Ready To Burn (Due South Book 3)

by Tracey Alvarez

  “That sounds like Lionel. Guts of a Fly-Boy, heart of a romantic.”

  “I never thought badly of Claire when she told me she and Lionel were getting married,” Bill said. “I figured she likely still had feelings for him, even if she wouldn’t admit it out loud.”

  Del dunked his brush into the paint, slapped it against the remaining bare section of wall. “So you let her leave. You let her take me away from everyone and everything I loved.”

  “You remember what your mum was like the last few years before she left? Or was your head stuck too far up your pimply teenage ass to notice?”

  “I remember.”

  His mom had been miserable. She’d wanted them to move to the States because of her parents’ failing health. But Bill wouldn’t leave Due South, so they’d fought all the time.

  One night after dinner, Mom and Bill had sat him and West down. Del had known what was coming before either of them said a word. Any conversation taking place on their family room couch wasn’t a happy one. Mom said she and Bill were getting a divorce, and she’d be returning home to Los Angeles. West had jumped up before she’d finished talking, yelling that he was sixteen and staying with his dad. Del, who’d thought the sun shone out of West’s asshole, also leaped to his feet, saying he was staying with West. He’d expected his mom to protest—after all, she still called him “baby”, even though she knew it pissed him off. Del had looked over at his dad’s face, his stubborn-as-a-constipated-mule expression.

  Bill shook his head and said, “You’ll go with your mother. She needs you, so you’re going.”

  He’d known with absolute teenage conviction then that his father didn’t fucking want him. That day was the last time he’d called Bill Dad.

  “I’ll tell you what I remember about you as a boy.” Bill folded his arms as Del climbed down the ladder and crossed to sit at the opposite end of the bench. “You liked to do things your way; you were never a team player. In sports, you chose athletics so you could compete solo. I seem to recall you didn’t like being made to play cricket or rugby much.”

  “Much to your disappointment—though you never bothered to watch my games.”

  “Oh, cry me a river.” Bill nailed him with a glacial stare. “No, I didn’t watch your bloody rugby matches, which you hated, anyway, but I remember teaching you to cook and letting you sell your god-awful baking experiments to the unsuspecting public out in front of Due South every school holiday.”

  Del’s cheeks flushed hot. “They were pretty bad, I guess.”

  “But you did what you always wanted to do, what I knew you were born to do. And after I agreed to let Claire take you to LA, I made her swear she’d send you to the College of Culinary Arts when you were old enough. I socked away money for years to make sure you went. I also told Claire if she ever married again, she’d better pick a decent bloke like Lionel Gatlin.”

  “Wait a second—Mom would never say where the money came from. It was from you?”

  Bill said nothing, just stared with his watery old-man eyes.

  Icy stones weighed down Del’s stomach. “You paid for me to go to school, not Mom. And you wanted her to get back with Lionel?”

  “I loved your mother too much, yet at the same time, not enough. She’d never be happy staying in Oban, and I couldn’t live in LA. Claire would never leave you behind—the only way she’d move on with her life and be happy was to return to the States with you.”

  “You didn’t want me around.” Del’s knee bounced a jig, and he slapped a hand on his thigh to keep it still. “I was always a pain in your ass.”

  “You were a pain in my ass because we’re peas in a bloody pod.”

  “Bull. Shit.”

  Bill cackled. “What’s the most important thing in the world to you? A woman?”

  Del straightened.

  “Or your work?” Bill continued, slanting him a wry glance. “Thought as much. The kitchen’s your woman, isn’t she? The demanding bitch has got you by the short and curlies, like she got holda me.”

  Bill twisted off a can and tossed it to Del. He caught it reflexively, the condensation gathered on the aluminum cooling his sweaty palm.

  “Maybe.” Del rolled the can around and around in his hands, his mind racing in a counter-clockwise whirl.

  “Ambition blinds you, boy. Have you seen the article on the internet going around—the five regrets of the dying?”

  “You’re on the internet now?”

  “Community hall runs a program every Wednesday morning, Social Media for Seniors. I’m top of the class.”

  “Good for you.”

