Sailing out of Darkness (Carolina Coast Book 4)

by Normandie Fischer

  Her eyes slammed shut and then opened almost immediately. She would not go there. She would not think of black hair.

  She glanced at Teo’s profile and as swiftly turned to the window. Light hair versus dark hair. Light eyes versus dark eyes.

  Why was she doing this to herself? She would not substitute one man for another. Any man, even a delightful companion such a Teo. She didn’t want a relationship. Not now. She wanted freedom from her needy self. Period.

  Get a grip, Sam. Breathe.

  She heard words, but didn’t catch them. “I’m sorry. I was daydreaming.”

  His voice held a hint of laughter. “I only wondered if you’d like to visit Martine soon?”

  Martine? Oh, yes, Martine. “I would, very much.”

  “I’ll arrange it and let you know.”

  Sunlight made the salmon walls of the Paoletti’s cliff-side villa glow with a welcoming warmth. Bushes Sam didn’t recognize lined the iron fence that separated the small yard from the road.

  “Just wait,” Teo said. “The hidden part is the best.”

  A housekeeper ushered them through the wide hall toward the back of the house, and all Sam could do was gape at the hills and the sea spread before them, the town beneath, dropping to the harbor. As Martine rose to greet them, Sam closed her mouth. “I would never leave home if that were my view.”

  Martine laughed and introduced her husband, Antonio.

  “Scusatemi, please, excuse me,” he said in a languid voice, waving at the chair in which he sat. “I apologize for this weakness.”

  Antonio Paoletti was a tall, thin man with a shock of white hair, but most notable were his deep blue eyes and a smile that put Sam instantly at ease. He motioned Teo to a chair across the chessboard, speaking to him in Italian. The housekeeper hovered.

  “Something to drink?” Martine asked. “Tea? Coffee? Anything else?”

  “Water, if you please,” Sam said.

  Teo agreed to a cup of tea.

  “Come.” Martine led Sam to chairs in front of the long windows. The view spanned the harbor where sailboats bobbed, along with dinghies and yachts of all sizes and shapes.

  “Oh, my, look at all those,” Sam said, unable to keep a wistful note from her voice.

  Martine accepted her cup. “We must make arrangements for that sail, you and I. I would be grateful for someone who knows how to manage the boat and could share the pleasure with me. Tonio has not been able to take me in recent years.” She sipped, set her cup on the table, and picked up a plate of small cakes.

  Sam accepted one. “I can’t believe you’re inviting me to sail here.” Waving outward, she said, “There. On that sea.” She missed Alice more even than she missed her home.

  Martine’s silvery laugh brought a question from her husband. “Cara? ”

  “Sam has agreed to sail with me.”

  “Ah. Ma, è perfetto! You have wanted to go on the boat again.” He gestured toward his frail limbs. “And I, I cannot take you.”

  “Yes, I’d thought of using you for research,” Teo said. “Wish I could have.”

  “Instead of the crazy Greek,” Sam said with a grin.

  “Exactly.”

  “I regret that we were not available. You would have been welcome.”

  “Sì,” Martine said, “but he would have needed a better teacher than I could have been.” She looked over at Sam. “But once you learn our boat, perhaps you could take Teo with you.”

  “Oh,” Sam said, “I don’t think... I mean, I couldn’t.”

  “No, no.” Teo waved away that suggestion. “I’ve had my fill of sailing, grazie, Martine. You two have fun. I’ll keep Tonio company.”

  “When would you like to go?” Martine asked.

  Sam glanced over at Teo. He shrugged. “Thursday? Will that work?”

  “I will telephone to the boat yard,” Tonio said. “They will do what is required.” And to his wife, “As long as the weather agrees.”

  Three days later, Sam stared up at a pale hydrangea blue. Specks of white showed off in the western sky, as if extensions of the billowy sails, but overhead was an unrelenting sun-bleached blue.

