by Lucy Kevin
He was beginning to read through the minutes from the last meeting of the Mussel Farmers’ Union when one final message from Margaret slid out. He saw the name first—Hanna Walker—before seeing that Benjamin Neale had called, again, regarding her request to go through the local historic archives.
“Hanna Walker wants to make a documentary film about what happened between your family and hers,” was what Benjamin had told him a few weeks ago. “She wants access to the archives. Now, none of the rest of the society board have any objections—”
“No,” Joel had said. “Absolutely not.”
And that had been that, he’d assumed. Yet now there was another message about her. What was the youngest Walker sister trying to do with her documentary? Open up old wounds? Reignite old arguments?
Joel had no intention of doing either. The past needed to stay in the past.
Her grandfather had turned his back on the Peterson-Walker merger and then his great aunt Poppy had taken her life. Why would anyone want to rake up all that?
The only thing that made sense was that Hanna obviously planned to use whatever skills she had with a video camera to reinvent the past. Wasn’t it true that people tended to believe what they saw on a TV screen over the truth? A few truths, a few lies, and suddenly the Walker family would come out of the whole mess looking far better than they had actually been. With access to the archives, Hanna would likely be able to put together enough information to make whatever mangled version of the truth she wanted to sell seem believable.
Joel couldn’t risk that. He wouldn’t risk that.
He owed it to his family not to.
He’d known most of her older sisters from school, but his memories of Hanna were as a little shadow trailing behind Emily, Rachel, Paige and Morgan. Not, of course, that Joel had ever had much to do with the Walkers at school. He was a Peterson, after all.
Shaking his head, he had just re-focused on the meeting minutes regarding mussel seeding ratios when he heard Margaret arguing with someone outside the door.
“I’m sorry, but Mr. Peterson can’t be disturbed right now. He has a meeting soon—”
“I understand,” another woman said, “but if he’s not with anyone right now, this will only take a few minutes. We just have a small misunderstanding to straighten out.”
Joel didn’t have time to straighten his tie before a woman pushed open the door to his office. Small and fine-boned, she was incredibly beautiful, albeit in a slightly unconventional way. Her blonde hair was streaked with light pink highlights, and her eyes shone out, blue and fierce from beneath her bangs. Even in cargo pants and a denim jacket it was obvious that she had a gorgeous figure.
As a high school quarterback, the son of the local shipping magnate, and then the director of the family business, Joel had had his share of relationships with good looking women. But there was something uniquely attractive about the way this woman strode over to his desk like nothing in the world was going to stop her from getting what she wanted.
Of course, by that point, two other things had become pretty obvious, both of which should have dampened the attraction Joel had felt in that first glance. The first was that she was probably only in her early twenties, which was far too young for him. But it was the second that was far more important.
She was a Walker.
Hanna Walker.
She might have been the youngest Walker sister, but she was no longer a little girl. Not even close.
“Oh, wow,” she said, her eyes widening as she stopped moving closer to stare at him. “You would look just great on camera.”
“Hanna—”
“You recognized me.” She sounded surprised. “I wasn’t sure you would. I’ve grown up.”
Yes, he thought, you certainly have. This close, he could smell the fresh scent of the sea on her and guessed that she must have only just come over on the ferry. He knew she was here to convince him to let her into the archives, but just looking at her beautiful face scrambled up his brain cells so badly that before he could put them back in order and let her know he wasn’t going to change his mind, she was moving closer...and scrambling his insides up more and more with every step she took.
“I just spoke to Mr. Neale, who told me that you’d said I couldn’t have access to the archives, but I figured that couldn’t be right. I mean, why would you do that? And since he’s very busy with everyone who wants ice cream today, I thought I’d come here and talk to you directly. And you know, you really would look great on camera. Maybe we could do a segment in the documentary with you talking about how the Peterson family is doing now, a couple of generations after the big feud? And we could also include a few shots of mussel farming, because though I know it isn’t totally relevant to our families’ stories, it is a really big part of the island culture and industry.” Barely pausing for breath, she added, “So if you could let Mr. Neale know it was just a slight mix up, that would be great. And it would be even better if you could talk to him today, because I need to get to work on my documentary immediately so that I can edit it together and submit it before the end of the summer.”
Joel was, frankly, stunned by Hanna’s passion. He’d hoped that her interest in the Walker-Peterson feud would be fleeting. But as she began to move even closer—close enough that he could smell the lavender scent of her shampoo in addition to the sea spray on her skin—he realized he had to stop this here and now. All of this.
“There is no mix up.” He pushed away from his desk, and made himself move across the room, away from all of her incredible beauty and passion. “I’m not going to give you access to the historical archives.”
“But why?”
How, he wondered, could she be this genuinely surprised by his response? “Hasn’t your grandmother told you why?”
For the first time since entering his office, she looked a little unsure. “I haven’t told Grams about it quite yet,” Hanna admitted. “The interview with her will be one of the main features of the documentary, and if I told her what I was doing too soon, it might spoil her natural reaction. It’s really important with documentaries to get people’s real reactions.”
