by Noelle Adams
When his body enjoyed the image too much, he stopped imagining.
He wondered if she would be looking for him, if she would expect him there as he’d been yesterday evening. She didn’t seem to mind his presence—which in itself was a real victory—but he couldn’t tell at all whether she liked him, whether she would be hoping to see him again.
Even kissing him didn’t necessarily mean more than she’d felt like kissing him at the moment. She was a creature of instinct and feeling. There weren’t all the layers of motivation and expectation in a kiss from her that there would be in a kiss from all the other women he knew.
He couldn’t help but hope she was missing him right now though. He couldn’t help but hope that he was on her mind as much as she was on his.
He was so wrapped up in thoughts of Holly that he was taken by surprise when a man came over to his table and asked if he was Cade Chesterton.
Kevin Todd was a blue-collar type with a relaxed manner and a friendly smile. Cade liked him immediately. He was also relieved that, with a son like this, he’d be able to get as much information from Rosie as possible.
After chatting for a minute about the trip, Kevin said, “She’s in and out of it most days, so I don’t know if you’ll be able to get any clear answers from her.”
“I completely understand.” Cade did his best to keep any sense of urgency from his voice. He didn’t want Kevin to think his inquiries were particularly important. “I appreciate your making the time to give me the chance.”
They drove separately over to the nursing home, which was a midrange facility that seemed clean and safe but still gave Cade a sick feeling in his gut. Kevin was obviously known by most of the staff, so he must come to visit his mother a lot.
When Kevin knocked on the door, he turned back to tell Cade, “She gets easily startled, so we try to keep our voices at an even keel.”
“Got it.”
“Hey, Mom,” Kevin said, as he opened the door. No one had answered, but it wasn’t locked. “It’s Kevin.”
The woman was sitting in a small recliner, staring out the window. The room was small and meticulously neat, and it made Cade’s stomach tighten up even more. There was nothing wrong with the room or the facility. He just couldn’t imagine spending the remainder of his life in a place like this.
Rosie looked far too young to have dementia, and the fact that she did was quite frightening. She turned vaguely to look in their direction. “Who did you say it was?” She was focused on Cade rather than her son.
“It’s Kevin,” Kevin repeated, his voice as patient as before. He pulled up a chair that had been at the small table closer to her recliner and gestured for Cade to do the same. “How are you feeling today?”
“Oh, I’m fine. I’m just fine.” She was blinking a lot and fluttering her hands, and Cade wondered if she had any idea who she was talking to.
“I’ve brought someone with me,” Kevin said. “He’s a friend, who wanted to talk to you about Cape Charles.”
“I’m Cade Chesterton,” Cade said, reaching a hand out toward her and starting to get the sense that this was going to be a wasted trip. “It’s very nice to meet you, Mrs. Todd.”
“Oh, thank you.” She smiled at him, but it seemed like a habit more than a real expression of feeling. “I used to know Chestertons in Cape Charles when I was a girl.”
Cade straightened up. “Did you? They might have been my parents or grandparents. Lola and Michael?”
“Lola, yes. She baked the best coffee cake.” The eyes and voice were still unfocused, but she’d obviously landed on a real memory.
Cade smiled. “Yes, that’s my mother. She makes the best coffee cake ever.”
“And there was one little boy who was always reading in a corner somewhere.”
“That would be me.” He didn’t like to think about himself as a child. It made him feel weak. It made him feel like a loser.
Rosie blinked at him for a minute. “Oh, no, I don’t think so, dear.”
Cade didn’t contradict her, and Kevin gave him an apologetic smile.
Then Kevin said, “Mom, Cade is working on a research project on Cape Charles, and he was wondering if you remembered Meg Chaney.”
“Meg Chaney,” Rosie repeated, turning her head and staring out the window again. “Meg. Meg.” She drifted off without adding anything to the name.
Cade waited, his stirring of hope dying again. Everywhere he turned was dead ends. Surely someone, somewhere, knew what had happened to Meg Chaney. She couldn’t have disappeared off the face of the earth without a trace.
Unless she’d been killed, of course.
“Do you remember her, Mom?” Kevin prompted gently. “She worked in the library, Cade says. Someone thought she was a friend of yours. You went shopping together?”
“Yes, of course, Meg worked in the library,” Rosie said as if this was an obvious point of fact. “She used to wear her hair in a bun and her glasses down on her nose so she could give us all the librarian glare.” She tittered softly. “The boys would all come to stare at her, but she didn’t give any of them a second look.”
“Did she have a boyfriend then?”
“Oh, no. Of course not.”
Cade frowned. “Why didn’t she have a boyfriend?”
“She didn’t like any of the Cape Charles boys. They were too white-bread, she used to say.”
“Maybe she met someone who wasn’t from Cape Charles?” Cade was trying to keep his voice from becoming urgent or pushy since he didn’t want to spook the woman now that she was saying something interesting.
“Oh, she was crazy about Mason.”
“Mason who?”
“Mason,” Rosie repeated, giving him a slightly disapproving look. “He came down from New Jersey one summer.”
“You don’t remember his last name?”