  They escaped the harbor using the diesel-powered engine with Sam at the helm. It was so simple really, but on first seeing the key switch and the labels Off, Run, Preheat, Start—in English, at least—Sam had raised her brows and pointed. The gas outboards of her experience required only a pump of the fuel line, the start button, and then forward or reverse.

  “Ah. This I can do,” Martine said. “The key goes to this point.” She indicated the Preheat position. “You hold there for some seconds, cosi, so, and then over to Start. ” She did this. “See, the engine goes. And now I loose it, and it falls by itself back to Run.”

  The next bit was complicated by a crowded marina, not at all like pointing Alice into an empty river—a little like working one’s way around the Neuse on race day, except here they dodged moored boats and water taxis, big yachts and small dinghies.

  Once they escaped the harbor and the small boats moored cheek by jowl in their floating parking lot, they hoisted sail. And then there was nothing but the wind in their face, the scent of salt air, the slap of boat on waves. Sam crowed, and Martine clapped, laughing at Sam’s joy. Soon they were out past the cerulean, bobbing over the cornflower blue, and onto the darker iris and then a blackened hue. Belle Journée slid along on a calm sea, the wind puffing just enough to move her forward.

  A pod of dolphins cavorted off their starboard bow but soon leapt away, disturbed by the loud engine of a cigarette boat. Farther out, the wind eased, and Sam steered them closer to shore.

  Martine finished reapplying sunscreen to her face and hands and asked, “Hai fame?”

  “I know that one,” Sam said, raising an index finger. “Sì, ho fame.” Her grin widened. “Of course, I’m usually hungry.”

  “I know. I, too. I thought that would lessen with age, because the ability to keep off the extra pounds certainly diminished.”

  “Did it ever.”

  “I must exercise daily. But here on the water, one is always hungry, yes? I will bring the food that was prepared for us.”

  The click of the opening refrigerator sounded from the small galley. Belle Journée had a head with a real toilet and a V-berth forward, so much more room than on Alice.

  When Martine returned, she carried a tray of cheese, prosciutto, and bread. “Do you continue with water?”

  “Sì, grazie. This is so good for me, practicing the language. Just make the words simple, per piacere.”

  Martine leaned against the cushioned seat. “Senti, listen. Is there anything better than to be on a boat when this is what you hear, the water so gentle, the birds calling to us?” She nodded toward a couple of terns with their black heads and orange bills, swooping across the bow and down the port side.

  Sam shook out her ponytail. “Nothing better. And your boat is a dream to sail.” And eating like this, instead of jostling for comfort on Alice’s floorboards, seemed extravagant.

  “Tell me about yours.” Martine lowered the bill of her boating cap to keep the sun out of her eyes as Belle fell off slightly to catch a breeze that had circled around the promontory.

  “She’s eighteen feet, made of wood, and her name is Alice.”

  “You love her.”

  “I do.” Sam reached for the bottled water, opened it, and took a sip. “Of course, she doesn’t have a holder for drinks. Or a comfortable place to sit.”

  “Perché no? Why not?”

  “She’s a daysailer. I sit on the aft deck to steer, using a tiller. And guests sit on the floorboards, on cushions.”

  “And you do not get tired? Your back does not hurt from this?”

  “Well, no.” Sam hadn’t really thought about comfort on Alice, just about the experience of being on the water. “I suppose she’s primitive, but she’s really beautiful and lots of fun to sail.”

  “I see. But Alice is an odd name for a boat,
yes?”

  Sam grinned, remembering the day she’d picked up the new-to-her boat. “The builder was a widower who’d named her the Alice II after his wife. He asked me to keep the name.”

  “That’s very sweet.”

  Sam checked ahead, saw that they were coming a shade too close to shore, and suggested they tack. “Ready about?”

  “Oh, sì, un momento.” Martine set down her sandwich and readied the jib sheets, one to loosen and one to tighten. “Pronto! ”

  “Hard to lee,” Sam said, turning the boat’s nose into and through the wind. She managed the mainsheet, trimming it once they’d finished the maneuver and she’d pointed Belle further out to sea. Because of the Med’s changeable nature and the winds that could come up suddenly, Sam tried to judge her course to make for an easy trip back.

