Sea Fever

by Virginia Kantra

  He took the box from her instead, dumping it on the counter.

  She bit her lip. “Listen—”

  The front bell jingled. Regina glanced toward the door and back at him, her dilemma plain on her face.

  He showed her the edge of his teeth. “Deal with it.”

  The customers? Or him helping her? He wasn’t sure.

  Maybe she wasn’t either, but she didn’t have much choice. She shot him a look and stalked through the swinging door. He heard her voice. “How’s it going, Henry? What can I get you tonight?”

  Dylan unloaded two more cartons while she boxed Henry’s dinner— one lasagna to go— and took an order for four lobsters, steamed, with a side of slaw.

  She bumped a hip against the door, grabbing up the lobsters on her way to the cook top. “Thanks.” She dismissed him. “I’ll get the rest in a minute.”

  Dylan ignored her. Each case of tomatoes must weigh sixty pounds. How had she gotten them into the van in the first place? “Where does this go?”

  “Walk-in refrigerator. On your left. But—”

  “What’s wrong with iceberg?” he asked, to distract her.

  She dropped the lobsters into boiling water. Dylan restrained a wince. “Other than being colorless, tasteless, and relatively lacking in nutritional value, not a thing.”

  “Then why buy it?”

  “I don’t. So either my mother did, or the supplier switched the order.”

  She snapped the lids on various containers: lemon, butter, cole slaw. By the time she rang up the lobsters, Dylan was setting the last case on the floor.

  Regina blew out her breath. “Thanks. I guess I owe you.”

  “I’m sure we can work out some form of payment,” he said silkily.

  She snorted. “I’ll cook you dinner.”

  “That’s not what I had in mind.” He moved in, trapping her against the stainless steel counter, watching awareness bloom in her big brown eyes.

  “Too bad, because that’s all I’m offering.”

  He stepped between her thighs, sliding his hands into her hair, beneath her bandana. The pulse in her throat leaped against the heel of his hand. “Then I won’t wait for you to offer,” he said and took her scowling mouth.

  She tasted sharp and earthy, like sun-warmed tomatoes and olives and garlic. She smelled like apricots. She flooded his senses, filled his head, good, yes, this, now. Her arms wrapped around his neck. Her mouth was warm and eager. He felt the tension in her tight little body as she pressed against him, slight breasts, narrow waist, slim thighs, all fine, all feminine, all his, and the hunger in him developed claws that raked his gut.

  He wanted . . . something. The release of sex, yes. More. He wanted to feel her tremble and come apart again, wanted her wet and soft and under him. Craved her tenderness. Her touch.

  He hitched her up on the counter. She hooked her legs around his waist. He pictured himself stripping the jeans from her and pushing his way inside, now. He fumbled for her waistband.

  Her hands came up between them, flattened against his chest. Good, yes, touch me, he thought.

  She pushed, hard.

  He raised his head, confused.

  Her lips were full and wet, her eyes dark. The tiny gold cross on her chest moved up and down with her breath.

  “So, what’s the deal with you and Margred?” she asked.

  “What?”

  “You were talking to her when I came in.”

  His blood roared in his head. “That has nothing to do with you. With this.”

  “Yeah?” She attempted to close her legs. He didn’t move. “Because I won’t be used to make her jealous. Or to cover whatever thing you two have going on from Caleb. What do you want, Dylan?”

  “I’d think that was obvious.”

  “Not to me.”

  He took her hand and pressed it to his crotch, where he was hard and aching for her. “You,” he said. “I want you.”

  Her lips trembled; firmed into a sneer. “Very nice. Excuse me if I’m not flattered. Or convinced.”

  He pulsed against her. “What would it take to convince you?”

  Blushing, she tugged her hand away. “I don’t know. More than being groped against the kitchen counter. Been there, done that.”

  “I did not grope you,” he said, irritated. She’d pushed him away before he’d had the chance.

  “It’s not always about you, handsome.”

  Some other man, then.

  He narrowed his eyes. “Who?”

  “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “Then you shouldn’t have brought him up. Who was he?”

  “Like you really want to know.” Her head came up, almost connecting with his jaw. “It’s not me you care about; it’s who else had what you want. Well, fuck you.”

  “You ruled that out. So talk to me.”

  Her snort of laughter took them both by surprise. “It was Nick’s father, all right? I worked in his kitchen.”

  “In Boston.”

  Her eyes widened. “How did you know?”

  “Nick told me. That first day, on the beach.”

  Her hand went to the chain around her neck, to the totem of her murdered Christ. Dylan had noticed the gesture before. Did she call on Him for help? Or was the gesture merely nervous habit?

  “Nick talked to you about his father?” she asked.

  He was still looking at her chest, the gold chain, all that smooth skin above the scooped neckline of her tank top. “He said you left him.”

