Tides of Love

by Tracy Sumner

  He fell to his knees; she spread her legs. Hip to hip, chest to chest, he entered her in a sure, swift stroke. Uninhibited, they mated like animals in the dawning light.

  Animals.

  Something Noah had never in his life thought to compare himself to.

  * * *

  Elle fished a threadbare sailor’s cap from Noah’s satchel and settled it over his face. He’d already blistered his skin, trudging around the island in improper attire.

  She threw his shirt across his chest and watched it rise and fall on a long breath. He was exhausted, his cheeks dotted with stubble, dark circles beneath his eyes. His hair hung past his ears, far longer than usual. A memory of her nose embedded in the thick strands as he plunged into her curled her toes into the sand.

  Nonplused, she concentrated on the break of waves on the shore; the call of seagulls in search of food; the rustle of sea oats on the sand dune behind her. Even after a hurried swim, she could smell the scent of their joining on her skin. Even after washing her mouth with salty water, she could taste him. Sliding Noah’s satchel to the side, she slumped against the dune and groaned at the tender friction between her thighs.

  They had made love three times. Once while waist-deep in the ocean. An hour ago, no more. How could she want him again so soon? How?

  Juste Ciel, she had not expected this.

  It’s not as if she hadn’t understood the mechanics of copulation. An indistinct, yet defined, sense of what happened between a man and a woman in a darkened bedroom. He positioned his sex accordingly; she complied, stiff and sacrificing beneath him. This information circulated at every sewing bee and quilting circle, crossed every coverlet at every church picnic. Naturally, the married women stopped talking the minute she, unmarried and ignorant to the reality of wifely duty, entered their line of sight.

  Until her engagement to Magnus Leland.

  She had no mother, and they felt obliged to educate her.

  Mrs. Scoggins explained in shadowy terms how thinking of household chores made the act go quicker. Widow Wynne listed excuses she once used to avoid it altogether. Jewel Quattlebaum detailed the necessary pain involved in a reporter’s concise, unemotional manner. Lillian Quinn’s description was the only one that sounded more pleasurable than tooth surgery.

  Thankfully, lovemaking was nothing like those descriptions. Love made it truly wonderful. She reached out, needing to touch him. A muscular arm lay folded over his belly; the other stretched from his body, fingers nestled in the sand. Her breathing accelerated. She had touched much of him, with her hands, and later—at his urging—with her lips and her teeth. His sex’s rigid shape was gone for the moment, but she could still see a firm outline beneath clinging cotton.

  She had not imagined that circumspect Noah Garrett, the first to hesitate and weigh all the options, would take her with such confidence, such lewd boldness? As if he knew exactly what she needed and held no misgivings about giving it to her.

  This excited her—in a secret place Noah had brought to life—to picture him, staid and fussy, buttoned up and pressed down, precise speech and polite bearing, panting and plunging into her, passion stealing air from his lungs, rational thought from his mind. She was amazed to find she could set him aflame, that she could shatter the composed facade he presented to the world.

  She slid her hand closer, just one touch. Sighing, she forced her arm to her lap. He needed sleep. And she needed to conclude if this night had changed her plans for the future.

  Leaning over him, she rolled his cuffs past his ankles, shading more of his skin.

  She loved him, but he had not said he loved her.

  Luckily, she hadn’t admitted it, either.

  Did he love her? She traced a faded scar on the sole of his foot. Indefinable lights, tender sparks of emotion flared in his eyes more than once last night. Especially the last time they made love. They left the water still joined, and he brought her on top of him in the sand as they attained bliss.

  If there were the slightest chance he loved her, she would forgo the scholarship, and persuade Noah to take her with him. She remembered seeing a university in Chicago on the list of those offering women’s programs.

  Her hand stilled. What if he didn’t want a wife who attended university? What if he didn’t want a wife at all? Perhaps making love meant next to nothing to him.

  She sat back on her heels. She could go with him anyway, make a life with him, somehow. She preferred this choice to the wretched one of never talking and laughing with him again, never being intimate with him again. Maybe a modern relationship was called for in this situation. Like Caleb and Christa had. Except, Caleb had asked Christa to marry him on more than one occasion.