  “This is so fun, is it not?” Martine said. “Your friendship with Teo and his with us, as if perhaps it is something meant.”

  Sam cocked her head, curious but a bit wary. Was this to be Martine’s take on the too many coincidences? “Meant?”

  “Well, you have told me that you were hurt and so has Teo been. Perhaps you can find solace. All of the signs point you to each other.”

  Sam felt like a mimic, and yet she needed to understand exactly what Martine had in mind before agreeing or arguing the point. “What do you mean by signs?”

  Martine ticked off the list on her fingers. “Per prima cosa, you work with, no, excuse me, you have hired the niece to work for you.” Her correction accompanied a laugh. “Secondo, I meet you in Roma, and you become my driver. This is a big one, no? Because the timing, the arrangement that put you there at the same time that I need you. Terzo, I invite you to visit, not knowing at all about this niece of my friend, who has also told you to contact him.”

  “Yes, she told me to, but I didn’t intend to follow through with that. And I certainly did not know he lived here.”

  “Aha!” Martine said, holding up a fourth finger. “Numero quattro, to come and stop in Reggio without this knowledge. Il buon Dio has been at work.”

  “Do you really think God does that? That he bothers?”

  “Oh, yes, it is evident. From all around us. We must just listen to the wind and watch the sea. We must be still and quiet and wait.” Her shrug was very Gallic—lips, eyebrows, shoulders, hands. “Too often, we hurry. This must happen now. We cannot wait, and so we find ourselves working and hurrying to make our world do what we wish. Is this not true?”

  Thinking of Jack, Sam nodded. “Much too true.”

  “So, now, we see what will happen. We wait and we see.”

  “I’ll definitely buy into the idea of waiting. I’ve seen what happens when I don’t.”

  The wind changed slightly, luffing the mainsail. Sam reeled in the sheet and signaled Martine to adjust the jib.

  “I don’t know how often I’ve tried to control my world, but I’ve certainly gotten myself in trouble because of things that were lacking in me.”

  “Ah, yes?”

  “I mean, I’m willing to do whatever God wants, of course, but I’m not sure how to do that. I feel as if I’ve a long way to go to get healthy.”

  Martine nodded. “Trust is very hard. And I find that we often have an enemy that comes to live in our head. You agree? A whisperer who makes us remember only that which is not good about ourselves.”

  “Oh, I’ve got that one down pat.”

  “Perhaps, my friend, you will learn to whom you must listen and to whom you must not.”

  Sam forced a smile and said, “I hope I will.” She checked the way ahead and the dying wind. “I think we ought to douse these sails and start the engine.”

  The sweet little diesel roared to life. Sam had to admire an engine that worked on the first try and let them return to port at will. As they neared the harbor entrance, Martine went forward with the boat hook and used hand signals to help Sam steer the course she wanted. “There, point there,” Martine called. “I will grab that ball.”

  Sam edged the boat’s nose toward the mooring ball. All those boats in the way, so close together—she wasn’t sure she could do it. She took a deep breath, eased back on the throttle to just above an idle, and managed to get the boat close enough for Martine to hook the tether line’s float. Martine then secured the line to a cleat on the foredeck. That done, Sam backed the boat while Martine dropped a stern anchor.

  “I wouldn’t want to try that in any wind,” Sam said.

  Martine laughed. “Nor I. We will remember that. If there is wind, perhaps we will go back to the dock and get help first.”

  “Or pay one of them to do the job for us.”

  “Excellent idea.” Martine pointed her index finger at the side of her head. “We will use brains, yes? Now, I will hail a water taxi, if you would like to gather our things.”

  A few minutes later, they stepped off the small boat onto the quay. As the boatman handed up their bags, Sam took one and said to Martine, “That was such fun. Mille grazie.”

  “Prego.” Martine slipped a couple of Euro to the boatman with a “Grazie, signore,” waving away Sam’s offered contribution. “No, no. I, too, had a lovely time, and you have done me a great favor. It has been much too long since I have been able to enjoy our boat.”

