions, dozens of them, buzzed like bees in his head. And the answer, the single answer to all of them, was nearly within his reach.
He said her name, just once, then drew her unsteadily away. He had to look at her, really look, but nothing about him seemed quite on balance.
“Anna,” he said again. “Wait a minute.”
Before he could get a firm grip on the answer, before he could get his feet back under him again, the door creaked open, letting in sunlight.
“Excuse me, folks,” Mackensie said pleasantly. “I saw the car out front.”
NINETEEN
Cam’s first reaction was pure annoyance. Something was happening here, something monumental, and he didn’t want any interruptions.
“We’re not open for business, Mackensie.” He kept his grip on Anna’s arms firm and turned his back to the man he considered no more than a paper-pushing pest.
“Didn’t think you were.” With his voice still mild and friendly, Mackensie wandered in. In his line of work he rarely received a warm welcome. “Door was unlocked. Well, this is going to be quite a place.”
He was a Harry Homemaker at heart, and the sight of all those spanking-new power tools stirred the juices. “Got yourself some top-grade equipment here.”
“You want a boat, come back tomorrow and we’ll talk.”
“I get seasick,” Mackensie confessed with a quick grimace. “Can’t even stand on a dock without getting queasy.”
“That’s tough. Go away.”
“But I sure do admire the looks of boats. Can’t say I ever gave much thought to what went into building them. That’s some band saw over there. Must’ve set you back some.”
This time Cam did turn, the fury in his eyes as dangerous as a cocked gun. “It’s my business how I spend my money.”
Baffled by the exchange, Anna laid a hand on Cam’s arm. She wasn’t surprised that he was being rude—she’d seen him be rude before—but the snap and hiss of his anger over what appeared to be no more than a nuisance puzzled her.
If this is the way he intends to treat potential clients, she thought, he might as well close the doors now.
Before she could think of the proper calming words, Cam shook her off. “What the hell do you want now?”
“Just a couple of questions.” He nodded politely to Anna. “Ma’am. Larry Mackensie, claim investigator for True Life Insurance.”
In the dark, Anna automatically accepted the hand he held out. “Mr. Mackensie. I’m Anna Spinelli.”
Mackensie did a quick flip through his mental file. It took only a moment for him to tag her as Seth DeLauter’s caseworker. As she had come on the scene after the death of the insured, he’d had no need to contact her, but she was in his records. And the cozy little scene he’d walked in on told him she was pretty tight with at least one of the Quinns. He wasn’t sure if or how that little bit of information would apply, but he would just make a note of it.
“Pleased to meet you.”
“If you two have business to discuss,” Anna began, “I’ll just wait outside.”
“I don’t have anything to discuss with him, now or later. Go file your report, Mackensie. We’re done.”
“Just about. I figured you’d like to know I’ll be heading back to the home office. Got a lot of mixed results on my interviews, Mr. Quinn. Not much of what you’d call hard facts, though.” He glanced toward the band saw again, wished
fleetingly he could afford one like it. “There’s the letter that was found in your father’s car—that goes to state of mind. Single-car accident, driver a physically fit man, no traces of alcohol or drugs.” He lifted his shoulders. “Then there’s the fact that the insured increased his policy and added a beneficiary shortly before the accident. The company looks hard at that kind of thing.”
“You go ahead and look.” Cam’s voice had lowered, like the warning growl of an attack dog. “But not here. Not in my place.”
“Just letting you know how things stand. Starting a new business,” Mackensie said conversationally, “takes a good chunk of capital. You been planning this for long?”
Cam sprang quickly, had Mackensie by the lapels and up on the toes of his shiny, lace-up shoes. “You son of a bitch.”
“Cam, stop it!” The order was quick and sharp, and Anna punctuated it by stepping forward and shoving a hand on each man’s chest. She thought it was like moving between a wolf and a bull, but she held her ground. “Mr. Mackensie, I think you’d better go now.”
“On my way.” His voice was steady enough, despite the cold sweat that had pooled at the base of his neck and was even now dripping down his spine. “It’s just details, Mr. Quinn. The company pays me to gather the details.”
But it didn’t pay him, he reminded himself as he walked outside where he could gulp in air, to be beaten to a pulp by a furious beneficiary.
“Bastard, fucking bastard.” Cam desperately wanted to hit something, anything, but there was too much empty air. “Does he really think my father plowed into a telephone pole so I could start building boats? I should have decked him. Goddamn it. First they say he did it because he couldn’t face the scandal, now it’s because he wanted us to have a pile of money. The hell with their dead money. They didn’t know him. They don’t know any of us.”
Anna let him rant, let him prowl around the building looking for something to damage. Her heart was frozen in her chest. Suicide was suspected, she thought numbly. An investigation was in place.
And Cam had known, must have known all along.
“That was a claim investigator from the company who holds your father’s life insurance policy?”
“That was a fucking moron.” Cam whirled, more oaths stinging his tongue. Then he saw her face—set and entirely too cool. “It’s nothing. Just a hassle. Let’s get out of here.”
“It’s suspected that your father committed suicide.”
“He didn’t kill himself.”
She held up a hand. She had to keep the hurt buried for now and lead with the practical. “You’ve spoken with Mackensie before. And I assume you—your lawyer at any rate—has been in contact with the insurance company about this matter for some time.”
“Phillip’s handling it.”
“You knew, but you didn’t tell me.”
“It has nothing to do with you.”
No, she realized, it wasn’t possible to keep all the hurt buried. “I see.” That was personal, she reminded herself. She would deal with that later. “And as to how it affects Seth?”
Fury sprang up again, clawed at his throat. “He doesn’t know anything about it.”
“If you actually believe that, you’re deluding yourself. Gossip runs thick in small towns, close communities. And young boys hear a great deal.”
