Island Interlude Read online

  'I didn't think anyone was going to be poking through my groceries,' Libby retorted. 'Besides, I don't usually eat lunch.'

  'You should.' His eyes skated over her from neck to toes. 'You're too skinny.'

  'I'm thin.'

  'Too damned thin. Your hips are fuller, but there's no meat on you. You were just right before.'

  Libby, hating his appraisal, turned away. 'I was barely eighteen.'

  Alec drew a long breath. 'I know. That was one of the problems.' He jabbed at the food in the frying-pan.

  'It didn't seem to bother you at the time,' Libby said bitterly.

  'The more fool I,' Alec rasped. 'But,' he added, 'you're not a child now, are you?'

  'No, I'm not,' Libby said evenly.

  'So the stakes have changed.'

  She frowned. 'What stakes?'

  'It isn't just fun and games this time, Libby.'

  If she'd ever wanted verbal confirmation of how he'd felt about their lovemaking, now she had it. Her jaw tightened and her fists clenched. She willed herself not to react, not to show him she cared.

  He took another swipe at the mixture in the pan. 'Set the table,' he said brusquely. 'Lunch is ready.'

  Lunch was a stir-fry of left-over fish and shrimp, some green onion and green pepper, soy sauce and ginger, peas and rice. It was filling and remarkably tasty, or Libby was sure it would have been had she been able to appreciate it.

  She was still smarting from his 'fun and games' remark, still trying to get herself under control.

  She was wholly unprepared when Alec shoved back his plate and looked at her squarely. His fingers drummed for a moment on the table-top, then stilled. His dark eyes locked with hers. 'Marry me, Libby.'

  It was the last thing she expected him to say.

  She simply gaped.

  'Marry you? You're joking!'

  'No.'

  'I wouldn't have you if you were the last man on earth!' she said, her eyes flashing.

  'Why not?' He didn't sound surprised, just determined.

  Libby laid down her fork and met his gaze. 'One,' she said with every bit as much determination in her voice as she'd heard in his, 'I don't want to; two, I don't love you; and three, I'm marrying someone else.'

  One and two, she knew, wouldn't have made him even pause for thought. Three seemed momentarily to stun him.

  'Marrying… ? Who?' he demanded.

  'You wouldn't know him.' She picked up her fork again.

  'Who, damn it?'

  She didn't imagine she was hearing jealousy in his tone, only annoyance that someone else might dare to claim what he thought was his own. She took a sip of coffee. 'He's a professor at the university.'

  'What's his name?'

  'What difference does it make?'

  Alec slapped his hands on the table-top. 'I don't know, damn you. Just tell me his name!'

  Libby just looked at him. 'Why? Are you going to go intimidate him?'

  'Could I?'

  Probably, Libby thought, if you glared at him like that. 'No,' she said.

  'Then tell me. If he's going to be stepfather to my kid, I have a right to know.'

  'You have no rights at all, Alec'

  He sucked in a sharp breath. 'Damn you.' His eyes glinted dangerously. 'You're lying, Libby. There isn't anyone, is there? You're just saying it to put me off.'

  'I'm not "just saying" anything,' Libby said. She fin­ished her stir-fry and drained her mug, smacking it down on the table as she stood up.

  Alec got to his feet. 'Yes, you are. You're trying to hold me off. You're afraid of what you feel for me.'

  'What I feel for you, Alec, is nothing more than disgust. I was a fool for getting involved with you in the first place. I'm glad you married Margo. It saved you from doing the honourable thing and marrying me!' She brushed past him and went into the living-room, jerking open the door. 'Now just go away, leave me alone and stay the hell out of my life!'

  Alec stood in the doorway to the kitchen simply watching her, waiting, making her wait. And finally, when she had no choice but to turn around and face him, he shook his head.

  'I'm not going anywhere, Lib. Besides, you don't hate me. You couldn't kiss me the way you do if you hated me.'

  Libby said a very rude word.

  Alec scowled. 'Don't talk like that! You never used to talk like that.'

  'I never used to do a lot of things.' Libby lifted her chin defiantly. 'This is the new me.'

  'Ah, but the old you is still there, too, Lib,' Alec said as he moved towards her.

  Carefully, as casually as she dared, she backed away. 'No, she's not.'

