The Bride's Rescuer

by Charlotte Douglas

  “You could be right. I suppose I will have to satisfy myself with the bizarre green lights I have seen in the sky lately in the dead of night.”

  “Green lights? I never heard of such a thing, except for St. Elmo’s fire.” A memory of that greenish glow racing along the rigging of her sailboat before it capsized sent a chill down her spine. She pushed the disturbing thought away, afraid of precipitating another panic attack.

  “Think of the horizon as the boom of a ship,” he said, as if he’d read her mind, “and those huge cumulus clouds that we see with summer storms as St. Elmo’s fire. That is what I saw in the gulf the night before we found you on the beach.”

  Cameron had witnessed the storm that had ripped her from her boat and thrown her onto the sands of Solitaire. The thought brought back to her with a vengeance her status as prisoner on the island. But if she had to be a captive, she would make the best of it—and the best sat beside her in the seductive form of Cameron Alexander.

  Chapter Six

  Celia sat with Cameron for almost an hour, sipping wine and watching the fiery colors deepen, then fade in the western sky. Neither spoke, content with the silence and the glowing spectacle before them, but his nearness unnerved her, forcing her to face her growing attraction to him.

  In contrast to his surliness at their first encounter, his behavior that evening couldn’t have been more relaxed, and again she wondered what had caused his change of attitude. She watched for signs of pity, thinking he might only feel sorry for her, stranded on his island without friends or family. And she remembered Mrs. Givens’s threats to alert the authorities to his whereabouts if he wasn’t kinder to his guest, but Celia knew of no reason why Cameron should fear the police.

  The possible cause for his change in treatment of her that she found most appealing was that he had been drawn to her by the same magnetism that pulled her toward him. She hoped the events of the evening would present some clue to why he had finally decided to seek out her company.

  When the first stars spangled the canopy of sky, Cameron took her hand and led her to the dining room. Twin candelabra filled with lighted tapers illuminated the room with soft light and revealed the snowy damask cloth and a silver epergne filled with sprays of sea oats, bougainvillea and delicate ferns. Translucent ivory china rimmed with gold, ornate silver flatware and stemmed crystal goblets marked places for two at one end of the long table. The setting could have been the dining room of an English manor house, except for the tropical, salt-scented breeze that stirred the draperies pulled back from the open French doors.

  Cameron held her chair as she sat, then took his own at the head of the table. Mrs. Givens, wearing a sparkling white apron edged with lace for the occasion, carried a silver tureen in from the kitchen to the sideboard and ladled its contents into soup plates.

  The housekeeper waited, hands folded across her immaculate apron, while Celia tasted the clear liquid.

  “This is heavenly,” Celia said. “You’re a wonder, Mrs. Givens.”

  “Coquina broth. It’s one of my specialties.”

  As if she’d been waiting for Celia’s approval, the housekeeper hurried back to the kitchen.

  Cameron set down his spoon and considered Celia with a smile. “Since you will be my guest for some weeks to come, I thought you would feel more comfortable here if we were better acquainted. Tell me about yourself. You told me your parents are no longer living?” His amber eyes clouded, and his hand closed over hers. “I know how painful it is to lose those close to you.” He squeezed her fingers gently. “What about other relatives? Friends? Is no one expecting your return?”

  The warmth of his touch distracted her, making her ignore for the moment the motivation behind his questions. “I have friends who’ve probably given me up for lost. Not to mention the customers in my bookstore.”

  She caught herself before she said more. If she gave the impression no one was searching for her, would he refuse to let her leave, even when Captain Biggins arrived?

  “And your fiancé?” Cameron asked with obvious casualness.

  “Fiancé?” She had no desire to discuss Darren. The sooner she could erase that memory, the better.

  “Or are you married?”

  She shook her head. “Had cold feet at the altar. Realized I was marrying for all the wrong reasons, so I ran. That’s when my sailboat wrecked.”

  “Regrets?” His eyes studied her with a concentration that made her edgy.

