Safe Harbor

by Antoinette Stockenberg

  She got there before he did, and threw it wide open.

  "Well—look who's back," she said, trying to sound the way she did not feel. "Percy Billings."

  Chapter 13

  With a wry smile, Sam said, "Hey, kiddo. How's it goin'?" .

  "Never a dull moment. If you're here for the crab salad, I ate it all."

  "That's all right. It would have gone bad."

  "Things do, left unattended."

  His answer was a puzzled, painfully attractive smile.

  So that's what charisma looks like, Holly thought: a loopy smile in a handsome face that made the heart soar and then plunge like an ill-managed kite. Who needed that? All in all, she could do just fine without charisma.

  "Are you going to ask me inside?"

  "Do you have wounds that need tending?"

  "Nope. For the moment I'm shipshape," he said, still smiling.

  "Then why are you here?" To see me, to see me. Say it. The kite began climbing in a dizzying spiral.

  "I ran into a brick wall in Boston, so I thought I'd backtrack a little and start from where I left off. Which is to say, here."

  Nosedive. "She hasn't come back, if that's what you mean."

  "I didn't think she had. Not alone, anyway. But sooner or later your father has to bring the Vixen back to his dock. When he does, I'll be there waiting."

  "What do you plan to do? Perch on a pole like a seagull?"

  Again the smile; up went the kite.

  "Not if I can find a place to rent."

  Up and up and up. "If you mean the place I think you mean, it's all but spoken for. I showed the apartment to five waitresses last night, and they loved it. They're coming by tonight with a deposit."

  He had just one word to say to that. "Five?"

  "It's the only way they can afford the rent. They promised to be as quiet as butterflies."

  "Did you check out their references?"

  "They didn't have any; this is their first place."

  He laughed out loud at that. "You're new at this landlord stuff, I see."

  "Not at all," she said dryly. "You'll recall that I rented to Eden. I figure I have nowhere to go but up."

  The smile softened into something like commiseration. "Don't rent to them."

  "I need the money."

  "I have the money. Rent to me."

  "Sam, I can't," she said in anguish, even as that kite soared ever higher. "Things have happened. You don't know." What was she doing, yammering on about the apartment? "Something's happened. Eden is missing. It doesn't look good. My father's being questioned. And a man was here, looking for Eden. He was some kind of thug. I'm just on my way to the police station. You didn't notice the Coast Guard helicopter, either, I'll bet," she said, finishing up on a dizzying note.

  Sam blinked and tried to take it all in, then gestured inside. "Do you mind if we sit down?"

  Holly suddenly realized that she'd been barring the door to him. "I'm sorry," she said, stepping back to let him. "New force of habit."

  She led him into her locked-up living room and opened all the windows again before taking a seat opposite him in front of that brick hearth that she loved so well. The firebox was in hibernation now, hiding behind a copper screen painted over with bright red poppies, deep purple irises, and lacy green ferns. The painted firescreen was Holly's first effort—not as good as some that she had done since then on commission, but much more beloved.

  Books and magazines and sketches were heaped in sliding piles on the battered seaman's chest that sat foursquare in front of the slipcovered sofa, confined to shore duty for now. A gust of wind sent some sketches tumbling like rose petals onto the rag rug, adding to the sense of cheery disarray.

  Sam seemed to take in the room and then dismiss it, which made Holly wince. One woman's clutter is another man's litter, she supposed. He was probably one of those minimalist types. She hated minimalism.

  "From the beginning," he said.

  She related the news, if that's what it was, that Marjory had delivered about Eric and Eden—only without the pregnant pauses, raised eyebrows, and cheap dramatic tricks to which her mother's friend had resorted. Holly was entirely adult about it, entirely calm. But when she was done she yielded briefly to a shudder of stressed-out sobs.

  "I'm sorry," she said, pulling herself back out of her emotional tailspin. She plucked a tissue from a nearby box and blew her nose. "This is just such an unbelievable, ongoing ... disaster."

  Sam had let her speak, sob, and apologize, all without interruption. It was unnerving. "Aren't you going to say something?" she asked.

