The Bride's Rescuer

by Charlotte Douglas

  “Swim?” Mrs. Givens shook her head. “An old woman like me?”

  “It would be good for you. The gulf water is still warm and pleasant this time of year, and the salt will buoy you.”

  Mrs. Givens sniffed. “I haven’t time for such foolishness.”

  Celia finished her breakfast in silence, and she forgot completely Mrs. Givens’s forecast of doom when Cameron entered the kitchen.

  “Do you still wish to see everything for yourself?” he asked Celia.

  “Everything?” Celia stammered, thinking he referred to her earlier rummaging through his desk.

  “I thought you might like to sail through the mangrove islands today.”

  She remembered their conversation at dinner the night before when she had expressed her desire to see the islands and the Everglades. She remembered, too, his dejected posture later, slouched before the portrait, mourning his wife and child. Maybe this morning’s invitation was a sign that he was beginning to put the past behind him.

  Mrs. Givens turned from her dishwashing and studied them both with bright eyes. Celia felt a spasm of guilt at leaving the housekeeper to do all the work while Celia played sightseer.

  “There’s sewing to finish,” Celia said, “and I should help Mrs. Givens with her chores—”

  “Don’t you fret about me, m’dear. I’ll just put together a lunch for the two of you.”

  “Splendid, Mrs. Givens,” Cameron said.

  Had Darren uttered the word splendid, Celia would have laughed at his swishiness, but in a deep tone that discouraged ridicule and sent a thrill through her bones, Cameron managed to make the word sound both masculine and enthusiastic.

  Less than an hour later, with the handle of a full picnic basket tucked over her arm and Mrs. Givens’s wide-brimmed straw hat shading her face from the sun, Celia walked with Cameron down the garden path toward the pier.

  Noah worked on the sandy path to his cottage, sweeping the sand into neat patterns with a bamboo rake.

  “I’ll be taking the skiff today, Mr. Alex,” he called. “Got to gather grass for the cow, but I’ll be back before dark.”

  “Take care, Noah. You never know when you might run into a marine patrol,” Cameron warned.

  “Don’t you worry about old Noah,” the handyman said with a hearty laugh. “Ain’t no going back for me now. I’ll keep a good eye out.”

  Cameron climbed into the sailboat, took the basket and placed it under a seat. Celia placed her hands on his broad shoulders, and he grasped her waist and lifted her down into the boat. Her skin burned beneath her clothes where he’d touched her, and she regretted when he let her go.

  She settled onto a seat, and the boat slipped out of sight of Solitaire and Mrs. Givens. Luxuriating in the open air, Celia lifted her face toward the full blast of the sun.

  Cameron smiled at her and shook his head.

  “Why are you smiling?”

  “Because you are such an unusual woman.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Most other women I’ve known—” His smile faded and his voice faltered.

  “Yes?”

  “They’re always fretting about their complexions, their clothes and their hair.”

  She felt a prick of discomfort, wondering if her casual Florida ways made her seem coarse and unmannerly. She patted her hair self-consciously and tucked her battered sneakers underneath her borrowed skirt in an effort to appear more ladylike.

  “Don’t,” he said.

  “Don’t what?” She wasn’t accustomed to feeling awkward and unsure of herself.

  “Don’t change anything. Be yourself, because you are the most refreshing woman I’ve ever met.”

  She wasn’t sure if that was a compliment. In the past six years, she was the only woman he had met.

  But she couldn’t stay worried on such a day, with a brilliant blue, cloud-free sky, low humidity and enough breeze to fill the sails. She had not set foot off Solitaire since her escape attempt, and the new-found freedom exhilarated her.

  She could tell by looking at Cameron that he felt the same. He became a different person on the water as she watched his stiffness and reserve disappear with the breeze that ruffled his thick, golden hair and the sunshine that burnished the dynamic planes of his face. She couldn’t reconcile the dejected man she’d witnessed the previous night in front of his family’s portrait with the free spirit before her now. She liked this Cameron much better, even more than the one who had kissed her hands on the veranda not so many hours ago.

