by Rebecca York
Yesterday, she’d used it to make some free-form swirling designs.
She’d been about to check the pieces before firing them on a stove burner when she’d been interrupted by Granger.
But was it a good idea to be working with heat when she was feeling so— She cast around for the right word and came up with “unsettled.”
Maybe she should just look for design ideas. She often got her inspiration from art books and even current fashion magazines. She selected some of her favorites from the shelves in the workshop and took them to her apartment, settling on the couch and opening an Art Nouveau book with full-color illustrations of William Morris wallpaper, tile, fabric, and carpet designs.
She smiled as she studied a flower pattern that she admired, thinking that she could translate it into a delicate silver pin.
But after ten minutes, she admitted that there was no way she could focus on art. Instead, her thoughts kept coming back to her warring appraisals of Wyatt Granger. He’d sounded sincere, but she’d learned early in life that it was dangerous to trust people you didn’t know. And she didn’t think his strange visit was a good reason to change her view of human nature.
oOo
While Wyatt returned to his car, he kept mulling over his own past. And as he climbed behind the wheel, he realized why he felt so wound up with this case. Since the time when he’d seen his Uncle Don’s car crash, his psychic dreams had been detached warnings. Even when he’d known Sandy’s father was going to have a heart attack, that hadn’t affected him personally. This time was different because he knew that if he couldn’t make Kate believe him, it was going to be a personal disaster. He’d known that when he woke from the dream. He knew it now.
He gave a hollow laugh. How could that be true? He’d just met Kate Kingston. But that didn’t stop her from mattering to him on a subconscious level he couldn’t even understand.
He drove away from the dock area, then turned onto a series of side streets to a bed and breakfast he’d seen on the other side of the harbor from Kate’s workshop. It was a large white house, probably once the home of a prominent St. Stephens merchant. Over the years, extensions had been added to the sides, changing it from a private residence into a commercial establishment.
He was relieved to see the “Vacancy” sign was still hanging from the board that announced the name, “The Crow’s Nest B&B.”
When he pulled into the parking lot, he looked back toward the former warehouse. Although the circuitous auto route here had taken five minutes, you could get to Kate’s place by walking across a short bridge that spanned a little creek flowing into the harbor.
Pleased with the easy access, he climbed out of his car.
Since this was the end of the tourist season, there were only a few cars in the lot. Wyatt walked along a path of crushed oyster shells through nicely kept flower gardens to the front door of the rambling white house, then stepped into a wide front hall. From there he could see a parlor furnished with period antique side pieces and comfortable modern sofas.
Almost at once, a middle-aged woman with round face and her hair swept up in a bun came bustling into the room hall.
“I’m Mrs. Babson,” she said. “Can I help you?”
“I was looking for a room.”
“For one night or more?” she asked with a hopeful note in her voice. Probably he’d make her very happy by paying for a few days.
“Actually, I’ve been traveling around the country, writing articles on towns where people might want to go on vacation. And I was thinking of staying in St. Stephens for several days—finding out about the area,” he said, giving the story that he’d concocted after he’d left Kate Kingston’s workshop.
“Oh, we certainly would love the publicity,” she said. “Can I read some of your work?”
Wyatt grinned, thankful that he often used a similar cover and was prepared for the question. “I’ve got a collection of my articles on my Web site.” He gave her the URL for Wyatt Granger, author.
“And who would the article be for?”
“I’m doing it on speculation,” he answered. “But I’m thinking the Washington Post might be a good place to start.”
“Yes, we do have a front room available, but it’s our most expensive.”
“Can I see it?”
“Of course.”
She led him upstairs to a large room with a canopy bed and a huge bathroom with a whirlpool tub.
He strode to the window and looked out, seeing that he had an excellent view of Kate Kingston’s workshop.
Mrs. Babson named a fee.
“That’s fine. Why don’t I start with three days?” he said.
She was happy with the arrangement, and they went back downstairs to a small office off the parlor, where he gave her his credit card and got the key to the room.
“What can you tell me about the town?” he asked when he’d paid for the room.
“I suppose you looked up the history?”
“Yes. It was settled early because it was on the coast, and there were lots of rivers for navigation. Then it declined because it was so far away from the mainland. Didn’t you used to have to take a ferry to get here?”
“Unless you went the long way round,” she acknowledged. “But the town is so charming because it retains its colonial flavor. People come here for the atmosphere. It’s also great for boating, seafood and anything else you want to eat, and we have lovely shops along Main Street that sell all kinds of merchandise you won’t find in the chain stores.”
After the lead-up, he got to the point of his questioning.
“That’s perfect for my article. But I was also looking for a present for my girlfriend. Maybe some silver jewelry. I saw a sign on that building over there. It’s a silversmith’s workshop.”
“Kate Kingston’s workshop. But she doesn’t have a showroom there. She has a consignment arrangement with some of the shopkeepers.”
“And you’d recommend her work?”