  "I don't believe it."

  "Of course not. None of us does. But that's where all the evidence points—and then there's my mother's dream."

  "About?"

  "Eden. It was horrible. I've never seen my mother so terrified in my life." Holly described the nightmare In a few terse phrases, then added, "My mother has always had premonitions that way. The night that my uncle in Phoenix died in his sleep, she dreamed that she was packing a suitcase with black clothes, including a hat with a black veil like Jacqueline Kennedy wore. Five years ago, at the exact same moment that my grandmother had a fatal heart attack, my mother started up from a deep sleep during a vacation in California with a melody going through her head: it was the melody from Doctor Zhivago, my grandmother's favorite song in the world."

  "It means your mother had fears for their health," Sam said quietly. "That's all."

  Holly shook her head. "Both deaths were unexpected," she argued. "There have been other dreams, lesser dreams, but they've been just as eerily on the mark. My mother gets devastating migraines afterward. Believe me, this isn't exactly a gift that she has."

  Sam hardly heard her. For a long moment he sat with a look of intense concentration on his face. And then he jumped—exploded, really—out of his chair.

  "No way! No way! This is too much like Eden. This is exactly the kind of stunt she'd pull."

  "Really? She'd do something like that?" He may as well have told Holly that there really was a Santa Claus.

  "Absolutely," he said. He grabbed the mantel with both hands and leaned into it as if he wanted to push it through the wall. "She's not dead," he muttered at the floor. "She's not dead! She can't be!"

  Holly stared at him. She didn't want Eden to be dead, either, but ... some of the oppressiveness returned, she didn't know why.

  "Tell me about this thug," Sam said without turning around. "Was he tall and thin or short and fat?"

  "Tall. He didn't look thin to me."

  "Did he tell you his name?"

  "No. He had a gold tooth."

  "Stefan Koloman! Damn, what was he doing here?"

  "Well—terrorizing me, for one thing. He was this close to knocking me down and searching the place for Eden," Holly said, pinching her thumb and middle finger together. "He's convinced that I'm her friend and hiding her."

  She stood up and went over to the mantel, then propped her hands on her hips in her best I-demand-an-explanation pose. "How do you know this guy, anyway? Please don't tell me he's a golfing buddy."

  "He's a dealer," Sam said.

  Holly laughed and said, "Of what? Marijuana?"

  "I wouldn't be surprised. At the moment, he also has a gallery full of what looks like forged or stolen art. But I'm no authority; I was picking up on the ambiance more than anything else," Sam said dryly. "Anyway, he found a buyer who was willing to buy the engraving no questions asked. Eden—"

  "Cut him out of his commission?"

  He smiled and said, "You're quick."

  "I understand dealers and commissions. You did meet Claire at the Flying Horses Gallery, didn't you? Cut Claire out of a deal, and you wouldn't be left with hands to create any art, good, bad, or forged." She added thoughtfully, "But then, Claire's from New York."

  Sam laughed and then suddenly they were standing there, in front of Holly's sweet and cozy hearth, with nothing much to say.

  It was Sam who b
roke the awkward silence. "Holly, I'm sorry I dragged you into this. I mean that." To say that he looked sheepish would be grossly overstating it; but he definitely looked sincere.

  "Oh, that's all right," she said, feeling a fierce blush overtake her features. She hated that, hated the way her emotions paraded themselves over her face whenever they felt like it. Holly Anderson, daughter of a Dane! Where was the justice? Where were the genes?

  He said softly, "No, really. You've been a great sport about everything."

  "Especially the seaplane," she stuck in, harking back to the event fondly now.

  Sam grinned and said, "Billy sends his regards, by the way."

  "He made the wedding in time?"

  "Yep. The bride got airsick. She's suing Billy in small claims court for the cost of the wedding dress."

  "Oh, well."

  "Holly, I ..." Sam blew out air and tried again. "I never meant for you to get caught in the crossfire. I've come back to the Vineyard for two reasons. One of them is to wait for the Vixen's return. The other is to ask for your apology. I haven't exactly been— well! Friends?" He offered his hand.

