The bell on the door made an unnecessarily loud jangling noise as she slunk inside, an array of reassuring sweet scents filling her nose. The only other customers, a couple with a little girl, eyed her curiously as she slid behind an old fashioned coat rack next to the door. Mortified, she turned her gaze back to the window.
A moment later, Josh bolted into the shop. “Kate, what are you—”
“Shh…!” She motioned for him to join her as she peered out the window, straining to see the corner she’d come around.
Josh patiently moved next to her as directed. She held her breath, but no one on the sidewalk outside seemed to be paying any attention.
“Don’t worry.” He touched her shoulder. “It looks like we lost them.”
Her guard melted a little. “I’m just so tired of them taking pictures of me every time I step out in public.” Her hands moved to the sides of her face. It felt good to talk about it, but she had to take care not to let her defenses down too much.
He pulled his hand away, and a wave of inexplicable disappointment rushed through her. What was the matter with her, anyway?
“Look.” His voice sounded soft and kind. “This is going to blow over. People will get used to seeing you around the islands and they’ll stop acting this way.”
She looked up into his eyes, which were a richer shade of brown than she’d realized. Though her heart beat like a steel drum, her voice came out barely above a whisper. “Promise?”
A hint of amusement shaded his smile. “I can’t exactly ‘promise’ anything, but if I know human nature, people around here will move on to the next big thing before too long. Besides, what’s the worst that can happen? You get your picture taken a few more times and people speculate about your motive for marrying the local billionaire. In the big scheme of things, that’s really not so terrible.”
She looked away, not wanting to let on that the ‘worst thing that could happen’ was actually far worse than just that.
“Kate.” Josh looked down at her, a little more perceptively than she would have liked. “Is there something you’re not telling me?”
Oh no. Why did he have to be so smart? Forcing a contrite expression, she thought fast. “Yes. I have a confession to make.” Her attempt at lightheartedness came out too shaky to convince even herself. She tipped her head toward the ice cream case. “I have a secret passion for coconut.”
“Oh?” One corner of his mouth lifted. “I’m a chocolate fan, myself.”
“And I owe you that shake, right?” Casting another nervous glance out the window, Kate moved carefully toward the counter, where a young girl stood wiping off the glass case. She pulled a five dollar bill out of her purse and pushed it along the counter. “A chocolate shake, please.” She turned to Josh, who had followed her, but was keeping a skeptical eye on her. She smiled. “I’m suddenly dying for that cone you promised, so—”
Abruptly, the man with the camera skidded past the window, giving it a quick glance as he passed. Kate grabbed the front of Josh’s shirt, using him as a human shield. Peering around him, she watched the photographer stop a couple of tourists, no doubt to ask if they’d seen her, and bounce on his toes like he might spring out in any direction.
Kate looked around frantically, then snapped at the girl, who had her head inside the ice cream case. “Restroom!”
Eyes widening at the urgent outburst, the girl pointed with her scoop to a door near the back of the store. “It’s a single stall, but no one’s in there.”
Kate pivoted on the black and white checked floor just as the little girl from the nearby table darted in front of her and nearly sent her headlong into a shiny red and white booth. She panicked. The kid was clearly headed for Kate’s only reasonable hiding place.
“Whoa!” Josh looked down at the girl, who had sidelined herself by careening into his legs. “I thought this was an ice cream parlor, not a football field!”
The girl stopped to stare up at him and Kate grappled with the momentary advantage. As she attempted to regain her footing, the girl’s mother swooped in and put her hands on the girl’s shoulders.
“Marissa what do you say?”
The little tyke glanced up as she did a dance that clearly indicated her need to make it to the restroom was very different from Kate’s. “Sowwy.”
Kate’s heart turned to butterbrickle. How could she cut in front of a child?
A quick glance at the window reassured her that the photographer had moved on. Crossing back to the counter for support, she held up a weak hand, indicating that the girl should go before her.
