by Vicki Hinze
John crawled out of bed. Of all the times for anyone to call. Why not when they’d been fighting? When she’d been ranting? Why now? He grabbed the receiver then growled into it. “Mystic.”
Bess turned on the little tulip lamp, then propped on an elbow and called out to him from the bed. “Don’t bite off anyone’s head, Jonathan.”
Rumpled and flushed and hungry-eyed, she looked good enough to devour. Whoever was calling had twenty seconds. John was a reasonable man—and a realistic one. He couldn’t wait any longer than that to get back to her.
“This is Keith, down at Dockside.”
The Portland man. The bar where John had lost Dixie’s trail six years ago. How had Bess known? Tony? John’s heart started a low, hard beat. “You have news?”
“Yeah. The man you want is back in Portland. His name’s Gregor Samuels and he’ll be here tomorrow at two.”
“I’ll be there.” John swallowed hard. “Thanks.”
“No problem.”
The line went dead.
John hung up the phone, his hand shaking, and turned to Bess.
Sitting Indian-style in the middle of the bed, her eyes blazed. “I heard. You’re leaving, aren’t you?”
“Provided Tony will let me out, yes. It’s a lead on Dixie, Bess. I have to check it.”
Bess’s heart shattered. After six years, Dixie couldn’t have been kidnaped. Elise never had been contacted with a ransom demand. And after her death, if Dixie had eloped, then wouldn’t she have come home? If for no other reason, wouldn’t she have come to claim her inheritance?
That left only one explanation, and Bess couldn’t bring herself to think it, much less to say it out loud. But knowing it; knowing John had to realize Dixie’s status too; knowing that, in their own way, she and John were trying to settle their differences and, maybe—just maybe—trying to put their marriage back together, it hurt for him to again leave her to follow up on a lead. It devastated her that even now, even after all they’d been through together, she still ranked a poor second.
Isn’t it interesting?
“Tony! Good grief, would you please knock or something? You scared me out of my socks.”
“Tony, I’m glad you’re here. I need to go to Portland. It’s important. Could you please, please, let me out of here?”
Isn’t anyone going to ask me what’s interesting?
“Okay, Tony. What’s interesting?”
Thank you, Jonathan. Isn’t it interesting that you two are so very opposed to being stuck here together and yet for hours neither of you has tried to open the door?
“Jonathan, don’t do it! He’s a ghost, for God’s sake.”
Primed for a strong shout, John shut his mouth, held his tongue, and strode to the door. Though he hadn’t replaced the hinge pins, they were back in their slots. He grabbed the knob then twisted it.
The door swung open.
“You were bluffing. Damn it, Tony, why did—”
“Jonathan, darling, don’t rile him.” Bess crawled out of bed, came to John’s side, then put a restraining hand on his arm. “What will we gain?”
For the record, I wasn’t bluffing. I was proving a point.
“Lord help us, another puzzle.”
Yes, Bess. But one you’ll surely understand—if you dare.
Knowing exactly what Tony meant, she looked up at Jonathan, her chest tight with fear. Yet another monumental moment. She dredged up her courage, swallowed her pride, and then confessed the truth. “I didn’t try the door because I didn’t want to leave.”
“You didn’t?”
She’d been about to make love with him and he asks her that? Shocked herself, though, she couldn’t hold his surprise against him. She gave him a slow, negative nod.
John looked down at her, his eyes bright and tender. “Me either, Doc.”
Ah, sweet progress. I suggest you both think about that.
She sat in the gazebo, staring out onto the moonlit pond. The gentle wind nipped at her hair, ruffled her white blouse and slacks. If she’d worn any other color, John might not have seen her; she sat so still. Deep in thought, he suspected, dragging a hand through his hair. God knew that since Tony’s last stunt and Bess’s confession, John had thought plenty.
