by Blake, Toni
“No, it’s a work arrangement.”
He laughed lightly. Guileless about everything except her attraction to him. “Whatever you say, darlin’.”
And then he suffered the compulsion to kiss her goodbye. Odd that it passed over him that way, like she was someone he knew better, like it was the normal thing to do. He’d even begun to lean slightly forward when he realized—no, this wasn’t a woman he kissed. Not yet anyway.
“’Night, Meg darlin’,” he said.
“You can...bring an invoice next time if you like. For the last two days.”
The suggestion forced more laughter from his throat. “I don’t really have...that kinda system.”
Her pleasant expression stayed in place. “Well, I’ll need invoices for my taxes, so you should come up with one.” She ended on a smile, then tacked on a quick, “Goodnight, Seth,” and disappeared back into the house, that fast.
He stood looking after her, amused, tired. It had been a long day. But a good day. Better than most in his life.
Dusk settled over Summer Island in thick layers of darkening blue as he began the walk back around the western perimeter toward his empty little cabin. Unlike at lunch, the water looked smooth as glass now—everything seemed still but for the occasional call of a bird. A few of the brightest stars grew visible in the sky as he walked, punctuated by a pale white moon.
He didn’t know Meg well, but he knew instinctively that a fling would be good for her. She clearly needed something she wasn’t getting, something she didn’t have. But in truth, he thought it could be just as good for him, too. A good distraction from some of the more serious shit in his head right now—some of the stuff he was trying to remember, and some of the stuff he was trying to forget.
CHAPTER SIX
MEG SPENT THE next morning thinking. About cabinets to be painted. About floors to be changed and redone. About repairs to the walkways that led through gardens where roses and lilacs planted by her grandfather would soon bloom, adding fragrance and color to her world. And about Seth Darden.
But every time Seth came to mind, she diverted her thoughts back to cabinets and the like. And she decided she’d employ her new handyman on a project-by-project basis—doing the bigger things first, seeing how much it cost and how long it took, and then deciding from there if more work was warranted. And maybe as a little time passed, she’d know whether or not she was going to stick to her plan to sell the inn.
It all depended on Zack really. She didn’t want anything from him that he didn’t want to give. And so whenever he came back, she didn’t intend to serve him up any sort of ultimatum or anything—she simply set an internal deadline in her head, same as she’d alluded to Seth. If nothing happened to change her mind by the end of the tourist season in September, she’d put the inn up for sale and start a new life somewhere else by next spring.
She only hoped Gran would forgive her from up on that cloud. But at the same time, she knew Gran would want her to be happy—and she just thought her life could be richer; she thought there could be...more. And once you thought that, if you didn’t go after it, how did you live with yourself?
Though she wasn’t going to tell anyone about this, not even Suzanne. She didn’t want anyone influencing her decision. She didn’t want anyone telling her no, that her life was here and how could she ever want to leave? Or telling her yes, that much bigger and better things awaited her out there and she should give up on Zack and throw caution to the wind and just do it. This had to come from inside her, in her heart.
Of course, fishing season ran from April to December on the Great Lakes, and summer kept Zack away longer than other parts of the year for practical reasons. The weather was nicer for life on a fishing boat, and fish was more in demand at restaurants and chains up and down the shores and beyond when temperatures were warmer. So he probably wouldn’t be back for a while—for better or worse when it came to this decision.
Would he care very much if he knew? Maybe he wouldn’t. Maybe he’d just tilt his handsome head and say: Do what ya gotta do, Maggie May. And maybe that would be the worst possible thing to know, to hear. It would make the decision easy. But the heartbreak worse.
Just after noon, she fed Miss Kitty, who was the perfect inn cat—she kept to herself, a quiet little furry statue in a corner of the room or curled up asleep on a shelf. She didn’t run from the guests for the most part, and didn’t even mind occasionally being petted by a visiting child. She was content and tolerant.
