A Journey of the Heart Collection

by Colleen Coble

  “Haylie will be fine if you’re five minutes late. Don’t stress.”

  Easy enough for Carol to say. She didn’t have children. “I’ve got to run. Talk to you when I get home.”

  She dropped her phone back into her purse, then drummed her fingers on the steering wheel as traffic stopped at another light. The clock on the dash flipped another minute closer to two fifty. The light changed to green and she shot through it.

  Kids milled around the schoolyard as she pulled to the curb. She scanned the area for Haylie’s red jacket.

  Her breath caught in her throat when she saw her fourteen-year-old daughter talking to someone in a gray van. Wasn’t that the same gray van she’d seen parked outside the house last week? That definitely had not been her imagination.

  She threw open her door and ran toward her daughter. “Haylie!”

  Her daughter looked up, her dark-brown eyes wide. The van’s tires squealed as it peeled away from the curb. Mallory tried to see the driver as it sped past, but the windows were tinted, and she couldn’t see more than a shape inside.

  She reached Haylie and grabbed her arm. “I’ve told you never to talk to strangers.”

  Haylie rolled her eyes. “He was only asking if I knew someone. I told him I didn’t. Chill out, Mom.”

  Mallory gritted her teeth and swallowed the rebuke wanting to burst out. “He could have grabbed you and taken off.”

  Haylie shifted her khaki backpack to her shoulder. “Why do you have to make such a big deal out of everything?” She took off toward the car in an angry stride.

  Mallory sighed and followed. Her daughter had no idea just how unsafe the world could be, how quickly life could go from perfect to shattered beyond repair. One mistake and the world could change. She knew that only too well.

  She turned and stared after the van. Something bad could have happened because she’d been late. She had to be extra vigilant.

  Her purse vibrated and she dug around for her silenced phone. Dad flashed on the screen and her smile vanished. Things had been tense between them for so many years, and she wished for the umpteenth time that she could find a way to turn back the clock.

  Haylie waved to her from the passenger seat, and Mallory turned her back to her daughter’s impatient face. “Hi, Dad.” She forced a light note into her voice.

  Only silence answered her. Was that the distant sound of a boat engine? “Dad, are you there? I hear gulls, but I can’t hear you.” She detected a faint gasp, and her fingers tightened around the phone. “Dad?” Was he having a heart attack? He’d put on twenty pounds this year, all around the middle. He was a heart attack waiting to happen.

  Pulling the phone from her ear, she saw full bars. The problem wasn’t on her end. “Dad?”

  A choking sound vibrated in her ear, then his shaky voice whispered across the miles. “Love you . . . always. Find . . . Mother.” A rattle sounded as though he needed to clear his throat and couldn’t. “Tell . . . Haylie. Love her.”

  “Dad!” Her chest squeezed as the import of his words hit. He must be delusional. Her mother had been dead for fifteen years. “Where are you? I’ll come right now.”

  “Should have . . . known better.” The words were barely a whisper. A long sigh eased through the phone, and something clunked.

  Pressing the phone tighter to her ear, she heard only the sound of the gulls, the lap of waves, and the putt-putt of the boat motor. “Dad, talk to me!”

  He was on his boat, but where? She spoke his name again and waited. Nothing. Had he fallen? Maybe the clunk was the phone dropping to the deck. She didn’t want to hang up, not while the connection held. How could she find him?

  Wait, she had a family tracker app on her phone. Just for fun, she’d connected her dad’s phone with hers. Still maintaining the connection with her father, she flipped over to the app and located his phone. It was near Folly Shoals. He must have been delivering the mail.

  She went back to the phone call. “Dad?”

  She got the wa-wa sound of a disconnected call in her ear.

  A number popped into Mallory’s head and she punched it in, then walked farther away so Haylie couldn’t hear what was going on.

  A deep male voice answered on the second ring. “Game Warden O’Connor.”

  Her chest tightened at the familiar voice. Had she really called Kevin O’Connor? “Kevin, it’s Mallory. Dad’s in trouble. Can you go check on him?”

  There was a slight hesitation. “Mallory?”