  Bill grinned. “Conclusion of that article—nobody bitches about how they shoulda worked harder at their jobs on their deathbed.” He stood and dusted off his butt. “It’s all about the people you love. Best you figure out who they are and what’s really important.”

  “I know what’s important,” Del said sourly.

  Getting the hell away from these troubling revelations and his Stewart Island imprisonment. Those were important…at least, that’s what Del told himself.

  “Glad to hear it.”

  “Don’t forget your beer.” Del held out the remaining five cans, but Bill waved Del off.

  “Put them in your fridge for later. Nothing like a cold beer after a hard day’s work.”

  Amen. But somehow, the thought of drinking the remaining cans alone didn’t have half the appeal of hanging out with Shaye and her siblings, who often wandered into the kitchen after it closed. Just shooting the shit and ragging on each other. They’d sometimes have a beer, but the drive for Del to have more seemed to have dissipated to a dull ache instead of a sharp burn.

  Because for the first time in years, he didn’t feel alone.

  “Anyway, I’m off, and you’d better get on with it.”

  Del crossed to the ladder but paused at the foot. “Dad?” The word slipped past his mental blockage of Bill, always call him Bill and sounded foreign on his tongue.

  His father turned back.

  “Why did you come here this morning? To see if I’d give you a kidney?”

  Bill tugged off his hat and swiped a wrist across his brow.

  “No, son,” he said. “I didn’t come to ask for that sort of sacrifice. After thirteen years, I don’t have any right to ask you diddley-squat.”

  “Then why?”

  Bill offered a weary smile. “To try to shrink the bloody Pacific Ocean to a more manageable distance. I’m not much of a swimmer, boy.”

  “Huh.”

  He didn’t know what to say. Since when had Bill Westlake started talking in analogies?

  “By the way, you missed a spot.” Bill pointed toward the wall, where, goddammit, Del had missed an area—right under the eaves.

  How the hell hadn’t he seen such a plain, in-his-face empty spot?

  The snarky little voice in his head offered an opinion: Maybe the same way you haven’t noticed the big-ass empty gap in your life. Until now.

  Del waved off his father and then picked up the brush. God, he hated that little voice some days.

  ***

  It’d been a last minute thing—or so Ethan Ward’s director, Henry Fairburn, said. Ethan and Henry cornered Shaye while she was busy with morning prep.

  “We need you,” Henry gushed, as Shaye’s knife rapid-fire chopped on her board. “And since Ethan’s offered to help Vince with lunch service to get a feel for Due South, you’re all set. No worries.”

  Shaye managed to keep her eye roll mental instead of outwardly mocking Henry. The five-foot-something ferret of a man, old enough to be Bill’s peer yet dressed in skinny jeans and a rocker tee shirt, had decided the best way to win the locals’ support was imitating their slang.

  “We want footage of you and Del working together on the Mollymawk. It’ll give Del’s episode a bit of human interest. Whaddya reckon?” Henry twitched, eager to be off to the wharf, no doubt.

  The whole time Henry talked, Ethan stood behind him, l
eaning a hip against the counter and watching her with olive-green eyes. Eyes that danced over Henry’s narrow shoulder, as if she and Ethan shared some sort of private joke.

  “Mmm.” Her stomach twisted as it always did when boats were involved.

  After seconds passed in a chop-chop-chopping blur and she still hadn’t given Henry an answer, Ethan laid a hand on the shorter man’s back and said, “Henry, Shaye and I’ll have a chat while you get the crew sorted.”

  Henry threw up his arms in a jazz-hands display of resignation. “Fine. We’re leaving in thirty.”

  He swished out of the kitchen.

  “I’m sorry for the short notice, but I’d like you to go with them.” Ethan didn’t move from his spot at the counter end, but her scalp prickled as if he’d come to stand right beside her.

  She’d seen within moments of meeting him why some women went nuts. Tall and blond, with an endearing flop of hair, a la Hugh Grant, and the plummy British accent to match—plus a healthy dollop of charisma that drew the average person’s gaze like a magnet. Even if he hadn’t been a TV celebrity, Ethan Ward would’ve caused a stir in Oban. He had presence, and, she couldn’t deny, the man was some serious eye candy. Ethan’s gorgeousness should’ve made her happy-place fire up as it did whenever Del walked into a room. Should’ve…but didn’t.

