Inconnu(e)

by Vicki Hinze

  She no doubt was sincere. The thought of sharing a meal alone with him couldn’t hold much appeal. T.J. looked at Miss Hattie. “Can’t Lucy check on Jimmy? She’s right next door, and you shouldn’t be out in that mess. You’ll get sick yourself.”

  “Bah, I never get sick. Too stubborn, most likely. Anyway, Jimmy needs some hot chicken soup.” She hiked the bowl, balancing it on her hip. “Oh, I nearly forgot, Tyler. Vic was late with the mail today. You’ve got about a half-dozen catalogues and two travel magazines on the desk.”

  “Sounds like Vic’s been to the Grange dance again.” T.J. grinned.

  “Afraid so.” Miss Hattie sighed indulgently. “The man is awfully hard on his feet. But, my, he loves to dance.” She headed toward the back door. “Just leave the dishes. I’ll see to them later.”

  “Be careful.” Tyler frowned at her back, then returned to the dining room.

  Miss Hattie dropped her voice to a whisper. “Maggie, dear, forgive Tyler. He’s upset because he can’t walk me over to Jimmy’s. Be patient with him, mmm?”

  Why couldn’t he walk Miss Hattie over to Jimmy’s? Maggie started to ask, but felt guilty about prying when she herself held a mountain of secrets. Instead, she nodded.

  Seconds later the door closed behind Miss Hattie, and Maggie went back to eat dinner, certain it’d be the longest meal in her life. A shame really. With its attractive wainscoting, pretty pink-floral-on–navy-blue wallpaper that matched the pads on the chair seats, and its crown molding, the dining room was as charming as the rest of the house. A long, shiny buffet rested against the west wall, and three huge windows defined the south. Behind Maggie, French doors led to a veranda that she pictured laden in summer with hanging baskets brimming with marigolds, petunias, and impatiens.

  T.J. sliced the roast. Though huge, his hands moved swiftly, deftly, and she suffered a totally unreasonable urge to see them busy doing his work. “When you aren’t hassling women in the bath or sending them sprawling over tons of luggage in hallways, what do you do, MacGregor?”

  “I did paint.” He didn’t meet her eyes.

  Past tense. An odd chill whisked over her nape. “Paint?”

  He motioned for her plate. “Paint.”

  She passed it over. Like pulling teeth. “What did you paint?”

  “Miss Hattie claims I did a wicked job on her gazebo and greenhouse.”

  Why was he lying to her? “Greenhouse. That explains the fresh flowers everywhere. They’re all yellow, too—even the porcelain ones on the kitchen table. Have you noticed that?”

  He nodded. “She gripes about the expense—the woman’s as frugal as only a Mainer can be—but she loves tending the flowers. She has a real touch with them.” He filled her plate. “Lucy Baker says keeping fresh flowers is Hattie’s duty.” He lifted the meat fork. “And before you ask, no, I don’t know what she meant by that.”

  Maggie accepted her plate back, then took a sip of tangy tea. “Who’s Lucy Baker?” He’d mentioned her several times.

  “She and her husband, Fred, run the Blue Moon Cafe. Fred’s homegrown. Sits on the Planning and Zoning Commission.”

  T.J. was confusing her again. Maggie frowned. “Why are you smirking?”

  “Fred took the commission seat because he hates tourists. They don’t respect the land like locals do.”

  “I’m figuring that eventually you’ll get around to explaining that smirk, MacGregor. What does Fred hating tourists have to do with it?”

  “He married one.”

  Maggie felt her lips curve. “Where’s Lucy from?”

  “Mississippi, but Fred calls her a pseudo-local. Her father was from here. He relocated in Mississippi with his job, but Lucy and her family came back here every summer.”

  “Sounds like a good family life. Refreshing, these days.” A stab of envy slipped into Maggie’s voice. Realizing she’d spoken aloud, and not wanting to be pressed to explain, she quickly added, “What’s Lucy like?”

  “She’s a great cook, and she chews a mean piece of gum.” He paused to reach for the salt, sprinkled his potatoes, and then continued. “But she’s a bit of a romantic.”

  “Ah.” Maggie cut into her meat. The knife slid right through, promising it would be tender, and the smell of garlic had her mouth watering. “So she fell in love with Fred and stayed in Maine.”