  His cautious tone told her all she needed to know about his feelings. “Hurry, Kevin. I-it sounded like he was dying.” She gave him the coordinates.

  “I’ll call you.”

  “Give me two hours. On my way.” She hung up and called her dad back again.

  Only the gulls answered.

  Claire Dellamare lifted her face to the wind and let it toss her hair as she inhaled the briny scent of the sea. Luke Rocco turned off the boat’s engine, then threw the anchor overboard. The rocky crags of Mermaid Point, a westward promontory of Folly Shoals Island, rose to their left and blocked a bit of the sun glaring in her eyes. She could just make out the metal roof of Breakwater Cottage where Edmund Blanchard lived. He was a familiar sight around the Downeast as he delivered the mail by boat.

  She turned to smile at Luke. “Why are we stopping here? I thought we were going to check out the orca pod.”

  Luke’s good looks never failed to thrill her. With his nearly black hair and dark-brown eyes, he could have been a pirate in the old days. Finding him at the beach six months ago had been her lucky day, and knowing he loved her was a little bit of God’s grace given to her.

  “We are. There was something else I wanted to talk to you about first.”

  Her stomach plunged at his somber expression. “Walker?”

  He rose from his seat at the controls. “No, Dad’s fine. He’s taken the news that I’m selling the cranberry farm better than I expected. I think he’s weary of the battle, too, and he knows I can’t keep up with the farm and my duties in the Coast Guard too. He’s got other things on his mind now.” A ghost of a smile lifted his lips. “Like dancing attendance on Dixie.”

  Claire had to chuckle. Seeing Walker start to date again after all those years as a widower had been a hoot. He was like a teenager. “You scared me there for a minute. So, what’s wrong? You look so serious.”

  He reached into his pocket and withdrew a box. “This is a momentous moment.”

  A ring box.

  Her breath caught in her throat, and her heart rate pumped into overdrive as he dropped to one knee. It was happening now. Right now. Her lungs compressed, and she stared into his handsome face and the eyes she loved so much.

  He opened the little velvet box, and a beautiful marquis ring set with diamonds and tourmaline sparkled in the bright Maine sunshine. “I can’t imagine my life without you in it, Claire. Will you marry me? I love you more than I can say.”

  A lump formed in her throat and her vision blurred. They’d been through so much together. Things that should have shoved them apart, not brought them together. “I . . . I love you too. And of course I’ll marry you. Today, tomorrow, anytime you say.”

  He rose and slipped the ring on her finger. She threw her arms around his neck, and his lips came down on hers. It was the sweetest kiss they’d ever shared, warm and passionate with promise and commitment. She closed her eyes and clung to him. If she didn’t open her eyes, maybe she could make this moment last forever, like a secret treasure only the two of them found.

  When Luke broke the kiss, she murmured a protest and tried to pull his head back down. His grunt of surprise made her lids spring open. “What’s wrong?”

  He was frowning as he looked toward the pier at the breakwater below the point. “That’s Edmund’s boat, and it seems to be drifting aimlessly. And the game warden is just about to it. I think something’s wrong. I should go see if there’s anything I can do to help Kevin.” His radio squawked with a request fo
r aid from the Coast Guard. “That’s Kevin’s voice.”

  The boat bobbed in the waves about a mile off Mermaid Point. And she saw no sign of Edmund. “Let’s help.”

  TWO

  Edmund’s boat floated aimlessly in the choppy waves toward the rocky shore off the island of Folly Shoals. Kevin consulted the GPS on his boat console and throttled back the engine. His boat slewed sideways and came to a stop beside the blue-and-white mail boat. Mallory’s call had set all Kevin’s alarms ringing, and the sharp kee-arr of a tern overhead added to his unease.

  He tossed an anchor overboard, then tied up his boat to the mail boat and stepped aboard. “Edmund?” He moved toward the bridge, past the bay where Edmund had stacked the freight for delivery to Folly Shoals. The atmosphere aboard ship had a stillness, as if the boat held its breath along with him. Sheer imagination, but he couldn’t shake the feeling of dread that curdled his lunch of lobster bisque in his belly.