Like me. The similarities had never occurred to Meg before. Though she thought the traits sounded more pleasing in a cat than a woman.
“Sorry to tell you, though,” she said to the kitty as she lowered her food bowl to the floor, “wherever I go, you go. You don’t come with the inn.” She’d adopted the cat as a kitten—who’d come mysteriously walking up onto her doorstep one rainy spring morning eight years ago. She hadn’t been in the market for a cat, but very quickly discovered she enjoyed having her around. A quiet companion who fit in the quiet house, and sometimes, if Meg was lucky, Miss Kitty would curl up beside her in the nook or next to her in bed.
Just then, she heard the buzz of her cell phone in the next room, and soon found a text. Still not from Zack. Suzanne. Lunch on Dahlia’s deck?
She’d been just about to make herself a sandwich and step out on the patio to eat it. After two days of Seth Darden shaking up her world in more ways than one, she welcomed the quiet. See, you’ve become too conditioned to that. A woman who has to force herself to be social—that’s not who you want to be.
So for the sake of not letting herself begin the slow morph into a cat lady who never went outside, she texted back: Meet you there in ten.
She walked to a mirror in the hall, glancing quickly at her reflection, then proceeded on to the mirror in her bathroom. She looked plain to herself—felt plain. Long winter plain. Cat lady plain. She needed to brush her hair, put on a little makeup.
I didn’t even do that with Seth here. Even when I knew he was coming back yesterday.
She always tried to look reasonably pretty for Zack when he was around—just the normal stuff like makeup and a little grooming. But she’d forgotten that entirely with Seth. And he’d treated her like the most alluring creature on earth anyway. Charmer or not, there was something lovely in that.
Peering into the glass, she bit her lip, thinking that over, taking herself in. She looked at her eyes, her lips, her complexion, her hair. She was getting a few wrinkles under her eyes, lines around her mouth. She had crow’s feet now when she smiled. She thought her features appeared a bit sunken before she highlighted them with mascara and lipstick. But Seth hadn’t? Seth had seen something pretty there? Something she couldn’t?
Or maybe he just wanted the work. Maybe a handsome young handyman drifter learns that flattery will get you everywhere—or at least to a bigger paycheck. Maybe it was all talk.
But it hadn’t felt that way.
She didn’t want to be naive—she didn’t want her disappointments with Zack to make her susceptible to any line of crap from another man—but it just hadn’t felt that way.
If he was faking it, he was damn good.
Because there was chemistry there. Something electric. With stronger currents the second day than the first.
How strong will they be on the third day he’s here? And the fourth?
Maybe that was why she’d taken the day in between—to just...calm her body down. Calm her reactions down. Calm her thoughts down. If he’s going to be here working, you really have no choice—you have to stop having physical reactions to him. So that was what she would do.
It felt good to walk up the street to Dahlia’s, and to see more people out and about. Residents who wintered on the mainland returned all through May, and it was becoming evident the island was more populated than even a week earlier.
Just then,
Cooper Cross went running past her in the direction of the inn. “Meg!” he called with a wave and a smile.
She returned it. “Good to see you!”
She didn’t know him well—only that he was a handsome professional type who summered here in one of the large stately old homes on Huron Hill and went running faithfully every day.
And as she approached Dahlia’s, other businesspeople around the town could be seen nearby. Trent Fordham, who owned the bicycle livery, was out getting his stock ready for the season, and Mr. Wittleston, owner of the Bayberry Bed and Breakfast, was leaving the flower shop with a flat full of pansies, the bell on the door tinkling behind him.
“How’s my girl?” Dahlia said in greeting when she stepped inside.
“Good,” Meg answered with a smile. Oh Dahlia—I fear you want Zack and I together as much as I do. How would Dahlia feel if she knew Meg was considering selling? Well, that was just one of many reasons to keep the whole thing to herself.
“Suzanne’s out back.” The older woman pointed.