  “Only that I let matters go as far as they did. I was still in shock from my parents’ deaths and not thinking straight.”

  To her relief, Mrs. Givens chose that moment to bring in the main course, a magnificent baked grouper with new potatoes, carrots and green beans fresh from Noah’s garden. The housekeeper placed the tray in front of Cameron, and while he served, returned to the kitchen for hot rolls and fresh butter. The woman’s competence amazed Celia. In a primitive kitchen with the barest of supplies, she served as fine a meal as any five-star restaurant.

  “You live well on your island here in the middle of nowhere,” Celia said to her host.

  “Bis vivit qui bene vivit,” he replied.

  “He lives twice who lives well. Milton said the same. ‘Nor love thy life, nor hate; but that thou liv’st, live well; how long or short permit to heaven.’”

  “So you really do read Milton.” A wry grin tugged at the corners of his attractive mouth.

  Celia took a moment to realize he was referring to finding her with the upside-down copy of Paradise Lost in his office the previous week and couldn’t stop the flush she felt spreading across her face.

  “A wise man, Milton,” Cameron said, ignoring her discomfort. “The quality of life must be more important than the length—although sometimes I wonder.”

  His eyes dimmed with pain, and his hand shook slightly as he sipped from his crystal goblet. She wondered if he was thinking of the brevity of the lives of his wife and son.

  In the candlelight, his expression suddenly transformed, and he smiled, as if a mask had fallen over the unhappy man she’d glimpsed a moment before. With sudden clarity, she realized his moodiness had nothing to do with madness, as she’d first suspected when she’d ascribed Cameron’s rapid change of moods to mental instability. Whenever his true feelings surfaced, Cameron erected a wall around himself she couldn’t breach, always holding a part of himself secret, a man within the man, unknown and frightening, repelling her as surely as his outer self drew her to him.

  “You surprise me with your knowledge of both Latin and Milton,” he said congenially. “I didn’t know Americans were trained in the classics.”

  “I’ve spent the majority of my life surrounded by books,” she said. She felt an overwhelming desire to batter down the defenses he’d erected, to learn all she could about him. “Noah tells me you’re a naturalist.”

  He nodded. “It passes the time. I study the swamps and coastal waters and record my observations. You’d be amazed at the flora and fauna in Florida.”

  “I live here, remember?”

  “But have you ever stood among cypress trees a hundred and fifty feet high? Or walked among the other native hardwoods—red maple, swamp bay, pop ash and pond apple?”

  “They must be very different from the trees of England.”

  His face, relaxed and alight with enthusiasm, was even more handsome than before. “I’m astonished every day when I consider the myriad plants here—ferns, marsh pinks, buttonbush and cocoplum, to name only a few, and dozens of species of bromeliads and orchids.”

  Celia’s gaze fell on the spray of butterfly orchids beside her plate, and his gift’s significance grew with his words.

  “And there’re dozens of aquatic plants, too,” he continued. “Bladderworts and waterlilies.”

  She grimaced. “Bladderwort. What a disgusting name.”

  He actually smiled then, an expression of such handsome sweetness, it took her breath away and intensified her longing to know more about Camer
on’s life before he came to America. “Did you have this interest in botany in England?”

  His smile vanished. “No.”

  Cameron’s abrupt change of mood unsettled her, and she turned the conversation back to his present studies in an effort to see him smile again. “What about wildlife, besides the obvious alligators and seabirds? Do you study it, too?”

  He leaned forward, his enthusiasm returned. “The Everglades support an abundance of magnificent birds—wood storks, pileated woodpeckers, a variety of owls. And I’ve observed panthers and red wolves, black bear, white-tailed deer, bobcats, squirrels and raccoons—the list is endless.”

  “Do you hunt them?”

  He looked embarrassed, as if she’d caught him in a weakness. “I can’t bring myself to kill any of them. They’re so beautiful, it seems wrong to harm them. We eat well from the gulf and have no need to hunt.”