It was the caseworker now, Cam thought with rising resentment. She might as well be carrying her briefcase and wearing one of her dumpy suits. “Gossip’s all it is. It doesn’t matter.”
“On the contrary, gossip can be very damaging. You’d be wiser to be open with him, to be honest. Though that seems to be difficult for you.”
“Don’t twist this around on me, Anna. It’s goddamn insurance. It’s nothing.”
“It’s your father,” she corrected. “His reputation. I don’t imagine there’s much that means more to you.” She drew a deep breath. “But as you said, it’s nothing to do with me on a personal level. I think we’re finished here.”
“Wait a minute.” He stepped in front of her, blocking her exit. He had the sinking feeling that if she walked, she meant to walk a lot farther than his car.
“Why? So you can explain? It’s family business? I’m not family. You’re absolutely right.” It amazed her that her voice was so calm, so detached, so utterly reasonable when she was boiling inside. “And I imagine you felt it best to hold the matter back from Seth’s caseworker. Much wiser to show her only the positive angles, lock up any negatives.”
“My father didn’t kill himself. I don’t have to defend him to you, or anyone.”
“No, you don’t. And I’d never ask you to.” She stepped around him and started for the door. He caught her before she reached it, but she’d expected that and turned calmly. “There’s no point in arguing, Cam, when essentially we agree.”
“There’s no point in you being pissed off,” he shot back. “We’re handling the insurance company. We’re handling the gossip about Seth being his love child, for Christ’s sake.”
“What?” Stunned, she pressed a hand to her head. “There’s speculation that Seth is your father’s illegitimate son?”
“It’s nothing but bull and small minds,” Cam replied.
“My God, have you considered, even for a moment, what it could do to Seth to hear that kind of talk? Have you considered, even for a moment, that this was something I needed to know in order to evaluate, in order to help Seth properly?”
His thumbs went into his pockets. “Yeah, I considered it—and I didn’t tell you. Because we’re handling it. We’re talking about my father here.”
“We’re also talking about a minor child in your care.”
“He is in my care,” Cam said evenly. “And that’s the point. I’m doing what I thought was best all around. I didn’t tell you about the insurance thing or about the gossip because they’re both lies.”
“Perhaps they are, but by not telling me, you lied.”
“I wasn’t going to go around feeding anybody this crap that the kid was my father’s bastard.”
She nodded slowly. “Well, take it from some other man’s bastard, it doesn’t make Seth less of a person.”
“I didn’t mean it like that,” he began and reached out for her. But she stepped away. “Don’t do that.” He exploded with it and grabbed her arms. “Don’t back off from me. For Christ’s sake, Anna, my life has turned inside out in the past couple of months, and I don’t know how long it’s going to be before I can turn it back around. I’ve got the kid to worry about, the business, you. Mackensie’s coming around, people are speculating about my father’s morals over the fresh fruit at the supermarket, Seth’s bitch of a mother’s down in Norfolk—”
“Wait.” She didn’t move away this time, she yanked away. “Seth’s mother has contacted you?”
“No. No.” Jesus, his brain was on fire. “We hired a detective to track her down. Phillip figured we’d be better off knowing where she is, what she’s up to.”
“I see.” Her heart broke in two halves, one for the woman, one for the professional. Both sides bled. “And she’s in Norfolk, but you didn’t bother to tell me that either.”
“No, I didn’t tell you.” He’d backed himself into this corner, Cam realized. And there was no way out. “We only know she was there a couple of days ago.”
“Social Services would expect to be notified of this information.”
He kept his eyes on hers, nodded slowly. “I guess they just were. My mistake.”
There was a line between them now, she realized, very thick and very darkly drawn. “Obviously you don’t think very much of me—or of yourself, for that matter. Let me explain something to you. However I may be feeling about you on a personal level at this moment, it’s my professional opinion that you and your brothers are the right guardians for Seth.”
“Okay, so—”
“I will have to take this information I’ve just learned into consideration,” she continued. “It will have to be
documented.”
“All that’s going to do is screw things up for the kid.” He hated the fact that his stomach clenched at the thought. Hated the idea that he might see that look of white-faced fear on Seth’s face again. “I’m not going to let some sick gossip mess things up for him.”
“Well, on that we can agree.” She’d gotten her wish on one level, Anna realized. She’d been around to see how much Seth would come to matter to him. Just long enough, she thought hollowly.
“It’s my professional opinion that Seth is well cared for both physically and emotionally.” Her voice was brisk now, professional. “He’s happy and is beginning to feel secure. Added to that is the fact that he loves you, and you love him, though neither one of you may fully realize it. I still believe counseling would benefit all of you, and that, too, will go into my report and recommendation when the court rules on permanent guardianship. As I told you from the beginning, my concern—my primary concern—is the best welfare of the child.”
She was solidly behind them, Cam realized. And would have been no matter what he’d told her. Or hadn’t told her. Guilt struck him a sharp, backhanded blow.
“I was never less than honest with you,” she said before he could speak.
“Damn it, Anna—”
“I’m not through,” she said coolly. “I have no doubt that you’ll see Seth is well settled, and that this new business is secure before—as you put it—you turn your life back around. Which I assume means picking up your racing career in Europe. You’ll have to find a way to juggle your needs, but that’s not my concern. But there may come a time when the guardianship is contested, if indeed Seth’s mother makes her way back here. At that time, the case file will be reevaluated. If he remains happy and well cared for under your guardianship, I’ll do whatever I can to see to it that he remains with you. I’m on his side, which appears to put me on yours. That’s all.”
Shame layered onto guilt, with a sprinkling of relief between. “Anna, I know how much you’ve done. I’m grateful.”
She shook her head when he lifted a hand. “I’m not feeling very friendly toward you at the moment. I don’t want to be touched.”