It took a moment for Drew to blink back into awareness. She was actually breathing hard. The room came into focus. St. Claire was babbling about his background. “Enough of this creep,” she muttered.
“I’m not changing the channel,” Lanyon said, his chin jutting out stubbornly.
“You better not,” Drew hissed. She didn’t even glance at her little brother. She was afraid to miss a glimpse of her guy in the background. But all she got was an impression of bare ankles as she saw his butt and his legs climbing back up into the boat. It was a good butt. And she’d never seen anything in her life as sexy as those ankles.
“And what makes you think you’ll be successful where others have failed?” the announcer was asking St. Claire. “The Santa Angela has been sought for centuries.”
The ruddy-faced man glanced behind him. At the beautiful guy? “I just may have a secret weapon.” He gave the camera an easy smile. “But you’ll have to wait and see what happens.”
“And there you have it, ladies and gentlemen. We’ll be back to see whether Mr. St. Claire can make good on his promise as he goes after one of the most famous shipwrecks in history, rumored to have been carrying a fortune when it sank. Now, we go to Audrey, who is deep in the Black Hills of North Dakota with a man who found a gold nugget the size of a man’s fist....” The marina disappeared.
Drew bounced to her feet and started to pace. What had happened here? She’d had some kind of out-of-body experience over a fourth-rate TV show on some cable channel?
Who was that guy? And why was she so captured by him?
“Are you all right?” Tammy asked, concerned.
“Yes. Of course.” Drew stopped pacing and whirled on Tammy. “I mean no. I have a headache. Must be the champagne. I ... I think I’ll go to bed.”
“Who goes to bed at nine-thirty?” Lanyon asked, frowning.
“I do,” she snapped and practically ran from the room.
She hurried upstairs, grateful to be able to slam the door of her room and lean against it. She was actually shaking. In the dim light from the windows, the familiar blue and beige Aubusson carpets, the faded tapestries, and her own indigo satin quilt sprinkled with stars and moons like a wizard’s tunic should have been comforting. But it all seemed wrong. She shouldn’t be here. All she could see clearly were those starkly handsome features. She could imagine that body without its rumpled clothes. That was making her.... “Get hold of yourself,” she whispered. “What’s wrong with you?”
She pulled her mind away from that glimpse of some man a continent away and started taking off her clothes. A shower. That’s what she needed. The old hacienda-style house had been remodeled so each bedroom had a full bath. That was one way to keep peace in a big family. She left a trail of clothes on her way to the bathroom.
“Going whacky over a guy you saw for less than sixty seconds on TV?” She shook her head and turned on the water in the big walk-in shower. “This is even more stupid than falling for Roger.” The steam began to rise. She grabbed one of the huge white towels and hung it on the hook placed just out of range of the spray. “You’re going downhill, fast.”
Like, for instance, having conversations with herself.
The water sluiced over her head and down her naked body. Sinuous rivulets danced over her skin on the way to the drain. She soaped a loofa briskly. She wouldn’t think about that. She scrubbed herself without mercy, allowed not an extra second of time in the deliciously hot water than required, and slapped off the shower handles. Then a vigorous job with the towel and she was ready for a nightgown and bed. No skin routine. No hair drying. She’d just sleep off whatever this was.
Sleep was nowhere to be found. She was wet between her legs, tossing and turning, thinking about that guy on TV.
Finally, she just gave up. She threw back the covers, pulled on a white silk robe edged with feathers and some matching mules, and crept down the stairs for a change of scenery.
Slipping out to the terrace, she felt better. The charcoal gray of the ocean was cut by the moon’s silver channel of light. It hung only a couple of hand-spans above the horizon. The cool air calmed her. She walked across the flagstone terrace to the lawn that sloped away to the cliffs and kicked off her heeled slippers. The grass, color drained to black by the night, was cool and damp on her bare feet. It almost made up for the fact that her core was still hot and wet.
Her life was spinning out of control. Her destiny suddenly wasn’t comforting. She felt like some kind of failure. She’d been wrong about Roger. And she had to admit she’d thought that French boy might be the One too. She was screwing things up somehow. Maybe she’d snapped under the strain of knowing she was failing and that’s why now she was crazy fixated on some guy she didn’t even know. Certifiable.
Or.… She heard, in her mind, her father telling his kids that when you found the One, you knew instantly. He’d known immediately with her mother. And it was true that Tris had been attracted to Maggie immediately.
Maybe ... maybe this guy was the real deal, when no one else had been.
She sighed. And then she couldn’t help but chuckle. So, your true love is some guy in Florida you saw on TV for thirty seconds? Right. Get a grip, Drew. He doesn’t even look Celtic. Lots of Italian descendants of Merlin hanging around—not.
She wandered over to the path that led down to the beach trail. There was a bench on the cliff that allowed her to look north around Santa Monica Bay. An ornate birdbath sat in front of the bench surrounded by Mexican sage and lavender bushes. The birdbath drew small birds and hummers all summer long, making this one of Drew’s favorite places when she was growing up. The barking of seals on the rocks at the base of the headland echoed up from below. She sat. This was better. This felt right.
