by Owner
Right before sailing, the SUV careened down the road. The radio blasted an unrecognizable tune. Creases strained Jon’s mouth. A teenager with green hair bobbed up and down in the backseat.
He piled out of the vehicle as Wanda dashed toward her ticket window and flipped the Closed sign to Open. The teenager hopped into the front seat of the car, blaring the radio through a speedy series of stations before settling on rap music.
Wanda eyeballed Maddie from behind her ticket cage as if she’d never met her before. “May I help you?”
“I have a return ticket inland.” Maddie played along, acting as if she’d never set eyes on the ticket taker either. With a quick click, Wanda stamped her ticket stub.
“Sir?” She nudged her chin toward where Jon stood. The woman took her role seriously. She apparently wasn’t one to mix business with pleasure.
“The same.” Jon got his stub from his wallet.
After stamping his ticket, Wanda flipped the sign and closed up shop. Once she came around from the cage area, she changed roles again. “Sorry about the delay in getting here, but I promised my kid sister I’d deliver the latest issue of Teenage Rant & Rave as soon as the mag hit the island.”
“I can see where you wouldn’t want to keep any of the Thirty-Kewlest-Fashion-Musts from her for a minute too long.” Jon laughed.
He had an amiable, intoxicating laugh. Everything about the man was intoxicating. Maddie looked away before her eyes strayed to his crotch.
“I gather you must’ve browsed a few pages on the ride over to my mother’s house.” Wanda arched a mole-laden eyebrow and grinned.
Just then, the ferryboat tooted, they waved their goodbyes, and hurried aboard. The boat ride back to the mainland harbor was less intense than the ride over had been. Jon munched his bagel and then his apple and managed not to turn green.
“Do you know that bird has crossed eyes?” He pointed his half-eaten apple to the canvas of the loon.
“It’s a long story.”
“You didn’t commission that, did you?”
“No, I felt sorry for the painter.”
“He needs pity.” He tossed his meaty apple core into the trash bin. “Have you given consideration to our next meeting?” He lounged his arm along the back of her bench seat, casual yet proprietary. She kind of liked that.
A few gulls squawked as she examined her feelings one last time. “We’re consenting adults and if we chose to spend a getaway weekend together next year, I don’t see why we shouldn’t.”
He smiled at her, toyed with her braid. She liked that, too.
“But I think we need stipulations,” she added.
“Of course.” He nodded, his smile fading.
“If either one of us should happen to fall in love from now until next year, then, of course, that person wouldn’t want to show up, and by their not showing up the other party would understand and accept the failure without any hard feelings.”
He leaned in close. “But suppose the party who fell in love still needs to show up to discuss their deep-rooted problems, which they’re unable to confide to anyone else?”
“That would be acceptable,” she agreed. “Talk is permissible, but sex would be out of the question as unfair to the party’s new love, whoever he or she may be.”
“I agree.” He traced his finger along her neck absently.
She shivered, but wouldn’t be deterred. “Discussing any terms or details of the relationship or the place of the meeting with the new, other party, or any person for that matter, is strictly out of the question.”
He nodded. “This time next year. The same place?”
“The third weekend of the month would be better for me.”
And for her father. She certainly didn’t want to run into him and Grace. The similarities between their situations hadn’t escaped her. But, she and Jon were different. They weren’t hiding their relationship. They were protecting theirs, along with their shared secrets.
“That’s fine with me.” He kissed her neck.
“Don’t forget, familiarity breeds interference.”
“We wouldn’t want any interference.” Jon moved up to her mouth.
Their lips met and waves crashed on the shore, which was nowhere in sight yet.
Maddie relaxed into the kiss. They’d both agreed to the terms. What did she have to lose?
Chapter Ten
When they docked, Jon walked with Maddie to the dirt parking lot and kissed her goodbye. She tasted as if next year was too far away.