Mrs. Babson looked out the front window, toward the graying building where Wyatt had just been.
“Kate’s new in town, and she’s very talented.”
Wyatt heard the hesitation in her voice.
“But?” he asked.
“She’s had a little trouble fitting in with the other artisans.”
“How do you mean?”
“I really don’t like to gossip.”
“Okay. I understand. I’ll just go out and try to get a feel for the town.”
“Do you want to bring your luggage in?” Mrs. Babson asked.
“Yes. I’ll do that and then go out.”
He brought in the travel bag he kept ready in the trunk of his car, then drove back to Main Street so that he could take a quick look at the shops. Several seemed like a good bet for silver jewelry. He parked once again and stopped in a candy shop where he bought a bag of saltwater taffy.
“So what should I make sure I don’t miss in town?” he asked the teenage girl behind the counter.
She shrugged. “A lot of people like the Maritime Museum.”
“Okay, good. But I’d like to find a present for my girlfriend,” he said, using the same ploy he’d tried before. “Would silver jewelry be a good choice?”
The girl leaned toward him and lowered her voice. “Some of it is pretty expensive. But some is priced better.” She held up her hand to display a pretty ring. “This was really cheap.”
“Thanks for the tip. Do you know what I should ask for? I mean what artist?”
She glanced toward the door, then said, “Kate Kingston did it. She gave me a good deal.”
“It’s very nice, but are there other silversmiths you’d recommend?”
“There are other good ones, but they’re more expensive.”
“Okay, thanks for the tip.”
He left with the candy and the information, then strolled down the street, stopping at a shop called Indulgences which advertised “fine jewelry, pottery and other items made by l
ocal artisans.”
Through the window, he could see only two people in the shop. One was a tall, balding man with sloping shoulders, standing behind a counter. He was wearing a yellow polo shirt and tan slacks. The other was a middle-aged woman with short curly hair dressed in a baggy, rainbow-colored dress and a lumpy sweater. The two people looked like their discussion wasn’t entirely friendly discussion.
Wyatt edged closer, staying to the side of the doorway.
Curly hair was saying, “This is the fifteenth of the month, Hillman. You didn’t sell any of the jewelry I left?”
“I sold one piece, but as you know,” the man behind the counter answered. “I don’t pay for consignment items until you’ve reached $75 dollars.”
“Most of my items are almost that much.”
“Yes, I know,” he answered in a flat voice.
“I was counting on some money from you.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Wait a minute. What was that crack about my pricing?”
Hillman shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “I wasn’t making a crack.”
The woman leaned forward menacingly. “I suppose you sold a lot of Kate Kingston’s stuff.”
The man shrugged. “I’m not at liberty to discuss her business with anyone else.”
“She’s undercutting the rest of us. When she drives us out of business, she’ll raise her prices.”
The store owner pulled a long face. “It doesn’t work out so well for me, either.”
“What do you mean?”
“You can probably figure it out.”
The woman gave him a hard look. “I’ve been here for ten years. She just arrived, and she’s acting like she owns the place.”
“You . . .”
“It’s not just me,” the woman snapped.
“What—you discuss her over lunch?”
Curly hair turned and marched out the door, her gaze fixed straight ahead.
Chapter Four
Wyatt waited several beats before going inside. He found the man still behind the counter with an exasperated look on his face.
“Something wrong?” Wyatt asked.
“No. Everything’s fine,” he answered, apparently sticking to his policy of not discussing other people’s business. “Can I help you?”
Wyatt stuck to his own story. “I was looking for a present for my girlfriend.”
“What does she like?”
He thought about the wives of some of the other Decorah agents and said, “Well she loves handmade pottery.”
“We have some excellent pieces over there.” The clerk pointed to shelves along one wall holding bowls of various sizes, mugs, and pitchers. Some of the best pieces were displayed on a table in front of the shelves.
Wyatt wandered over and looked at them, picking up a mug with interesting horizontal stripes and putting it down again.
“Maybe something a little more personal would be better,” he said.
“We have a nice selection of jewelry over here,” the man said, pointing to a shelf inside the glass-topped counter.
Wyatt looked at the pieces and the price tags. “They all look very nice, but some are a lot more expensive than others. Are they all sterling silver?”
“Oh yes.”
“Then why are some so much less?”
“One of the artists in town is able to turn out superior work quickly.”
“Lucky for me.” He could have said he was going to keep looking, but a pretty little silver cat-shaped pin caught his eye. And it was only twenty dollars. “I’d like to buy that,” he said.
“An excellent choice.”
“And I’d like to tell my girlfriend who made it.”
“The artist is Kate Kingston.”
Keeping up the pretense, he said, “I was down here last year, and I don’t remember that name.”
“She’s new in town.”
Wyatt offered his credit card.
“Would you like to purchase something else as well?” Hillman asked.
“No, this is fine.” He waited while the man put the pin into a decorative box.
He held up the candy. Do you have a bag big enough for both items?”
“Of course.”