  He smiled. 'I'll find her.'

  'You won't.'

  He caught her chin in his hand and lifted it so that she was forced to look into his eyes. He grinned, proving that, whether she had changed or not, he was definitely the old Alec. 'Count on it, Lib. I'm sure as hell going to give it a try.'

  Everywhere she went, there he was.

  He materialised in the library whenever she was writing—though how he knew what the hours were when she had had to badger the librarian to get them, she didn't know; he lurked on the beach when she and Sam went for a swim. He and Juliet went fishing with Lyman, Sam and Arthur; they invited Sam back to their house to cook the fish afterwards.

  Libby, of course, was invited as well.

  She didn't want either of them to go and found excuse after excuse, until Alec showed up on the doorstep one evening with Sam and Juliet in tow, a line of fish in his hand.

  'Come on,' he said without ceremony. 'You and Sam are having dinner with us.'

  And when Libby demurred he simply shrugged. 'Fine, then, we're having dinner with you.'

  Short of throwing a tantrum there was nothing she could do. Alec simply strode in and took over, filleting the fish himself with the help of Sam and Juliet, while Libby was deputised to peel potatoes.

  He was a surprisingly good cook, which she did not admit aloud. He took it as given anyway. 'Does what's-his-name cook for you?' he asked her while he worked over the fish.

  'Sometimes.' Michael wasn't an enthusiastic cook, but he had on occasion done a bit. He did, however, take Libby and Sam out for a pizza or to one of the local eateries now and then.

  'What's his name?'

  She still hadn't told him and the fact seemed to gall him.

  'What's whose name?' Sam asked.

  Libby didn't speak.

  Alec said, 'The man your mother thinks she's going to marry.'

  His tone made Libby grit her teeth. The glare she gave him could have nailed him to the wall.

  'Michael, you mean?' Sam offered.

  Alec looked at Libby. 'Michael, is it? Michael who?'

  'Garner,' Sam supplied again.

  'He's a professor?' Alec made it sound like a dirty word.

  Sam nodded blithely. 'He teaches biology. That's about frogs an' stuff. Him and me raised frogs last year. I mean we got the eggs—spawn, it's called,' he told Alec with grave authority. 'And we put fresh pond water in almost every day, and pretty soon we had tadpoles and they got bigger an' bigger, and then they started to get legs an' their tails fell off an', you know what, we had frogs. It was neat.' He looked at Libby for confirmation.

  She sighed and nodded. 'It was.'

  The envy on Alec's face was obvious—not because Sam had raised tadpoles, but because Michael had been the one to do it with him.

  'Could we do that some time, Daddy?' Juliet asked him.

  Alec gave a jerky nod. 'We'll try, sugar.' With un­necessary force he slapped the fish into the pan in which he was broiling them. 'Aren't you done with those potatoes yet?'

  'Almost,' Libby said with false sweetness. 'I haven't had all the help you've had.'

  'It sounds to me,' Alec said darkly, 'as if you've had more than enough help.'

  Periodically throughout the evening the conversation came back to Michael. Libby didn't offer any infor­mation. The less Alec knew, the less ammunition he'd have t
o fight with. But she hadn't told Sam that, and Sam was dismayingly forthcoming. He chattered on at length about Michael, about how Michael took him out into the woods and taught him the names of the trees and shrubs, about how Michael had helped him dissect a grasshopper, about how, whenever Michael went on a field trip, he brought Sam back specimens.

  Libby watched Alec get grimmer and grimmer. She watched his jaw tighten, watched a nerve twitch in his cheek.

  'Veritable paragon, isn't he?' he muttered so only Libby could hear as he and Juliet prepared to leave.

  'He's a wonderful man.'

  Alec opened his mouth, then clamped his teeth shut on whatever he'd been about to say. The look he gave Libby was icy cold.

  'I'll see you tomorrow,' he said at last.

  'Don't bother,' she replied. 'I've got lots of work to do. I don't need distractions.'

  He smiled then. 'Ah, but I want to, Libby. I dearly want to distract you.'

  Seven days passed during which he appeared at least two and sometimes as many as five times a day. He swam with her, talked to her, walked with her, ate with her. He joked with Sam, played catch with Sam, went fishing with Sam.