  Her kite-heart had been soaring, but that last word sent it plummeting down to earth. Friends. The word had such a pre-emptive ring to it. Friends. She didn't want to be his stupid friend.

  Whether it showed in her face—safe guess—she never afterward knew, but as soon as Sam had her hand in his, he pulled her gently into his embrace. With a sigh of consent, she let him hold her in his arms. Inhaling deep, she closed her eyes and savored the moment of him. Her joy ran deep; maybe being friends wasn't so awful after all.

  Still, it seemed to Holly that the hug went on a little longer than a friendly hug should. It must have seemed that way to Sam, too, because after he separated from her, he held her at arm's length and said gruffly, "Okay, then. That's settled."

  Her eyes got wider. "Settled" seemed strong. She tried not to smile and more or less succeeded. Sam looked confused. Good.

  She said, "You can have the apartment."

  More confusion. Sam glanced off in another direction, then looked back into her eyes—with an effort, she thought. "That wasn't my motive."

  "In offering to be friends? Of course not."

  "No, seriously, I—" He pulled himself up short after he saw the smile she could no longer hide. Smiling himself, he said. "You're a witchy kind of innocent, you know that?"

  "Not me. Everyone says I'm as sweet as scilla in spring."

  "They judge you through your art. I'm going by the look in your eyes."

  She wanted to hold that look, whatever it was, but she could feel it go. Her lashes fluttered down and she said, "Do you want the key?"

  "I do."

  "I'll get—oh, nuts. It's in my purse, and I left my purse at my mother's house. She's in bed with another mi—anyway, I don't dare telephone."

  The word had barely tumbled from her lips when the phone on her sofa table rang. It was her mother calling, a not uncommon coincidence between the two. "Hi, Mom," she said, purposely cuing Sam in. He wandered over to the French doors that led to a small brick patio and made a pretense of looking at the garden that surrounded it.

  "How are you feeling?" she asked, but she could hear by her mother's rapid breathing that it couldn't be very well.

  "Holly, Holly," her mother said in a voice of anguish. "I was just out on the deck. It's back. It's back. The Vixen is back!"

  Chapter 14

  Feeling like a helpless passenger in a runaway stagecoach, Sam watched through half-shut eyes as Holly blasted into and out of the slow-moving cars headed for downtown Vineyard Haven. The wild ride came to a welcome if abrupt halt in the drive of the Andersons' enviably situated house, and Holly jumped out of the truck with Sam hard on her heels.

  As they waited for Charlotte Anderson to answer the bell, Sam noted with approval that the house hadn't been tricked out to boring perfection. The weathered shingles were loose in spots, and the trim was peeling here and there. The black, louvered shutters were thick with generations of paint. The brass light fixtures flanking the massive door had not been lacquered into an unnatural state of shine, but over the years had acquired a pleasing patina of verdigris. The overall effect was of a large, genteel house that had been allowed to age with charm and grace.

  Too bad that Eric Anderson wasn't letting his wife do the same.

  Charlotte Anderson answered the door at last, and Sam was immediately struck with the resemblance between mother and daughter. The same vulnerability in the same deeply luminous green eyes is what hit him first; but he saw that the nose, the chin, the cheekbones were cut from the same cloth as well. Of all things, he saw a spark of Eden in both mother and daughter—a kind of don't-push-me-too-far steeliness that surprised him. Of course, with Eden, you took that as a challenge; it was almost fun to goad her into a reaction. But with these two ....

  He made a mental note never to test them.

  "Mom, this is Sam."

  "Sam?" her mother said, turning to him in surprise. "I thought you said he'd—"

  "Never mind. It's him. Sam, my mother."

  "Pleased to meet you, Mrs. Anderson."

  "Uh-huh. How do you do?"

  He wanted to say, "Like you: going in goddamned circles," but he settled for some mindless pleasantry, which—considering that they were missing a body and getting ready to descend on the man who might have hidden it—seemed especially surreal just then.

