Safe Harbor: A Cold Creek Homecoming

by Sherryl Woods

  “Mind letting me in on the joke?”

  “We’ve been had, my dear.”

  “What on earth are you talking about?”

  “Remember I told you about those anonymous letters, telling me about what was going on here and suggesting that I should check it out personally.”

  “The ones that sent you scurrying off to talk to my neighbors and interview every official in town?”

  “Yep.”

  “How could I forget? What about them?”

  “We have Aunt Juliet to thank for them.”

  “What!” Tina’s horrified shriek wasn’t muffled a bit by the thick velvet drapes. It practically shook the windows.

  Drew nodded, wearing one heckuva grin, Tina thought as she tried to focus on the implications of what he was saying.

  “I’m no handwriting expert,” he told her, “but I’d wager my income for the next few years on it.”

  “But why?” Tina’s amber eyes filled with confusion. “Why on earth would she do something like that? She must have known the trouble it would cause.”

  “Obviously she didn’t.” He held out his hand. “Shall we go find out what she was up to?”

  The conversation that followed was like something out of a Freudian case study. As soon as everyone had assembled on the terrace, Drew gazed fondly at Juliet and said gently, “Mind if I ask you a question?”

  “Of course not, young man. You’re practically a part of the family.”

  “Were you the one who sent me those anonymous letters?” he asked bluntly.

  Aunt Juliet immediately turned pale. Behind her glasses, her eyes took on a vague, faraway look, and she twisted her napkin nervously. She did not once meet Tina’s incredulous gaze.

  “I don’t know what you mean,” she said in a whispery, frightened voice.

  “I think you do. It’s okay. I just wanted to know if you were the one who sent them.”

  Tears welled up in Juliet’s brown eyes and she tugged off her glasses and wiped at the dampness futilely. “I didn’t mean to cause all this fuss. We only wanted to do something nice for Tina,” she said, staring at Drew pleadingly. “I had no idea... Oh, I’m so sorry.”

  Suddenly she jumped up and ran weeping into the house.

  “Now look what you’ve done. Thought we’d had enough of an inquisition ’round here already today,” Mr. Kelly admonished and went after her. Billy glared at Drew, then followed.

  “Oh, dear, it’s all my fault,” Grandmother Sarah wailed, as Seth Landry patted her hand.

  “Now, Sarah, calm down,” he said gently. “Don’t get all worked up over this. I’m sure they’ll understand.”

  “Understand what?” Tina demanded, just as Drew repeated, “Your fault?”

  To Tina’s astonishment, Sarah blushed furiously and clung tightly to Seth Landry’s hand. She must really be in a dither if she was hanging onto a man she hardly knew.

  “Well?” Tina urged. “What did you do, Sarah?”

  “Leave the woman be,” Seth said defensively. “Can’t you see you’re upsetting her?”

  “If she’s done something, we might as well get it out in the open,” Tina countered. “Keeping things quiet has already caused enough trouble.”

  “It’s okay, Seth,” Sarah said with a resigned sigh. “Tina’s right. I suppose I might as well admit to everything.”

  “Sarah!” Tina’s patience was reaching the breaking point.

  “All right. Just give me a minute to pull my thoughts together.”

  “Your thoughts have never been scattered for a single minute. Stop fiddling around.”

  Sarah’s eyes twinkled with a devilish glint, then shifted to include Drew. “Okay. The truth of the matter is that I was trying to think of some way to get the two of you together. I’d seen Drew’s picture in the paper and you didn’t have anyone in your life to speak of.”

  She stared at Tina, daring her to contradict the statement. Tina simply scowled. “When he moved in next door, I thought it was too good to be true. Juliet and I discussed it, and I guess she decided to take matters into her own hands. You know how she can be when she goes all flighty and romantic. I had no idea things would get this out of hand. I doubt if she ever even thought of the consequences.”