  He raised his voice above the wind whistling outside the windows. “Edmund, it’s Warden Kevin O’Connor.”

  It felt odd to identify himself as a game warden instead of his first name. He’d looked up to Mallory’s father for as long as he could remember. The whole area knew Edmund well. A lobster-man from a family that had fished these waters since the 1800s, Edmund was one of those men who had forgotten more about the sea than most men ever knew. He’d given up lobstering after his wife died and had gone to mail boat delivery instead.

  A sharp coppery scent mingled with the smell of sea and kelp, and under all of it, a slight aroma of something sweet and perfumy. Kevin’s steps faltered as he recognized the stench of blood. He curled his fingers into his palms and ducked to enter the bridge doorway.

  He saw Edmund’s boot first. Then his outstretched hand, and lastly, his head with a spreading pool of blood under it. He stepped over the chart map lying on the floor, then knelt and touched the older man’s neck, searching for a pulse. No sign of life. Edmund’s flesh was cold.

  Kevin swallowed hard and retraced the steps to his boat to call the Coast Guard. Edmund had a radio on the Mermaid, but Kevin didn’t want to contaminate any evidence. The bleeding head wound could have come from a bad fall, but until the investigation was completed, he didn’t want to be accused of messing up a crime scene. After reporting his discovery, he used his cell phone to call the sheriff and the state police.

  His cell phone began to play “The River” by Garth Brooks. Mallory. No way did he want to be the bearer of such bad news, but he couldn’t ignore his duty. Or the way his heart still leapt at the sight of her name.

  Inhaling, he answered the call. “Warden O’Connor.”

  “Kevin?” Mallory’s voice quivered with a thread of terror. “Did you find Dad?”

  He turned to stare at the island cliff rising toward the drifting clouds. An eagle’s nest caught his attention, and he counted four small heads as he tried to decide how to phrase his answer. Should he be blunt or try to put her off?

  He couldn’t lie to her. “I found him, Mallory. I’m sorry, but there was nothing I could do.”

  At the sound of her choked cry, his free hand curled into a fist. He’d give anything to spare her this pain. She’d lost both her parents now, and he still cared about what she faced, even if he hadn’t seen her in fifteen years. Soft weeping vibrated in his ear, and he waited until her sobs tapered off.

  “The state boys are on their way and so is the sheriff. The Coast Guard will be here any minute.”

  “What happened? H-heart attack?”

  “I don’t know for sure yet.” Details could wait until he saw her in person. She didn’t need to know about the blood, not yet. “What’s your ETA?”

  “About an hour. You’re still with him?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Good. I’ll be there as fast as I can. Where will they take him?”

  A couple of orcas swam by the boat, and he watched their trajectory toward Sunset Bay. Even though he didn’t want to, he had to come clean. “Probably to the coroner’s.”

  She gasped. “There will be an autopsy? Why would they do that? You don’t think it was a heart attack?”

  “He had some kind of head wound. It might have been from a bad fall, but the coroner will have to make that determination.”

  “A fall?”

  The phone went silent in his ear, and he pulled it away a moment to make sure the connection hadn’t dropped. Cell service was sketchy out here. “Mallory?”

  “I’m here, just thinking. Dad said something odd when he called me. He told me to find my mom. I thought he was delusional since Mom is dead. What if he was trying to tell me a woman had hurt him?”

  “You’re stretching, Mallory. Why would he mention your mom when it couldn’t possibly be?”

  “Maybe he was confused and it came out wrong.”

  “Let’s wait and see what the coroner says. I’m sorry though, Mal.” The old nickname slipped out before he could stop it, and he cleared his throat. “I mean, I know this is going to be hard for you and Haylie. Is she with you?”

  “Not yet. I left her with my friend. Carol will drive her up in a couple of days.” Her words choked off on a sob. “For th-the funeral, I guess.”

  “Is there anyone I can call for you?” As far as he knew, Edmund only had a sister, Blanche, who lived near Bucksport. She and Edmund hadn’t gotten along for as long as he could remember.