But he couldn’t renegotiate. He’d been lucky to get this much out of her. She was hell-bent on staying confidants and strangers. When he pressed his lips to hers again, the tenderness of her mouth made his head spin. He stopped while he still had his balance.
“Rose Island next year,” he reminded her.
“Yes.” She smiled, her lips pouty from his kisses.
“You won’t forget.”
“I won’t forget.” Her violet eyes shone.
“Promise.”
“I promise.”
“We’ll meet at the ticket office.” He hedged his bets in case something went wrong with the cabin until then, like a blow down or a tear down.
Opening the squeaky door to her red but rusty Jeep, he shoved her inside before he made a complete fool of himself with his demand for reassurances. He was going to watch her pull away but changed his mind, thinking he might appear too needy.
As he trotted toward his Jag, she peeled out and her wheels kicked up a cloud of dirt big enough to qualify as nuclear fallout. He groaned. Now he remembered. The Jeep. It had been her. She’d dusted his beloved car with grit and sand when she’d pulled in three days ago.
His throat went dry. He didn’t know what to do first, book the cabin for next year before he changed his mind or find a car wash.
He opted to do both. His car reservation wasn’t until a later ferry. He drove a few blocks until he lucked out, finding a car wash with an attendant willing to hand wash the Jaguar.
While he waited inside the attached service area, he dialed Rose Island’s ticket office from a grimy payphone smelling of motor oil. Too bad his cell had died.
“Rose Island Ferry Service. Wanda speaking.”
“Wanda, Jon here. I want to rent Gull Cottage for next year. Do you know who I should talk to?”
“I have the Culvers’ number. But I have to warn you, if you want this weekend next year, it’s taken. I can’t imagine what happened to the annuals this past Friday, unless the storm kept them away.”
“I want to book the following weekend,” Jon said, sadly knowing why one of them didn’t show. His mother. “May I have the Culvers’ phone number?”
With a grimy stub of a pencil that rested atop the phone, Jon scribbled the number on the wall next to dozens of others. He thanked Wanda, and hung up to dial the Culvers who gave him the same roundabout tale concerning the annuals.
Finally, he told the owner, “The usual couple are acquaintances of mine and the woman’s. She’s no longer able to use the cottage.”
“Hope she’s all right,” Mr. Culver said.
“No, her illness was terminal.” Let one of the Culvers break it to his mother’s lover if he called. Save everybody a lot of grief. And possibly jail time. Jon flexed his knuckles.
“Sorry to hear that. They were such a happy couple.”
Jon shook his head. He didn’t want to hear about it. “I was interested in the third weekend.”
“Will that be an annual as well?” Culver asked.
“Yes.” Jon had no intention of losing Maddie next year or the next or ever, irrational as that sounded. He took down an address where to send a check and hung up the receiver. How had he gotten himself into such a situation?
Craig and Sarah, that was how. He dialed his sister’s number next. Craig answered. “He didn’t show up,” Jon blurted out.
“That should’ve made you happy.”
“The hurricane, make that two hurrica
nes, did show up, though.”
“Yeah, I heard on the TV. But, Jon, it was only a rainstorm.” When Jon sputtered a protest, Craig went on. “A big one.”
Satisfied, he asked, “How’s Sarah? Did she deliver yet?”
“No,” his brother-in-law moaned. “And she’s as finicky as the stock market.”
With a ding-ding of the bell over the door, the youthful attendant ducked his head inside. “Car’s done.”
“Listen, I have to go. I’ll call you from Bain Island once I get the board’s mindshare.”
“Right.” Craig clicked off the phone.
“Whit-whew.” Jon whistled as soon as he came out of the garage and saw the Jag gleaming silvery gray in the sunlight. “You did a beauty of a job.” He tipped the attendant generously. “Where’s the nearest auto accessory shop?”
The teen shoved the money into the pocket of his denim coverall. “Two lights down on the left.”
Jon wasn’t taking any chances on Bain Island with wind and sand. He was purchasing the best car cover the auto store had to offer.