  “Actually, she says she fell in love with Maine and married Fred to stay.”

  “Seriously?”

  “No, just Lucy’s sense of humor.” He paused and cocked his head. “At least, I think it is. She seems nuts about Fred, but who knows? Appearances can be... deceptive. Especially in relationships.”

  “True.” To outsiders, Maggie’s parents had seemed the perfect couple, and nothing could have been further from the truth.

  T.J. spooned a large serving of carrots onto his plate. “You never mentioned why you’re here.”

  Dangerous Ground warnings flashed in her mind. She chewed slowly, then swallowed. She’d better stick as close as possible to the truth. “I needed a rest.”

  “From what?” Clearly surprised, he stabbed a hot-buttered carrot with his fork then raked it into his mouth.

  “My mother was injured in an accident. I’ve spent the last several years caring for her.” Her hand shook. Had she been too specific?

  He looked down at his plate. His voice lost its acidity, almost gentled. “Did she... recover?”

  Strange. He seemed genuinely empathetic. Because of Carolyn? “Yes, she did.”

  Empathetic? Genuine? Impossible. Maggie took another bite of hot, succulent roast, warning herself to be careful here. This man was not what he seemed.

  As soon as the thought formed in her mind, a whisper of heat crept over her skin as if verifying the thought. Again feeling watched, Maggie instinctively turned to look behind her. But, as on the stairs earlier, she saw no one. Nothing except the French doors, which were tightly closed.

  “Something wrong?”

  T.J.’s voice startled her. Maggie whipped back around in her chair and forced a smile to her lips. “No. No, everything is fine.”

  He watched her warily, and she tilted her head. “There’s something... I don’t know... special about this house. Do you feel it?”

  He didn’t answer. Just chewed his food and stared daggers at her.

  What had she done wrong now? Well, hell. At this rate, they’d both die of old age before she got past his first line of defense. “Have you been here long?”

  “Yes.” He speared a potato.

  And he didn’t like it. So why didn’t he leave? “Mmm.” She sipped at her tea. The chilled glass was sweating, and droplets of moisture ran down it in rivulets to the tablecloth. “How long will you stay?”

  “Until I leave.”

  Why did he sound upset? Evasive? “Miss Hattie mentioned magazines. Do you enjoy traveling?”

  He polished off his last carrot, dabbed at his lips with his napkin, then stood up. “If you’ll excuse me. This session of Twenty Questions is over.” He lifted his plate, then went into the kitchen.

  Maggie let out a frustrated sigh. Something wasn’t right here. What it was, she didn’t have a clue. But MacGregor reeked of being a man in trouble—and one peeved to the tips of his arrogant ears about something. The question was what. Did it have anything to do with Carolyn?

  After finishing her meal alone, Maggie took her plate and the platter into the kitchen.

  MacGregor stood at the sink scrubbing a blue enamel roasting pan, his arms submerged in hot, soapy water up to his elbows.

  She set her plate onto the counter and, when he finished rinsing the pan, she grabbed a dishcloth and reached for it. “I’ll dry.”

  He frowned, didn’t utter so much as a whisper, but passed the pan.

  She took it, her cool fingers brushing against his warm, wet ones. Their gazes locked. Emotions fumbled through MacGregor’s eyes. Hope. Bitterness. Then anger. His frown deepened. Before he could smart-off at her, she gave him
her best, disgusted look. “I don’t know how long you’ve been here, MacGregor, but your social skills could stand a little elbow grease.”

  “I’m not social.” He plunged the lid into the suds. A wall of water splashed onto the counter.

  “No kidding?” She cupped her hand and swiped the water back into the sink, then patted the counter dry with the cloth.

  He scrubbed the pan lid until she thought the enamel would be worn clean through. An apple in the fruit bowl looked entirely too tempting. She grabbed it. Sidling up to MacGregor at the sink, she stole the stream of water he was using to rinse the pan, and washed off her apple. Lord, but it irked her to look at his shoulder. To see his face, she’d have to crane her neck. “Thanks.”

  “You always eat so much?”

  She took a crunchy bite. It was sweet and firm—perfect. “Yes, I do.”

