Some Kind of Wonderful Page 25

  She pushed her hair back from her face. “I should go. Thanks for listening.”

  “Anytime.” He paused. “So do I take it you and Zach are involved again?”

  “I wouldn’t describe it as involved, exactly.”

  “Be careful. I wouldn’t want to see you hurt. I don’t want you to get in trouble.” Unsmiling, he reached out and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.

  She felt the comforting warmth of his touch and thought for the millionth time in her life that without her friends her life would be a barren wasteland.

  “I won’t be hurt and I’m not in trouble. I’m not one of those women who think the only relationship worth having is one that could potentially end in wedding bells.”

  He laughed. “If that’s true, then you might be my perfect woman.”

  “Alec, we would kill each other.” She gave him a light punch on the arm and carried on walking. “See you around.” She threw her parting words over her shoulder and made her way down the narrow path that wound its way down to Shell Bay.

  There, nestled on the far side of the beach, was Castaway Cottage.

  Despite everything, her heart lifted.

  Was there a more perfect place to live on the whole planet?

  She didn’t think so, and judging from the number of calls she had from real estate agents, she wasn’t the only one with that opinion.

  She stared at her home for a moment, absorbing the truth.

  For the first time in her life she didn’t want to leave.

  There was no urge to travel, no restless pull or wanderlust.

  She wanted to stay.

  She wanted to spend Thanksgiving with her friends and have Christmas here, too. Maybe Sky and Richard could be persuaded to join them for a few days.

  Mulling over the possibilities, she walked the final distance and took the sandy path that led to the front door.

  She let herself in, decided that coffee was her priority and walked through to the kitchen.

  And there, fixing the lock on her back door, was Zach. He wore black jeans and a black shirt with the sleeves rolled back and he looked sexier than any man had a right to look.

  Her mood lifted and her heart flew.

  Shit, she thought. I am in trouble.

  Serious trouble.

  HE SHOULD HAVE stayed away.

  When he’d woken and found her gone, he should have thanked his lucky stars she’d made that decision. Instead he’d felt a gut-wrenching disappointment and that unsettled him far more than finding her in his bed would have.

  His brain had told him to stay away, and yet somehow he was here, standing in her kitchen, remembering the kindness in her eyes as he’d given her a glimpse into the toxic wasteland of his past.

  He was trying to work out how to best make his excuses and leave, when she flashed him a smile.

  “Maybe I should just give you a key? Then you could come and go as you please without breaking in.”

  “I don’t need a damn key.” His voice didn’t sound like his own. His tongue felt thick and his head was spinning. She’d pulled her hair into a simple ponytail but it was uneven and a little tangled and he knew he was to blame for that. “Everyone can gain access to this place just by giving the door a push. Hilda’s right, it’s time someone fixed that.”

  That was his excuse for being here.

  It sounded pathetic, even to him, and presumably she thought so, too, because she raised an eyebrow.

  “Who is ‘everyone’? I’m pretty much on my own out here.”

  “Which is why you need a decent lock. The world isn’t populated by fairy-tale characters.” He knew. He’d witnessed firsthand the tarnished side of human nature. It was something he never wanted her to see. Except that she had, and he was the one who’d shown it to her. In a careless moment he’d given her a glimpse into a past he tried never to look at himself.

  There was a metallic taste in his mouth and a sick feeling in his stomach.

  He wanted to wind the clock back and unsay the words but it was too late for that.

  All he could do was wait for her to mention it and then make it clear the subject was closed.

  He braced himself, ready to block her attempts to dig deeper.

  She didn’t mention it.

  Instead she walked across the kitchen and pulled open a door. “You don’t need to worry about my ability to defend myself. I’m a black belt in karate and I won a couple of medals with this when I was in college.” This turned out to be a sword, which she kept in a long bag in one of the cupboards. “I’m not as skilled with my left hand but I could still do damage to an intruder.”

  He’d expected pity. He’d expected sympathetic looks and an awkward conversation where she encouraged him to open up and he struggled to escape like a fish on a hook.

  He hadn’t expected her to be standing in the kitchen pointing a sword at his chest.

  Some of the tension left him. “It’s a sabre.”

  “You fence?”

  “No. But I once flew a fencing team to a competition. We were delayed by fog and by the time we managed to take off I knew more than I ever needed to know about that particular sport.” His heart rate slowed. “I thought your expertise was Bronze Age weapons.”

  “It is, but my interest is broader than that. Weapons interest me. The ability to cut was vital for early man. Paleolithic hunters needed to kill and dismember animals, and the distinction between blades for hunting and blades for weaponry was pretty blurred for a long time.” She swept the sword through the air in an elegant movement and then returned it to the cupboard.

  Zach watched. “Might be simpler just to get a decent lock on the door.”

  “Don’t spoil my fun.” She leaned against the cupboard and closed it. “I’ve been waiting half my life to confront an intruder with a sword. Think I’d give them a shock?”

  “Maybe.” The thought of her confronting an intruder, with a sword or otherwise, turned him cold. “I hope you won’t ever need to find out.”