“Here you go!” Smiling brightly, the counter girl thrust a cold cup into Kate’s hand.
The little girl’s mother looked weary as she spoke to her daughter. “Let’s go.” She gestured toward the restroom. “I’m right behind you.”
Kate caught sight of the photographer jogging past the window in the other direction. She shoved the shake at Josh, maneuvering so that he would once again block her from the window. At the same time, Josh stepped aside for the woman, causing Kate to accidentally move directly into her path. They did an awkward step dance as the little girl dashed around them and pushed open the women’s room door with the urgency of someone running from a fire.
An unidentifiable emotion charged the mom’s eyes as she angled herself sideways and tried to push between Kate and the booth.
Kate’s stomach lurched. Was this another friend of Trina’s, suddenly realizing who Kate was? She braced herself for another admonishment.
Instead of fixing a glare on Kate, the woman glanced over at the restroom door as it closed behind her daughter. Her look softened to one of apology and she stopped trying to get around Kate. “I’m really sorry about that.”
“Oh, no big…” Josh met the woman’s gaze, then gave a grunt of surprise and stepped forward.
Kate looked up. Did he know this woman? He stared, incredulity slacking his features. “Sorry. It’s just… has anyone ever told you, you look like Shania Hane?”
Kate honed her focus on the woman. It was true. The woman bore a striking resemblance to the movie star, but that was of little interest to Kate at the moment.
The man who had been sitting with the woman and child stood and joined them, settling his hands against the woman’s shoulders. “She hears that a lot.”
Kate breathed out, hoping that no one would mention the ‘striking resemblance’ she herself bore to the woman whose sunglass-concealed face had appeared on the national news more than once. She really needed to get Josh out of this conversation, to spare herself and to spare this poor woman.
“Josh!” Without thinking, she grabbed his arm and pulled him out of the woman’s way. “You’ll have to forgive my friend. He’s a big movie buff.”
“Yes,” he went on, getting that light in his eyes that he seemed to get whenever he talked about film, like nothing else really mattered. “And Genesis Expedition was one of my favorites.” He tilted his head to one side, studying her intently. “You look just like her.”
Kate flashed him a look that seemed to go unnoticed. Didn’t he realize how annoying this was?
The man sighed. “This is Devynne Lang. Devynne is the owner of The Healing Quilt, here on the island.” He stepped around Devynne and stretched out his hand. “I’m Carcen.”
Kate stared at his hand. What was she supposed to do? Josh was still gaping at the woman named Devynne like some kind of crazed fan.
Kate stepped forward and took the man’s hand. “I’m Kate and this is my… friend… Josh.” She wanted to bite back the words the second they were out. Why had she just admitted to being the woman this entire community was probably bent on hating? She bit her lip, waiting for the light to go on in their eyes.
Josh seemed to recover his senses. He snapped his mouth shut and gave himself a little shake. “Yeah, I’m Josh.” His face reddened. “But…” he pointed toward Kate, “she said that already. I’ll just be quiet now. Nice to meet you.”
> In spite of her irritation with him at the moment, Kate almost laughed. So he had a less-than-totally-cool-and-collected side to him after all.
The man just smiled and then looked down at the woman without a hint of recognition of Kate. “Need to go see to Marissa?”
“Yes.” She offered them a parting smile and headed past Kate, toward the restroom.
Relief and thankfulness for the deflating of another potential disaster coursed through Kate. Once the man turned to go back to his table, Kate backhanded Josh across his bicep.
His eyes trailed after the woman, who lingered outside the closed door. He rubbed his arm, seeming to barely notice the blow.
She blew a puff of air through her lips. “That poor woman.” She kept her voice low.
“Huh?” He finally focused on Kate.
Kate gave him another stern look. “Don’t you realize she’s probably sick of hearing that she looks like Shania Hane?”
He squinted. “I thought it was a compliment.”
Her mouth twisted. “Haven’t you learned anything from watching me suffer through this celebrity thing? Don’t inflict that on some poor innocent woman who happens to look like a movie star.”