  “Any time. If you want to sail again, just let me know.” A boat. The water. A new friend. Please.

  And, perhaps, if she spent time sailing with Martine, the gnawing in the pit of her stomach would ease. The past would recede, and she’d be here, doing what she’d come to do.

  Which would not include a new man. In spite of Martine’s theories.

  16

  Teo

  An egret dips, a pelican plunges,

  A seagull swoops, but I…well, I forgot how to dance.

  The computer screen darkened. Teo’s fingers tapped the air, but they couldn’t seem to find purchase on his keyboard.

  Fine. Whatever.

  He wandered into the kitchen, poured mineral water into a glass, and eased his aching hip down onto the big recliner. Outside, pale yellows splashed against the blue of the western horizon as the sun crept toward dusk. He stared out the window, unfocused on anything but an awareness of color.

  He sipped and realized he’d forgotten to add a slice of lemon. He wasn’t about to walk back into the kitchen to get one.

  Perhaps it had been the pink glaze on Samantha’s cheeks after her sail or the bright tint to her eyes that had stalled him when he tried to shift gears back into Sophrina’s world. He’d promised himself, hadn’t he, that a quick trip to Cinque Terre would fulfill his obligations? But then there’d been Martine and Tonio. How could he not escort her to see Martine? And to go sailing, when it obviously meant so much to her? It was, after all, only common courtesy.

  It wasn’t his fault that he enjoyed the occasional shared meal. The chance to speak English with a fellow American. And who wouldn’t delight in showing off a favorite town to a visitor?

  He dragged fingers through his hair. Fine. He also couldn’t ignore the fact that her mere existence carried elements of the supernatural that he simply couldn’t explain.

  “I’d like to understand, please.”

  Nary a whisper in response.

  “A clue here?”

  He should get a cat. A cat might at least look his way when he spoke. Traveling, he could leave a cat at home and have his cleaning lady change the litter box, make sure the animal had food and water. And when he was home, he’d have something to talk to other than walls. Not someone. But an animal would be better than nothing.

  Yeah, except cats didn’t give a hoot about anyone but themselves. And they didn’t talk back any better than the air did.

  His rational self wanted an explanation. His literary self wanted to dig in and explore. His petrified-of-caring self wanted to catch the next plane out of town. Maybe he could justify a trip to China. Or Japan. He could send Sophrina off in search of stolen artifacts. Have her look for smugglers. Ba
d guys who dealt in jade or bronze figurines.

  He closed his eyes. And concentrated on the street noises that filtered through his open patio door. A scooter sputtered to life. Children played something that involved a ball bouncing on concrete. A woman yelled for someone named Leonardo. She repeated her words, and a door slammed.

  “Relax,” Teo whispered. It was time to relax. Time to quit thinking about puzzles. Or women.

  A woman.

  Why did she have such a compelling slant to her eyes, so much liveliness when her lips moved? He’d watched her ease into comfort with him a few times and then back away like a skittish doe. How could he not be curious?

  After all, he was a writer. Writers needed to know. That’s all this was.

  Simple curiosity. Research.

  17

  Samantha

  Life pours out the messy bits,

  The rats and snakes and honey pits.

  It’s up to us to shut them out,

  To close the door and bar the way.

  Sam climbed back toward her room as dusk settled over the town. Lights shone out of still-open shops. Chatter competed with the clomp of shoes and the noise of motors on the street.

  The sail had invigorated her, and she’d felt the first pangs of hunger shortly after Teo had dropped her off at her pensione. She’d dined on a bowl of tortellini in brodo accompanied by a light salad, an excellent ending to the day.

  The daughter of the house greeted her from the front desk, waving a folded note. Sam took it, said, “Grazie,” and read the scribbles as she waited for the elevator.

  How odd. Her ex-sister-in-law, Lena, had phoned and would call again at nine. She and Lena had never been close, so why was Greg’s sister phoning her here and now?