She sat there, just breathing, calm for the first time tonight. The moon turned the water in the birdbath almost into a mirror. The breath of breeze made infinitesimal ripples that moved from left to right. Almost mesmerizing....
A picture appeared in the silvered water.
Drew gasped. She jerked to her feet. But the change of angle didn’t make the picture change. It was actually clearer when she could look down on it. My God, it’s me.
No question. There she was, in a sleek linen suit she owned with the big Coach satchel she always took on planes because she could stuff everything she needed into it. She was walking through a crowd into an airport terminal. The sign said, “Welcome to Miami.” Under it were signs in Spanish and English that pointed the way to baggage claim and rental cars.
She glanced around, looking for something that might be projecting the image on the still water of the birdbath. When she looked back, the water was just a dark, translucent pool. At this angle the moonlight didn’t even turn it silver.
Drew sucked in little panting breaths. What was that? She’d never been to Miami. And how would images even get projected onto the water in a birdbath in the middle of the night? “Lanyon?” she hissed into the night air. He was the practical joker of the family.
Silence.
Suddenly, the security of the garden was gone. The shadows made by the moonlight loomed rather than comforted. Drew whirled and hurried back to the house. She ran up the stairs and down to the end of the north corridor to Lanyon’s room. Quietly turning the knob, she pushed in. There he was, his gangly limbs splayed out over the bed in sleepy disarray. His flute, an almost constant companion, lay beside him. As though he sensed her, he stirred then settled back into deeper sleep.
Whatever had happened out there, Lanyon hadn’t done it.
Drew stood in her brother’s dark room and began to shake. Something inside her knew what had happened, and she didn’t want to listen to what it was telling her.
Somehow, she backed out and pulled the door shut behind her. She found herself running back down the hall, her bare feet slapping on the hardwood floors between the carpet runners. Her pretty mule slippers weren’t all she’d left outside.
Her life would never be
the same again.
She pushed into her room and shut the door behind her.
She’d never been to Miami. She’d had an actual … actual what? A vision. Of herself in Miami.
Could she have been seeing what would happen? In which case, she’d just gotten a magical power. But not because she’d found true love with Roger. Roger and true love didn’t occur in the same universe, let alone the same sentence.
It couldn’t be.
She wouldn’t let it be.
She could not have found her destined lover by seeing some guy in Florida on the TV.
*****
Drew was up early, in spite of a nearly sleepless night, because the person she wanted to talk to most was an early riser. She threw on a jogging suit, glanced in the mirror and then wished she hadn’t, the circles were so pronounced under her eyes. Then she headed out to wait at the stairway that led to the apartment over the garages. It wasn’t long before Maggie came trotting down, dressed in jeans and boots and a plaid flannel shirt over an extra-small men’s tee.
Maggie started when she saw Drew. “Whoa.” She peered into the dim dawn light. “Didn’t expect to see you out before breakfast. You okay?”
“Yes. Yes, I’m fine,” Drew lied. “I ... I need to talk to you.” Where was her vaunted drawl now? She sounded like a desperate teenager.
“Well, come on down to the stable with me. I’m going to exercise a couple of my horses before Tris gets up.” The tiny woman strode out across the circular drive toward the stable.
“Great. Thanks.” Drew had to hurry to keep up, though her legs were longer.
“By the way, that was a neat job last night. Sure made your mother happy.”
“Thanks.” Drew waved a dismissive hand. “I ... uh, wanted to talk to you about when you found your magic.”
Maggie cast her a sideways look. “You lookin’ for the G version or the R version?”
Drew felt herself blushing. “I know that episode out at the camp for disabled kids was after you and Tris had ... had been intimate. But, before, when you rescued him from that accident with the truck ... he said you used your power to calm him, so he didn’t feel the pain.”
“That’s about right.” Maggie pulled the big stable door aside on its track. She flipped on the lights in the barn aisle. The horses made sleepy nickers down the row of stalls.
“Well, uh ... that was before ... before you and Tris....”
“Yeah,” Maggie said, stopping in front of the tack room to think. “Yeah. I’d only met him three times, all in one day. We mainly argued up to that point.”
“So ... you didn’t need to actually ...” Drew cleared her throat. Be a big girl here. “... have sex to get your power?”
Maggie paused and considered. “Nope. That night Tris was in major stress. Leg broke. Shoulder torn up. I was so attracted to him, I was practically crazy with it.”
“You were?” Drew asked in a small voice.
“Bad,” Maggie said, shaking her head. “Not normal. But in spite of how worked up I was, I calmed him within an inch of his life. He practically fell asleep.” She chuckled. “Didn’t know then that was a magic power, of course.”
Drew nodded slowly.
“Why you want to know?”
“No reason,” Drew said in her brightest voice. And before she could say anything stupid, she turned around and left.
That was it, then. It was early, but she had to call Jane. The feeling of urgency that had kept her up all night just reached lift-off intensity. Maybe she didn’t need to be a matchmaker. Someone or something had done it for her.
*****
“So, I’m not going to the Ritz. But you are. You’ll have a wonderful week.” Drew had her roller bag out and was stuffing essentials into it. It was still big enough that she’d have to check it. She tossed a pair of strappy high-heeled sandals back in the closet. Her closet was an entire room off her bedroom. Dear Father had had an old-fashioned dressing room converted for her clothes collection.