  “Yeah. After Alain made it really clear he didn’t want anything to do with me or the baby.”

  Babies, well . . . Babies were a serious commitment. No wonder the guy was scared off. Dylan raised his gaze from the slight slope of her breasts to her mouth, sensitive and a little sad.

  “There are worse things than growing up without a father,” he offered.

  “I wouldn’t know.”

  Dylan raised his brows.

  “Mine took off when I was three years old,” Regina explained.

  “But you had your mother.”

  “When she wasn’t working. I wanted different for Nick.”

  The shadows in her eyes disturbed him. “It wasn’t your choice,” Dylan said.

  “Not then. It is now.”

  He didn’t follow. He was still hard, his brain still blurred with lust.

  Regina sighed. “I can’t give Nick a mother who’s around all the time. The least I can do is spare him some guy who won’t stick.”

  Dylan frowned. “You knew all along I would not stay. It did not stop you on the beach.”

  Her pointed chin came up. “I was drunk. Anyway, that was before I knew you. Before Nick knew you. I can’t risk him getting attached.”

  “I’m not asking to move in with you.” Frustration sharpened his voice. “Nothing has to change. I just want sex.”

  “Sex changes things.” Her eyes met his. Warm, brown, honest eyes. “Maybe I can’t risk me getting attached either.”

  His heart tightened like a fist. He was selkie. It was not in his nature to form attachments. And yet . . .

  “You underestimate yourself,” he said.

  “What the hell does that mean?”

  “Perhaps you are more like me than you acknowledge.”

  Or perhaps she had more power over him than he dared admit, even to himself.

  “I have a kid. You don’t.” Regina hopped down from the counter, brushing him aside. “You try being responsible for somebody besides yourself sometime, and we’ll talk.”

  6

  “I CAN’T EAT IN THE KITCHEN.” JERICHO TOOK a step back from the kitchen door, clutching his take-out bag. The aroma of potatoes and onions followed him into the alley, mingling with the smell of grease from the fryer, a whiff of rotting lobster from the Dumpster. Regina’s gorge rose.

  “It would be different,” he said, “if I wasn’t taking charity.”

  Regina scowled. It pissed her off that she couldn’t do
more for him. Didn’t want to do more. “It’s not charity. It’s a sandwich.”

  Jericho’s thin lips twitched in the ghost of a smile. He’d made an effort to wash, she noticed, even to shave. She could see the line on his neck where his beard ended and the dirt began. Despite that dubious demarcation, she had to admit he looked more approachable without the stubble. Not as scary.

  “I could help out maybe,” he offered, not quite meeting her eyes. “In return for the food.”

  Oh, no. She wasn’t looking to take on another responsibility. Although, maybe . . .

  Her relief when Dylan showed up yesterday had been a revelation and a warning. She couldn’t count on his help with every delivery. She couldn’t count on Dylan, period.

  What had he said yesterday? “Nothing has to change. I just want sex.” Predictable guy response.

  Not reliable. But predictable.

  “Sorry,” she said. “We’re not hiring.”

  “I’m not asking for money.” A hint of the South flavored Jericho’s voice like bourbon in branch water. She wondered again what demons drove him so far from home. “Just sometimes . . . I thought I could help out,” he repeated with quiet dignity.

  Her head hurt. She didn’t know what to do. When Perfetto’s needed a dishwasher, Alain used to drive to the corner where the day laborers hung out and hire a guy right off the street. But then, Alain didn’t have a kid on the premises to worry about. Hadn’t wanted a kid to worry about. Rat bastard.

  But after all these years, the words no longer had the power to energize her. Thinking of Alain only made her tired.

  “I’ll let you know,” she said.

  “Yes, ma’am.” Jericho tugged on his cap, shading those clear, haunted eyes. “Appreciate it.”

  He turned to go, almost bumping into Margred as she rounded the corner. They circled without touching, like fighters looking for an opening. Finally, Jericho stepped back, and Margred entered the kitchen.

  She reached for her apron, her cheeks flushed. “What was he doing here?”

  Regina raised her brows, surprised by the faint hostility in her tone. “I’m thinking of hiring him.”

  “What for?”

  “Scrub floors, unload deliveries, stuff like that.”

  Antonia sniffed without turning around from the cook top. “We don’t need some man around to do our work for us.”

  They hadn’t needed a man eight years ago, when Regina showed up on Antonia’s doorstep with Nick in her arms. Whatever her faults, whatever her feelings about providing for her estranged daughter and a three-month-old grandson, Antonia had done everything that needed to be done. But her mother wasn’t getting any younger. Regina watched her mother’s hands on the spatula as she turned hash on the griddle— strong, veined hands, the knuckles growing knobby with age, the nails yellow with smoke— and felt a surge of love and panic tighten her throat. Antonia would never admit it, but she couldn’t do as much as she used to. Margred was great with customers, but she went home to her husband at night. And Regina . . .

