She shook her head, pushing away the thought. She was absolutely not attracted to the resort’s security director. Hadn’t she just made it clear to him that they were to keep their dealings on a distant, professional level only?
She sighed. The only reason she had behaved so poorly toward Alex was because she had been embarrassed by the amused expression in his eyes when he had caught her practically drooling over him.
She had only recently extricated herself from an emotionally abusive relationship with her ex, Bradley Higgins. She certainly wasn’t ready to become involved with a man who most likely had every woman on the resort lusting after him.
Not that Alex had given even the slightest indication that he was interested in her.
Harriet settled into her seat with a grumbled harrumph. It dawned on her that she had only been on the island for less than two hours and she already had a public relations nightmare to deal with.
How could she put a positive spin on a dead body?
Chapter Four
Fortunately the ride back to Mermaid Cottage didn’t take long. Harriet thanked Albion for the lift and waved him off.
This time she noticed the small plaque over the door identifying the cottage–an exact replica of the tile mural in the bathroom etched into the bronze with Mermaid in Greek-style type over the top.
She let herself into the cool, soothing space and walked straight through to the large glass doors and stared out at the white sand and blue water beyond. The beauty of the scene felt surreal after the harsh reality of finding a dead man hanging in Solomon’s greenhouse.
A dead man! She shuddered. Who was he? And why did the killer leave him in the greenhouse? Was he trying to pin the murder on her friend?
She felt too agitated to sit and wait for Solomon–there were too many emotions whirling around inside her. She needed to think, and she did her best thinking while moving.
She quickly slipped off her sneakers and stepped through the door, closing the screen behind her. The soft warm ocean breeze in her face and the palm trees flanking her narrow lanai brought home the fact that she was not in cold New England any more. She now lived on a tropical island at the most luxurious resort in the world.
Even a dead body couldn’t change the fact that she had landed her dream job.
She stood for a moment and listened to the palm fronds rattling overhead in the breeze, and took several deep, calming breaths. Feeling slightly less jittery, Harriet headed down to the beach and turned in the opposite direction from the main resort.
Tomorrow she would tour the remainder of the resort: the kitchens and dining areas, the guest cottages, the amusement park, the circus, the spas, the marinas, and the theatre.
Mr. Wade had set out to create the ultimate vacation resort with something for every taste. Children were as welcome as adults, but not everyone liked being around them, so Harriet knew that a separate area for those who wanted nothing to do with the young crowd had been constructed away from the main resort.
It was a large island and Mr. Wade owned it all. She couldn’t wait to see more of it.
The smooth white sand felt warm on Harriet’s bare soles. She felt as if she was walking through fine sugar crystals. She ground and twisted her feet into the soft sand as she walked, reaching for the cooler, damp sand underneath, and soon felt her calf muscles burning from the effort.
Seagulls cried overhead and plopped onto the water next to her, gently bobbing on the shallow waves. Some sat for a few moments, watching her curiously before lifting off with a cry to join the others.
The occasional pink, white, or brown shell caught her eye and she stooped to pick them up, examining them before setting them back on the beach.
By the time all the tension left her body and her mind had emptied, she had reached the end of the beach and faced an impenetrable mangrove swamp. She sat on an exposed mangrove root and lazily dipped her feet in the warm water.
She felt bad that she had acted like a bitch toward Alex Hayes. She had actually told him to call her Harriet. She hated the name Harriet and always went by Harry.
What had come over her? She even told strangers to call her Harry.
She brooded as she watched a school of small, bright orange fish dart around her feet. A tiny green crab scuttled out from beneath a root and disappeared under another, and a large brown and white striped periwinkle made its slow way across the sandy bottom.
She knew exactly why she had behaved badly toward the security director. She just hated to admit it to herself.
Solly had been right, the man was a hubba-hubba of walking testosterone and she had felt a strong attraction to him.
Well, she wasn’t going there. She’d already made that particular mistake and paid dearly for it. She had no desire to repeat the experience.
Her ex Bradley was a very handsome and macho man and she had fallen for him hook, line, and sinker. When he asked her to live with him and move into his beautiful home on Portland’s Eastern Promenade, she had foolishly leaped at the chance, moving out of the large apartment she shared at the time with Solly.
In the beginning living with Bradley had been wonderful. Then the manipulation had started, so subtle at first that Harriet hadn’t even picked up on it.
Bradley wanted her to cancel a dinner date with Solly and be with him, so she had.
Or he’d ask her to cancel her yoga class to accompany him to the movies.
She had felt flattered that he wanted to spend time with her and cancelled her class. And she didn’t even like slasher films.
A year and a half passed before Harriet realized that her friends had stopped asking her to join them because she always had to do something with Bradley. She had even been dropped from her yoga class because she didn’t attend often enough to keep up her practice.
When she tried to talk with Bradley about needing to do more things on her own he accused her of having an affair and kept an even closer eye on her.
That’s when she knew she had made a terrible mistake.
She had examined her feelings and found that she no longer felt any love for Bradley. She had been seduced by the idea of having someone like him actually want a nobody like her, tall and gawky, runaway Harriet Monroe.