  In short he did everything she'd once wished he would do.

  But it was a fantasy world, not the real one. Libby didn't trust it—didn't trust him—and wouldn't have even if she hadn't been engaged to Michael.

  There were few places to go to avoid him. Being trapped on a tiny island with a man determined to make his presence felt was not easy. Especially because he evoked in her so many of the sensations he had eight years before. She was still attracted to him physically. He could still make her heart beat faster, her pulse hum.

  But she was determined to resist him, and resist him she would.

  It was with considerable relish, then, that she dis­covered the need to go to Spanish Wells for the day. One particular old fisherman, Gibb Sawyer, had come up in her interviews over and over.

  'You must talk to Gibb, he'll know,' said Martha at the straw shop when Libby asked about a particular ship­building period.

  'Ask Gibb Sawyer,' said Ambrose, another of the fishermen.

  'Go see Gibb,' Travis Walker at the grocery told her.

  Gibb Sawyer was well into his eighties now. And, according to everyone oh Harbour Island, he was the best man with a story.

  'Ole Gibb'll tell you everything,' they said.

  'Lived here most of his life,' Martha told her. 'Went to live with his daughter over in Spanish Wells jus' last year. You talk to him.'

  And when at least eight other people had said the same thing to her, it was time, Libby thought, that she went.

  She was delighted. A day away. Time away from the relentless attention of Alec Blanchard. Time to think, to reassess, re-gird, regroup. A whole day of not having to look over her shoulder.

  She made arrangements to take Sam out of school for the day and asked Lyman to take them.

  'In the morning,' she told him. 'And come back in the evening. I want to take Sam around to see a bit of Spanish Wells, too. Can you do it?'

  Lyman nodded. 'Meet you at the dock at nine.'

  But when Libby and Sam arrived at five past nine the following morning, it wasn't Lyman who was waiting.

  It was Alec. And Juliet. The two of them sitting in Lyman's boat.

  Libby stopped dead in the centre of the dock, teeth clenching, fists curling in the face of Alec's smile.

  'Lyman got a job,' he said with perfect equanimity. 'Got a chance to crew on one of the big boats docked at Valentine's this morning. I said I'd fill in.'

  Chance to crew, my foot, Libby thought. He'd been bought off. 'We can go another day.' She started to turn back.

  'Sawyer's expecting you, isn't he?'

  'I'll call him, arrange another meeting.' She said over her shoulder.

  'He won't be there,' Alec said to her back.

  Libby stopped and turned, giving him a narrow look. 'What?'

  'Lyman heard he was going out on a fishing expe­dition tomorrow. Ten days or two weeks, he thought.'

  Libby bristled. 'The man is eighty-six years old, Alec. I hardly think—'

  Alec shook his head, smiling up at her. 'Amazing, isn't it?' He gave an equable shrug. 'Apparently he likes to keep his hand in. Going on his son-in-law's boat.'

  'Tomorrow?'

  'That's what I heard.'

  'It's truly astonishing how much you hear, Alec,' Libby said with false sweetness.

  Innocence personified, Alec smiled. 'A good director always keeps his ear to the ground.'

  'I'm surprised you don't get your head stepped on more often,' Libby muttered through her teeth.

  'What?'

  'Nothing.'

  He waited, watching her, and she knew he could see every angry emotion she felt. He probably even enjoyed them. Damn him.

  And if she did walk away and set up another time, she knew what would happen. Lyman would get another 'chance' to crew on someone's boat. At the rate things were going, Lyman might crew all summer. Good for Lyman. Not so good for her.

  And if, by chance, Lyman could be persuaded to take her, there wasn't a snowball's chance in hell that Gibb Sawyer would be available. Alec would see to that.

  No. It was clear enough that Alec was directing this show. The circumstances were all going his way.

  But Libby was damned if she was going to let him write her lines.

  She met his gaze but not his smile. 'All right,' she said flatly. 'Let's go.'

  It was impossible, however, to remain entirely stiff-necked and disapproving in the face of Sam and Juliet's whole-hearted enthusiasm as the boat left the harbour. They hung over the sides of Lyman's old outboard, pointing out reefs and rocks, spotting turtles and schools of fish as the boat skimmed northward, then turned west to curve around the top of Eleuthera.