  He held out a clean plate, waiting for her to take it. “Better watch it. Your metabolism might shut down on you.”

  Droplets of water sprinkled steadily onto the floor. “You think I’m fat?”

  “Not yet.”

  The man sounded about as interested as if he’d been discussing drippy weather. Good thing she wasn’t in this for an ego boost. Her mother’s flatter-than-a-flitter expression regarding stomachs took on a whole new meaning. “Hate to break it to you, MacGregor, but your sleeve is getting soaked.”

  “It’ll dry.” He reached into the sink and pulled out the plug. “Good night.”

  “Good night.” So much for accomplishing anything tonight. She munched her disappointment, taking it out on the apple, still having no idea why the man was here.

  T.J. turned out the dining room light, then just stood there in the darkness. Maggie Wright worried him. She was a beautiful woman who watched him like a hawk. It wasn’t an appreciative woman/man kind of look, though. More like she expected at any second he’d sprout a spare head.

  He leaned back against the wall and let his fingertips drift over the smooth, wainscoted wood. Worse, he couldn’t, shake the feeling that her seemingly innocent questions actually were pointed and razor-sharp. He told himself again that she’d just been making polite conversation with a stranger, but he didn’t believe it. Though he knew he couldn’t trust his instincts, he wished he could, because she sure didn’t strike him as a woman on a resting vacation.

  An odd tingling started in his toes.

  It worked its way up his legs, crept through his stomach, then spread through his chest and up his neck, into his head. What the hell was happening to him now?

  He tried to move and couldn’t. Knowing only Maggie Wright would hear him, he tried to yell out, but he couldn’t make a sound.

  The grandfather clock ticked louder and louder until it pounded inside his head, blocking out all other sounds. The rhythm suddenly altered to a deep, melodic whisper. It wasn’t a trick of the mind. He heard a whisper. A man’s whisper. A message meant for him. A warning.

  She’s on a mission. On a mission. On a mission...

  The whisper ceased.

  The clock’s ticks returned to normal, then softened, and the sounds of the house, of the sleet slanting against the roof and pinging against the windows, returned. And, as suddenly as it had started, the tingling inside his body stopped.

  Shaky, T.J. dragged in a great gulp of air, but didn’t risk trying to move. Instinctively he knew the room was empty. So who had whispered that message to warn him? Who... or what?

  He was losing it. It couldn’t have happened. It had to have been his imagination. Of course, it had been. Stress-induced. Not insane, but psychological—just as Bill Butler had said.

  Footsteps sounded. Seconds later, Maggie walked down the gallery toward the stairs, humming and clearly not realizing T.J. stood there in the darkness.

  She’s on a mission.

  Wary, T.J. followed her.

  Midway up the stairs, she stopped and studied Cecelia Freeport’s painting, touching the canvas with delicate fingertips, as if it were fragile glass she feared would shatter.

  Carolyn crossed his mind. She and Maggie didn’t resemble each other, or even stand or move alike. But the way Maggie touched Cecelia’s painting bitterly reminded T.J. of the way Carolyn had caressed his painting of Seascape Inn. God, had she given him grief over that painting.

  Her guard down, Maggie let out a sigh that T.J. felt in his bones. Because he suffered the same malady, he recognized it instantly in her. The woman was in trouble.

  But what kind of trouble? Was it the reason she’d come here? What was her mission?

  When she walked on, he took to the stairs, pausing and touching Cecelia’s painting as Maggie had. Warmed by the overhead light, the paint felt smooth, though the canvas beneath it added substance and texture. Paint reminded him a lot of skin.

  A warm spark of heat ignited inside him. A flicker of healing, of peace. Only a flicker, but God how he savored it. His eyes filmed over and he blinked hard. It’d been so long since he’d felt either.

  “MacGregor!”

  Startled, he jumped, jerked his hand away from the canvas and stared up the stairs to the landing. Empty. Ah, she’d found them. And she was indignant as hell about finding them.

  Grinning, he rushed upstairs.

  At the landing, he paused and deliberately slowed his pace to a swagger. “You bellowed, Miss Wright?”

  Standing outside the door to her room, she snatched her underwear off the doorknob. “What do you think you’re doing?”