“Oh, trust me,” Joel told her, “once you bring this up with your grandmother, you’ll get a real reaction. Surely, you know the details of the island scandal, don’t you?” Details of a feud that had been drummed into Joel’s head from as far back as he could remember.
“Some of them,” she replied, “although I won’t know everything until I’ve had a chance to look through the archives properly.”
“No,” he said again. “And once you speak with your grandmother, I’m certain you’ll understand why I can’t support your documentary project.”
Before Hanna could try to argue her case again, Margaret opened the door. “Joel, Frank Williams is here for your meeting. Do you need him to wait a few minutes?”
Hanna spoke first. “No, that’s okay. I need to go let my family know I’m back home.” Scrupulously polite now, and in direct contrast to the way she had barged in earlier, she said, “Thank you for your time, Joel.”
When she turned and walked out with her spine straight and her head held high, Joel couldn’t help but admire her beauty yet again. Working to shake her vibrant image out of his head as he shook hands with the head of the Mussel Farmers’ Union, Joel did his best to focus on the meeting so that he could understand the changes they wanted. But all the while his brain was somewhere else entirely.
Still thinking about Hanna…
CHAPTER THREE
“Hanna?” Ava Walker stepped out of the front door just as Hanna was about to head inside. “When did you get back, darling? We would have come down to the ferry to meet you.”
There were those who said that Ava had been a real beauty in her youth. Hanna always thought they had it wrong. Her grandmother was beautiful now. She kept herself in great shape with regular exercise and healthy food and still moved with the poise of a dancer. Her bright blue eyes still had plen
ty of fire in them, too.
“I came in on the two o’clock, but I didn’t want to interrupt any of you when you were working. Plus, it’s such a beautiful day that I wanted to get some footage of town.”
She’d had a wonderful time in town…that is, until her run-in with Joel at the Peterson Shipping offices. Hanna had always been happy to get back to the island during school breaks, but all she could think about right then was how Joel had flat out ruined her plans for the documentary.
“Hanna, what is it?” Ava asked, reaching out to take hold of her hand. “You look so upset.”
“No, it’s…” Hanna shook her head. If her grandmother was on the way out, then she didn’t have enough time to go into it all. “We can talk about it later if you have to go open up the studio for your afternoon classes.”
“Oh, Paige has already done that,” Ava assured her. “And I’m sure she can handle things there a little longer while you tell me what’s going on.” Putting her arm around Hanna’s waist, she said, “Come on inside.”
Together, they headed through the entry and into the kitchen. The big old house that had held so many generations of Walkers wasn’t a mansion, but could easily accommodate five energetic kids running around. The kitchen was the largest room in the house, with a big dining table around which the whole family could fit to eat.
Hanna wasn’t surprised to see a man in a plaid shirt and jeans working beneath the sink. Michael Bennet had moved in with the Walkers for a few years as a teenager when he’d lost his parents. Hanna had always looked at him as a big brother. All of her sisters did. Well, all except Emily, who could never quite hide her emotions whenever she looked at the dark-eyed, dark-haired man who was always underfoot....
When he spotted her, Michael quickly moved to his feet to pull her into a warm hug. “I thought we’d gotten rid of you to Seattle for good. I’m glad to see I was wrong about that.”
“Does Emily know you’re fiddling with her sink?” Hanna countered with a big grin as she hugged him back just as hard.
“No, but she does now,” Hanna’s oldest sister said from the kitchen door.
Hanna had often thought that Emily was the prettiest of them all, even if some days it seemed like she was too busy to make much of an effort. Today, she had her hair tied back, and she hadn’t bothered putting on any makeup, which would have horrified Morgan’s makeup-artist soul. Emily had always been so much more than a big sister, having stepped up to take care of all of them after their mother passed away.
“Welcome home, Hanna,” Emily said as she also gave her a hug, before turning to Michael. “You didn’t leave your crew down at Mrs. Hellman’s house to come fix our sink, did you?”
“Ava asked me to have a look at it. And now,” he said as he flipped the faucet up and water poured out into the sink, “you don’t have to do it.”
Hanna watched the play of emotions roll across her big sister’s face: pleasure at being near Michael, which turned into longing for more, before Emily tamped down on all of it.
“Thank you,” Emily finally said, “for fixing it just in time for me to get dinner started for everyone. Are you going to stay to eat with us?”
Michael’s eyes were full of the same longing Hanna had just seen in her sister’s eyes as he watched Emily efficiently move to the fridge and pull out three bell peppers. “Only if you think you’ll have enough.”
Seriously, how many years were the two of them going to do this dance with each other? Frustrated by both of them, Hanna sat down with her grandmother at the kitchen table and said, “She always makes enough.” When both Michael and Emily looked surprised by her tone, she immediately apologized. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to sound snarky.”
Her grandmother reached for her hand. “What is it, Hanna? What’s wrong?”
She knew she’d feel better if she got everything off her chest, but at the same time, she hated spoiling things in her first few moments back home by complaining about her film...and Joel.
