by Sandra Field
“Don’t you? Now why would that be?”
“You left here and you never once got in touch,” she said bitterly. “Not once. You don’t have the right to ask me a single question—you gave up that right years ago.”
It was no moment for Jake to discover that all he wanted to do was put his arms around her and kiss her until the turmoil in his chest changed to something straightforward, like lust. “Your face,” he said slowly, “it’s different. Fined down, as though somehow you’ve grown into it. It hasn’t been easy for you, has it?”
“That’s none of your business,” she said tightly. “So why don’t you just leave? And this time, don’t bother coming back.”
But Jake wasn’t about to be deflected. “You’re more beautiful than ever, that’s what I’m trying to say.”
For a moment, he would have sworn, pleasure glanced off the blazing green of her eyes. “Keep that line for someone else,” she flared. “I don’t need it.”
“There isn’t anyone else. I haven’t married, or even come close. What about you?”
Her lips, so delectably soft and sensual, thinned. “You just don’t get it, do you? Get out of my shop, Jake. Get out of my life. I never want to see you again!”
“You ought to remember something,” he said with dangerous softness. “I don’t like being told what to do.”
“You’ve never grown up, that’s what you mean. Your needs are what’s important. Not anyone else’s.” Her voice hardened. “If you don’t leave, I’ll call my brothers to come and put you out.”
“You’d have to call all three of them,” he said, laughter bubbling in his chest. “I don’t fight fair.”
“That’s the first true word you’ve said since you walked in that door.”
“Why were you so scared?”
“You took me by surprise, that’s all.” In an agony of impatience she burst out, “Just go, why don’t you?”
“I’m going because I choose to. Not because you’re handing out orders right and left.”
“I don’t give a damn about your motives!”
Jake wasn’t sure he had anything as clear-cut as motives; he felt like a bullet ricocheting from wall to wall. With sudden fierceness he wished he could rewrite this whole meeting. He and Shaine had been friends; and now were glaring at each other as though they were mortal enemies. He said roughly, “I wish you well, in whatever you do. You have some beautiful things in your shop. The glass panel in the window, for instance—you made that, didn’t you?”
“Yes,” she said grudgingly.
“If no one buys it, get in touch with me.” He brought out his wallet and dropped one of his cards on the counter. “I know people who’d pay a lot of money for work like that.”
She didn’t even glance at the card. “I have an agent already,” she snapped. “How dare you walk in the door after all these years and think you can fix my life?”
“One thing hasn’t changed,” he said. “Your temper always did match your hair.”
In a swirl of brightly patterned skirts she pushed past him and stalked toward the door. Opening it, she said, “Goodbye, Jake. Have a wonderful life.”
He crossed the polished softwood floor, the old boards creaking underfoot. If there was fury in her eyes, there was also something akin to panic. She wanted him gone, and gone now. But he still had no idea why. “Goodbye, Shaine,” he said. Then, before she could evade him, he dropped his hands to her shoulders and kissed her hard on the mouth.
For a moment she was rigid, as though he’d taken her completely by surprise. Then, suddenly, she was quivering like a frightened bird. He pulled her closer, his eyes closed, lost to everything but the softness and warmth of her lips, the fragility of the bones taut under his fingers. The heat from her skin seeped through her dress, warming him in a place so deeply buried he’d all but forgotten it.
He wanted her. God, how he wanted her.
Pulling her to the length of his body, Jake deepened his kiss, letting all his passionate need of her speak for itself. And then realized that she was struggling, twisting away from him, trying desperately to tug her mouth free of his.
Dazed, he raised his head and spoke the first words that came to mind. “That hasn’t changed,” he said thickly.
“Everything’s changed,” she spat, flags of color flaring on her cheeks. “Do you honestly think you can walk in the door and pick up as if thirteen years haven’t gone by?”
Put like that, it didn’t sound too sensible. Still struggling to subdue a reaction that had shocked him with its intensity, Jake muttered, “I hadn’t planned on kissing—”
“You’re sure not getting the chance again.”
The words were out before he could stop them. “You didn’t like making love with me on Ghost Island.”
Her jaw dropped. “What are you talking about?”
“That’s why you wouldn’t go away with me—sexually, I failed you in some way.”
She said brusquely, “Don’t be ridiculous! I loved what we did.”
“Is that the truth?” he demanded, and realized how deep it had gone, the certainty that he’d disappointed her. He’d only been twenty-two; and she’d meant the world to him.
“Yes, it’s the truth, and I’m not getting into all that—it’s too long ago to matter anymore.”
“Not to me, it isn’t.”
“You expect me to believe you?” She shoved the door further open with her hip. “Get out of my life, Jake Reilly. And stay out.”
She meant it. She wasn’t being coy or playing games; she hadn’t had a manipulative bone in her body as a girl or a young woman. Jake turned on his heel, closed the door very carefully behind him and set off down the street.
He had no idea where he was going.
Yes, he did. He was going back to his rented car and driving to the airport just as fast as the car would take him. Which wouldn’t be nearly fast enough.
Whether or not she’d liked making love with him that one time, Shaine now hated his guts.