  “You don’t have to worry about me, Zach. I can take care of myself.” Her voice was soft and he knew she wasn’t just talking about the physical threat of an intruder.

  “The first stage of taking care of yourself is having basic security in place.” Choosing to ignore the message she was sending, he returned to the job he’d been doing when she arrived. He’d stopped at the store and bought the best lock Puffin Island had to offer. The best had been pitiful, and he’d felt like making some suggestions to Ted Whittaker, who owned the only hardware store on the island, then decided he didn’t need to draw attention to a past that was already part of island gossip.

  A past Brittany now had access to.

  The cold rush of panic was disturbed by a clatter as she lifted mugs from the cupboard.

  “How much do I owe you for the lock?”

  “Nothing.” He wiped his brow with his palm. “Turns out Ted Whittaker is Grace Green’s uncle.”

  “I know who Ted is, but— Oh!” She filled the kettle and gave a nod of understanding. “You’re the hero of the hour and he gave you the lock without charge?”

  “I’m guessing Grace has been exaggerating, but so far I’m getting more free stuff than I did when I stole it.”

  “I love that.”

  “Yeah, there’s an irony there.” And there was an irony in the fact that he was the one with the skills of breaking and entering, and yet Brittany had somehow found her way into the locked vault inside him. She’d sneaked in there, around the deadly barbs of protection that had kept him safe for years. He watched as she made fresh coffee and poured it into both mugs. The rich fragrance of roasted beans filled the kitchen. “That’s the best thing I’ve smelled in a long time.”

  “It’s not bad, but I miss Greek coffee. Thick, black and guaranteed to keep you awake when you’re working on a paper in the middle of the night.”

  Both of them knew he didn’t need coffee to keep him awake.

  He already spent
most nights wide-awake.

  Except for last night. Last night, he’d slept.

  Not wanting to analyze the reason for that, he removed the screws from the old lock. “Who takes care of this place when you’re away?”

  “When I don’t have a friend in crisis living here, Ryan watches out for it and Susan Miller tends the garden to stop it from getting out of control. Zach, you don’t have to—” She winced as the lock fell into his hand. “All right, you’ve proved your point. I need a new lock. But if you replace it with a shiny, secure version how are you going to get in next time you hear me scream?”

  “I’ll push twice as hard as I did last time.” He ran his finger over the wood of the frame, trying not to think about how he’d felt when he’d heard her scream. “This whole damn door needs replacing.”

  “Then I’ll arrange it. I don’t expect you to do it.” There was a pause as she added cream and sugar to his coffee. “I didn’t expect to see you here today. You didn’t have to do this.”

  Yes, he did. And that was the scariest thing of all. For the first time in his life he had no idea how to stay away.

  “Why didn’t you wake me?”

  “It was early. And I wasn’t sure how you’d feel about waking up and finding me there. I know we talked about some stuff you haven’t told anyone before. I just want to assure you that I’d never share it. Not with anyone.”

  He ignored that. “You should have woken me. I would have driven you home.”

  “It was good to see you sleeping.” She sat down at the kitchen table in a graceful movement. “And it’s a pretty day. Perfect for a walk. I met Alec on the cliff path.”

  That bothered him more than it should have. He knew from listening to Ryan’s teasing that Alec had a large female fan base. “You two have plenty in common.”

  “We share some interests, that’s true.” She sipped her coffee. “He’s a good friend. Nothing more.”

  “It’s none of my business.”

  “No, but I thought I’d clarify before you break that new bolt you’re putting in.”

  “Like I said, your love life is none of my business.” He lifted his eyes from the lock and met her steady gaze.

  “After last night I would have thought it was fair to say that you at least have a stake in it. I’m not going to push you, Zach. I don’t want to make you uncomfortable, but if you ever feel like hooking up again, let me know.”

  “Hooking up?” He tightened the screws, checked the bolt and decided it should be enough to deter a casual housebreaker as long as they didn’t know what they were doing. “Is that what we did?”

  “I don’t know what we did, Flynn. Do we have to put a name to it? Generally I’m not big on labeling things unless I’ve pulled them out of the ground.” Looking tired, she pushed the mug towards him. “You should drink this before it gets cold.”

  As it dawned on him that she didn’t intend to subject him to an interrogation, he slowly relaxed. Putting down his tools, he sat down opposite her. “Tell me the most exciting thing you’ve ever found.”

  “On a dig?” She propped her feet on one of the empty chairs. “It’s nothing like the movies. Discovering King Tut’s tomb is the exception rather than the rule, but you don’t need to uncover a room of sparkly objects to get excited. Standing on a patch of ground, knowing that you’re literally going to uncover the past—well, that sets my pulse racing. You find something, maybe just a fragment of pottery, and straightaway you’re thinking about the people who used it and how they lived.”

  He watched the light dance across her eyes. Even sitting still she exuded energy and vitality, as if she believed everything and anything were possible if approached with enough enthusiasm and determination.

  “So you’re a detective.”

  “In a way, yes. And I love it. Archaeology is a perfect combination of history, science and mystery. How about you? What do you love about flying?”

  “There’s not much about flying I don’t love.”