He loved her. He always had, and he always would. But could he stay married to her without destroying them both? That, he didn’t know. Nor did he know how she felt about him. Needing him—dear God, nothing in his life ever had made him feel that good—was a far cry from still loving him. And how did Santos fit in? It didn’t seem possible Bess loved the man. It wasn’t her style to love one man and make love with another. John frowned. And they would have made love—had Keith not called from Portland.
That certainty had John’s heart racing, his stomach knotting, and all of him regretting the interruption. It beat at him like a series of potent punches. The bottom line was that, yes, they were resolving their differences. But they hadn’t resolved them yet. And exactly what that resolution entailed, they’d neither determined nor stipulated. But from John’s side of the fence, only one point of agreement couldn’t be waived. He had to settle this case. He had to find Dixie and put the case, and the guilt, behind him. After all it’d cost him, he couldn’t crawl back to Bess and their marriage a failure. He just couldn’t do it. And, by her own admission, she wouldn’t respect him if he did.
He walked on, across the rocky leaf-strewn ground, into the gazebo, then stopped beside the slatted bench. She didn’t turn around; kept staring out onto the pond. Sprinkled with moonlight, it shimmered as if star-studded with diamonds. “Bess?”
“Hmmm?”
No surprise. She’d known it was him approaching. Still acutely perceptive. So why then couldn’t she perceive all his feelings for her? Was it a blessing that she couldn’t, or a curse? “Don’t you think you should come inside? It’s late and it’s getting cold out.” She didn’t have on a sweater. She had to be chilled.
“I’ve been thinking.”
“Me, too.” He stepped over and put a hand on her shoulder. “You okay?”
She looked up at him, her eyes sad, her tone resigned. “You’re leaving.”
God, how he wished he could say no. But nothing had changed and, until he settled this case, peace for him, for Elise, would remain as elusive as any hope of a reconciliation with Bess. “In the morning.” Would she miss him? Be glad to see him go? Pray he didn’t return? “But I’ll be back tomorrow night.”
“Maybe.” She shrugged. “That depends on what happens at Dockside, doesn’t it?”
“Yeah.” She knew him better than he knew himself. He lowered his hand from her shoulder, then fisted his hand and stuffed it into his slacks pocket. “I guess it does.”
Bess stood up and tilted her chin, then leaned back against the lattice-work railing. “I hadn’t planned on spending my time here the way I have.”
Because she didn’t sound as if she regretted the way she had spent it, he smiled. “Me either.”
“I wanted to go out to Little Island and cook clams in the rocks. When you bake clams that way, the seaweed is very important.”
“As soon as I get back, we can go.”
She stared up at him. “Are you coming back?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Good question. “We haven’t settled anything.” A strand of her hair blew over her cheek. He thumbed it away from her eyes. “In fact, a lot less between us is settled now than before we came to Seascape.”
“I’ve been thinking about your proposition—”
“Proposal.” Frogs from down at the pond croaked throatily, and something scurried in an evergreen bush off to the left. Ah, the raccoon.
“Whatever. I’ve thought about it and I’ve decided, okay. You can have your week.”
His heart nearly rocked through his ribs. “What changed your mind?”
She lifted her hands to his chest, let her right one drift up over his clavicle and circle his neck, then t
ugged, pulling him down to where she could reach his mouth. “You, darling. Only you,” she whispered, then kissed him.
God, the things this woman made him feel. And so gentle, this kiss. So gentle and loving it filled him with a longing that burned soul-deep. He kissed her back, giving her the tenderness he’d too often denied her, letting her know that, while he wanted her, his feelings for her ran deeper than lust and desire and passion. Those feelings were there, but others were too. Ones that were stronger. So much stronger . . . and freer. Untethered and boundless, those feelings were founded in love.
She lifted her head, then pressed her cheek against his chest. Her arms looping his waist, she snuggled to him, then gave his sides a firm squeeze. He held her tighter, his heart so full he feared it’d burst, her You, darling. Only you echoing through the chambers of his mind. “Bess, what exactly does that mean?”
