Stranger on the Shore (Mirabelle Harbor, Book 4)

by Marilyn Brant

  I watched in awe and appreciation as Gil prepared dinner for us.

  And then we ate. Buttery deliciousness. The plump scallops and succulent shrimp were perfectly cooked, and the vegetables added a crunchy lightness to an already fairly healthy meal. But, good as it all was, it wasn’t nearly as good as my memory of Gil’s lips on mine. I wanted more of that.

  So, when Gil asked what I’d like for dessert—fresh fruit, ice cream, or both—I decided it was high time to put boldness into action.

  “Option D,” I proclaimed. “It’s not on the list, but I’d rather have a kiss from you.” I feigned a heavy sigh and hoped he wouldn’t be able to hear the crazy thumping of my heart. “I’ve been feeling deprived since last Sunday, and I’d like to pick up where we left off.”

  Whether or not I’d fooled him into thinking I was being genuinely gutsy, it didn’t matter. He grinned at me with a devilish twist of his lips. “We do have some unfinished kissing time from last weekend. But, if we pick up where we left off, my body will betray my desires again.” He was still smiling, but his look turned more serious when he added, “Just know that the fact that I want you doesn’t constitute any pressure to go further than you want to go or feel comfortable with tonight, okay?”

  He was being entirely sincere, and I appreciated that more than I was willing to admit. His respectfulness gave me an extra burst of courage. Enough so that I added, “That is a really thoughtful disclaimer, Gil. Now, please, please kiss me.”

  He immediately rose from the table and held out his hand.

  I took it and he led me to the sofa in his den, passing a pet tank on the way with a little black creature in it.

  “We can do formal introductions later,” he said, tugging me deeper into the room. “But for now, I’ll just tell you that this is my newt Nancy. She and I have been living together for three years. My longest relationship to date.”

  “Then Nancy knows a good man when she sees one,” I said.

  “Oh, you sweet talker. Let me taste those words.” He put his mouth on mine and, suddenly, I wouldn’t have been able to speak a complete sentence if my entire future depended on it.

  He nudged me toward his sofa, which was made of a soft brown leather. “Imagine being seventeen and making out on your parents’ couch,” he joked as he pulled me onto the cushions.

  But I didn’t have to imagine that. I’d lived it... and lived to regret it.

  Thoughts of Donny were, of course, an instant mood killer, so I pressed for an immediate change of subject.

  “I’m not one of those women who misses adolescence, Gil. I lived with someone who was very juvenile for a long time. Now, I’d like to be with a man, not a boy.” I paused. “And you’re that man.”

  It was impossible to see much of a blush under Gil’s deep tan, but I still detected a hint of rising color. “That’s flattering to hear,” he whispered, “but it’s also a pretty big leap of faith. I’m not known for my commitment readiness, you know. What if I disappoint you?”

  I chuckled as I tugged his body closer to mine. Close enough so he was half on top of me. So I could feel his belt buckle against my abdomen, the weight of his chest on mine, the ridge of his erection at the apex of my legs. God, it had been so long. I let my hips rise to meet his. Scandalous behavior, my mother would have said, had she been around to judge me on this. And my sister, of course, would have been full of her usual criticisms and sarcastic commentary. But, dammit, for once I didn’t care.

  This was Gil. And I’d witnessed enough bad male behavior up close and personal to recognize its opposite.

  “You won’t disappoint me,” I assured him. “And I know this probably isn’t true of every woman you’ve ever met, but I’m not looking for a commitment right now. Truly. I just want to explore this connection we share. I want to spend these next few weeks with someone I really like... you.”

  I heard him exhale, heavily, almost like a moan, before he started to systematically press every square inch of his body against mine, as if stamping me. Limb to limb. Mouth to mouth. Hip to hip. We moved together as if we had but one skin.

  And one moment flowed so naturally, so effortlessly into the next that there was no sense of struggle or second guessing. Our kisses not only connected our bodies, but it synched our breathing and, possibly, even our pulse. So, later, after we’d been making out for what felt like hours, and after all of me had come to be tuned in to all of him, the next step seemed not only natural but inevitable.