Although the temps still warranted sweaters—worn by them both, Meg noticed as she approached the table where Suzanne waited—it was the kind of day that made the island feel as if it were coming back to life. White pelicans, with their black-rimmed wings, perched on the docks below, and ring-billed gulls fluttered and cawed in the distance. Just to see a small lunch crowd on the deck, just to feel the sun warming her face in a way it seldom did in winter, brought summer a little closer than it had been yesterday.
Dahlia had already delivered them both iced teas in tall glasses. Meg sat down, gave her friend a “Hey,” along with a quick smile, then glanced at the menu—though she wasn’t sure why since she probably could have recited it.
“What’s up?” Suzanne asked in greeting.
“The shutters. And they look great.”
“That’s a shame.”
This drew Meg’s gaze. “It is?”
Suzanne’s lips curved into a mischievous smile. “He made the view nice out the shop window.”
But Meg cast an accusing look. “He was really too far away from you to have made the view all that nice.”
With a tilt of her head, dark curls blowing in the breeze, Suzanne mused, “Well, maybe the idea of him made the view nice. But I’m sure he made your view much nicer, being so much closer.”
“Yeah, okay, my view was nice.” She saw no reason to lie. “But I’m glad the job is done.”
“I was going to ask you to lunch yesterday, but I saw you were already engaged.”
Now Meg sighed. Eyes everywhere. “I made sandwiches for us both—no biggie. What was I supposed to do, starve him?”
Suzanne tilted her head the other way. “I think most paid laborers provide their own lunch.”
Yet Meg just shrugged. “He’s new here—and sure, I could have sent him marching up the street to the deli or the Skipper’s Wheel, but that seemed silly. And inefficient.”
Suzanne studied her with a sizing-up look. Appeared a little let down. “So you’re really not into him.”
Meg sipped her iced tea. “Why would you think I would be? I mean, I have Zack.”
“Sort of. But not right now,” she pointed out.
Their gazes met across the table. Acknowledgment that she wasn’t bound to Zack—even if most people didn’t realize that.
Dahlia arrived then, pad and pen hand, and they both clammed up on the topic and ordered their lunch. As comfortable as Meg usually was with Zack’s aunt, this wasn’t a conversation for her ears. Even if Meg was saying all the right things. Because that didn’t mean she was feeling all the right things.
After Dahlia’s departure, Meg looked back to Suzanne and said, “Even if I was in the market for a man, he’s too young. And too...a lot of things.”
Suzanne pursed her lips. “A lot of things, huh? Like what kind of things?”
“Flirty,” Meg admitted. “Forward.”
At this, Suzanne’s eyes widened. “He’s flirting with you? And you’re not leaping on that? Are you crazy?”
“No, I’m very sane, thank you. Crazy would be leaping on it. He’s a self-proclaimed drifter who I know nothing about. He’s thirty-one and doesn’t seem to have a home—or at least made it sound that way. He might be cute, but there are so many reasons not to leap on that and to instead just be content to let him work on my house.” Then she narrowed her eyes on her friend, remembering. “Besides, two days ago you thought he was dangerous and that I was too trusting. What’s with the about-face?”
Meg watched as Suzanne took all that in, weighed it. “I guess I got used to the idea.” She shrugged. “And decided I was being too...wary on your behalf, like you said. And the upshot is...” She switched her expression back to an admonishing one. “There aren’t a lot of a viable, single, attractive men on this little island, my friend.”
“Then it’s good I have Zack,” Meg replied without missing a beat, “who is at least single and attractive. And if you’re so into my handyman, I happen to know he’s available. So maybe you should leap on that.”
“You know I’m not in the market for a man,” Suzanne said—and though she made the statement often, today sounded a bit more wistful about it than usual.
So Meg let her off the hook. “I know. Never mind. I’m just saying—you’re hardly in a position to be scolding me about this.”