  He turned the sailboat east and threaded his way among the hundreds of tiny islands that dotted the coast. She’d never been especially brilliant at geography, but her best guess placed Solitaire somewhere south of Cape Romano in the Ten Thousand Islands Aquatic Preserve, one of the last great wildernesses left in the state.

  They sailed for almost two hours through an endless maze of bays, channels and islands.

  “How can you tell where we are?” she asked.

  “I know these waters like the back of my hand. Every island is different. I’ll show you.”

  He lowered the sail and pulled alongside a protrusion in the water, little more than a sandbar and shoals where a few young mangroves balanced delicately on spiderlike branches on the limestone of oyster shells.

  “This is how an island begins,” he explained. “Alongshore currents from the north carry quartz sand and deposit it in deeper water parallel to the shore. As the sand deposits build nearer the surface, the oysters colonize.”

  Celia peered into the clear water beside the boat.

  “You can see it there.” He moved next to her, placed his arm around her shoulders to steady her, and pointed.

  As she studied the area where the limestone mixed with other sediments, pushing out of the water at low tide high enough that the mangroves could take hold, she had difficulty concentrating. Her pulse hummed at the warmth of his flesh against hers, and the intoxicating male scent of him stirred her senses. He released her too soon for her liking and reached over the side, scooping a long, green cigar-shaped pod from the water.

  “This is a red mangrove seed,” he said. “Carried by the tide, it eventually takes root in the sediments on an oyster bar, like that one.”

  She looked to the spindly tree with its arched prop roots that stretched into the sand like the extended legs of a gigantic spider.

  “Because of their strange roots,” he explained, “and the way they appear to walk out across the shallow tidal zones, the Seminoles named the red mangroves ‘walking trees.’”

  His enthusiasm reminded her of Kevin Jordan, the tiny eight-year-old with a passion for dinosaurs whose mother had brought him every Saturday morning to Sand Castles to buy the latest book on the creatures. Kevin’s infatuation was like a religion to him, and he converted everyone he met with his zeal for the prehistoric beasts. Convinced by the little boy’s careful explanations and transfixed by the ardor in his eyes, Celia had come to love the beasts herself.

  Cameron’s obvious love of his surroundings had the same effect on her. She couldn’t imagine anyone spending a day with him in the Ten Thousand Islands and coming away untouched by his knowledge and enthusiasm. He was an extraordinary teacher, and his love of the land and water was contagious. He had exposed another facet of himself there among the mangrove islands, a side that intrigued and fascinated her.

  He pushed the boat off the oyster bar, raised the sail, and headed toward one of the denser islands to the south. As they approached it, Celia spotted a sandy beach where the water lapped instead of breaking, shaded by tall trees whose slender trunks were capped with a profusion of small, deep green leaves. Cameron turned the boat straight in, lowered the sail once more, and beached the boat on the sand beneath the canopy of shade.

  She tilted her head back and gazed into the overlapping branches high above her. “They’re beautiful. Almost regal.”

  “These are mangroves, too.”

  “But their trunks are
straight and tall. No monkey-bar roots. How can these be mangroves without the arching root system?”

  “These are black mangroves. They grow better in areas more protected from the wind and waves. Come ashore, and we’ll have a better look.”

  “And you called me unusual,” Celia said with a laugh. “I’ve never seen anyone as passionate about mangroves as you are.”

  His eyes burned into hers and his tone turned intimate and teasing. “And what should I feel passionately about?”

  Me, she longed to say, but couldn’t. She was the first to look away, unsure of what she saw in the depth of his gaze.

  Cameron pulled off his boots and rolled his pants legs above his knees. She looked down at her sneakers, the single pair of shoes she owned. She didn’t want to ruin them in the saltwater, but she also feared slicing her feet on shells if she took them off.

  As if reading her mind, Cameron said, “Don’t bother to take off your shoes.”

