The Return of Caine O'Halloran: Hard Choices

by JoAnn Ross

  She probably was. She went into her room and quickly changed, slipping the limp sweatshirt she wore off and pulling the dry sweater on in its place. It felt heavenly.

  But there was nothing to be done about Logan’s wet clothes. She had nothing handy that would remotely fit his wide shoulders, and pants were even more out of the question. His shirt still lay in a wet heap on the floor of the bathroom underneath the debris.

  But he’d pulled on his leather jacket by the time she rejoined them, and Annie managed to keep her eyes averted from the wedge of hard brown chest that showed above the half-fastened zipper.

  “We learned about microbursts in science,” Riley was saying. She’d already changed into drier clothes, having escaped the confines of the tub the moment Logan gave the okay. “They can do as much damage as a tornado, but they don’t, you know, twist.” She whirled her hand. “The force just comes straight down and blows out at the base.” She shrugged, suddenly looking uncomfortable at providing them with the science lesson.

  Logan nodded as he surveyed the damaged roof. “We’re going to need to cover that roof up before the rain does even more damage inside.”

  “With what? The only wood I have around here is for burning in the fire pit out on the beach.” Annie picked her way through the debris in the short hallway, fearing what she’d find in the main portion of the house. She couldn’t bring herself even to wonder about the fields that supplied Island Botanica.

  Without their plants, they’d have no products. Without products, they’d have nothing. She’d have nothing. Again.

  She deliberately pushed away the dismal thought and focused on the immediate. The glass door off the living room looked undamaged. The window in the kitchen was broken to pieces. Annie’s chaise from the deck poked halfway through it, leaning drunkenly into the sink below the window. One of her cupboards hung half off the wall, the door opened to display the broken glass and dishes inside it.

  “Toto, I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore,” Riley said, joining Annie by the breakfast counter. “All we need are some flying monkeys and the wicked witch and it’d be like we’re living inside the Wizard of Oz movie. How are you going to get all this fixed again?”

  “I always hated those flying-monkey things,” Annie murmured instead of answering something she had no answer for. “They gave me nightmares.” The two half-full mugs of chocolate still sat on the counter, twin sentries oblivious to the tempest that had occurred around them. The marshmallows had melted into the liquid.

  She went around the counter, picked up the mugs and reaching through the legs of the chaise, dumped the cold cocoa down the sink. When she turned away, Logan was watching her, his expression strangely gentle as he set the gallon jug of water that he’d rescued on the countertop. “Try to make that last,” he suggested. “I’m going to town to see if I can find something to cover the holes in the roof.”

  Annie nodded and moved around the counter to look through the unscathed glass door. If she tried to speak, she feared she would burst into tears. She hadn’t cried in years and she had no intention of starting up again.

  “Want to come with me?”

  She turned around, only to realize that Logan had offered the invitation to Riley.

  “Why? So you can drag me off the island?”

  He just looked at the teen and finally she made a face and shrugged. “Whatever.”

  Logan moved the couch away from the front door, positioning it back where it belonged. It had done the job, at least, of keeping the door from flying open. He stopped to pick up a potted fern that had tipped over, spilling soil onto the tile.

  “We won’t be long. Don’t try to pick up anything that’s not stable.” As if his words were prophetic, the loose cabinet in the kitchen gave a squeal of splitting wood and plunged to the floor, bouncing off the counter along the way.

  Shattered glassware and dishes flew.

  Annie choked back a shocked yelp and turned her gaze from the sight.

  Riley was the first to break the thick silence. “Well that sucks. Hope that wasn’t the family china or something.”

  Annie shook her head. “I think I’ll go with you, too,” she said. “There may be houses hit worse than mine. People who might need help.”

  The thought was somber and the three of them left the house in silence. Outside, it was still drizzling, and Annie ran back inside long enough to grab her umbrella from its hook in the coat closet as well as a bright yellow slicker. She told Riley to put on the slicker, then opened the umbrella and Logan held it over all three of them.

  The water that had flooded the narrow road had already narrowed to a trickle. The sun was beginning to set, bathing the thick ribbons of clouds and everything below them with an otherworldly cast of red and orange.

  Annie’s feet dragged as she stepped over the felled palm tree. The vivid sky seemed all the more remarkable because of the rainbow that glittered, looking close enough to touch.

  Rainbows were supposed to be a sign of hope, weren’t they? But as she watched, the wondrous arch faded, leaving only the sunset behind.

  Logan stopped, too. “Turnabout always did have unbelievable sunsets. The best view was from the Castillo House, though, at the point of the island. Old place probably doesn’t even exist anymore.”

  “Yes, it does.” Annie had a particular interest in the abandoned Mission-style house, but she was more concerned with Riley, who’d walked on ahead of them, only to stop and wait near the very boulders that had kept Annie from blowing away earlier. She put thoughts of rainbows—and hope—right out of her mind as reaction set in, making her shake at the awful “what ifs.”

  “She thinks she’s too cool to walk underneath the umbrella,” he said.

  “I should have marched her right back to Will and Noelle,” she said. “The day she showed up. Instead of calling my brother, I should have taken her back myself.”