  Gil removed his jeans, pulled out a condom, and looked at me in question.

  I nodded. “Oh, yes,” I murmured.

  Then, when he slid it on, helped me get rid of my shorts, and thrust himself deep inside me, I said those same words again—only much louder. And all I could think was that this was how it always should have been. That, thank goodness, I’d lived long enough to finally get something right in the relationship world.

  Sure, there was a soft voice crying within me, who remained sad that I’d wasted my youth on someone like Donny. Resentful of the innocence I’d traded for a man who’d betrayed me. But I was also grateful that I’d gotten to experience the difference now. Being with someone like Gil, who was as warm and passionate and generous in his lovemaking as he was in his life, was significant for me.

  And while I hoped he and I would get a few more nights like this one before I had to head back to Mirabelle Harbor, I knew I’d always be incredibly thankful that his fiery touch wiped away the memory of Donny’s indifferent one—at least for tonight.

  “It’s been a long time for me,” Gil whispered sometime later, covering both of our half-naked bodies with a cream-colored throw blanket that had been draped over one arm of the sofa.

  “Longer than three and a half years?” I asked.

  He winced and hugged me tighter. “No, not quite that long. But it wasn’t just a couple of weeks ago, either. It’s been a few months since I was even dating anyone and... well, more than a year since I was with a woman who made me want to cook her dinner or stay up half the night talking and kissing and—”

  “Wait. You mean I’m not the only woman you ever wanted to cook dinner for? And here I thought I was special.” I kissed the tip of his nose and winked at him.

  He laughed. “Believe me, Marianna, you’re plenty special. You are, in fact, a far more unusual woman in my life than you could begin to guess.” He reached to brush the hair from my eyes, his hips angling toward me. It’d been less than an hour since our first time together, but I could feel the stirrings of his arousal again.

  Practicing boldness, I decided, had its advantages. It got easier to be gutsy with a little experience. “I want to hear about all the ways you think I’m an unusual addition to your life, Gil.” I paused for dramatic effect, running my fingertips up the backside of his thigh until I felt him quiver beneath my touch. “Or you can just expound upon a few of my better qualities through nonverbal language.”

  “I’m more of a show rather than tell kind of guy,” he divulged in a low, sexy tone.

  “Then by all means, feel free to start showing... ”

  I wouldn’t have thought it possible, but making love with Gil was even better the second time around.

  It was well after one a.m. when he drove me back to my car.

  “You know you can stay with me tonight,” he’d said. “Nancy won’t mind.”

  I was tempted. “Your newt may not have a problem with it—or, maybe, she just wouldn’t tell us—but Ellen might worry if I didn’t come back to the bungalow. Plus, I could use a toothbrush and a change of clothes before showing up at your sister’s shop tomorrow morning.” I glanced at my watch. “Or, rather, today. In about eight hours, actually.”

  “Joy’s making you work on a Sunday morning?”

  I nodded. “And she’d probably be suspicious if I came back in the same outfit I was wearing all day Saturday.”

  He chuckled. “Trust me, Marianna, she’s gonna be suspicious anyway. The girl can sense things
like a gypsy woman, I’m telling you. Hope you won’t mind being at the center of a good-natured inquisition.”

  I shook my head. “I know your sister’s heart is in the right place. And, whether she asks me directly or just guesses, I’m not hiding from her how much I like you, Gil.”

  He gave me a long, lingering kiss by my car. “She definitely knows I like you. But Joy can be dangerous with too much information. I give you permission to downplay tonight’s events with her, or she’ll likely have us engaged and planning a fall wedding before you can say, ‘Here comes the bride... ’”

  We both laughed at that. Then with a final peck on my forehead, he tucked me into my car and I drove dreamily back to the bungalow.

  The lights were off at #26, so I carefully slid my key into the door lock and let myself in. I’d taken only two steps when I heard my sister’s angry voice cutting into the darkness.