“This one protects against sun, rain, dust, dings and has heat insulation,” the clerk assured him.
“Sold.” Next he searched out a restaurant.
“One,” he told the hostess who seated him at a roomy booth anyway and handed him a menu.
He didn’t need one. He intended to order the biggest, juiciest burger they made, with all the extras, fried onions, American cheese, mushrooms, and peppers. And French fries, with gravy and more cheese. Maybe wash it all down with a milkshake. Whole milk, none of that soy stuff.
He browsed the menu anyway while he waited for his server to appear. When she wandered over with pen and pad in hand, he ordered, “A grilled chicken salad.”
Even as the words spilled from his mouth, he didn’t know where they’d come from.
“To drink?” She tapped her pen on her pad.
“Water, with ice and lemon.” And off she trotted toward the waft of hot grease to put in his order, wimpy as it was. What was wrong with him?
Nothing. He patted his gut. No more bulge over his belt, almost none anyway. A few more days and he’d be back at his desk a new man, fitter and…and what? Lovestruck.
That’s what he acted like. He’d seen Craig act this way, needy and thin, before he asked Jon’s sister, Sarah, to marry him.
Jon shook his head to shrug off the weird feeling. Hell, lucky he had a whole year to get over it.
Picking at his tangy salad, he ruffled through the local newspaper. Nothing but weather, sales, and gossip. He checked his watch when he paid his bill. Time to drive out to the ferry landing. Only this trip, he didn’t have to leave his Jag in the crummy parking lot at the mercy of any hotrod driver who kicked up her wheels.
Once Jon and his car were onboard and the ferry launched, he familiarized himself with what was left of Bain Island’s splotchy files from the drenching rain he’d been caught in on the bicycle.
Seems the Bains were not only the founders of the island but were still a driving force. Barbra Bain’s husband was First Selectman, but chose to be referred to as Mayor, while Tolliver & Partners, Attorneys at Law, where Barbra was an associate, handled the island’s legal matters. The entire Board of Selectmen consisted of four men and one woman. He couldn’t make out their names clearly, but experience told him they’d probably be old and crotchety.
With a loud toot, the ferryboat signaled it was docking. Jon went below to drive his car safely onto land. While exhaust fumes from the other vehicles revving their engines tinged his nostrils, he checked the Jag for dents before climbing in behind the wheel. After tucking the files into the laptop’s carrying case, he waited his turn to go ashore.
The woman at this ticket office was no Wanda.
“Excuse me, where can I get a local map?” he asked the stone-faced lady.
She looked up from reading a book. “At the local library, I imagine.” She didn’t blink and somehow talked without moving her lips.
“I don’t mean survey maps or planning maps. I need a street map, like a travel guide,” he explained.
She stared at him blankly.
“The kind tourists use to get around,” he said.
“We don’t get many tourists.”
He could see why. The unhelpful woman with stark black hair and a pale complexion stared back at him through vacuous eyes. She resembled Vampira from the haunted house at the rotary fundraiser last Halloween, but was scarier.
“Can you direct me to the nearest store where they sell magazines and such?” Jon pursued. “They might carry maps.”
“You can try the gift store. Turn right at the birthday cake house on Shore Road.” She didn’t point or flutter a lash. She was good. Or dead. Either way he was gone.
He found Shore Road and then the birthday house, which was painted pink and trimmed with white ornate Victorian moldings, filigree, and newels. The elaborate millwork resembled frosting and candles. Nice touch.
Veering right, he spotted the cluttered gift shop about a mile later. Once parked and inside, he spied a circular rack stuffed with newspapers, magazines proclaiming Aliens Ate the Dingo Who Ate My Baby, sunglasses, and yellowed maps of the island.
He purchased a map and studied it for locations of hotels. Looked as if the Harbor Inn was the only bed in town.
“Oomph.” He smiled. Maybe not.