Rearing back, she looked at him. “I don’t know. Maybe I’m sick of the world and all its problems and I want to just forget they exist for a while. Maybe I just need . . .”
“Me?” he asked around a lump in his throat.
She laughed. “Arrogant pig.”
He nearly dropped his teeth. “What?”
“Arrogant pig.” She rubbed his nose with the tip of hers and held her smile.
He grunted. An endearment if ever he’d heard one. “And how does it feel to know that you once loved this arrogant pig?”
She pretended to think about it. “I’ll let you know in a week.”
“Fair enough.” He pecked a kiss to her lips, light and teasing. “Just so we understand the terms here. No mention of the divorce, no mudslinging from the past, and no games. We’re a married couple, very much in love, enjoying a summer vacation in a sleepy Maine fishing village.” Why had he added that about love? Why delude himself? The answer came far too easily. I . . . need.
“Okay, provided you agree to my terms too.”
“Which are?”
“No saying things we really don’t mean, no taboo topics, and, at the end of the week, no custody suit over Silk.”
He let his arms slide down her shoulders then locked them at her back. “That leaves only one issue to be solved.”
“The money settlement.” She swallowed hard. “Jonathan, I know you don’t understand this, and you clearly think I’m being unreasonable about it, but I’m not. I can’t take your money. I just . . . can’t.”
“Even though it’s your money, too?” Why was she so adamant about this?
“Yes.” She looked down at his chest. “Even though it’s my money, too.”
There was some deeper reason than the value alone he’d suspected at work here. Was it tied to her thinking he opposed any dependency? Surely she realized he was every bit as dependent as she was. And theirs were joint assets. He wanted to ask, but she looked fragile, as if she’d wrestled with all she could stand to for a while. He’d find out her reasons soon enough. She’d set the terms—no secrets. So he’d give her a few days, and then he’d just ask. Surely she’d tell him. She’d named the condition, after all, so she hardly could renege on fulfilling it now. “We’ll work it out, Doc.” He pressed a tender kiss to her forehead. “Can we change the terms to seven days together rather than a week?”
“Ah, Portland.” That he wanted his full seven days with her made her smile. “I suppose—provided you’ll be reasonable on any request I might have.”
“The sound of that makes me a little nervous.”
“A week of marriage to you again makes me nervous, too.”
“All right. I agree.” She couldn’t think he wasn’t nervous about this. He wouldn’t be human.
“Good.” She ran her fingers over the front of his royal blue shirt, waist to collar. “While I was thinking, something else occurred to me.”
“Oh?” Now that really made him nervous.
She nodded. “I was thinking that I’m miserable with you and without you. So I might as well be miserable with you.”
“Geez, Bess. I’m not sure my ego can take a week with you.”
“Seven days,” she corrected.
“Seven days.” And he’d fill each of them with enough memories to last him a lifetime. “But I’ll risk it.”
“I’m glad.”
“We’re agreed then?”
“We’re agreed.”
“Okay.” He started breathing again. “From here on out, not a word about the divorce or us not being together.”
“Fantasy time.”
“Right.”
“Okay:” She raised her chin offering him her mouth. “Then let’s start this fantasy out right.”
He growled from deep in his throat and tugged her closer. “Woman, I do like the way you think.”
Her kiss was lusty, carnal, meant to incite and enrage his every sense. And it did that . . . and more. Their lips meshed, their tongues swirled and rubbed, and their hands explored, growing familiar again with a renewed awareness that this gift was one neither of them had expected, couldn’t have anticipated, and yet relished.
When she broke the kiss, her breathing erupted as ragged as his. He grunted in total male satisfaction.
“Jonathan?” She nuzzled his neck.
“Yes?” His knees were shaking.
“We’re not having sex together tonight.”
Disappointment stabbed him. “Oh?”
“No.” She drew in a breath that had her breasts brushing against his ribs. “We’re going to go over Dixie’s files. Together.”