  “You were trying to do what?” Tina still couldn’t believe her ears and she didn’t dare look at Drew. Of all the hare-brained, idiotic, humiliating schemes.

  Drew was suddenly chuckling again. Tina glowered at him. “Are you crazy, too?”

  “No crazier than anyone else around here.”

  “Sarah, how could you?” Tina glared at Seth Landry. “How did you know about this?”

  “Sarah just mentioned that she thought something like this might have happened, but she wasn’t sure. She’s been worried sick about it.”

  “Why didn’t you say something to me?” Tina demanded. “Maybe I could have done something sooner. If I’d gone right over, I could have stopped that report to DCF.”

  “Like Seth said, I wasn’t sure, until now. I didn’t want to go pointing the finger at Juliet. Besides, what good would it have done? All the wheels were already in motion. My telling you wouldn’t have stopped them.”

  “Dear God,” Tina moaned. “I don’t believe this. You two and your matchmaking. I should have known that sooner or later something like this would go on. Couldn’t you have tried a little harder to like Martin? Then none of this would have happened.”

  At the mention of Martin, Drew shot her a startled glance. Sarah lifted her chin defiantly. “You don’t have to make such a fuss about it now. It might not have been the ideal solution, but it worked, didn’t it?” she sniffed. “You two are together, aren’t you? That’s all we wanted.”

  Tina and Drew exchanged glances, hers resigned, his sparkling with devilment. “Not yet, we aren’t,” she retorted, as he nodded enthusiastically. “Don’t you go encouraging her.”

  “Why not? I think she’s got a terrific head on her shoulders.”

  “You’re all impossible. While you’re so busy manipulating my love life, the state’s going to come in here and cart every one of us off to the funny farm, where,” she added pointedly, “I’m not at all sure we don’t belong.”

  She stood and ran around the corner of the house, only to run smack into Martin. The impact rocked her back on her heels. He reached out to steady her, though his gray eyes were filled with disapproval and his mouth was twisted in a way that reminded her of someone forced into doing a distasteful deed. She got the distinct impression he would have preferred to see her fall flat on her rear.

  She cursed under her breath. She did not need this. Biting off every word with a minimum of politeness in her tone, she said, “Martin! What are you doing here?”

  It was amazing, but until a few minutes ago she hadn’t given him a thought. She’d never once considered calling on him for moral support. Now that he was here, she found his presence to be nothing more than another irritant in an already horrendous day.

  “I came to see what the devil was going on over here,” he replied peevishly. He looked surprisingly rumpled and distraught. Martin never appeared in public unless every hair was in place. He must be upset, she decided, then realized why when he added, “I couldn’t even get in a decent game of golf at the country club because everyone kept coming up to ask if you’d gone bonkers or something.”

  Tina prayed for strength. “Not so far, though I am considering it,” she retorted. Martin was staring at her as though he’d never really seen her before.

  “I don’t understand. How could you allow yourself to become the subject of public ridicule, Christina? It’s certainly not good for business and it’s an embarrassment to me personally.”

  If she’d been distracted and upset when she bumped into Martin, his r
emark got her full attention. “An embarrassment to you? I’m not sure I understand.” Her tone would have daunted a more sensitive man. It didn’t faze Martin.

  “People know that you and I are involved—”

  “We are not involved, Martin.”

  He looked at her peculiarly. “Of course, we are. Everyone expects that we’ll get married one day. I’ll take over Harrington Industries, if you haven’t destroyed it by then...” His voice trailed off significantly.

  “I beg your pardon,” she said coldly. “You will never take over Harrington Industries, and you and I will never be married. It’s not like you to make assumptions, Martin.” In fact, it was not like Martin to make a scene, either. Obviously he figured this one was too erratic. He took her hand and patted it. She did not find the gesture comforting. If anything, it was patronizing and infuriated her even more. His words only added to her rapidly growing sense of outrage.