  “She’s okay, Annie. She’s not hurt. She’s probably feeling pretty foolish for leaving the house, too.”

  “She’s okay only because you were there and knew what to do. You found her. Brought her back to the house. It never would have occurred to me to use a bathtub and a mattress for protection.”

  “You’d have found her if I hadn’t. You’d have thought of something.”

  She was beyond listening, though, as she sloshed through the water and hurried up the gravel. “Riley should never be in danger. Ever. She’s just a girl, a baby. Completely innocent and undeserving of-—”

  “Hey.” He closed his hand around her shoulder and halted her. “No kid deserves to be in danger. But this was a storm. A freakish one. You didn’t wiggle your pretty nose and summon it. And it’s not like you can protect your niece from life.”

  Why not? Annie barely kept from crying out the words as they heard a vehicle and the distinctive crunch of tires on gravel. In seconds, the sheriff’s truck appeared and Sam Vega stuck his head out the window. “Yo, Annie. Everybody okay at your place?”

  Avoiding Logan’s eyes, Annie jogged over to the olive-drab vehicle. “We’re not hurt,” she assured shakily. “What about in town?”

  Sam looked grim. “We’ve got a dozen or so injuries, so far, the least of which is Janie. She was trying to save some of her special glass and ended up breaking her wrist, instead. I’ll know more once I’ve made it across the isle to check on everybody. A lot of windows broke in the winds, but most of the buildings are okay. Your shop’ll need some boarding up. Got a report that Diego’s dock is history, though. I haven’t been by your fields yet.”

  “The dock?” Dismay settled like a stone inside her. Her fields overlooked the dock. “What about Diego’s boats?” She struggled to keep her voice steady.

  “Out of commission for a while,” Sam said. His gaze went past her to Logan. “If somebody has to get on or off the islan
d, it’ll be by Coast Guard.”

  She could feel the edges of her sanity unraveling. “What about a plane? A charter? When Dr. Trahern and his wife took April Fielding off for surgery last year, they did it in a plane that landed on the main road.” Her brother had connections and plenty of money. He could arrange a plane or a helicopter for Riley’s sake. Cell phones didn’t work out on the island, and the phone lines were undoubtedly down along with the electricity, but surely if the sheriff could reach the Coast Guard, they could manage a way to contact her brother.

  “And that plane tore the hell out of the road, which wasn’t in great shape to begin with. Even a chopper would have to be an emergency, Annie. The coastline is socked in from Mexico on up. We’ll be lucky if this—” Sam’s gesture encompassed the destruction that had already occurred “—is all we have to contend with. Before we lost communications, the weather service was warning that several storm systems were on a collision course with each other. The weather’s bad here. It’s worse on the mainland. They’ve got straight winds that are tearing the hell out of San Diego.”

  And Sara was in San Diego. Annie pressed her hand to her mouth, struggling for composure.

  “She wants to get Riley home to her parents,” Logan said.

  Sam shook his head. “Riley is physically unharmed. On a scale of priorities for getting to the mainland, that means she’s not going to be at the top. I’m sorry, Annie, but that’s just the way it is. Hugo can do a lot with those who are injured, but his clinic is small and underequipped. Anybody needing more serious medical attention will be the first to go. My suggestion to you is to try to board up the windows at your shop—”

  “And her roof at home,” Logan added.

  “—whatever needs doing,” Sam’s gaze took in Logan also, “and hunker down. At best, we’ve got a few days of cleanup. At worst...” He shook his head, obviously not wanting to elaborate. “So, if you guys are okay, I’ve gotta head on. I’ll come back when I can and we’ll get that palm dragged off the road.”

  Annie nodded and stepped away from the truck. She heard Logan offer his assistance should Sam need it, then he, too, stepped back. Sam reversed his truck up the gravel, passing by Riley who’d perched herself on the boulders to wait, and headed off into the shadows.

  The light from the truck’s headlights bounced over the scrubby bushes lining the hillside, seeming to reflect back on the truck because of the wall of mist shrouding the landscape.

  Annie swept back her damp hair and headed toward Riley. “I need to see how bad the fields are.” She didn’t wait to see if Logan followed.

  Of course, he did.

  Riley slid off the boulder when they reached her. She said nothing, but apparently it was dark enough to quell her worry over appearing cool, for she fell into step alongside Annie underneath the protection of the umbrella that Logan still held.

  The fields were in the opposite direction to the town and it was dark by the time they got there. With no moonlight to guide them, it was impossible to see what sort of damage they’d sustained. She closed her eyes against what she couldn’t see and battled back fear of the worst.

  Logan’s hand touched her shoulder. “We’ll come back when it’s light.”

  Annie’s eyes burned. She moved. His hand fell away.

  They turned toward town, walking down the center of the roughly paved road that would lead them straight into the heart of Turnabout. When they reached it, people were walking up and down in front of the storefronts, circles of illumination from their flashlights bobbing along as they checked businesses and property.

  She wished again that she’d thought to bring the flashlight, but she’d forgotten it in the tub when Logan had pushed back the mattress.