  She pulled her watch from her pocket and checked the time. Another half hour, and she would wake him. She glanced overhead: the sun was a bright, blinding ball in the sky. Looking at Noah, she noted that his cap shaded his nose and cheeks, but not his lips. Red and swollen, they looked well loved.

  When they got home, she would make a baking-soda paste for his skin and spread salve on his chapped skin. She snapped her fingers. Maybe he carried medical supplies in his satchel.

  She searched the shallow outside pocket. Two pencils, a metal measuring tool. In the larger section, she found a notebook and a leather-bound manual of some sort.

  Normally not a meddlesome person, she took the notebook out, wanting only to read what he’d been studying the last two days. A garbled scrawl detailing migration habits for a fish she’d never heard of. On another, a rough sketch of the beach and back bay, marked off in specific sections, with complex names attached. She leafed through sheet after sheet of scientific terms, facts, and figures.

  Wishing biology had been a part of her study plan at university, she turned a page and froze.

  Outcome: mind free of Elle Beaumont was written in block letters and underlined.

  Twice.

  Her jaw dropped as she skimmed the lines of text. Work longer hours. No more kissing. No more touching. No more daydreams. Eating dinner or repairing shutters is forbidden. A circled notation reminded him to ask Caleb to mow her grass. She dug her toes into the sand, a furious quiver working its way down her legs. Obviously, he intended to share this list with her now that they had privacy to discuss the situation.

  His lust, hell, her lust, had simply derailed his plan.

  A sharp wedge of pain drive the breath from her body; she doubled over and sucked in air. A dull buzz sounding in her ears, she placed his satchel beside her and laid the notebook on top. Dazed, she covered him with the blanket, knowing he would swelter, but at least his skin wouldn’t crisp.

  She trudged toward the water, readied the skiff for sail, and found the strength to shove it through the bucking waves. She licked her finger and held it into the wind. She could make it to the dock in less than fifteen minutes, pack a bag, and have Stymie shuttle her to Morehead City in time for the four o’clock train. She would send a telegraph to Savannah and ask her to meet the train in New York City.

  I’ll be here, with you. Always.

  Disbelieving, Elle tugged the lines taut and sailed from one dream and toward another.

  * * *

  For six months after leaving Pilot Isle, Noah slept in deserted rail cars and abandoned shelters, curled into a ball, fearful and tense. The dreadful experience had honed his instincts, razor-sharp, and when he woke, he realized instantly.

  She was gone.

  He blinked into muted light, flipped his sailor’s cap from his face, and swore. Blessit, he was burning up. Shoving the thin blanket from his body, he rolled to his knees, praying Elle would be sitting beside him, a smile of happiness, of acceptance, on her lovely face.

  A bead of sweat coursed down his check, another down his chest. He shook his head and calmed his breathing. Think, Noah, think.

  That had always been easy before.

  He stumbled to his feet, his stiff trousers crinkling. For a step or two, he followed the set of petit
e footprints, remembering his first day back on Devil and the picnic they had shared. He felt for his spectacles. No pockets. Hell, he didn’t even have his shirt on.

  He squinted, glanced anxiously around him, and turned a full circle. Where could she—

  Two things struck.

  His skiff, although he couldn’t see clearly, no longer appeared to be on the shore. And his satchel lay in a spill, his notebook sprawled open beside it. He dropped to his haunches, and brought the paper close to his face. Dear God, he thought, the notebook sliding from his fingers. In the distance, the harsh grunt of a white ibis filtered through his bafflement.

  Hadn’t she known? Hadn’t she trusted him? He had begged her to, told her he would be there for her. His list... it didn’t mean anything. Nothing at all. Just an asinine way to try to expunge her from his system. Blessit, he loved her. Didn’t she understand? Did she imagine he’d ever had a night like this one with another woman?

  Impossible.

  He tipped his head back and located the sun. Elle couldn’t have left more than three hours ago. Four at most. He would straighten this mess out: tell her he loved her and explain the silly damned list. Plan in mind, he set about folding the blankets, spreading his campfire ashes, packing his satchel. Slipping his arms through his sleeves, he lifted his wrist to his nose, and inhaled deeply. He hoped he could persuade her to stay at the coach house tonight.