He left with his purchase. Although it was late in the afternoon, the stores were still open, and he could have continued his shopping—or rather fishing expedition. But he thought he had enough information to understand the big picture. He might not know specific names, but apparently the other silversmiths in town wished they weren’t competing against the interloper, Kate Kingston.
Did that mean one or a group of them would do something to harm her?
Curly hair had looked mad enough to do it. But there was a big step from wanting to strangle a rival to actually doing something to injure her.
After witnessing the encounter between the artisan and the shop owner, he wanted to rush back to Kate’s workshop to share the information, but he thought she wouldn’t find it as compelling as he did. Instead, he returned to the Crow’s Nest and emptied the saltwater taffy into a candy bowl in the parlor.
“What are you doing?” Mrs. Babson inquired as she saw the bowl filling.
“You caught me.”
He wasn’t going to tell her he’d bought the candy to help him look like a typical tourist. Instead, he improvised, “I couldn’t resist the impulse buy some sweets, then decided I didn’t need all those calories.”
“Well, thank you. Saltwater taffy is one of my guests’ favorites.”
“So where’s a good place to get seafood in town?”
She directed him to a restaurant on the other side of the little harbor.
He strolled over, passing Kate’s workshop and forcing himself not to stop. At the carry-out counter, he got a crab cake sandwich, a bottle of local beer with a duck on the label, and a Styrofoam carton of cream of crab soup, thinking, “When on the Eastern Shore, do as the natives do.” Or maybe the rich soup was more of a tourist attraction.
It was almost dark when he started back with the food. There was a light on at the back of Kate’s building. Did she leave it on for security? Was she working late? Or did she also live there? Probably he could find out in the morning.
He brought his dinner back to his room and sat in the semidarkness at the table by the window, looking out at the silversmith workshop and wishing Miss Aggressive hadn’t dismissed him so quickly.
While he ate, he fired up his laptop and looked up Kate Kingston in some databases. He came across several entries with that name, but he didn’t think any were the woman who had pointed a gun at him a few hours earlier. They were either too young or too old or they had an entirely different profession.
The first mention of this Kate Kingston was in an article about a craft fair in York, Pennsylvania, a few years earlier. She’d been selling silver jewelry there, and a reporter from the local paper had interviewed her.
He read the article, then went on to other sources. It appeared that Kate Kingston has sprung into being five years ago. Before that there was no record of her at all, which must mean she had assumed the identity.
Why?
She hadn’t wanted to hear that someone was poking around her workshop, but obviously there was a reason for going under cover.
The witness protection program? Or had she done it on her own?
He focused on that puzzle for several minutes and was pretty sure he wasn’t going to figure it out tonight.
He typed an e-mail to Teddy Granada, one of the Decorah IT guys, explaining the situation and asking for any information he could dig up.
A few minutes later, he got a query from Frank, asking why Wyatt was interested. He drafted a quick explanation, leaving out the personal urgency he’d felt. He knew Frank wouldn’t call him home, not when Wyatt was down here as the result of a dream.
He was leaning back in his chair, gazing toward the warehouse, when he saw a flicker of movement outside the building and sat up straighter. I
t was Kate. She had stepped outside and was looking around. From his window, he admired her lithe figure and graceful movements and was charmed as she unclipped the barrette at the back of her neck and shook her hair loose. The clip must keep it tamed while she worked, and now she was done.
She stretched, then went back inside the building.
He hadn’t solved the puzzle of who she was, but he couldn’t stop himself from going into a little fantasy.
What would happen if he walked into her workshop and reached for her? He laughed. Probably she’d pull her gun again. But this was his fantasy, he told himself, and he preferred to imagine that she would respond to him with the same need that he felt for her. He closed his eyes, seeing himself pulling her close and lowering his lips to hers for a long drugging kiss. He imagined her opening for him so that his tongue could sweep the inside of her mouth and taste her.
He grew hard as he let the scenario unspool in his mind, like a tantalizing YouTube video that he’d watched over and over.
Then he ordered himself to stop making himself hot and stick to business—which was protecting Kate, although she had been very clear that she thought she didn’t need his help.
She reminded him of a gritty pioneer woman who was willing to risk everything for a new start. But she was also vulnerable. From her reaction to him, he was sure someone had hurt her in the past—and that made it difficult for her to trust. He’d been the same way, until Frank Decorah had shown him he could open up with the right people. The Decorah family had given him the confidence that had been beaten out of him when he was growing up—being careful about everything he said for fear he’d be talking about some future event. He didn’t have to worry about that with Frank Decorah and the rest of the team. For the first time in his life, he had dared to be happy about his life.
He wanted that for Kate Kingston, too. Which sent him back to thinking about holding her in his arms and making her realize she didn’t have to push him away. Physically or any other way.
Again, he struggled to stop focusing on a relationship he wished he had with her. She was in trouble, even if she didn’t want to discuss it with him, and he couldn’t romance her until he’d made sure she was safe.