Desire had vanished, eclipsed by what was unquestionably pain. The same pain he’d felt on Ghost Island when Shaine—after they had made heated, inexpert and passionate love, after he’d poured his heart out to her—had said to him, “I can’t leave Cranberry Cove with you, Jake. I have to stay here.”
She had stayed. He was the one who’d left, left on his own that very day and done his best to forget her.
The day before yesterday he would have said he’d succeeded. But that was when the idea had come to him on a crowded Montreal street to fly to Newfoundland and see Cranberry Cove through the eyes of a grown man.
Bad move. Very bad move. Downright stupid move.
Shaine watched through the window until Jake was out of sight, and realized she was trembling with reaction.
He’d gone. For now.
But would he stay long enough in the cove to discover her secret? And then would he come back?
Again sheer terror coursed through her veins. She switched the sign in the window from Open to Closed, locked the door, turned off the lights and hurried into the back room. Sinking into a chair, she buried her face in her hands.
CHAPTER TWO
WITHOUT making a conscious choice, Jake realized he was walking toward the high school where he’d been the captain of the hockey team and a local hero. He slowed down. It all seemed such a long time ago: the bite of his skates into the ice; the blur of the puck as it whipped into the net; the screaming fans; and, of course, the adoring girls in his class. What did it all mean now? He hadn’t played hockey for years; he’d been too busy amassing his fortune and building a carefully selected, international clientele.
Some boys were playing basketball in the yard to one side of the school, where a net had been screwed to the brick wall and white lines painted on the pavement. Jake had played there himself many times, keeping fit all summer until hockey began again in the fall. Absently he watched, glad of the distraction.
One boy stood o
ut from the rest for the speed of his reactions and the accuracy of his shots; Jake’s attention sharpened. The boy was skinny, outstripping his height, and almost danced with the ball, so that it became an extension of his fingertips; the others circled him, trying to distract him, only occasionally deflecting the pure arc of the ball against the brick wall, the swish as it fell through the metal circle of the net. But it was all in fun. The shouts were good-natured, and as often as not the boy would bounce the ball to one of his companions, letting him have a chance at the net, as comfortable with a defensive position as with an offensive.
Nice kid, Jake thought, noting the boy’s thatch of dark hair and wide grin. He’d make a good hockey player. Although he looked too young for high school.
What would become of him? Would he be content to stay in the village and follow in the footsteps of his father, fishing for crab and lobster in the dangerous waters offshore? Or would he seek wider horizons, and grow away from the place that had birthed him?
Restlessly Jake moved his shoulders under his leather jacket. It wasn’t like him to be fanciful, or to involve himself too deeply in the lives of others. So why was he mooning over the future of a kid who meant nothing to him?
Then the boy neatly nipped the ball from one of the other players, zigzagged through a defensive line that had been caught off guard, and leaped high in the air, his body and the ball one elegant, continuous curve. As the ball sank through the net, Jake had to conquer the impulse to applaud.
Couldn’t he find something better to do than clap for a kid he didn’t even know? Turning away, getting his bearings, Jake set off toward the street where he’d parked his car. He’d made his choices many years ago and there was no going back. He should never have come here. Although he was doing his best to ignore it, there was a cold lump in the pit of his stomach, and it would take very little to replay the scene in Shaine’s shop. If he’d known she was still living here, he wouldn’t have come near the place. Because that choice, too, had been made years ago: by her, initially, and then by him.
He strode along the street, head down, wanting nothing more than to be in his car and on the road south. His private jet was at the Deer Lake airport. Assuming the weather held, he could leave tonight.
“Well, if it isn’t Jake Reilly.”
Jake looked up, and for a moment couldn’t place the man standing in front of him, hands on his hips, the look on his face far from friendly. “Padric,” Jake said slowly. The last time he’d seen Shaine’s brothers, Padric had been a stringy eight-year-old; he’d grown into a tall, rugged young man with a mop of curly chestnut hair and opaque gray eyes.
“I heard you were in these parts,” Padric drawled. “Local boy makes good and comes back to his roots—you’ve been watching too much TV.”
“So you’re no happier to see me than Shaine was.”
“Where’d you see Shaine?” Padric rapped.
“In her store. Why?”
“Headed right for her, did you?”
“Cranberry Cove’s not big enough to avoid her,” Jake said with partial truth.
“You’re about as welcome around here as a sculpin in a drag net—I bet she gave you the same message.”
“A little more subtly than you.”
Padric’s voice was laden with sarcasm. “We all really appreciated the sympathy card you sent when our parents died.”
Jake met his gaze unflinchingly. “I didn’t know they’d died until I bumped into Abe today.”
“Right. Couldn’t wait to shake the dust of the cove off your boots all those years ago. You’ve never looked back, have you?”
“I had other things on my mind.”
“Like making money. You don’t belong here anymore, buddy. So why don’t you hike right back to the big city and forget about us country bumpkins?”
“You’re acting like I committed a crime by leaving the village,” Jake said forcibly. “I went to university when I was seventeen, came back at twenty-two when my dad drowned, and left again once my mum went to Australia. Nothing wrong with any of that, Padric.”