Rosie gave a little fling of her hand. “He was visiting a cousin or something. He stayed at the Weston’s bed-and-breakfast, and they said he ate them out of house and home. Meg was crazy about him.”
Cade was about to ask another question, when Rosie’s expression changed, becoming suddenly downcast. “I didn’t like him though,” she whispered, giving Cade an anxious look. “He wasn’t nice.”
“Why wasn’t he nice? What did he do?”
Rosie just shook her head. “He wasn’t nice.” She looked back out the window as if she’d drifted off again. “She didn’t like men at all later, when she came up here to live.”
Cade managed to smother a gasp of excitement at this piece of news. So Meg Chaney had lived up here in Ocean City for a while. That was very helpful to know.
“She didn’t like for her pretty little girl to be going out with boys the way she did.”
Her pretty girl. Holly. Cade asked gently, “She had a daughter?”
“Of course she had a daughter. Such a smart, pretty thing. She seemed so lonely, even when she went out with boys and tried to act normal. Poor, poor little thing. Not much of a life for her.”
Cade met Kevin’s eyes.
“Mom, do you remember anything else?”
“Oh, Kevin, son,” Rosie said, looking surprised. “When did you get here?”
Kevin gave Cade a discreet shake of his head. “I’ve been here just a few minutes. Do you remember anything else about Meg Chaney or Mason?”
“Who, dear?”
Cade sighed. He’d evidently tapped the full extent of his resource. He was tempted to stay and push some more, but he knew Kevin wouldn’t allow him to do so, and he had a sense that it would be futile anyway. So he stood up with a smile. “I won’t bother you anymore. Thank you very much for talking to me.”
Rosie just ignored him.
Kevin got up too and walked him to the door. “Sorry she wasn’t more help. Like I said, she’s in and out. But I’ll let you know if she happens to say anything else.”
“I appreciate it.” Cade shook the other man’s hand. “Thank you for taking the time.”
/> As he left, so many more questions filled Cade’s mind. Surely Holly was Meg’s smart, pretty daughter. Something had happened with Meg Chaney—something connected to Holly and how she was now. He wanted to know what the answers were, and he was determined to find out.
He also wanted to know what Holly was doing right now—whether she was thinking about him—but there was not much chance of his ever finding that out.
Cade got back to Cape Charles before ten in the evening, and he spent the night at his mother’s house since it had wireless Internet and air-conditioning. He went back over to the beach house at nine o’clock the following morning.
He’d intended to wake up early so he could get there in time to see Holly on her early morning walk, but he overslept and then stayed for breakfast because his mother was fixing pancakes.
He asked his mom whether she ever remembered a Mason visiting from New Jersey—and she said that sounded familiar but she couldn’t remember any details.
No one seemed to be able to remember the details he needed. It was getting frustrating.
He made a call to Weston’s bed-and-breakfast and, with some very smooth talking, got the owner to agree to look back in the records for a guest named Mason.
He walked down to the beach as soon as he’d hung up, but Holly was nowhere in sight. She evidently did a walk around her property every morning, but that was very early—as soon as the sun came up. He had no idea what she did to fill her days in between her morning walk and her swim.
He stared at the empty stretch of beach—at the waves lapping on the sand, leaving foam and a scattering of sticks and shells—and he wondered what would happen if he were to head up Holly’s boardwalk and knock on her door.
He might find out a few interesting things, but he would also likely blow any trust he’d developed over the past few days.
He did walk over onto her beach, thinking maybe he could see up toward her house and catch a glimpse of her, but he stayed well away from her walkway. He walked the length of it, resigning himself to the fact that he’d probably have to wait until her evening swim to see her today, and then he headed back toward the beach on his property.
He was passing by her walkway when he looked up to the house and caught sight of her. She was trimming back the branches on a tree that grew near her boardwalk—up near the house.
She held a pair of hedge clippers, and she was reaching up toward a high branch that was hanging down over the walkway.
Cade’s heart gave a silly jump when he saw her.
She wore two braids today and another of her little dresses, and her arms and legs were slim, tanned, and bare. He stood for a few minutes, watching her, wondering how he should get her attention and how she expected to cut back all those branches with the little clippers and no ladder.
Finally he moved up toward the boardwalk, without actually stepping onto it, and called out as loud as he could, “Do you need any help with that?”
She was a good distance away, but his voice carried. He saw her jerk in surprise and whirl around.
He couldn’t see her expression, but she stood for a minute just staring down the walkway at him.
Finally she lowered the clippers and started walking toward him very slowly. “What are you doing here?” she asked when she got close enough for him to see her face. She didn’t look angry or resentful, but she definitely didn’t look welcoming.
“I was just seeing if you were around,” he replied with a casual smile. “That tree is pretty tall. Do you need any help with it?”
“No.” She didn’t soften the negative with an explanation or qualification.
“Don’t you have a ladder?”
“Yes, I have a ladder.”
“Then why don’t you use it?”
“I’ll use it when I need it.”