  “Now, Christina,” he began in an awful, condescending tone. “I realize all of this unpleasant notoriety has been most upsetting to you, but don’t talk crazy. People will forget all about this little peccadillo as soon as another scandal comes along.”

  “Peccadillo? Scandal?” she said with quiet fury. “You think I’m involved in a scandal? You don’t know the meaning of the word. There have been divorces in this town that scattered more dirt than what’s happening here.”

  Martin continued as though she’d never opened her mouth. “You and I will be married as soon as everything settles down again and these people are out of here.”

  Shock filled Tina’s eyes, followed by a sharp twisting in her stomach. “You want my friends to leave?”

  Martin apparently missed the ominous edge to her voice because he blundered on. “They certainly can’t live with us. I’m sure you can find them a more suitable place, perhaps a nice nursing home for the older ones and a foster home for the boy if you feel you must help them. They don’t belong on a Palm Beach estate.”

  “Why you...you...” Words failed her. “I don’t think I ever realized that you are nothing but a high-class snob! How dare you come here and insult my friends. There’s not a one of them who needs to be in a damned nursing home. If anyone doesn’t belong on this Palm Beach estate, it’s you!”

  She tried to brush past him, but he caught her arm. “Christina, don’t be foolish.”

  “I’m not being foolish, Martin. I am seeing things very clearly. And, frankly, I don’t much like what I see.”

  She twisted free from his grasp and stalked across the lawn, not stopping until she was off the grounds and across the street.

  She’d always believed that the sea, whether smooth as glass or whipped to a white-capped turbulence as it was now, held a sort of magic, that it could bring her serenity. After the DCF inspection, the press conference, her doubts about Drew, then Aunt Juliet’s revelation and now Martin, today was going to be a real humdinger test of its powers.

  Chapter Nine

  Tina had gone to the beach, oblivious to the rolling clouds that were gathering to the west in the late afternoon sky, turning it to an ominous gray. The wild fury of the impending storm matched her mood perfectly. Even when torrents of rain poured down, plastering her auburn hair to her head and soaking her clothes so that they clung revealingly and uncomfortably to her body, she continued to walk, wondering how her life had gotten into such a tangle in so short a time.

  As if things hadn’t been bad enough, Martin’s revealing outburst had shattered her few remaining illusions about his suitability for her. Oddly enough, she felt more relief than dismay. How had she ever deluded herself into thinking that they might someday become seriously involved? Worse, how had she ever thought that he was remotely comparable to Gerald?

  Martin had revealed himself as an undeniable snob, one of the idle rich who had nothing to do except make judgments about other people. Talk about people destroying Harrington Industries. Martin could probably do it within a week. That’s probably why his father had given him such a large trust fund, to keep him safely away from the family firm.

  Tina was rounding a curve of the ocean when she spotted Drew ambling toward her. His hands were jammed into the pockets of faded, cutoff jeans he’d obviously gone home to put on. Those jeans ought to be outlawed in mixed company, Tina decided.

  Water ran down his face and cascaded over his bare shoulders. It reminded her of the day she’d caught him coming out of his pool. It seemed no matter how lousy she felt, or what his role had been in creating the events affecting her mood, she was always glad to see him, always instantly aroused by him to an intriguing level of sunlight-bright expectancy.

  “Mind some company?” he said as his gaze swept over her with heated intensity, finally coming to rest on her breasts, which were clearly visible through the soaked material of her blouse. Her nipples hardened.

  She shrugged, feigning an indifference she most certainly did not feel.

  “Want to tell me what got you so upset back there?”

  “Before or after Martin?”

  Drew stared at her blankly. “Who the devil is this Martin? That’s the second time this afternoon his name has come up.”

  “According to Sarah, he’s a wimp. According to him, he’s the man I’m supposed to marry.”

  “And according to you?” he asked with tight-lipped restraint, his eyes darkening to a shade even more dangerous than the sky.