“Honey, you don’t have to do that. I know how upset—”
Bess pressed a fingertip to his lips. “Shh. I want to, Jonathan. Maybe if we’d taken more interest in each other’s work before, we wouldn’t have stumbled around hurting each other. Maybe we would’ve understood the significance of some things we didn’t grasp. Our professional lives were a large part of who we were. We needed each other, and yet we kept our professional lives separate. It was a mistake I don’t want to make again.”
She made sense. But was her reasoning for not making love because she’d had second thoughts about Miguel, because it would complicate the divorce, or because she just didn’t want John? Her kiss told him she wanted him, but could that be his wishful thinking? Did he dare to trust his instincts?
New agreement and new terms. No secrets. “When will we be together again?’
She looked up at him, solemn-eyed and serious. “When it’s right.”
He didn’t understand. But she hadn’t denied they would be together, only clarified the timing, more or less. “Right? Could you be a little more specific, darling?”
She lifted a gentle hand to his face then let her fingertips slide along the curve of his jaw. “When it’s making love, Jonathan. You were right. I’ve never had sex with you. Never. And I don’t want to start now. When it’s right, we’ll know it. Then we’ll make love.”
The back of his eyes burned. His body rebelled against the wait, but his heart took flight in it. Tony once had said to give her time. That there was hope. John hadn’t believed him then but, if this lead panned out, if John solved the case, then maybe there was hope for him and Bess—long-term. Maybe during their seven days together he could love her enough to make her forget how lousy a husband he had been. Maybe he could love her enough that she’d forgive him. And then maybe he could forgive himself.
Never in his entire professional life had so much ridden on a single lead. What if it went sour? Fell flat? What if it proved to be just another false shot in the dark? What more could he do?
Fighting panic, he darted his gaze back to Seascape Inn. Tony. Tony, I can’t lose her again. I can’t!
A phantom wind whipped up. Swirling leaves and sand, it carried an ominous message:
Have faith that an island will appear.
Part of Tony’s leap message to Bess. Leap. Leap? Did John dare? After all the pain and suffering and loneliness—God, the gut-wrenching loneliness—did he dare to have faith and leap? Faith in what? In hi
mself? In Bess?
John had no idea.
Chapter 9
John leaned against his car and looked down at Bess, who stared at the ground. Why did he feel he was deserting her rather than simply checking out a lead on the case? Why did he feel guilty? “Honey, I have to do this.”
“I know.” She sighed up at him. “It’s okay.”
Dark smudges shadowed the skin beneath her eyes. She hadn’t slept well. Neither had he, though he suspected their reasons different. She’d worried about Tony, dreaded Millicent Fairgate’s you’re-fired call which, according to Miss Hattie, Bess expected today. John had thought of nothing but her, across the hall and one room away. “You’re not resting.”
“No.”
“Me either. When I get back, we’re sleeping in the same bed. We don’t have to make love, but we will sleep together.” That seemed the only way either of them would get any rest.
“Sounds good to me.” She gave him a smile that told him she’d known exactly what he’d meant.
He smiled back at her, immensely relieved and more than a little surprised. He’d been primed with a half-dozen logical reasons—the doc loved logic—to convince her, and missing out on the debate left him feeling a little cheated, and a lot happy. She’d known that his desire for her was there, but this went deeper than desire of the flesh. It went to the core: contentment of the soul.
He clasped her hand then rubbed the length of her forefinger with his thumb. Soft and smooth. Creamy skin. “Would it upset you if I said I’d miss you?”
She shrugged. “Will you?”
No lies. They’d promised. “Yes, I will.”
“Then, no. It wouldn’t upset me.” She stepped closer, leaning against him, wrapping her arms around his waist. “In fact, I kind of like knowing it.”
She’d changed so much. What had happened to her cool facade? To that slick cashmere, eel-skin control? He didn’t miss it. He liked this open and honest Bess. Even if he didn’t know what to expect from her. She was real. Touchable. “Do I dare to ask if you’ll miss me?”