  "You're sure it's the Vixen?" Holly asked her mother.

  "Of course I am. Go up and see for yourself."

  "I will," said Holly, and she charged up the curving staircase.

  Sam wasn't sure that he ought to charge past the mother after the daughter—what was it about these Anderson women that they enjoyed blocking his way?—so he stood at the threshold and tried not to shuffle his feet.

  "This is an awkward business," he offered after futilely wracking his brain for something to say.

  "Yes, isn't it?" Charlotte said brightly. "And just when you think it can't get any more awkward, something awkwarder goes and happens. I'm getting quite used to it!" She flashed him a dazzling grin, then turned and hurried up the steps after Holly, leaving Sam to shuffle his feet some more.

  Well, hell, speaking of awkward ....

  He waited a moment, then stepped onto one of the wide planks of the spacious entry hall and closed the door gingerly behind him. How long could it take to figure out if a boat was at a dock or not? For two cents he'd hijack Holly's pickup and drive down to the marina on his own.

  Patience. He clamped his jaw down tight and made himself stay where he was.

  The more he thought about it, the more he was convinced that Eden was simply up to her old tricks—in which case, the trail was getting colder by the minute. He didn't really know if at this point he was looking for cash, or uncut diamonds, or pre-Columbian art, or a deed to a farm. Eden could have fenced the engraving for just about anything.

  He decided arbitrarily to go with the presumption of cash. The question then became, had she taken it in small bills or in large? The first would be easier to use; the second, to carry. She could cram quite a few thousand-dollar bills into a waterproof knapsack, not to mention a drip-dry tunic to get around in, if she really did have a plan to slip away from the windsurfer after faking her death. Why she'd fake that death to look like murder—that was harder to figure out.

  One thing at a time; he reminded himself. One thing at a time.

  He had called his parents from Boston and had informed them that he was closer than ever to the Durer. In other words, he'd lied. The hope and relief in their voices had made it a foregone conclusion that he would lie again if the need arose.

  He had to find Eden. Now. Now, dammit.

  Still no women! Wild with impatience, Sam bolted up the stairs, then followed a trail of open doors through a kind of sitting room that led out to a deck. He found mother and daughter huddled over a telescope, taking turns looking through it. At hi
s approach, Holly looked up from the eyepiece.

  "What took you so long? Look through here. Tell us what you see."

  She stepped aside and he squatted down to see indeed what he could see. Yes, there it was: a graceful sloop nestled in the previously empty slip. Sam couldn't make out the name written in stylized script on the transom, but it looked like about five letters, and it looked like the first one was a V. There was no sign of anyone on board. He adjusted the scope some more. Two men were standing on the dock next to some gear and staring at the boat as they conversed. Sam had to assume that neither of them was Eric Anderson.

  He stood up and said, "You'd know the boat better than I w—"

  He stopped himself, frowned, and hunkered down for a second look. Something wasn't quite right. Yes. There, tied between the dock pilings—a long strip of yellow. Yellow plastic. Crime scene yellow plastic.

  Holly said to her mother, "I knew it! He sees it, too. They've cordoned off the boat, haven't they, Sam?"

  "Oh, this isn't good," Charlotte said faintly. "This isn't good at all."

  "Where's Dad? He can't be on the Vixen. Is it possible that he's in jail?"

  It sounded so quaint, almost lighthearted, expressed that way—as if she wasn't sure which bed-and-breakfast her father had booked his family at. But when Sam straightened up, he saw looks of genuine agony on both women's faces. It occurred to him with force that neither wife nor daughter was ready to write off Eric Anderson as a lost cause.

  Sam had never seen that kind of loyalty up close and personal before—except maybe in Millie Steadman, a kindhearted lady who had taken in an eight-year-old punk and had decided to love him come hell or come high water. Up until now Sam had believed that the Millies of the world were few and far between. These two were making him rethink that.

  A thought came from out of nowhere: what about Sam's birth mother? Had she loved Sam's father with a blind and unquestioning love? Would Sam have done it, too, if he had ever been offered the chance?