  “Where the hell have you been?” she demanded. “It’s 1:42 a.m., Marianna. I was worried you were dead or abducted or some bad shit like that.”

  “I just had a date,” I said, feeling my defensiveness rising. “And, for the record, Ellen, you’re not my mother or my court-appointed parole officer—not that I have one of those. I don’t have to let you know every place I’m going or every person I’m seeing.”

  “Ah. Screwing Elvis, were you?”

  My brain flashed red and my temper snapped like a Chinese firecracker. “For heaven’s sake, can’t you just shut up and mind your own damn business for a change?” I heard myself shout. My eyes, having begun to adjust to the dark, could see Ellen’s outline on the floral sofa, curled into an angry ball and clutching a pillow like she was trying to strangle it.

  When I’d left Gil in the parking lot, I didn’t think anything could dampen my mood. Clearly, I hadn’t counted on my bossy sister waiting up to badger me.

  “I texted you four times,” she shouted back.

  I grimaced. I’d muted my cell phone earlier in the day and hadn’t remembered to undo that. “You know I don’t have that thing glued to my hands, like some people.”

  But she wasn’t distracted by my not-so-subtle insinuation that she was one of those people.

  “If I knew anything about these new ‘friends’ you’ve been hanging around with every fucking minute, maybe I wouldn’t have been so scared out of my mind about your safety. But I only met your hot beachcomber once, and you won’t tell me hardly any details about him or these hipster jewelry makers you’re supposedly ‘working’ with. It could be a cult, for all I know. But you don’t care about what anyone who knows you and loves you thinks anymore, do you? I mean, what would things be like for Kathryn if something bad had happened to you? Did you even think about her while you were out running around tonight with that stranger?”

  “Gil’s not a stranger.” Certainly not anymore. “And don’t you dare try to guilt trip me. I’ve done nothing but be there for my daughter every single day of every single year of her life. Be honest, Ellen, you weren’t thinking of Kathryn tonight. You were thinking of you. You probably just wanted someone to yak at while you channel surfed, but you didn’t have anybody at your immediate disposal. Not with your employees and your colleagues and your husband hundreds of miles away from you, and probably relieved to have a couple of weeks off from your constant demands.”

  I glared at my sister who was, in turn, glaring back at me with a ghostly white cast to her face, illuminated as she was by only a sliver of moonlight streaming into the bungalow. So very pale.

  I expected her to immediately argue back. Tell me I was full of bullshit. Or claim she wasn’t as condescending and irritating and demanding as I knew she was.

  But she just stared back at me with an oddly haunted expression on her face, which somehow telegraphed both discomfort and surprise. She swiped at her forehead repeatedly, as if trying to brush away a pesky bug.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked.

  She didn’t answer me, but I sensed a new movement from where she was sitting on the sofa. She almost looked like she was shaking.

  I reached over to the wall and flipped on the light. Her pallor wasn’t just from the cast of the moon. She really was ghostly white. And she was trembling like a frightened animal. Fresh sweat beaded up on her forehead the second she’d managed to wipe it away, and she was struggling to catch her breath.

  This freaked me out.

  I raced over to her. “Ellen? Are you okay? What’s happening?”

  She clutched her chest above her heart and grimaced. “I think—” she began, and then stopped.

  “You can tell me,” I said, suddenly flooded with shame that I’d left her alone for the whole night and come back so late, only to argue with her over petty things. I’d had no idea she was so sick, but what kind of flu or virus was this? I felt her forehead. I couldn’t detect a fever, but there was no denying she had other symptoms of illness. “Do you need a doctor?”

  She nodded. “Pretty sure I’m having another panic attack. But this is worse than the last one. You’d better take me to the ER.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Revelations Unexpected

  If Ellen had been annoyed by that pain-in-the-ass Dr. Joseph Cole back in New Haven, this Sarasota doctor—Dr. Kristy Sutterfield—had brought Ellen’s irritation to a whole new level.