She realized then that she needed to move out and get her life back.
She also realized that a move to anywhere in the Portland area wouldn’t do it. Bradley was obsessed with her and would never leave her alone.
She began to feel afraid. Her work and her health had suffered.
Fortunately Solly had come through with an amazing job offer, and after a tense week of negotiating with Mr. Wade, here she was, thousands of miles away from her controlling ex.
She had packed only minimal summer clothing and her two treasures–her carved hippo collection and the holo of her parents–and caught a shuttle flight while Bradley was at work.
Afraid that Bradley might follow her, she had flown to several destinations before finally buying a ticket under an assumed name and flying to the island resort.
That was another thing she owed Solly for; he had found a way to provide her with a fake i.d. for the last shuttle flight.
A plop in the mangrove swamp brought Harriet out of her reverie. Solly was coming by to see her, and so was Alex Hayes. She needed to get back to her cottage.
She stood abruptly, sending a couple of small crabs and the fish darting away from her feet.
She had walked less than halfway back to the cottages when she saw Solly coming along the beach toward her. Despite his slight limp his long legs covered the ground at a good pace. He had ditched his shirt and put on a pair of ragged jean shorts. He looked tan and fit and handsome as hell.
She sighed. It really was a shame her best friend was gay. He could have been her perfect mate.
“Hi, doll.” Solly turned to join her and slung an arm around Harriet’s shoulder. “How’s my best girl doing? I hope the dead body hasn’t soured you on your new job. This is a great place to work, I
promise.”
Harriet realized that Solly hadn’t heard her tell Alex Hayes to call her Harriet. That was a good thing, otherwise Solly would know she had been attracted to the security director and tease her. Sometimes she thought Solly knew her better than she knew herself.
“I admit finding a dead body rattled me,” she said, placing her arm around Solly’s waist and matching her step to his, “but this place is so beautiful I couldn’t give up my job without at least giving it a solid shot.”
Solly squeezed her. “Good girl. Soooo, tell me, what did you think of Alex McDreamy? Is he worth several hubbas or what?” He grinned at her and Harriet laughed.
“Hubbas” were the way she and Solly rated the sex appeal of anyone they found attractive. It had started as a joke when they were teens, then stuck.
“Yeah, maybe,” she admitted. “I’ll give him one and a half hubbas, although his personality might negate them. He must have all the women on the resort panting after him the way he shoots out all that male T.”
“Ahhh, noticed that steamy testosterone, did you? I can tell you that many of the hired help, young and old, male and female, have all tried to catch our security director’s attention but so far none have succeeded.”
Harriet frowned. “I wonder why not. He seems normal. Maybe he has a wife stashed somewhere.”
“Or maybe he was injured in some war and no longer has the use of his . . . equipment.”
“Sol! That’s an awful thought.”
“I agree. It would be a real shame for that hunk of man flesh to be impotent.”
They had reached Harriet’s cottage and stepped up to the lanai.
“Leave a towel out here when you take walks on the beach,” Solomon advised. He showed her an outside faucet with a short hose attached. “You can rinse your feet here. That way you won’t track sand inside.”
Harriet poked her friend. “Leave it to you to think of that, Mr. Neat and Tidy. I promise I will leave a towel when I take a walk and not track sand inside my new home.”
Solomon acted offended. “I’m just thinking of the help. Rebecca and her daughter Amy clean our cottages once a week, on Thursdays. Their salary is covered by the resort but I always leave a little extra for them on the kitchen counter.”
“Good to know. I can’t believe that I’ll actually be living in this cottage. When Albion brought me here to unload my bags I thought he’d made a mistake and taken me to a guest cottage.”
They rinsed their feet and went inside. Solomon sat on the couch and stretched his arms along the back. “Mr. Wade is using psychology on us,” he said as he put his bare feet on the bamboo coffee table.
Harriet sat in one of the chairs opposite and tucked her legs up under her. The chair cushions were roomy and soft and comfortable. It felt good to be sitting like this with Solly again. Over the years they had spent many an hour simply sitting and talking when they lived together.
“What do you mean?” she asked him.
She had missed having Solly in her life. Missed his unwavering friendship, his irreverent view of anything that wasn’t related to plants. She had especially missed his keen insight into people.
Unfortunately she hadn’t listened when Solly had tried to warn her early on about Bradley Higgins.
“Wade wants to hire and keep good help,” Solomon answered. “One way to do that is to pay us well, which he does. Another way is to provide us with beautiful accommodations so we never want to leave.”
““He sure nailed the accommodations. My office is beautiful too. Have you met our employer yet?” Harriet asked. “We talked several times before he hired me but he always blocked the vid screen. I’m curious about him.”
“Nope. He did the same thing with me. I tried to find a photo of the man but there’s nothing. Plenty of stories about his businesses and charitable donations but apparently he keeps his personal life well under the radar. He even sends representatives to charity functions rather than attend himself. No one here that I’ve asked has met him in person either.”
“Hmmm. I wonder if Alex Hayes has met him. You’d think Mr. Wade would want to get the measure of the resort’s security director personally before hiring him.”