  Without warning, she felt herself swept up in his powerful arms. She clasped her arms around his neck and saw the smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.

  The warmth of his body generated a heat within her own, and she longed to press her lips against the upturned corners of his mouth. At that moment, she feared that she had fallen irrevocably in love with the mysterious Cameron Alexander.

  He carried her onto the beach well above the high tide mark and set her on her feet. Reluctantly, she dropped her arms from around his neck. If holding her against his heart had stirred him in any way, he didn’t show it. Maybe his love for the long-dead Clarissa shielded him from other attractions. Except for the brush of his lips against her forehead the night he had rescued her, and the kiss on the back of her hands the night before, Cameron had been only a host, at some times more gracious than others, but nothing more.

  “Let me show you the rest of the island,” he said in a calm voice that contrasted sharply with the wild racing of her heart.

  They threaded their way through the broad sandy spaces beneath the mangroves to slightly higher ground, where Cameron pointed out white mangroves. The names red, black and white confused her, because all had grayish-brown trunks and deep green leaves. Mixed in with the white mangroves were the buttonwood trees.

  “The buttonwood is not a true mangrove,” he continued in his relaxed, scholarly tone, “but it is salt-tolerant and commonly found in most mangrove forests.”

  They plunged toward the island’s interior through thickets of trees. She recognized wax myrtles and towering sea grape and cabbage palms. The others Cameron identified as gumbo limbo, strangler fig, red bay and gray nickerbean. At times he took her arm to lead her safely away from the thorny perils of cat-claw and Hercules’-club or to prevent her slipping over treacherous strands of a wiry cactus, but she could read nothing but politeness in his gesture.

  “How did you learn about all this?” she asked.

  “From the books Captain Biggins brings me.”

  “You should write a book of your own.” She thought of the tourists who had thronged her shop, always hungry for more information about the Sunshine State.

  “I keep records,” he said. “Perhaps one day when I am too old to sail anything but a desk, I’ll put all this knowledge into book form.”

  “Why wait?”

  “To be honest,” Cameron said, “I fear if others learn of the beauty here, too many will come to visit and it will all be ruined.” He scowled at the unpleasant prospect. “We can’t linger here. There are other islands I want to show you.”

  He led the way back to the boat, stopping now and then to point out mangrove periwinkles—tree snails with brilliantly colored shells—fiddler crabs and even a raccoon making an early lunch of a horseshoe crab.

  When they reached the beach, again he scooped her into his arms and carried her through the shallow water to the boat. When he reached the bow, he didn’t release her, but stood with her in his arms and gazed into her eyes.

  “Celia—”

  She held her breath, hoping he would give some clue to his feelings for her.

  “When I noticed your reluctance to ruin your shoes, your only pair,” he said, “I thought of all the things you have done without since your arrival here, of the friends who must be missing you, of your bookstore that needs your attention.”

  Captivated by the look in his amber eyes, she couldn’t speak.

  “I’ve been terribly selfish,” he said, “thinking only of myself and my desire for seclusion, but I intend to rectify that situation now.”

  She waited, still saying nothing, hoping for words of affection, of some sign that he was beginning to care for her as she did for him.

  “To prove to you that I’m not the selfish ogre you must think and that I can place your welfare above my own—”

  She peered into his eyes, trying to read his feelings, wanting to cup her hand against the strength of his square jaw.

  “—tomorrow,” he said, “we’ll leave before dawn, and I’ll sail you to Key West as you wish.”

  CAMERON SET CELIA IN the boat, pushed it from its anchorage near the sandy beach, and hopped aboard. She sat in the bow, facing him, unable to speak, her mind whirling as she struggled with her conflicting emotions. Part of her longed for home, but a stronger part wanted to remain on the island with Cameron.

  Unaware of her turmoil, Cameron raised the sail and set a westward course through the islands toward the gulf.