  “I’d like to see it all for myself.” She found his passion contagious. “Maybe you could take me with you some day.”

  The Everglades had their appeal, but the man who would be her guide made a potential excursion even more attractive.

  At her request, a strange look flitted across his face, but was gone before she could assess whether it was puzzlement or revulsion. His enthusiasm for the plants and wildlife seemed genuine, but she guessed he used his knowledge to keep her at a safe distance and avoid any topic he found too personal.

  Smiling his charming smile once more, he diverted her with small talk while they finished Mrs. Givens’s meal, but underneath his beguiling exterior, she sensed a reserve, as if he were somehow afraid of her. When she tried to guess why he should fear her, she came up clueless.

  Mrs. Givens saved her pièce de résistance for dessert. Bearing it before her like a treasure, she brought in a magnificent trifle with layers of delicate sponge cake, sliced bananas, pineapple chunks and grated coconut visible through the clear crystal bowl, all topped with mounds of thick whipped cream.

  “My compliments, Mrs. Givens.” Cameron finished the last bite of his trifle and laid his napkin aside. “You’ve outdone yourself this evening.”

  The housekeeper beamed at his praise. “It’s a pleasure to cook for those who appreciate it.”

  Mrs. Givens kept her eyes lowered as she removed the plates, but Celia had the uncomfortable feeling the woman was observing them very carefully. What the housekeeper expected to see, Celia had no guess.

  Cameron and Celia left Mrs. Givens clearing the table and moved into the front room, where Cameron poured himself a brandy. Celia declined, remembering its effect on her the first night she met him. She had, however, a method to her abstinence. She hoped the alcohol would loosen his tongue and crumble the barriers he hid behind. During dessert, he’d talked of the weather and British politics, but had said nothing more about himself.

  The portrait above the fern-filled fireplace caught her eye, and her question popped out before she could consider its consequences. “Do you miss them?”

  “I miss Randolph very much.”

  His face couldn’t have expressed more pain if she’d driven a stake through his heart. She noted, however, that he hadn’t mentioned Clarissa. Afraid of treading further on dangerous ground and unsure what to say to crack his reserve without fueling his pain or anger, she remained silent.

  “Do you dance, Celia?”

  His rapid change of subject wasn’t lost on her, an unsubtle signal that she had encroached onto a subject he preferred to avoid.

  “Yes, a bit. I belonged to a cotillion when I was younger.”

  And she’d hated every minute of it. Awkward teenaged boys with sweaty palms had been forced to dance, even with a wallflower like her. Her mother had claimed the exercise would teach Celia social graces, but she’d hidden in the rest room of the hotel ballroom more often than she had participated and had learned only a great aversion to dancing.

  Cameron set down his untouched brandy, picked up a massive carved wooden box from the sideboard, and tucked it under his arm. “Come.”

  He took her hand and pulled her after him. The warmth of his bare flesh pressed against hers sent shivers of pleasure through her, and she wondered if he experienced the same effect. On the darkened veranda, he placed the box on a table, wound a large key protruding from its side, and opened the lid.

  The tinkling music of an unfamiliar waltz floated onto the night air, blending with the gentle pounding of the distant surf and the soughing of wind through the trees. It was a night made for lovers, and she realized with a start that she might be falling in love with Cameron Alexander.

  He held his arms open. “Dance with me, Celia.”

  Without hesitation, she raised her hand to his, placed the other on his broad shoulder, and was drawn into his embrace. With a natural grace, he waltzed her up and down the broad porch, through the rectangles of lamplight cast through the tall windows onto the weathered wood of the floor.

  The imprint of his hand burned like a brand at her waist while the silvery, tumbling notes of the antique music box scattered like stardust on the night air. He didn’t hold her in a clenched embrace, but at arm’s length, so that she could watch his face while they twirled slowly up the veranda and back again.

  “Cameron—”

  “Don’t speak,” he said gently. “Don’t spoil it.”