  He was willing to grovel if necessary.

  A shout sounded above the breaking waves. The wind ripped at his shirt as he turned toward the sea.

  Caleb sailed into shore in a spritsail skiff of his design—one he had promised to construct for Noah. He glanced up the beach, his lips parting, words Noah couldn’t catch over snapping canvas.

  Was that Zach sitting in the stern? Noah fumbled for his spectacles. The troubled look hardening Zach’s usually agreeable features triggered an alarm. He stood, rooted to a blistering spot of sand, trying not to let his imagination get the best of him. But... both of them? Why had both his brothers come? Like they performed some mission of mercy or something.

  Zach reached him first; Caleb lingered by the skiff, clearly hesitant. Without saying a word, his brother dropped a wrapped bundle in his hands. Noah started to loosen the piece of cloth, then halted, staring.

  He fondled the worn material, his anxiety building. “Where did you get this?”

  “Where did you leave it?” Zach’s tone held a faint thread of anger.

  The material, once pale blue, was now the color of chalk. And stained in spots—with blood from a long-ago split eyelid. “The docks. Or Stymie’s sloop, maybe. He ferried me to Morehead City that night. I changed into a shirt I grabbed from a clothesline.” He swallowed, fighting the dread creeping higher. “Where did you get this, Zach?” But he knew, oh, he knew. Elle had kept his shirt for all these years. The shirt he’d been wearing the night he left Pilot Isle.

  He wasn’t sure what that made him feel.

  Queasy, impatient, fearful.

  “Noah, you know where I got it. She left you a coat, too.”

  “Left? Where is she?”

  “Wherever she went, your friend Caroline went with her, so she’s not alone, thank God.” Zach retraced his steps, his stride chafing and furious. As he neared the skiff, he called over his shoulder, “I don’t understand why Ellie wanted you to have that. You’ll have to ask her, if you ever get to.”

  Noah flung the shirt to the ground and stared at the book in his hand. He had only seen it once, but he would never forget what his mother’s diary looked like. Not when her secrets had cost him so much.

  Why had Elle left this for him?

  A moment passed and then he understood.

  This was her way of saying good-bye.

  * * *

  “Are you going to go get him or do I have to?” Zach banged the skillet to the stove. A tarnished ladle followed.

  Caleb slouched in his chair, hung his head over the back and groaned low, where Zach couldn’t hear it. He drummed his fingertips on his thighs, wishing the aroma of dinner—fried ham and sweet potatoes—did something besides make his gut twist. He didn’t want to face his little brother across the scant width of a kitchen table. Not right now. Ellie had been gone for three weeks and each day proved worst than the last.

  “I don’t like going there,” he finally said. Shamed him, yes, because only children feared the burying ground. Shamed him, but truth was truth.

  “I don’t care what you like, Cale. Go get him. He’s like Rory right now. Doesn’t eat here, I don’t know if he eats at all.” Zach slammed a bowl of gravy to the table, rocking Caleb’s glass of tea. “From the lost weight, I don’t think he’s eating anywhere but here, that’s for sure. And what about the stunt he pulled with Sean Duggan, knocking him unconscious on the docks. Whatever Mrs. Bartram wrote in her letter, Lord, I believed Noah was going to kill the man. Someone has to talk some sense into him.”

  Caleb grabbed his wobbling glass in both hands. He’d been trying to get Noah’s skiff ready, hoping that would lighten his brother’s black mood. “I don’t understand women. I’ve been asking Christa to marry me for nigh on five years, and she always says no. Holy Mother Mary! What do you want me to say?” He took a slow sip of tea. “Anyhow, thinking about him and Ellie, well, it kind of makes me uncomfortable.”

  Zach wedged a knife between the pan edge and a cake of corn bread, snapped his wrist, and popped the steaming loaf onto a plate. “Makes you uncomfortable to imagine your brother in love?”