Though Suzanne had come to Summer Island less than two years ago, she and Meg had bonded quickly and already knew each other well. Suzanne’s husband had died five years earlier and she still wasn’t ready to move on—and was, in Meg’s opinion, far too fond of saying that maybe she never would be.
She’d dated a couple of guys since then and it hadn’t gone well—one had turned out to be married and the other had been a world-class player. She’d moved here to retreat—same as Meg once had—and was also too fond of making it clear she had no interest in dating and that she generally considered men more trouble than they were worth.
“I’m not suggesting you marry the guy and have his babies,” she said now. “I was more thinking you could just enjoy him a little while Zack’s away.”
“You could enjoy him a little just as easily if it’s only about...that,” Meg said, her voice laced with a slight discomfort.
“He hasn’t flirted with me,” Suzanne aloofly pointed out. “Or been forward with me.”
Meg raised her eyebrows. “He hasn’t met you. But again, if you’re so into him, I’d be happy to arrange an introduction when he comes back tomorrow.”
At this, Suzanne appeared unduly pleased, albeit clearly ignoring the part about her and keeping the focus on Meg’s connection with the guy in question. “He’s coming back? Pray tell whatever for.”
Meg sighed, blinked. She almost hated to fill her in. “I’ve decided to have him do some more work.”
“Smartest thing I’ve heard you say in days.” A wide smile unfurled on her friend’s face.
“There are really quite a few little things that could stand to be repaired. And bigger things that need updated.”
“This seems sudden,” Suzanne remarked with a saucy slant of her head.
Another shrug from Meg. “He seems to know what he’s doing, so it makes sense to take advantage of that.”
When Suzanne simply smiled, Meg reheard her own words. And was grateful when one of Dahlia’s servers, a quiet teenager named Catelyn who Meg had never seen minus her ponytail, delivered their food.
“Now let’s change the subject to something more sane,” Meg suggested as she picked up the cheeseburger from her plate.
“Okay. Have you heard from Zack?”
Meg flicked her gaze from the burger to Suzanne. “Something other than men, period.” Truthfully, the very mention of Zack—at least in terms of reminding her that she hadn’t heard from him—was annoying. “How’s the flow
er business?” She raised her eyebrows pointedly, very ready to move on from this.
As they ate, she learned that traffic at Petal Pushers—the flower shop and nursery Suzanne had bought and cutely renamed after Aunt Julia’s passing—had picked up predictably in the last week or two. Before coming north, she’d run a similar establishment in Indiana, a place that had allowed her business to thrive in more seasons—but having the only stop on the island for plants or flowers of any kind, she did just fine here, as Julia had before her.
From there, they discussed the idea of Suzanne buying a new bicycle this year. It was a practical discussion—bikes were to Summer Islanders what cars were to mainlanders. They weighed the merits of having a basket on the front versus a larger one in back, and Suzanne informed her Trent Fordham had a few nice used ones for sale as he was weeding out his stock, adding new bikes to take their place. “I have my eye on a fun aqua three-speed,” Suzanne concluded.
Meg let out a soft laugh. “We lead such wild lives.”
In response, Suzanne gave her a quiet, almost gentle smile. “The difference between you and I, Meg, is that I’m very content with the peace and quiet here, and you’re not. I know you once were, but that’s changed. Deep down, you want more.”
Meg had never said anything to Suzanne about that, wanting more—in fact, the revelation still felt very new to her. So she was taken aback to hear it stated so absolutely.
And the truth, the truth she couldn’t share even with Suzanne, was that talking about Seth had her reliving certain moments from yesterday—remembering how drawn to him she’d been, how her body had felt like molten lava that wanted to flow all over him. But also remembering just as much, at the same time, how insane it was to feel that way.
Meanwhile, Suzanne went on. “I know you once made the choice to come here, and to stay. But that was a long time ago. So... I guess that’s why I just feel compelled to urge you to...take a chance when one comes along. Me—I like to look at a hot guy out the window, but I don’t really want the emotions or complications involved with anything more than just the looking. I think you do.”