She was the strangest, most stubborn, most frustrating woman he’d ever met. He had no idea why his heart was beating wildly in his chest just because he was talking to her again. “It’s not safe for you to climb up a tall ladder all by yourself, especially carrying those clippers.”
She frowned at him, pushing one of her braids back over her shoulder. “I do everything all by myself.”
“I know that. But that doesn’t mean it’s safe. I thought safety was important to you.”
“Safety from outside.” Her silvery eyes held his without wavering. “Not safety from a ladder. I’ve never fallen before.”
“Why don’t you let me help you?”
“I don’t want your help.”
“Why not?”
“Am I obliged to give you an explanation?”
“No,” he admitted. “But I’d like one anyway.”
“This is my home. I take care of it.”
It took him a minute to realize that this was her explanation. It made perfect sense to her. Because this was her property, she had a duty to take care of it. Not all that different from the fact that she still felt a duty to read his books, even though she’d only liked the first one.
He’d been shocked and unsettled to hear that she’d actually read his books, and he’d been bleakly disappointed when it was clear she didn’t like most of them.
Not that her opinion should matter so much to him, but for some reason it did.
“Okay.”
She was still frowning in his direction, but she stepped down the stairs from the boardwalk to the sand and sat down on the top step, placing her clippers carefully beside her.
Cade sat next to her, relieved that she wasn’t kicking him out—at least not yet.
“Why do you do that?” she asked at last.
He had no idea what she was talking about. “Do what?”
“Say okay when you don’t mean it.”
“I did mean it.”
“No, you didn’t. You didn’t like what I was saying, and you wanted to ask me more, but you still said okay.”
He slanted her a curious look. “That’s a normal part of conversation—saying okay, even when you don’t mean it so you don’t leave the other person hanging.”
“I’d rather you say what you mean.”
“I don’t think you really want me to say what I mean.”
“Why not? Do you mean things that aren’t nice?”
“Sometimes.”
She turned her eyes away from him and stared down at the clippers. “Me too,” she said at last.
Cade had never talked to anyone like her before. She always left him guessing, never allowed him to get settled into one of his normal patterns of interacting. He couldn’t flirt with her. He couldn’t talk politely to her. He couldn’t subtly fish around for information. He couldn’t even argue with her in his normal manner. He always had to think about what he was saying, try to figure out what was going on beneath her pretty face.
Finally she said, “You weren’t on the beach yesterday evening.”
His breath hitched slightly as he realized she’d missed him after all. “Yeah. I wanted to, but something came up.”
“What came up?”
“A… a job opportunity.” He didn’t like the slight stammer, and he hoped she wouldn’t interpret it as dissembling, even though that was what he was doing.
“Did it work out?” Her eyes were focused on his face now, seeming to see a lot more than they should.
“I don’t know. I don’t think so. I think it was a wasted trip.”
“Oh.”
He decided it was time to turn the conversation around so he wasn’t at a disadvantage. He gave her a little smile. “So you were looking for me, were you?”
“Why do you say that?”
“Because you noticed I wasn’t here. That seems to imply you were hoping to see me.”
“I thought you might be there,” she said seriously, “but you weren’t.”
“Did you go swimming?”
“Of course.”
“Did you miss me?”
“I…” As her voice drifted off, her brows drew together.
His question had been teasing, so he was surprised she was taking the question seriously. And, for some reason, it made his heart beat even faster. He was almost breathless as he said softly, “So you did miss me.”
“I don’t know,” she admitted at last, meeting his eyes again. “I didn’t expect to, but I wondered where you were. I don’t know why.”
His blood was coursing in his veins now, and his whole body felt intensely alive. He knew he should think about how he acted just now, calculate the best strategy, but he couldn’t seem to do so. He was brutally conscious of her, and he spoke by instinct alone. “I know why,” he murmured, his voice sounding strangely thick.
“You do?” Her cheeks were flushed, and it looked like she was feeling as tense and excited as he was.
He reached out to take her face in one of his hands, stroking his thumb over the soft skin of her cheek. “Yes. I do. You wanted to see me again.”
She took a shaky little breath and leaned her face into his hand. “Maybe I did. I’m surprised.”
“Why are you surprised?”
“Because I don’t normally want to see anyone again.”
“I’m glad I’m the exception then.” He couldn’t resist any longer, and he leaned toward her until he could brush her lips with his. His body immediately wanted more, but he resisted the urge to deepen the kiss. He caught her lower lip between both of his and gave it a little tug.
She gasped against his mouth and reached up to hold on to his shoulder. Then she closed the distance between their lips and claimed his hungrily.
His entire being was roaring now in pride and desire and need, and he had to hold himself back from grabbing her hard. He cupped the back of her head and let his tongue slip into her mouth, and a jolt of pleasure shot through him as he heard her make a little moan in response.
Soon she was eagerly twining both her arms around his neck, and he’d raised one of his hands to span the side of her ribs. Desire had taken him so hard that he couldn’t resist sliding his hand up just slightly so he was cupping her breast. It was full and soft in his palm. He tweaked the nipple gently with his thumb.
She gasped loudly and let her head fall back.
Intoxicated by her shameless response to him, he twirled the nipple some more.