  Caleb wiped his chin and squirmed against the unforgiving seat. “Yeah, I guess. I mean, it is Ellie. Professor spent the night on Devil with her. God knows what they did.”

  Zach wedged a piece of corn bread into his mouth and chewed, a smile growing. “Doesn’t take God to figure that one.”

  “Stop. I don’t want to hear this. Practically my little sister you’re talking about.”

  Propping his hip on the counter, Zach folded his arms, and settled his stoic gaze on his brother. Damn, Caleb hated that look. “I never understood Noah either, Cale, if that admission makes you feel better. Less than you, safe to say. Always a step ahead of me, a step ahead of any child I ever met. And then Momma died, leaving me to raise him. I tried my best. And when the two of you... well, I figured giving him some time to think was the way to repair things.” He cupped his elbows in his hands and squeezed hard. “Let emotions settle. Only, he had the hurt fixed in his heart, so deeply fixed, there was no way to budge it. Every day that passed, he built these walls around himself, holding us out, betrayed and alone. And, he’s doing the building again, only this time with Ellie.”

  “Maybe she’ll—”

  “She won’t come back, not while he’s here. You remember what he told us, the list she found? Hell, what’s she to think?”

  Defeated, Caleb scooted his chair back and rose, his shoulders hunched. He rubbed the nape of his neck, trying to remove the stiffness. “I’ll go. I hate the danged burying ground, but I’ll go.”

  “Just listen if he wants to talk. Simple.” Zach turned to the stove. “Besides, I’m leaving to pick up Ellie’s friend, the woman who’s running the school. Savannah. I can’t remember her last name.” He jammed a dishrag in the waist of his trousers. “Anyway, I don’t care how you do it. Drag him here by his toes. I’m not letting him withdraw from this family again. And you’re going to help me, even if you have to spend the night in a graveyard.”

  Caleb put his shoulder into the screen door. “Not funny, Zach. Lots of spiders in that creepy place.” The door smacked behind him as he stalked across the porch, Zach’s laughter trailing him.

  * * *

  She could be pregnant.

  Settling back, Noah rested his head against the gnarled wisteria vines circling the oak’s trunk, wondering a little angrily if Elle had considered this fact. Three times posed significant risk. He hadn’t minded taking the risk or asking her to. He assumed they would wed soon after. Dammit, every day spen
t imagining a child growing inside her pushed him closer to the edge.

  His child.

  He closed his eyes and let the unbidden images flow, accepting the agony as his due. To save his sanity, he allowed this painful process twice a day. When he woke, reaching for her, and again in the afternoon, after stocking the laboratory library. Nights were unbearable unless he labored to the point of exhaustion. Which should cover him tonight as he had just finished a twelve-hour shift on the Nellie Dey.

  He searched for a comfortable spot, leaves crackling beneath him. Dappled sunlight danced over his unlaced brogans and seared his skin through his clothing. High above, branches stirred restlessly—restlessness he understood.

  He located the marks in the tree trunk with ease. Like he did each day, he traced them: Elle loves Noah. Christabel had carved the words when he was fourteen, disfiguring two trees in the burying ground—which most people avoided unless lowering a loved one—and every tree in the schoolyard. It had taken her an entire summer to complete the project, she’d once told him. Naturally, he had been mortified.

  Now... now he wished some of them read Noah loves Elle.

  Because he did love her.

  More deeply than he had believed was possible.

  Would she have left if she’d known? Would it have made any difference? Hadn’t he proven his love during their night on Devil? He assumed he had. Didn’t such spirited lovemaking speak the same of her feelings?

  Her betrayal, even if the fault lay at his doorstep, cut as deeply as Christa’s marks. He questioned ever trusting Elle, ever trusting himself, again.

  Behind him, the creak of the gate sounded, followed by a heavy tread on the path. Noah leaned out and a frown spread. He watched Caleb chart a hesitant course through the graveyard, dodging the shell slabs with devout consideration. He remembered his brother’s fears: spiders and haunts.

  Caleb halted, his fists diving into the pocket of his trousers. He stared at the vaulted brick Noah propped his left arm upon. “You shouldn’t be leaning all over someone’s final resting place, should you?”