  But that wasn’t enough for her, of course. “Is it the technical challenge of understanding the aircraft? The buzz you get from knowing you can fly?”

  “Mostly it’s the freedom.” Zach picked up the mug and drank. It was the best thing he’d ever tasted. Smooth, strong, and with none of the bitter aftertaste that so often marred the flavor of coffee. “When you’re in the air there are no walls or doors, just open space.” And his need for that open space, for the freedom, was something that came from deep inside him.

  “Would you take me up sometime?” She spoke softly. “Not because you’re taking me to an appointment, but so that I can sit with you in the cockpit and see what you see?”

  He never let anyone sit with him in the cockpit unless he was flying with a copilot, which was rare. And he’d never taken a woman on a pleasure trip, at least not the sort that involved strapping in and cruising at six thousand feet.

  But her hand was on his and her eyes, bright and intelligent, were looking at him hopefully and somehow he felt himself nodding.

  She smiled, and that smile knocked him off balance and fried his brain.

  Sexual attraction he could deal with, it was the other feelings that shook him up like a wind gusting at thirty-five knots. Being with her was like being injected with adrenaline. Pushing women away was one of the few things in life that had come easily to him, but for some reason he’d lost that skill around Brittany.

  Instead of pushing her away, he wanted to carry her up to the bedroom, strip her naked and keep her there until she’d told him every single thing she’d done in the years they’d been apart.

  It was that last thought that drove him to his feet.

  She’d open up. She’d trust.

  And then he’d let her down.

  “I should go.” He gathered up his tools and made for the door, trying not to look at her sexy eyes and her wind-ruffled hair.

  “Thanks for fixing the lock. I owe you.”

  He almost crashed into the table in his haste to leave the room.

  It was only as he closed the door behind him that he realized she’d made no move to stop him leaving.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  “IT’S LIKE TRYING to cage a lion,” Brittany said to Skylar a few days later while they were chatting on the phone.

  “You still haven’t heard from him?”

  “Not a word in three days.”

  “You could go over there in black underwear.”

  “No. I don’t want to pressure him again. That’s what I did last time. This time he has to make the next move.”

  “What if he doesn’t?”

  “I die of sexual frustration.” Brittany sat in her favorite spot on the rocks above Shell Bay, watching the sea roll in. She’d gone for a run right after waking and was still dressed in sweats and her favorite sports top. “Are you going to visit this weekend?”

  “I don’t think I can. Richard needs me to be somewhere.” Sky was evasive. “What are your plans?”

  Brittany stared out to sea. “I thought I’d clear out some of Grams’s things. I haven’t been up into the attic since she died. It’s full of boxes I’ve never opened.”

  “You should wait until one of us is there and we can do it with you,” Sky said immediately. “You shouldn’t be on your own for that.”

  “I’ll be all right. I’ve put it off too long already.” She glanced back towards the cottage, all familiar lines and welcoming warmth as it nestled on the edge of the bay. “I don’t feel ready to leave here.”

  “So don’t leave.”

  “Staying was never part of my plans.”

  “Plans change, Brit.”

  “Do you remember what she used to say to us?”

  “Kathleen? Yes. ‘Change is part of life, girls.’ Then she’d slap down some of her apple-topped ginger cake and I always wondered if the change she was talking about was gaining a hundred pounds in one meal.”

  Laughter eased the ache in her chest. “She wouldn’t be impr
essed that I haven’t even started to sort through her things. I’ve been a wimp.”

  “You’ve been busy. Traveling. Working. Living your life. She would have approved.”

  “I’m wondering what she would have said about Zach being back. Those first few weeks after he left, I remember her sitting on the edge of my bed trying to feed me chicken soup. She kept saying, ‘He’s a good man, Brittany, but he doesn’t even know it himself.’ I had no idea how she could think he was a good man when he’d walked out on me. She said that one day, when time had passed, I’d see it more clearly.”

  “And do you?”

  “I think so, but it’s taken me ten years. This is one of those occasions where I’d like to be able to rewind time.” She stood up, tucked the phone between her ear and her shoulder and used her good hand to help scramble down from the rocks. “I’d better go. I want to make a start.”

  “Are you sure I can’t call Em? I don’t like to think of you being sad and having no one to hug you.”

  “I’ll be fine. Maybe I’ll go up to the shelter to walk Jaws first. He needs the exercise and he likes the company.”

  “ZACH IS A BIT like you,” she told Jaws later as they ambled through the fields that led along the edge of the Warrens’ farm. “He doesn’t trust easily. I guess deep down he thinks that every human he meets is capable of putting a wire round his neck.”

  Jaws grunted and stopped to thrust his nose in the grass, apparently unsympathetic to the traumas of humans.

  He’d put on a little weight and Sara was delighted with his progress.

  “He’s going to make a wonderful companion for someone,” she told Brittany as she put him back in his kennel along with a bowl of food. “We just need to work out who that someone is. Right now we don’t know what will happen to him next.”

  She and Jaws had something in common, Brittany thought. Neither of them knew what was going to happen next.

  For the first time she was grateful for her damaged wrist because she didn’t want to admit, even to herself, that Zach was the reason she didn’t want to leave.