  She wondered at his change of heart. Had he really repented of what he called his selfishness, or did he simply want the solitude of his island back as it had been before her arrival? Her spirits plummeted with her hopes. While she had come to admire the man and the life he lived, she wondered if he’d found her presence so intrusive, he would risk exposing his secret hideaway in order to be rid of her.

  The beauty of the islands helped distract her from her troublesome thoughts. Silver mullet flashed in the sunlight as they leaped into the air, and soon playful dolphins chased behind the boat in hot pursuit of a mullet meal.

  Celia looked up to find Cameron studying her and decided to tell him the truth. “I don’t want to leave here.”

  His face broke into a wide, delighted smile, looking as if she’d paid him a personal compliment. “I know what you mean. Sometimes I spend days and nights among the islands, returning to Solitaire only to prevent Mrs. Givens from worrying herself ill and sending Noah to find me.”

  “I meant that I don’t want to leave Solitaire.”

  The look he gave her seemed to probe her very soul. She finally turned away from the intensity in his eyes, but he said nothing.

  As they neared the gulf, Cameron dropped anchor off a narrow key rimmed with sparkling white quartz sand with a line of natural dunes above the stretch of beach. He gathered the picnic basket, a roll of canvas and a blanket and carried them into the dunes, where he deposited them beneath a trio of cabbage palms. Then he returned for her.

  She placed her arms around his neck as he lifted her from the boat. Her hands slid across the firm muscles of his back, and she felt the pressure of his arms beneath her legs. When he reached the beach and set her on her feet, she didn’t let go, but pulled his unresisting head toward hers and kissed him, molding her body to his with an abandon she had never felt before.

  He flinched as if in surprise for the briefest second before his mouth closed fiercely on hers. She tasted the salt on his lips and relished the hard length of his body against her own. Her head filled with a furious roar, and she couldn’t tell if it was the blood pounding there or the surf crashing on the beach.

  If he carried through with his intentions to take her to Key West, she thought, she would at least have today to remember.

  With a jerk, he pulled away and held her at arm’s length. “God in heaven, Celia, don’t do this.”

  She looked up into eyes like pools of misery. “I think I’m falling in love with you, Cameron.”

  He released her and stood staring with an expressi
on she couldn’t fathom. He lifted his hand and with his index finger slowly traced the curve of her cheek and the fullness of her lips, still throbbing from contact with his own. His touch sent a shudder of pleasure through her, but before she could respond, he turned away and walked into the dunes.

  His actions were so contradictory, she didn’t know what to think. Her heart believed that he felt as she did, but if that were true, her head argued, why did he turn from her and why did he insist that she leave the next day?

  She followed him into the dunes and watched as he fastened the canvas like an awning between the palms. In the shade it created, he spread the blanket and set the picnic basket on it.

  “Are you hungry?” His matter-of-fact tone spoke louder than his words, warning her not to indulge her emotions.

  Still confused by his behavior, Celia knelt before the basket and began unpacking the lunch Mrs. Givens had prepared. At the sight and smell of it, she realized the morning’s activities had given her an appetite undented by the turmoil in her heart.

  Cameron sat crosslegged beside her, and she handed him a sandwich wrapped in a linen napkin and took one for herself. The thick wedges of homemade bread had been spread with butter and mustard and filled with slices of sharp cheddar and leaves of crisp lettuce.

  As Celia ate, she considered her plight. She didn’t want to leave Solitaire. The main reason munched contentedly beside her. She needed to learn more about Cameron to better her chance of convincing him to allow her to stay.

  She planned her questions, hoping to lead him slowly into more personal topics. “Have you always loved the out-of-doors?”

  He leaned back on his elbows and stared out across the brilliant green waters of the gulf. The sea breeze lifted his sun-streaked hair from the broad expanse of his tanned forehead and exposed a jagged white scar at the hairline.

  “When I was a boy, summer holidays were my favorite time of year. We left London where Father had his offices and went to Devon where he owned farms and a manor house. I played the entire time along the shore, climbing rock cliffs and exploring caves.”