He pointed after the woman “But—”
“But nothing. You know she isn’t really her because Shania Hane died in that awful accident. Remember?”
His enthusiasm seemed to deflate. “You’re right. I just got caught up in the moment. It’s part of being in the film business. You know… thinking about making connections.” He looked at the woman again. “It’s so weird, though…”
With a loud thwumk, the door to the ladies’ room banged open and the little girl dashed out.
“Mama!” Frustration filled her tone. “They got the signs on the doows wong! Thewe’s a man in thewe and he tol’ me to give you this.” She thrust something into her mother’s hands, ran to the door marked ‘men’, and pushed through it before her mother could stop her.
Kate’s heart began to race, and she took a step toward the front door. A man in the ladies’ room? That photographer? Her defenses snapped to high alert.
The woman hurried toward the door the girl had just disappeared behind.
The man with her—Carcen—grabbed her arm and jerked her to a halt. He thrust her behind him, backing away from the table with alarming urgency. He pointed at Josh. “Both of you get outside, now! Call 9-1-1.Tell them there might be a bomb.”
A bomb! Terrified, Kate turned and stumbled for the door, grabbing at chairs for support as she went. The certainty that Joe had found her and that other people had been put in danger blurred in her mind.
Bounding down the steps and onto the sidewalk, she looked around. Where was she supposed to go? If Joe had taken a bomb into the ice cream store, that meant he’d been following them—that he was watching her now. Why hadn’t she thought it through before bolting out the front of the shop? She should have gone around the counter and escaped out the back.
Or would Joe have expected her to do that?
Confused, she jerked toward the main street and twisted her sore knee, which gave out and sent her plummeting toward the concrete.
Two powerful hands gripped her arms from behind, and terror paralyzed her. She struggled to get free, whirling around and flailing her arms in self-defense.
“Whoa.” Keeping a solid grasp on one of her elbows, Josh held up his other arm to shield himself from her frenzied hits. “Calm down, Kate. It’s okay.”
Seeing that it was him, she melted into a puddle of embarrassment and relief. He could protect her, but was it really fair to put his life in jeopardy any more than she already had?
“Aha!” Just then, the photographer appeared in front of them, reeling off a series of shots.
Kate shrieked, throwing her hand over her face.
“Hey, Mrs. Cole…” The photographer taunted as he continued to click. “How long do you think you’ll last before you disappear too?”
The words sent a tremor through her. He would have no way of knowing that the real danger in her life had nothing to do with Chase.
Josh took a powerful stride toward him. “Hey, get lost.”
Kate did her best to steady her breathing, but it was no use. Joe had to have been watching her. Waiting. He had to have seen her enter the ice cream store and had taken advantage of the opportunity to get to her. Then that little girl had walked in on him. That poor little girl could have been killed, and it was all her fault.
Terror filled her. In spite of all her precautions, Joe had found her. She had to face it. She had run but she couldn’t hide.
Chapter 11
Josh gave a peripheral glance at Kate as he drove down the ramp onto Shaw Island. She’d hardly said a word on the ferry, so he had taken the full hour of sitting in the car with her to ponder her behavior. Neither her overreaction to getting her picture taken nor her totally losing it over the bomb scare made any sense. Yet she seemed to think that marrying a guy whose previous wife had vanished without a trace was perfectly rational.
But the craziest thing of all was that Josh couldn’t put the brakes on his attraction to her.
“Stop the car!”
Kate jumped at Jessica’s piercing command from the backseat, but Josh just cringed in annoyance. He pulled over to allow the two cars behind him to pass, then shifted to ‘park’. Jessica hopped out, hurried to a red sports car that sat in front of the small general store next to the ferry dock, and got in. As the car swooped around, Kim blew Josh a kiss from the driver’s seat.
Josh resisted an eye roll, if just barely. Hand on the steering wheel, he turned to Kate. “I’d check the local news to see if they’re reporting anything about the bomb scare, but my radio doesn’t work.”