  He leaned a shoulder against the hallway wall and crossed his chest with his arms. “You mean you didn’t want your underwear back?”

  “Where did you get them?” She perched a hand on her hip. “Have you been in my room?”

  “You left them in the bathroom.”

  Narrowing her eyes, she balled the fragile snippet of lace in her fist. “If you hadn’t nagged and threatened me out of the bathroom, I wouldn’t have forgotten them there.” She marched back to him, her shoulders stiff enough to snap. “Was it really necessary to hang them on my doorknob?”

  “No.” He shrugged. “But I figured you’d take exception to me putting them in your room.”

  “You could’ve just left them in the bathroom.”

  He slid her his best innocent look. “You mean you weren’t issuing me an invitation?”

  Her face went apple-red and her shoulders hiked up a full three inches. “Fat chance.”

  “Mmm, then I highly recommend you be more careful about the signals you’re sending.”

  Her jaw gaped. She sputtered. Sent him a glower he’d still be feeling in his grave. Then turned and stormed down the hall, back to her room.

  Holding the doorknob in a death grip, she looked back at him. “You are one arrogant jerk, MacGregor. So arrogant it’s hard to believe you can stuff all your arrogance inside your body.”

  “Thank you.” He smiled.

  “That wasn’t a compliment.”

  “Sounded like one from here.”

  “A walking miracle,” she muttered, convinced that was absolute truth. It was a miracle no one had killed him yet.

  “Haven’t you heard, Maggie? There are no miracles.”

  He stepped into his room and softly shut the door.

  A pang of pity slid through her, head to heels.

  What was that all about? The man deserved a lot of things, but pity sure didn’t rank among them. Still, she would rather he’d yelled at her again than sounded so disillusioned. He’d looked disillusioned, too. And despairing. No.

  No, not despairing.

  He’d looked... haunted.

  Chapter 3

  “I still think we should put a pad on the rocks, Tyler.” Huddled deep in her sturdy black coat, Miss Hattie slid him a worried look, her stiff collar hiked up around her ears.

  “We can’t risk it.” Bill Butler sniffled, his nose buried in a forest-green muffler. “Anything straddling the boundary could extend it. We won’t know if the painting worked or not.”


  “He’s right.” T.J. curled his fingers around the painting’s frame, avoiding eye contact with the canvas he’d painted of Seascape Inn. He gripped it so hard that his red fingertips turned white.

  “All right.” Miss Hattie blinked, stuffed her hands deep into her pockets. “I agree it makes sense and it could have an effect. But, Tyler, you must believe in your heart that this is going to work. I would say that’s vitally important.”

  He couldn’t believe it. How could he? He hoped—good God, how he hoped—it would work, but he didn’t dare to believe it. Live with another failure? See another little piece of himself die? No, he didn’t dare to believe. He’d lost too many of those he’d loved and far too much of himself already.

  Still, Miss Hattie looked so worried. She needed the lie, and he couldn’t stand the thought of disappointing her. “I’ll believe it,” he told her then quickly looked at Bill. She was too intuitive, and she’d told him a hundred times that his eyes mirrored his soul. Even if she couldn’t see the truth, looking into her eyes and deliberately lying to her rankled—regardless that he’d done it for her own peace of mind.

  Bill locked gazes with T.J. and gave him an encouraging nod. His gentle umber eyes shone support and approval. He knew the truth. He knew T.J. didn’t dare to believe the painting would work. And his friend’s silent message was that he understood and believed enough for both of them.

  Swallowing hard, praying that friendship with him didn’t somehow kill Bill, too, T.J. nodded back and stepped up to the invisible boundary line. Sweat trickled down his temples, rolled over his ribs. He dragged his foot through the coarse sand, drawing the line, then closed his eyes and focused hard, concentrating all of his energy on the healing he’d once received at Seascape Inn. The healing that had restored his ability to create the painting he now held in his hands. The painting Bill and Miss Hattie—and half the time he—hoped would act as a conduit to his subconscious to free him from Seascape.

  Images flashed through his mind. Images of him arriving here, all those years ago. Images of him feeling that sense of peace and calm and serenity that Maggie Wright had been feeling, and T.J. had been envying, last night at dinner.