  'Wow, look!' Sam shouted over the noise of the engine.

  Libby sucked in her breath. Sam was pointing at a perfectly curved bay with a white sand beach and a line of palm trees for a background. It presented a visual Eden from afar.

  It had certain idyllic qualities when visited too, Libby remembered all too well. Quickly she turned away.

  'Can't we stop? Please, can't we stop?' Juliet begged.

  'Please?' echoed Sam.

  Libby waited, holding her breath, expecting Alec to make a sharp turn with the boat. He wasn't above that sort of deliberate manipulation, heaven knew.

  But he steered a steady course. 'Not now,' he said to Sam. 'Your mother has work to do.'

  Libby slanted him a glance and saw his sharp strained features. He didn't look at her.

  Was it possible, Libby wondered, that Alec was as un­willing to face the memories as she was?

  She glanced again towards the back of the boat, but she couldn't read his expression. He was staring straight ahead, his hand on the rudder, his face hard, his eyes squinting into the sunlit sea.

  'But it's so beautiful, Daddy,' Juliet wailed.

  'First things first,' Alec said flatly. 'And first we're going to Spanish Wells.'

  Spanish Wells was just as Libby remembered it. A small sun-baked hamlet, its fleet of fishing boats were strung out along the quay and its pastel-coloured houses rode a low hump of land in the middle of the island. The school, post office and scattered shops were, she knew, on the far side of the hump, overlooking a shallow, crystal-clear bay.

  'Do you know where to find Sawyer?' Alec asked as he anchored the boat.

  'His daughter gave me directions.'

  'You go on, then. I'll do some exploring with the kids.'

  'Sam can—'

  'Sam can come with me.'

  She considered arguing, then shrugged. Sam would be happier roaming with Alec than sitting with her. She'd save her strength for the fights that mattered.

  'When should we meet you?' Alec asked.

  'I should be done by noon.'

  'Fine.' Taking Sam and Juliet by the hand, Alec walked down the quay.

  L
ibby looked after him for a long moment, struck by how right he looked with a child clinging to each hand, as if they belonged there.

  She shut her eyes. It was folly to even think it, a curse to wish that it might have happened.

  Gibb Sawyer, in a wheelchair, didn't look to Libby as if he was about to set out on two weeks' worth of fishing.

  He said right off, 'So you want some reminiscing, do you? All I get any more. Ain't been out'na a boat since '84. Miss it, I do.'

  Alec, you fiend! she thought to herself.

  Sawyer raked a hand through thick white hair that had once been blond. His deep-set eyes sparkled an ocean blue. 'Sit a spell, then, 'n' I'll tell you what I know. Mag,' he said to his daughter. 'We could use somethin' cool t'drink.'

  Over glasses of Mag's iced tea and a plate of ginger-snaps, Gibb Sawyer held forth. He talked about the boom years, the boat-building, the days when Harbour Island and Dunmore Town had prospered then waned. He talked about the fat years and the lean years, the storms and the sunny days. He regaled her with tales of a full and loving life, of a fifty-two-year marriage that had only ended last year with the death of his wife. And when he spoke of her, Libby heard the love in his voice.

  She wrote frantically, glad for her tape-recorder, grateful that he'd agreed to let her use it.

  She lost all track of time, trapped by the sheer power of Sawyer's ability to tell a story, to make the people of Harbour Island of fifty, sixty, even seventy years ago come alive.

  It was a shock to both of them, then, when, just as he was getting to the high point of a hurricane story, Mag appeared in the doorway of the tiny lounge in which they'd been sitting and cleared her throat. 'Visitors,' she said.

  Libby looked around to see Alec and the kids standing behind her. She glanced for the first time at her watch. It was one-fifteen.

  'Oh, heavens. I'm sorry.'

  'No problem,' Alec said easily. 'Just wanted to tell you we're just going to get some lunch. We'll stop back.'

  Gibb Sawyer shook his head. 'No, sir, you won't. 'Bout talked her out for one day, I have. You go on 'n' take her now. You'll be back, won't you?' he asked Libby.

  She nodded. 'I wouldn't miss it for the world. But you can't leave me hanging here, either. I mean, you've got to finish telling me about the hurricane at least.' She shot an apologetic glance at Alec.