  Her heart yearned to know him better, to learn what made the enigma before her tick, what dreams he dreamed, what devils he wrestled, but she held her questions for another time and watched a gamut of emotions cross his face. She counted pain, desire and even amusement among them.

  They paused only long enough to rewind the music box, then fell again into a loose embrace and began their leisurely waltz once more.

  The music wound down, and the case clock chimed the hour in the front room. Although the dance had ended, Cameron held her in his arms and pulled her close. She tilted her head and lifted her lips, willing recipients, toward his. Her breath caught in her throat as he leaned toward her, but abruptly he drew back, clasped both her hands in his and crushed them to his lips.

  “Good night.” His words came out in a strangled tone, and he turned and left her standing alone in the moonlight.

  When her reeling senses had steadied, Celia stepped quietly into the hallway and paused at the door to the front room. A dejected Cameron sat on the sofa, gazing at the portrait above the mantel, his fingers curled around an empty brandy snifter.

  Celia climbed the stairs to her room, slipped out of her dress and toppled into bed. She expected to toss and turn, but fell instantly asleep. She dreamed of a man with a tortured expression who danced her across a floor painted with the portrait of his dead wife.

  Chapter Seven

  Celia awoke the next morning with conflicting emotions. Part of her yearned for the weeks to pass quickly so she could return home to her friends and business. But another part of her desired nothing more than to spend the rest of her days with Cameron on his island. She had detected a flicker of response from him the night before and believed that time might fan that flicker into a flame. She sang as she dressed for breakfast, something she hadn’t done since her arrival.

  She found Mrs. Givens in the kitchen, scowling into her teacup.

  “You didn’t tire yourself out last night?” Celia asked. The woman had to be at least in her sixties, and preparing such a meal without the usual conveniences had been a grueling task.

  “What?” The housekeeper looked up as if her mind were wrapped in fog.

  “Are you all right?”

  Mrs. Givens rose from the table and refilled her cup before sitting once more. Her age-spotted hands trembled. “It’s nothing, m’dear. Just my sixth sense running amok today.”

  She attempted a smile, but her expression wavered, and Celia feared the kind old woman would burst into tears.

  “What sixth sense?” Celia asked.

  “It’s a curse, it is, passed down to me from my old grandmother on my mother’s side. She coul
d see the future. Look straight into a person’s eyes and read their fate.”

  “You can do that?” Celia struggled to keep the skepticism from her voice. Mrs. Givens seemed upset enough without having her beliefs questioned.

  “Would be better if I could. Grandma could see a person’s destiny as clear as looking through a window. She knew the day that World War II would end and predicted the day to the hour that the old king would die.”

  “That’s some talent. Did you forecast my arrival here?”

  “Wish I was good enough for that. With me, I see only shapes and colors, and I don’t always know who they’re meant for.”

  Celia humored the old woman’s fantasies but didn’t buy the clairvoyance she spoke of. “And do you see something now?”

  Mrs. Givens’s stout shoulders shuddered. “Last time I had a premonition like this was when Clarissa and Randolph went off to Devon—”

  She clapped a plump hand over her mouth, and her eyes registered her horror at speaking aloud the very names she had warned Celia not to utter.

  Celia tried to make light of the woman’s worries. “Maybe there’s a physical explanation for the way you feel, like a dropping barometer at an approaching storm.”

  The housekeeper shook her head. “The feelings are too strong, the colors too dark—”

  She spoke in a keening moan, and Celia felt the hairs rise on the back of her neck. Mrs. Givens must have seen the uneasiness on her face, because she leaned over and patted her hand. When she spoke again, her voice had resumed its no-nonsense tone.

  “I hope you’re right, m’dear—although I don’t relish a storm here. If the wind don’t blow us away, the waves could wash us out to sea. It’d be the end of me, because I never learned to swim.”

  “Let me teach you.” Although talk of storms resurrected the horrible memories Celia had managed to tamp down into her subconscious, she was glad to abandon talk of premonitions and omens. And she was serious about the swimming lessons. They would help pass the time.