“And where, exactly, are you going?”
“Can’t say.”
Jane was standing between Drew and the suitcase when Drew came out of the closet. “No information, no deal. I’ll stay home.”
Drew wilted. “Oh, Jane. You’ll think I’m crazy.”
“I’m tending to think that anyway. You’re not meeting Roger, are you?”
“Good God, no. I’m not that stupid.”
Jane raised her brows and waited. She could be surprisingly forceful when she wanted.
“Oh, okay.” Drew cleared her throat. How did she explain this? But it was the only way she could enlist Jane’s help. “Uh, last night I … uh … saw a guy on TV, and I was immediately attracted to him. Like not just attracted, but super-abnormally attracted. And then later I was really upset, because I just couldn’t get this guy out of my mind, so I went out to that bench by the birdbath, and I saw …” What she saw now was Jane’s eyes getting an incredulous expression. “I saw a vision of me getting off a plane in Miami in the birdbath,” she continued with gritted teeth. “And I’ve never been to Miami, so it must be in the future.” She swallowed. “I think this guy is my destiny, because he raised my powers. I can see the future.” There. For better or worse, it was done.
Jane chewed her lip, thinking what to say. At last she settled on, “Name of guy?”
“I … I don’t know.” Drew held up a hand to forestall objections. “But the name of his boat is The Purgatory and it docks in Key West. I should be able to find him from that.”
“Did you actually listen to that explanation?” Jane’s voice was, as ever, calm and quiet.
Drew sighed and plopped down on her bed. “I know. I know. I’m probably having some kind of a breakdown. But I did see me in the Miami airport.”
“In a birdbath in the middle of the night when you were really upset about Roger.”
“But I wasn’t upset about Roger. I was upset at how ... attracted I was to a guy I saw for maybe thirty seconds on TV.”
Jane just raised her brows again.
Drew took a big breath. “You’re right. I have a bad track record. But, Jane, I’ve got to give it shot. What if he is my destiny, and I let the opportunity to grab the brass ring pass me by? I’ll regret it the rest of my life. I’ll end up a cranky old maid.”
Jane gave her a wry smile. “Not a pretty picture.”
Drew knew she’d won. “Definitely not pretty.”
“What do you need me to do?”
Drew got up and started packing again. Boat shoes and a windbreaker. A red shirt she could tie up under her breasts. She’d heard Florida was muggy. “Well, I … I need some money. Cash. I can take a couple thousand from my account without causing suspicion. But I’ll have to pay cash for the plane ticket and all expenses or Kemble will be able to track me. I’ll pay you back, with interest, of course.”
“Done. I can get you maybe six. Will that do?”
Drew leaned over and hugged her. “You’re the best friend a girl could have.”
“Be back in a week, though. I’m not lying to your family,” Jane warned.
“They won’t ask. And it won’t take me that long anyway, especially if you’re right. I’ll be back in a couple of days to join you at the Ritz-Carlton, where I will drown my sorrows in massages and peach Bellinis.”
Jane frowned. “You aren’t worried that the same people who attacked Tristram and Maggie will find you? I don’t want you in danger, Drew.”
“No one will even know I’m gone,” Drew laughed. “Including those creeps. I’m leaving my cellphone with you, so anyone will think that’s where I am. I wouldn’t put it past Kemble to check up on me in spite of my deal with Mother,” she said darkly as she put her makeup bag into the suitcase. “I’ll give the hotel my credit card number for charges to the room. You buy drinks and dinners, get massages and golf lessons and shop at those expensive little shops in the basement. The security guys will just think I’m sticking to the room.”
“Kemble would trace that. I’ll pay cash at the counter for the first available flight.”
CHAPTER THREE
Drew was very conscious as she walked out under the baggage claim signs in the Miami airport that this was the exact view of herself she’d had in the birdbath. But had she just re-created what she saw to make it look like she’d been seeing the future? She had chosen to wear the linen suit, and carry her Coach bag. Maybe it was all hoo-ha, as Lanyon would say. She wished she’d taken time to go back out to the birdbath and try to see something more useful. If she could see the future, did it only work in birdbaths, or that particular birdbath? Maybe the birdbath was magic, not Drew.
On the long flight, she’d tipped from thinking the whole thing was utter nonsense, over to being sure that this beautiful guy on the boat was her destiny and back again. And she couldn’t stop thinking about him. Her linen suit was wet in places it shouldn’t be.
Muggy doesn’t begin to describe how hot and humid it is. Who lives in places like this? Old people who are cold all the time? The terminal was better than the jet bridge, but still.
She couldn’t rent a car without using a credit card, so she took a taxi to a used car lot and paid thirty-five hundred cash for a plain beige 1997 Toyota Corolla. Bless Jane. She felt rather like some terribly sophisticated European spy. But now it was almost nine, and she hadn’t had dinner. She was exhausted by her frantic packing and flight, and all that mental agitation. She had no idea where to stay on the Keys, even after the three-hour drive down there.
He's A Magic Man (The Children of Merlin) Page 3