“Why are you here?” She’d said the same thing when she mowed him down with her grocery bags at the cottage. Maddie didn’t sound any happier to see him this time either.
“What are you doing here?” He cocked his head to get a better look at her. She appeared the same as she had hours earlier, but somehow better. Brighter, prettier, livelier. Maybe it was the purple, cotton-knit dress she wore that brought out the color of her eyes that made him think so.
“I live here. I told you I’m an islander.” She faked a grin, but her quivering lip gave her away. “I thought I recognized your car when I was driving by so I rushed in.”
“I’m here on business.” He sucked in her scent. She smelled sweet, like a homecoming.
“For how long?” she blurted out too quick for his liking.
“Probably a few days.” He wanted her now, already, again. Not in a few days or hours or next year. He had an urgent need to hold her close.
“Let’s go in the back and have a cup of something.” Grabbing his arm, she towed him through a narrow aisle of packaged headache, cold, and sinus medications. A short wooden counter with carafes and two small, red plastic-covered tables with mismatched chairs and an honor system was set up. “Sit, I’ll get the drinks.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Jon stuck the map into his shirt pocket and plopped down. She was more aggressive than usual. Nervous, too. She had a definite urgency about her.
When she plunked down two paper cups whorling with the steamy aroma of caffeine, his eyes rounded. “I didn’t think you drank anything as unhealthy as coffee.”
“I make exceptions.”
“And I’m one?” He smiled, feeling special.
“Usually during crises.”
“Oh.” He was a crisis. He stopped smiling and ripped open two packets of sugar, but tossed them aside. He didn’t want to drink anything. Hell, he wasn’t in crisis mode. He was on a fitness kick. Sort of, anyway.
“This is too soon to meet again. Besides, we’re on my home turf.” She gulped her coffee, hot and black. “How would you feel if I showed up at your door? Or office?”
“I’d offer you decaf.” Then he’d toss her down on the sleek veneer of his desk and have his way with her. Afterwards, her bottom would be imprinted on the glossy top that revealed every smudge. He grinned, pleased with himself.
“Why are you grinning? This isn’t funny.”
“No, ma’am.” Crossing his ankle over his leg, he nearly lost his balance as the narrow bistro chair wobbled.
“Stop being so polite. I know you better. Which is my point, I don’t want to know yo
u better. It will spoil our relationship.”
They were having a relationship. That pleased him, but he forced himself not to react or smile. He scratched his head and tried to appear thoughtful. “It’s not my fault,” he defended. “I didn’t know you lived on Bain Island.”
“I’m aware of that. But we can’t be seen together. No interaction whatsoever. What would my friends or family think?”
“That you know me.” He didn’t see the problem.
But maybe that was the problem. It was too soon to see her again. His head was still floating. He was thinking and acting like Craig did before he took that fatal vow and became Jon’s brother-in-law.
“Exactly,” she said, her tempting lips pursed.
He didn’t realize that love, if this was love, felt so cookie-tossing nauseous. She was staring at him with those violet eyes that melted his brain cells and made his sperm cells fight to swim downstream.
“Does this mean you want me to cross the street if I run into you?”
“Nothing so dramatic. But I want your promise not to snoop.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it.” Snooping wasn’t what he had in mind. A quickie under the table would do it though.
“You can see how if we were out together and we ran into someone who knew me and they said something, however unintentional, you couldn’t help but put one and one together.”
“Two.” He touched her hand across the tiny table.
She pulled hers away. “I’m serious. We had a bargain.”
“With clauses. I remember the provisions. My word’s good.” He wished she’d smile for him. He was so glad to see her and she was so un-glad. “It’s not my wish to make you unhappy.”
“I know you gave your word, but we have to modify our pact. I need a promise with a no-prying clause.” She sipped more coffee.
Pushing the paper cup from her lips, he held her hand and the container in his. Earlier he’d entered into a contract with her. Agreements were real and binding. Promises were made of different stuff. Vague stuff. Still…