  “No, thanks though. I’ll give Aunt Blanche a call. C-can you meet me at Dad’s? I don’t think I can go in there by myself.”

  “Yeah, of course. Text me or call when you hit Folly Shoals, and I’ll meet you at the ferry dock.” He hung up as he heard a boat approaching. Maybe by the time Mallory arrived, he’d have some answers.

  Turning, he recognized Luke Rocco with his girlfriend, Claire Dellamare, who also happened to be Kevin’s cousin. Raising his hand, he stepped over to help Luke tie off his boat.

  Carol’s Explorer reeked with the pungent odor of the pepperoni pizza in the take-out box on the backseat. She found it hard to keep her mind on Haylie’s chatter from the passenger seat. When Mallory had called with the bad news and to ask her to pick up her daughter, Mallory told her not to tell Haylie. It seemed wrong to keep her grandfather’s death from her. Poor kid loved her grandpa. He was the only male influence in her life, though she didn’t see him as often as Carol thought she should. The old man should have just let go of the past.

  “So is it okay?”

  Haylie’s words finally penetrated the fog encasing Carol’s brain. “Is what okay?”

  Haylie exhaled in a sharp whoosh. “If I have a couple of friends over tonight? It’s Friday.”

  “Oh, honey, I don’t think that’s a good idea with your mom gone. We have to pack and join her in Folly Shoals.”

  “But I’ll miss Alisha’s birthday party tomorrow! She actually invited me, and I can’t miss it.”

  Fourteen going on eighteen. Carol’s glance took in Haylie’s determined expression. When did kids start growing up so fast? Mallory had her hands full most of the time. Even just two years ago Haylie had only cared about what her mother thought. Then she started middle school, and suddenly the only ones with anything important to say were a group of five friends on the swim team who had more money than sense. If it weren’t for Haylie’s grandpa, she wouldn’t be taking those expensive swim lessons. Did the girl know how close her poor mom skated to the edge financially?

  Carol pulled the car into the drive of Mallory’s modest cottage in a cul-de-sac. “You’ll have to talk to your mother.”

  “Can I borrow your cell phone?”

  Carol handed it over and grabbed the pizza box from the backseat. “Don’t be too long. The pizza will get cold.”

  Haylie’s head was already down as her fingers tapped their way across the phone’s screen. “I’ll be right in.”

  Shaking her head, Carol got out and dropped
her keys into her pocket as she approached the front door. When she unlocked it and stepped inside, she heard a sliding noise like a tennis shoe slipping across the tile. Was someone in here or was she imagining it? She stopped and tried to hear over the pounding of the blood in her ears. There. It came again, then she heard a snick.

  “Hello?” Her voice quavered.

  She shouldn’t stay here. The pizza box fell from her nerveless fingers, and she whirled toward the door. She caught a flurry of movement, and a man with a ski mask over his face rushed at her from the kitchen.

  She gasped and reached for the doorknob, but he grabbed her arm and whipped her around to face him. “You’re not the Davis woman. Where is she?”

  Think! She slipped her hand into her coat pocket. “She’s not here.”

  “No joke, Sherlock.” His fingers tightened on her arm. “Where is she?”

  Before she could talk herself out of it, Carol jammed the key into his hand with all her might. The moment his grip loosened, she tore loose and threw open the front door. She exited the door screaming at the top of her lungs.

  The next-door neighbor was driving by in his pickup. It screeched to a halt. He came running up the walk toward her. “Carol, what’s wrong?”

  She pointed. “An intruder. He grabbed me.” Her insides matched the shake in her voice.

  “Get in your car and lock it. Call the police.” He jerked out a hunting knife from a sheath in his boot, threw open the door, and charged through the front door.

  Carol rushed to her car and practically fell inside. She locked all the doors, then grabbed her cell phone out of Haylie’s hands.

  “Hey!” Haylie tried to grab it back.

  Turning her back on the sulking girl, Carol called 911 and reported the break-in. “Yes, I’ll stay on the line until officers arrive.” Haylie’s eyes were huge when Carol glanced back at her.

  The neighbor exited the house and shook his head. “The back door is standing open and there’s no one inside.”