Solly shook his head. “I have no idea. Why don’t you ask him when he comes to question you?”
“I’ll do that.”
A soft chime sounded. “What’s that?”
“Your doorbell.” Solomon rose from the couch. “That’ll be Alex. I’ll catch up with you later. Come to my place around seven for dinner. I’m right next door in Venus.”
Solomon slipped out the back door and was gone.
Chapter Five
Alex stood outside Harriet’s door waiting for her to answer. He had observed her walking down the beach with Solomon, their arms wrapped around each other.
Were they an item? He could have sworn Solomon was interested in men, not women. Maybe the head gardener swung both ways.
He found the thought irritating.
The door opened and Harriet stood there looking windblown and flushed. He noticed that her bare feet were fine-boned, nicely shaped, and she had painted her toenails a soft shell pink.
She had the strangest colored silver-blue eyes he’d ever seen. Not quite silver-gray, not quite blue. They seemed to change, like liquid silver reflecting the sky. Changing eye color was a popular fashion choice these days but something told him Harriet Monroe had been born with hers.
“Are you coming in or did you want to interrogate me on the stoop?” she asked him.
Alex gave her his best ex-cop stare, eyes hooded. “I think inside would be best.”
“Very well.” She stood back and ushered him inside. “I suppose you’d like something to drink. I’m not sure what, if anything, has been stocked in my chiller. I haven’t been on the island long enough to find out where to get supplies.”
“That’s easy,” Alex said, following her into the kitchen. “Room and board is part of your salary. You place your grocery order by end of day Monday with Lana and the kitchen will add it to their own order. You’ll have to eat in the employee dining room until then.”
He pulled out a padded stool at the pale rose granite counter and sat. “You should find an order form in the drawer beside the chiller,” he continued. “A member of the kitchen staff will deliver your order on Wednesdays and stock your Redi-Meal unit if you request made-up meals. Of course you can cook your own meals or as I said, you always have the option of dining in the employee dining room.”
Surprised, Harriet stopped and looked at Alex. She hadn’t expected such a long, helpful answer from him.
She opened the chiller and peered inside. “I have lemonade, water, some kind of red fruit juice, and white wine.”
She pulled out one of the white wines. “Sauvignon Blanc. I’m going to have a glass. It’s been a long day. Do you want one?”
“I’m working, so no, thanks. Lemonade would be good.” He didn’t really want anything to drink, but he sensed that Harriet was nervous and figured having something to do would help her relax.
“So,” he said, taking the tall, frosty glass she handed him, “what do you think of our island so far? You haven’t been here long, have you?”
He watched her closely over the glass as he took a sip of the cold, tart drink. The island’s kitchen staff made the best lemonade Alex had ever tasted. He set the glass on the counter and waited for Harriet to pour her wine.
He knew the precise time Harriet’s shuttle flight had landed. He even knew she had traveled under an assumed name and he definitely intended to find out why.
Harriet returned the wine to the chiller and took a sip from her glass. It tasted crisp and cold with just the right balance of tart and fruity. She felt some of her tension over being interrogated ease away.
And why did she feel tense? she wondered. She didn’t have anything to do with the dead man. She should look on this as an interesting life experience. She gave a small shrug.
“I’ve only been here a few hours, Mr. Hayes. My office is lovely. This cottage is lovely. I love the beach and the warm sun and I’m thrilled to hook up with my friend Solomon.
“Let’s sit in the living room,” she suggested, moving out from behind the granite island. “I just took a walk on the beach and between travel and the flight and the fresh air and sun I suddenly feel exhausted. I want to put my feet up.”
She led the way to the living room where she plopped down into a chair and stacked her bare feet on the coffee table. Taking another sip of her wine she stifled a sigh. It was true, she did suddenly feel exhausted. She looked at the security director and waited.
Alex sat on the couch across from Harriet so he could watch her. Her skin had paled beneath the slight sunburn she had picked up and he noticed a sprinkling of small freckles across the bump on the bridge of her somewhat prominent nose. Her intelligent eyes–those odd, mesmerizing silver-blue eyes–were steady on him.
She pushed her thick honey-blond hair off her face and sighed. “Was it suicide?” she asked, when he didn’t speak right away. “The way he was just . . . hanging there.” She shuddered. “So sad. Was he one of the resort’s employees?”
Alex ignored her questions. He set his drink on a coaster shaped like a scallop shell. “So, you arrived on the island today?” he asked instead.
“Yes. I took the nine o’clock shuttle flight from the mainland.”
“And you went straight to the greenhouse?” He had spoken with both Lana and Albion so he knew that wasn’t true.
“No. I had the driver who met the shuttle take me to my office where I met Lana from the kitchen. She sent Albion to me to give me a tour of the resort. He brought me here first.”
Harriet yawned and covered her mouth. “Sorry.”
She shook her head to try to clear it. She hoped the security director didn’t have too many questions, the day had caught up with her and what little wine she’d drunk had put her over the edge. She wanted to crawl into her bed and take a nap.
“Have you ever seen the dead man before today?”
Stalked in Paradise Page 3