  “Things change,” Regina said shortly.

  “Sex changes things,” she’d said to Dylan.

  Oh, boy, did it ever.

  Her period was late. Only a day late. One day.

  Maybe she wasn’t knocked up. But she felt the weight of worry like a live thing pressing on her abdomen, burning beneath her breastbone.

  “It’s those damn catering jobs,” Antonia told Margred. “She took on another one, family reunion, week after Frank Ivey’s birthday party. Now she wants to hire help.”

  Regina grabbed a knife and started chopping scallions for the pasta salad, ignoring the ball in her stomach. “Six bucks an hour, a couple hours a day, a few days a week. Big deal.”

  “We can’t afford him. Not once the season’s over,” Antonia grumbled.

  Chop chop chop. “He won’t last that long. He won’t want to stay here in the winter.”

  “He could. He looks crazy enough.”

  Maybe he did at that. Her knife faltered.

  “I don’t like him,” Margred said.

  Regina glared at her, feeling betrayed. “You were okay with him before. He’s a vet. Like Caleb.”

  “He smells bad.”

  Regina remembered Jericho’s freshly scraped jaw, the line of dirt around his neck, and felt an uncomfortable prickle of guilt. “So would you if you didn’t have a place to take regular showers.”

  Margred shook her head. “Not that kind of bad. He smells . . . wrong.”

  Antonia slapped a plate on the pass. “As long as he doesn’t touch the food or scare off the customers, I don’t care how he smells.”

  Regina gaped at this unexpected support from her mother.

  Antonia set her hands on her hips. “You going to stand there jawing? Or are you going to serve this hash before it gets cold?”

  The next few hours passed in a haze of work and steam. At eleven o’clock the menu changed from eggs, hash, and home fries to sandwiches, subs, and pizza. The tables filled with summer people who didn’t want to cook, campers in search of a hot meal, yachters ashore for shopping or some local color.

  No Dylan. Regina caught her gaze wandering to the pass, watching the door for his tall, lean figure, and pressed her lips together.

  “Shit, oh, shit.” She jerked her hand from the cutting board.

  Her mother looked over. “You all right?”

  “Fine,” she said, examining her white fingers. She’d only caught a nail this time, under the knife’s edge. No blood, no foul.

  No blood.

  She’d run to the bathroom three times to check, as if the act of pulling down her underpants could somehow transform the sweat of the kitchen into good news: Not pregnant.

  She needed to go to Rockland and buy a damn test.

  She needed to keep her mind on her work. She loved cooking, took a deep satisfaction in feeding people. But there was no challenge in it anymore. No distraction. She could prepare this menu blindfolded.

  “If I never fried another clam or made another lobster roll, I could be happy,” she muttered.

  “You’d be happy, and we’d be out of business,” Antonia said. “Order up.”

  Eventually, the line of tickets shortened. The dining room cleared as customers returned to their boats, vacations, lives.

  “God, I need a cigarette,” Antonia said and went out by the Dumpster to smoke.

  Regina garnished the last two orders: lettuce, tomato, a slice of red onion. As she set the plates on the pass, she glanced again at the door. Tall man. Dark hair. Just for a moment the pressure eased. Dylan?

  But it was only Caleb, standing with his weight on his good leg, talking to Margred.

  “Get you anything?” Regina asked. “Cup of coffee?”

  His smile crinkled the corners of his eyes. “Coffee would be good.”

  She carried the mug out to him while Margred served the last table.

  “Thanks.” Caleb took the cup; watched her over the rim. “Maggie tells me you hired that homeless guy you’ve been feeding.”

  Regina jerked her mind from one set of worries to another. “I’m thinking about it. You said he checked out.”

  “He doesn’t have a record. He still has issues.”

  She cocked her chin, on the defensive. “You mean, besides needing a job and a place to live?”

  Caleb sipped his coffee. “There’s an encampment,” he said abruptly. “Homeless guys, vets mostly, out at the old quarry.”

  Her mouth opened. Shut without a sound. A camp? Of homeless vets. On World’s End?

  Margred finished her table.

  “I’ve been by there once or twice,” Caleb continued. “Keeping an eye out. Took one of them to the clinic this afternoon to see Doc Tomah.”

  “So?”

  “He had headaches. Delusions.” Caleb’s gaze locked with his wife’s. “Claimed he was possessed by the devil.”

  Margred sucked in her breath.

  “Uh-huh,�
�� Regina said. Why was he telling her this?

  “What did you do?” Margred asked.

  “The doctor prescribed Haldol. And I drove him back to camp.”