When she didn’t immediately spill her guts, her grandmother squeezed her hand. “Whatever problems you might be having, if you’ll talk to us about them, I’m sure we can put our minds together to find a way to work things out.”
“Not if Joel Peterson has anything to say about it, it won’t,” Hanna replied with more force than she intended. “I just went to see him in his office, actually.”
“You went to see the Peterson boy?” Ava said, her eyebrows raised in surprise.
“He’s not a boy anymore, Grams,” Emily said, putting down a plate of crackers, cheese and fruit for them to munch on before dinner. “He’s the head of Peterson shipping now and is only a couple of years younger than me.”
“What did Joel do to upset you so much?” Michael asked as he loaded up a cracker with two slices of sharp cheddar.
“I’m only provisionally accepted into grad school and I have to do a piece that’s good enough to truly earn my spot. Something with heart.” Hanna resisted the urge to slam her hand onto the table top in frustration. She knew from her teenage tantrums that the Walker family table was much harder than her hand. “But now that Joel has blocked my access to the archives, the project I was working on is dead in the water.”
“Why did you want access to the archives?” Ava asked.
Hanna thought about Joel’s parting words. He’d seemed to be under the impression that her grandmother wouldn’t like it when she told her what she was doing. Yet that couldn’t be right, could it? The Peterson-Walker feud was all in the past now. And yet, at the same time, Hanna sensed that it was a story that needed to be told.
“I want to make a documentary on the Peterson-Walker split.”
“Are you crazy?” Emily asked.
Hanna stared at her older sister in shock. Are you crazy was precisely the sort of thing school guidance counselors weren’t supposed to say. Besides, her sister had always been so supportive. Anything Hanna needed, Emily—and the rest of her sisters—had helped her with in the past. If anything, the problem was that they sometimes tried to help too much.
“The island feud is the perfect subject for a documentary. There’s history and tension, and I’ve got great archival sources, plus Grams is the one living person who really remembers what happened.”
“Only, now Joel doesn’t want you to have access to the archives,” Ava gently pointed out.
“It’s all for the best,” Emily said as she pushed her knife into the bell pepper. “There are plenty of other things on the island that you could make a documentary about.”
“Like what?” Hanna asked her sister, barely managing to keep the snark from seeping out again. “The whale migration?”
“Sure, why not?”
“I’m not interested in making a wildlife documentary,” Hanna insisted. “And even if I was, I couldn’t get access to the expensive cameras I’d need for that.”
“Okay, then don’t make it about the whales. How about the disappearance of the Snohomish from our island two hundred years ago? No one has ever done a good job of explaining what happened. You could look into the theories behind it.”
“You’re right,” Hanna said. “Someone should definitely do a documentary about the disappearance of the Snohomish. But I’m not the right person to tell that story. Not when what I really want to do—and what I need to do if I’m going to have any chance of securing my spot in the graduate program—is make a film about something close to me. Something that’s close to the heart of what I truly care about.”
“If you really cared,” Emily said, “you wouldn’t go dragging Grams into this. You’re kicking a hornet’s nest here. And all for what? Some documentary? Do you really think people want to watch a show about some stupid family fight that belongs in the past? Are you trying to hurt people, Hanna?”
Hanna didn’t think she’d seen her sister genuinely angry with her before. Occasionally exasperated, yes, but never angry. “No, of course I’m not trying to hurt anyone!” she shot back, “but—�
��
“Enough, both of you.”
Ava didn’t say it loudly, but Hanna and Emily both immediately fell silent. It was just like when they were children and Rachel and Morgan would be fighting to be the center of attention. Grams was the only one with the knack for getting them to stop. “Now, Emily, Hanna, do you two girls really want to argue?”
Hanna shook her head. Emily did the same.
“I just don’t want Hanna doing something that’s going to hurt you,” Emily said.
“I’m not going to do that,” Hanna insisted. “I just want to interview you, Grams, to find out what really happened back then and how you felt about it.”
“And I want my granddaughters to be able to follow their dreams, even if it’s painful.” She gave each of them a small smile. “When Morgan left to pursue her career in TV off the island, I know it was very bittersweet for all of us. It hurt, not seeing her, but at least we all know that she is doing what she loves. All of you should do the things that you love.”
When Emily opened her mouth to say something else, Michael gently put a hand on her arm. Whatever it was that silently passed between them had her turning her focus back to the vegetables she was cutting.
“If this documentary is a step along the path to following your dreams,” Ava told her, “then I support you. Just as I know your sisters will.”
“Thank you, Grams. You’re the best,” Hanna said as she threw her arms around her grandmother. Without the archives, she’d be missing a lot of the information, but interviewing Ava would hopefully cut through most of the problems. And she wouldn’t have to worry about Joel anymore. “By the time you get back from the studio, Grams, I’ll have my camera set up, and then—”
Ava held up a hand. “I want you to follow your dreams, but at the same time, I won’t be able to give you the interview that you want, darling.”
“Why not?”
“I made a promise a long time ago. One I can’t break.”