“You were Shaine’s friend. Or that’s what we thought. Guess we were wrong, though.”
“Don’t speculate about stuff you know nothing about!”
“Get off my case,” Padric said softly.
Although he could tell Padric was spoiling for a fight, it wasn’t in Jake’s plans to start a street brawl with one of Shaine’s brothers. He said flatly, “I’m on my way back to my car to get out of here for the third time. So back off.”
Briefly, relief was as unmistakably stamped on Padric’s face as terror had been on Shaine’s. Nor, Jake decided, was it relief that Padric was being spared a fight; Padric had always been a boy to use his fists first and think afterward. What the devil was going on?
“You do that,” Padric said. “Unless you want to find yourself flat on your back in the ditch.”
It would have been all too easy to respond in kind, because Jake was still smarting from Shaine’s harshness: Padric’s posturing on top of that was the last thing he needed. But Jake had learned in city boardrooms to pick his fights, and this wasn’t one he intended to engage. He said evenly, “Ask Shaine why I left the second time—you might be surprised by the answer.” With an edge of real emotion, he heard himself add, “Take care of her, Padric.”
“We all do. Devlin, me and Connor. We don’t need you putting your oar in.”
Feeling his temper rise in spite of himself, Jake pushed past the other man and crossed the street. He could already see his car. Thank heaven for small mercies, he thought dryly, and a few moments later was inserting his key into the ignition. Signaling, he pulled out into the street and turned toward Breakheart Hill.
Where Shaine’s parents had died in an accident.
He wasn’t going to think about Shaine.
The rental car was as different from his Ferrari as a car could be; it labored up the hill, giving Jake lots of time to watch the cove recede in his rearview mirror. Why had both Shaine and Padric been intent on him leaving the village the same day he’d arrived? Why had she been so afraid, and Padric so belligerent?
Did he want the answer to those questions? Or did he indeed want to shake the dust of Cranberry Cove off his expensive Italian loafers?
Seven miles down the road, in the next village, was a small motel and restaurant. Jake pulled in, and for several minutes sat drumming his fingers on the wheel. Back to Manhattan or back to Cranberry Cove. His choice.
He hadn’t had anything to eat since breakfast early that morning; so in the end it was his stomach that decided for him. Half an hour later, he had a room for the night and was tucking into an excellent seafood platter in the little restaurant.
He wouldn’t go back to the cove tonight. He’d let both Shaine and Padric think he was gone for good. Then tomorrow he’d confront Shaine again.
Kiss her again? And this time see if he could make her respond? Was that the real reason he wasn’t on his jet bound for New York?
In the morning Jake wasn’t so sure about going back to the cove. Why meddle where he wasn’t wanted and risk another rejection? His skin wasn’t that thick. In fact, he thought acerbically, where Shaine was concerned, it was distressingly thin.
Perhaps she’d had a lover hidden in a back room, and that explained her terror. Or she was engaged to be married, despite her lack of ring, and didn’t want her past surfacing in the form of Jake Reilly.
How many lovers had she had in the last thirteen years? There’d be no lack of men pursuing her; her sensuality, intelligence and sheer beauty would see to that.
He glanced at the clock. It always used to be Shaine’s habit to start her day by jogging around the lake just east of the village. He could be there in fifteen minutes. And if she didn’t turn up, nobody would be any the wiser.
It took Jake fourteen minutes to get to the parking lot by the lakeshore. Although there were no other cars, he knew Shaine could easily jog here from home. He stretc
hed against the sturdy wooden fence around the changing rooms, the breeze pleasantly cool against his bare legs. Seeking out breaks in the trees that would reveal anyone on the trail, he let his eyes follow the shoreline all around the lake. And then he saw her. She was just rounding the curve of the lake that was nearest the highway, moving easily, her red hair like a beacon.
Hidden by the undergrowth, he set off toward her at a slow run, wondering when she’d see him and what she’d do when she did. It wouldn’t be predictable and it almost certainly wouldn’t be cool, calm and collected. Round two, he thought with a tingle of anticipation, speeding up. She’d won the first round. But if he had his way, she wouldn’t win the second.
A grove of birches, their leaves already tinged with gold, concealed the last stretch of shoreline. Then he spurted around a corner, his steps deadened by the grass, and almost collided with her head-on. She stopped dead in her tracks, her breasts heaving.
Her first reaction was fear. But this time the fear was rapidly overtaken by fury. With unholy amusement Jake watched her eyes spark like emeralds and her chin snap up. She said with dangerous calm, “You told Padric you were leaving.”
“I changed my mind.”
“And you just happened to be jogging around the lake at the same time as me? What’s with you, Jake? Have you got spies all over the village?”
“You used to jog here years ago.”
“Oh,” she said with saccharine sweetness, “so you actually remember something about me—how flattering.”
He said with raw truth, “I doubt I’ve ever forgotten anything about you.”
“Don’t feed me that garbage—it might work on your fancy city women, but it doesn’t cut any ice with me.”
“I’ve never fed you a line in my life, and I’m not about to start now.”
“The sad thing is that I almost believe you,” she said. “That’s pretty pathetic, isn’t it?”