Kate shuddered. “Can we just get going?” Clutching her stomach, she slumped even further into her seat.
“In a minute.” He shut off the engine. “After you tell me what’s really bothering you.”
“It was a bomb, Josh.” Her eyes held the torment of confusion and indecision. “I’m going to have to just stay at Chase’s…I mean our house. It’s obviously too dangerous for me to go out.”
“Dangerous?” He hadn’t taken her to be a drama queen, but this was definitely an overreaction. “You honestly think someone would put a bomb in the ice cream parlor…why? To scare you away from marrying Mr. Cole?”
“Of course not…. That would be ridiculous.” Her voice weakened. “But when I went into the gallery, the owner made it really clear that I’m not welcome around here.”
“She did? That doesn’t seem like a very smart way to do business.”
“No, but she was Trina’s best friend. She’s obviously pretty bitter about me being here.”
“I guess that’s understandable.” A wave of protectiveness moved through him. “But did she threaten you?”
“N…no. She just wasn’t very nice to me.”
“But not dangerous.”
“I guess not.” Chewing her lower lip like she might just bite right through it, she pondered. “But even if that bomb scare had nothing to do with me this time, next time—”
“Kate, you’re not thinking clearly.” He turned in his seat to fully face her. “Take a couple of deep breaths. Nobody wants to hurt you.”
Obviously, she needed some perspective. The sheriff in Friday Harbor hadn’t told them much—just asked them a few questions and had the ice cream store cordoned off with yellow tape. Ordinarily, Josh would have stuck around to observe in case he ever needed to film a scene about a police investigation, but Kate hadn’t been able to stop shaking. They’d gotten on the next ferry for Shaw instead.
Now Josh longed to encourage her to open up about what was really scaring her. He tried to affect a more reassuring tone. “If the sheriff had thought this had anything to do with you, he wouldn’t have let you leave.”
Kate’s eyes darted around the parking lot. “I don’t trust the police.”
Whoa. Where did that s
entiment come from? He studied her. “Why not?”
With a vague headshake, she wrapped one arm around her middle and gnawed on her thumbnail.
“I know you must have a good reason for feeling that way, but all the police officers I know are really good at what they do.”
She frowned, finally looking at him. “You know a lot of police officers?”
He shrugged. “A few. My roommate is a rookie cop.”
Her eyes widened. “Seriously?”
“Yeah. Eli’s wanted to be a cop since we were kids.”
She nodded, taking that in. “So you’ve been friends for that long? Must be nice.”
“It’s good to have people in your life who you can always count on.” He smiled. “And he’s a good cop.”
“Even so…” Her tone was quiet, but filled with emotion. “The police don’t know everything.”
“Kate.” He tried to catch her eye. “What aren’t you telling me?”
“Nothing.” She looked down then away—a sure sign that she wasn’t being entirely honest. “I guess those fliers just upset me more than I realized.”
“Understandable. But the fliers are about Trina, not about you.”
She blinked, obviously trying to fight back tears. “But that photographer almost got a good close-up of me. If I hadn’t put my hands up, my face would be in every major paper in the country tomorrow.” Swallowing hard, she swiped at her eyes with her finger.
He leaned over to open the glove box, glad to see that the packet of tissues he’d acquired at some point was still there. “I don’t understand why that would be so terrible.”
Accepting the tissues, she rolled in her lips and looked nervously around the mostly unpopulated parking area. An old VW van appeared on the road in front of them and pulled into a parking space. As the driver’s door opened, Kate held a tissue up to her face and sunk down in her seat.
Josh couldn’t help a slight chuckle. “I don’t think you need to worry about her giving you a bad time.”
“Why not?” Kate pulled her head up a little to watch the woman in a formless blue dress and white head covering amble along the walkway in front of the store to the post office in the same building. “Is that a nun?”
Tide Will Tell (Islands of Intrigue: San Juans) Page 7