  “What I saw of you on Del’s audition tape impressed me,” he said. “It’s important for a head chef to have a sous prepared to back him up, don’t you agree?”

  Or her, she added, but schooled her features in polite interest. “Yes, of course.”

  “So, you’ll go? Might as well get used to Cruz and Ollie’s cameras in your face now.”

  She laid down her knife. “I prepare the meals for the romance cruises; I don’t serve them.”

  “Today you will, to support Del. Your future brother-in-law, isn’t he?”

  “Yes.”

  “Keeping it all in the family. Lovely.” His smile exposed very straight, glowingly white teeth.

  Great teeth, great smile. But a smile that didn’t even blip on her sexometer—not like a glimpse of Del’s slightly chipped incisor did when he flashed her his trademark wicked grin.

  “I imagine the popularity of your brother’s romance cruises will see a rise after the show airs. Be nice to support his business too.”

  Dammit. Somehow, the bastard had spotted her Achilles’ heel, and she couldn’t think of a viable excuse. Other than the truth of hating the endless fathoms of ocean below ready to swallow her every time she went out on a boat.

  “All right, I’ll go. I guess you want me like this?” She gestured at her chef’s jacket then froze.

  Oh, hell! That could’ve been misinterpreted. Her gaze flicked up, but there was no hint of a leering smirk on Ethan’s mouth.

  “That’ll be fine, Shaye. Just head down to the wharf. Vince, Robbie, and I can take it from here.”

  Half an hour later, on-board the Mollymawk, Shaye wished she’d slipped up to her room to apply more antiperspirant. With Henry, two assistants, Annie the make-up lady, Joss the sound guy, and Cruz and Ollie the cameramen all buzzing around them—plus Kezia and Kip, who’d been roped into pretending to be a honeymooning couple—the boat felt overcrowded and stuffy, even though they were well below their passenger allowance.

  “I didn’t know they would ask you, Shaye,” Del said, as she joined him in the galley. “I would’ve tried to nix the idea, but they sprang it on me only half an hour ago.”

  “It’ll be fine. Preparing the meal with all these people getting underfoot will keep me distracted.”

  He reached down and squeezed her hand, then let go before anyone noticed. “Thinking about our trip back from Bluff is enough to keep me distracted.”

  His blue eyes crinkled in the corners, and blood sped in a fiery trail across her cheekbones. This time, the heat wasn’t in dreaded embarrassment, but rather in a shared intimacy. Or crap, maybe she imagined it.

  Ben piloted them out of the harbor, heading to a secluded bay where earlier in the year a pod of pilot whales had beached themselves. Henry got all excited at the idea of coming across another pod, but fortunately, the long strip of sandy beach edged with unending miles of native bush was deserted.

  For an hour, she and Del created a three-course meal for the pretend honeymooning couple. Once the fake cooking shots had taken place, Henry sent one of his assistants to fetch Kezia and Kip for Annie the make-up girl to do her magic. The last sequence would be filmed on the outside stern deck.

  Shaye found herself squeezed beside Del, crowded to one side of the deck with the crew positioned in front. Annie fussed with Kezia’s dark curls, while Kip leaned against the bench seat and yawned. Make-up took longer than usual, the motion of the waves making applying anything other than powder difficult.

  In a moment, Kip and Kezia would taste the food in front of them and provide much orgasmic praise—since this footage would run after Ethan Ward had saved Due South’s reputation, taking Del and Shaye’s cuisine from bland to brilliant.

  Shaye narrowed her eyes at Henry, who flicked impatient fingers at Annie as she slid away from the table. She still resented being told to act like a puppet—there was even a script, for God’s sake. So much for “reality” TV.

  “Roll it,” Henry said.

  Kezia, on cue, slipped a forkful of roasted quail and Cumberland sauce into her mouth, squeezing her eyes shut with a moan worthy of Meg Ryan.

  “Good, baby?” Kip slid an arm around Kezia’s shoulders and kissed her cheek.

  Shaye swallowed a snicker, knowing Ben, confined inside with the assistants, would be fuming if he could see Kip hamming it up for the cameras.