  Tina grinned wryly. “I think Sarah has it pegged.”

  Drew’s expression brightened. “That takes care of old Martin, then. What sent you scurrying off in the first place? You don’t usually run away from your problems.”

  “I told you. I’m worried sick about what will happen to those people if the state says they can’t stay. All of the meddling by Juliet and Sarah may wind up destroying our lives.”

  “They love you. It was well-intentioned.”

  She sighed. “I know that and I’m sorry I snapped at everybody, but, Drew, don’t you see? They could be back on the streets or in some dump, and I could lose everything—my friends, my company.”

  “Your money?”

  “I don’t care about the money. I never have. What would I spend it on anyway, aside from the upkeep of the house? I don’t travel. I don’t have expensive taste. The idea of spending hundreds of dollars for a blouse or a pair of shoes appalls me. My one extravagance is...” She snapped her mouth shut and blushed. “Well, never mind what it is.”

  Drew was immediately intrigued by her reticence. Naturally. “Tina! What exactly do you fritter away your money on?”

  “I don’t fritter it away,” she grumbled, furious at herself for the slip of the tongue.

  “Whatever you want to call it then. What do you buy that makes your cheeks turn that attractive shade of pink?”

  She heaved a disgusted sigh. She might as well admit it. Drew wasn’t likely to give up until he’d wormed it out of her. The man probably would have been much happier in life as a detective.

  “Lingerie,” she mumbled.

  Drew’s lips quivered. “That’s your vice? Lingerie?”

  “Yes, dammit.” She scowled at him defiantly.

  “You mean that under those demure, businesslike suits of yours you are attired in sexy, lacy little things?” His voice was suddenly tense and he swept his gaze over her as if he were mentally disrobing her again.

  Her heart slammed against her ribs. “Drew, couldn’t we talk about something else?”

  “Actually, I’m beginning to like this topic just fine.”

  “Drew!”

  “Oh, okay,” he grumbled. “We’ll get back to that later.”

  “No, we won’t.” Her gaze locked with his, first in defiance, then in something else entirely. She felt crowded, though they were standing in the middle of a deserted beach. She felt ho
t, though the rain had cooled the air. But for all of the tension that knotted within her, it was Drew who finally blinked and looked away.

  “So,” he said, his voice thick and husky, “money doesn’t matter to you. It’s your grand passion for your husband that makes the thought of losing control of Harrington Industries so terrible.”

  “Exactly. I married Gerald because I loved him, because he was kind to me, not because of what he could do for me professionally and socially, and certainly not because of his wealth. I was already on my way up at Harrington Industries when Gerald and I met, and he was paying me very well even then. It was enough.”

  “He did help you along the way, though. He did speed up the process. You have to admit that.”

  “Of course, but I could do it again if I really had to. I love the challenge of mastering something new anyway. To tell you the truth, I’ve discovered that living in Palm Beach is not all it’s cracked up to be or it wasn’t until Sarah and Juliet and Mr. Kelly came along. They’re real. Their lives are more than shopping trips to Worth Avenue or luncheon at the country club. Do you know that Sarah and Juliet spend three mornings a week volunteering at a hospital? Even when they didn’t have much, they gave what they did have—their time. They know all about loving and sharing and trust. Some of my neighbors love their stockbrokers more than they do their families.”

  “Are you including me in that group?”

  “I’m not sure,” she said directly. She saw the hurt that her doubts inflicted, but she had to tell him the truth. “All this talk about mergers and takeovers this afternoon has spooked me. I’m not sure anymore what you want from me.”

  Drew nodded. “That’s fair.” He hesitated, and Tina interpreted that tiny pause as time he needed to calculate a response. Shouldn’t the truth have come more easily?

  “The answer’s not so easy,” he said at last. “You and I have just met. You’ve awakened desires in me I’ve never felt before, desires for a home of my own, a family. I want to protect you and make love to you and show you things you’ve never seen before.