  “What are they doing over there?” Riley pointed toward the community center across the street from them. Affectionately dubbed the “biggest building on Turnabout” by the residents even though it really was no such thing, the center had its doors opened wide. A fire burned in the domed iron fireplace outside the building and in the light from that, Annie recognized several people carrying boxes of every size through the doors.

  “Taking supplies to a central point,” Logan said.

  “Riley, why don’t you go on over there,” Annie suggested. “The community center has a generator of its own. I don’t imagine it will take long for someone to get it going. And there’s no point in you freezing out here while I check the shop.”

  Riley hesitated. But a group of teenagers huddled around the heat of the fire, and after a moment, she headed toward them.

  Annie watched long enough to see her niece approach the group, then, just as easily get swallowed into it. Relieved, she turned away, glancing at Logan as they set off for her shop near the other end of the string of businesses. “I’m glad she’s not shy. It’s debilitating.”

  “You were never shy a day in your life.” Logan caught her arm when her shoe caught on a bump in the dark sidewalk.

  “Yes, I was. Painfully.” She hurried her step, mostly to get away from Logan’s hand since her imagination was telling her that her arm was tingling beneath her thick sweater.

  “You were born to be the life of the party.”

  She crossed her arms, surreptitiously rubbing that spot on her elbow. Apparently, her imagination was really in fine form. “I learned to act the life of the party,” she corrected wearily. “It was easier to do that than let anyone see what I was really like.”

  “And it got George and Lucia’s attention more effectively?”

  Annie lifted her shoulder, neither agreeing nor disagreeing. She didn’t like talking about her parents. She’d been an enormous disappointment to them. She cast a look his way, wanting to get the subject off herself. She’d been foolish for even touching on her past. “What were you like as a teenager?”

  “When I wasn’t running down Maisy’s trees at the inn, you mean? I’d have thought Sara would have filled you in chapter and verse.”

  “Like we had nothing more interesting to talk about than you?”

  “I’m wounded.” He pressed his hand to his chest. But she’d caught the gleam of his teeth and heard the smile in his voice.

  It charmed her.

  And she didn’t want to be charmed. Particularly by a man who would be leaving Turnabout as quickly as possible. “You don’t have to come with me to the shop. I’m capable of screwing in some planks of plywood over my windows if need be.”

  “And where are you going to get the sheets of wood?”

  “I have some in my workroom, if you must know. And even if I didn’t, I’m sure someone else would have some. Turns help each other out when it’s called for.”

  “You weren’t born on Turnabout. Therefore, you’re not officially a Turn,” he said smoothly. “You might consider yourself an islander now, but that doesn’t change facts and make you a Turn.”

  “No, but your sister is a Turn, and she’s my business partner. Courtesies get extended to me as a result.”

  He snorted softly. “Honey, you’re dreaming if you think the die-hards of this place will ever truly accept you. They have too much respect for the Turnabout curse that says Turns and outsiders don’t mix. That curse has been around a helluva lot longer than you have.”

  “Spoken with all the sureness of being a Turn yourself,” Annie scoffed, even though she secretly feared there was a grain of truth in his words. Though she felt a part of the community, there still remained a lingering sense that she was not entirely accepted. Trusted.

  “I wasn’t born on Turnabout,” Logan said. “I’m no more a Turn than you are.”

  Her toe caught another buckle in the sidewalk right in front of the broken plateglass window of her shop. She barely kept herself from pitching forward onto her nose, and was grateful when she didn’t. She already felt as if she’d been hit by a tr
uck. “But Dr. Hugo is a Turn, and so is your sister.”

  “So?”

  “Well, where were you born, then?”

  “Oregon.”

  She didn’t remember Sara ever mentioning Oregon. “Your family must have lived there before Sara was born, I guess.”

  “My parents were separated for a while. They reunited after I was born,” he said flatly. “Now, do you want to show me where this plywood of yours is, or should I head through the shop window like a bull and find it myself?”

  Feeling well and truly put in her place by his tone, Annie unlocked the door. Though Logan had been right; they could just as easily have walked in through the window that no longer existed. Despite the darkness, she found her way across the retail front, and was relieved that the racks and cases seemed to be where they belonged.

  In the workroom, she took a candle from the stock shelves and felt through the jumble atop the desk for one of the lighters that Sara was forever stealing from her father. Annie had always wondered why Sara bothered, considering that Hugo never did use his lighters for his cigars. But for now, she was glad of it when she found one and used it to light the candle.

  She set it on the desk then lit a few more, until there was a soft, warm glow inside the workroom. She pointed to the pallets in the farthest corner of the room, beyond the oven they often used to help dry herbs.

  “Plywood,” she said. “Sara and I had it shipped here a few months ago. We’re planning to build more shelves back here for the stock, but we haven’t gotten to it, yet.”

  He moved toward the pallets, ducking to keep from knocking his head into the bundles hanging by string from the frame that hung suspended from the high ceiling. “Handy for us,” he said.

  Annie found the toolbox and brought it out to the front while Logan carried a sheet of wood. She winced anew at the crunch of glass beneath their shoes. “What a mess. And,” she lifted a forestalling hand, “I know. It could be a whole lot worse. I have no reason to complain.” Of course, she hadn’t seen her fields, yet, either.