  The Mollymawk heaved, angling down sharply into a trough. Shaye’s stomach dropped with it. Joss the sound-guy stumbled backward, slamming into Del.

  Joss fell, people cussed, flatware pinged, plates broke—a dull crack, splash, wetness on her cheek and—where was Del?

  Shaye whipped around.

  There—oh, God. Suspended eerily vertical in the water but sinking, Del floated with his arms floundering in lazy circles, a crimson stream of blood spiraling out from his temple.

  Shaye’s throat closed, her heart jammed into it so she couldn’t breathe. Seconds seemed to turn into minutes. Her gaze zipped around. No one else had noticed Del; it was all on her. Shaye kicked off her chef shoes.

  “Man overboard!” she yelled and dove off the boat.

  The seawater closed over her in an icy grip, shocking her system to absolute clarity. Down, down into her nightmare of clear blue. Her eyes stung with the cold, with the salt, but she kept them open as she powered her muscles through watery resistance. Del hadn’t gone far, since the initial crack to his stubborn male head hadn’t knocked him unconscious, thankyougod, and he was trying to claw his way to the surface.

  Their gazes connected, and her heart dipped and rolled like the hull above. No panic showed in his beautiful eyes, which were fixed on her face. No panic, just a slight wrinkling of his brow as if he were worried about her. She swam closer, grabbed fistfuls of his jacket and yanked, kicking her legs to propel them into the light.

  Bubbles exploded nearby, clearing to reveal Ben and Kip surging toward them.

  I got this, she wanted to say as Ben wrapped his arm around Del, and Kip appeared on her other side. Hey, I got this.

  But she was grateful for their strength in the few seconds it took for their heads to break the surface. Shaye shrugged Kip’s hand off her arm and trod water in a fast circle until she spotted Del and her brother, both sucking down huge gulps of air. Blood oozed down Del’s cheek and jaw. An inflatable device splashed next to her. She flinched then grabbed hold, continuing to swim.

  “Get. Out. Bleeding,” Del wheezed when she reached his side. “Sharks.”

  “Please.” She shoved the bright orange floatie at him. “Henry’s more likely to attack you for stuffing up his filming than a great white.”

  Ben laughed. “No shar
k’ll mess with a Harland. Not with her mad on.”

  Del’s nose crinkled at the floatie, but he wrapped his arms around it. “Why’s she mad?” He rubbed a hand on his forehead and glanced down, grimacing. “I’m the one…bleeding out…here.”

  “Man up. It’s only a scratch.” Ben nudged Del’s shoulder but stayed at his side as they dog-paddled toward the Mollymawk.

  Shaye stroked backward, watching Del for any sign of struggle. The surge and flow of the waves buffeted her, her cotton pants clinging to her legs. Nothing, strangely, that made her panic. Not even the blood seeping down from a shallow cut on his head, slowing now with the water temperature. Not while Del’s gaze remained locked on hers.

  “She’s mad because she had to jump in and save your skinny ass.” Ben grinned over at her, propelling Del and the floatie closer to the boat ladder. “Now her hair looks like ropes of seaweed. Right, sis?”

  Shaye huffed out a sigh and issued an eye-roll. Seaweed? Super. Thanks, big brother.

  Del winked at her and some of the tightness in her belly eased. Actually, mad was only one of many emotions tumbling through her body. Mad, relieved, wanting-to-hug-and-kiss-the-snot-out-of-Del. Wait, was that an emotion?

  Shaye reached the bottom rail of the ladder. Kip climbed up before her and then stretched down a hand, helping her struggle up the rungs. Kezia wrapped a blanket and her arms around Shaye when she hit the deck. Shaye hugged her friend tightly, not wanting to admit the other emotion shredding her raw.

  Fear. Not fear of the water, anymore. Fear of losing Del Westlake.

  ***

  Kezia and Annie bustled Shaye into a stateroom, so she didn’t see Del and Ben climb onto the Mollymawk. Piper and Ben kept a few spare clothes in a locker, so at least she had a Coffee Before Talkie tee shirt and a pair of yoga pants of Piper’s to pull on after a hot shower.