  “Ms. Slater, can you try to remember what you were talking about and thinking about just prior to this latest episode?” the doc asked at the hospital an hour later.

  She shrugged. “I was arguing with my sister. But that’s nothing new.” Hell, she and Marianna had spent over four decades disagreeing on nearly everything. Hadn’t given her a panic attack before.

  “Was there anything different about your conversation with your sister this time?” the doc persisted. “Anything that irritated you in particular?”

  “In particular?” Ellen repeated. Shit. Everything irritated her right now. Her inability to go to work without worrying about sweating through her clothing. Her longstanding family dynamics with all of the same old dysfunction, which always reared its ugly head when she and her sister fought. Her aging body and being in her forties or whatever.

  “Look,” she said to the woman, “all I know is that I was fine until Marianna came back to the bungalow tonight. I mean, I was ticked off at her for getting in so late, but I wasn’t panicky or anything. Not right away.”

  “Had your sister promised she’d be back at a specific time?”

  Ellen shook her head. “She didn’t tell me a time, although I think she should have. It would’ve been more considerate. Living with her has never been easy, though. And I knew that before I came down here and surprised her last week. She’s not typically a huge fan of the unexpected, but... ” She shrugged.

  Dr. Sutterfield glanced at her sharply. “So, you came down knowing that? Were you purposely trying to anger her? Throw her off kilter?”

  She glared at the doc. “Of course not. I just needed a place to go for a bit. But when I tried to tell Marianna on the phone about my plans to fly down for a visit, she was too busy to listen to me.”

  “Hmm.” The doc jotted some notes down on her clipboard and frowned.

  “Hmm... what?”

  The lady doctor inhaled slowly, as if she were gathering a supply of much-needed patience, and then she exhaled even more slowly before she spoke. “Would I be correct in surmising that being the one in control is important to you, Ms. Slater? That you’re a Type A personality?”

  Ellen rolled her eyes. “Do I look like one of those laidback, I-live-for-yoga types?”

  The doc cracked a smile. “You do not.”

  “Then there’s your answer.”

  Dr. Sutterfield regarded her thoughtfully for a moment. “Your sister asked to see you after I’d had a chance to conduct my exam and chat with you privately. But after you visit with her for a few minutes, I’m going to instruct her to go home. The nurse is going to run a few tests and, given that it’s so late, I’d prefer to ke
ep you here for observation tonight—”

  “What? I have to stay—”

  “You do. I’d like for you to get a restful sleep, ideally away from whatever trigger set off this latest panic attack. And I’m going to give you just one small assignment.” She pulled a pocket-sized spiral notebook from one of the drawers and handed it to Ellen, along with a ballpoint pen. “Write down, in chronological order, the conversational progression you had with your sister earlier tonight. Everything that you remember saying to her or hearing her say. Every thought you can recall that ran through your head or emotion you experienced. Pay particularly close attention to how your body feels as you revisit the dialogue from the evening. The way your conversation escalated into a full-blown argument. Do you think you can do that?”

  She nodded. “Should I talk with my sister about this? Tell her I’m supposed to write it all down? She might remember something I don’t.”

  “No. Not this time. The exercise is about you, not her. It’s your memories and reactions that we need to pinpoint, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  Then with a competent, kind, and—in Ellen’s opinion—utterly exasperating nod that signaled the end of their discussion, the doc left her in the hospital room alone.

  Fifteen seconds later, Marianna rushed in.

  “Hey, how are you feeling?” her sister asked, her face flushed with heat and creased with worry, exhaustion, and guilt.

  “Don’t look at me like that,” Ellen told her.

  “Like what?”

  “Like it’s your fault that I’m in here.”

  Marianna shook her head and held up her cell phone. “I read all of your texts in the waiting room. If I would’ve just let you know I’d be late, we wouldn’t have been arguing and—”

  “And nothing. Listen, you were sort of right. You are almost forty, and I’m not your mother. You’ll always be my kid sister, though, so there’s a part of me that’s forever going to want to tell you what to do. Seriously, Sis, when are you gonna get used to that?”