She pushed up the sleeves of her sweater. “It’s boxed up and waiting for my next trip to the post office.” The value of the whole batch was around four hundred dollars, not a legacy, but still welcome. “I’m selling it. Turns out, I’m too poor to drink hundreds of dollars’ worth of wine myself. Or offer it to an unwanted houseguest.”
“I’ll buy a bottle from you. Better yet, I’ll trade it for the food you stole from me.”
“I didn’t steal anything. I told you. I’ll replace it all when the supply boat comes in next week.” She made a hasty amendment. “Except for what you ate.”
“I don’t want it replaced. I want your wine.”
Scamp butted in. Give him your body instead.
Damn it, Scamp. Shut up. Annie gazed toward the pots on the stove. “Even the least expensive bottle is worth more than the food I borrowed.”
“You’re forgetting tonight’s lobster.”
“On Peregrine, hamburger is more expensive than lobster. But nice try.”
“Fine. I’ll buy a bottle from you.”
“Great. Let me get my price list.”
He muttered something under his breath as she made her way to the bedroom.
“How much do you want to pay?” she called out.
“Surprise me,” he said from the kitchen. “And you can’t have any. I’m drinking the whole thing myself.”
She pulled the box from the rear of the closet. “Then I’ll have to add a corking fee. It’ll be cheaper to share.”
She heard something that was either a cough or a rough laugh.
Theo had made mashed potatoes to go with the lobster—creamy, garlicky mashed potatoes—indisputable evidence that his offer to fix dinner was premeditated, since there hadn’t been any potatoes in the cottage that morning. What was his motivation for hanging around here? It definitely wasn’t altruistic.
She set the table, grabbed a sweatshirt against the draft coming in through the bay window, and helped carry the dishes in from the kitchen. “Did you really sweep out all those fireplaces?” he asked as they started to eat.
“I did.”
Something happened at the corner of his mouth as he filled her wineglass and lifted his own in a toast. “To good women everywhere.”
She wasn’t getting into an argument with him—not while she had a rosy red lobster and ramekin of warm butter in front of her, so she pretended she was alone.
They ate in silence. Only after she’d finished her last bite—a particularly sweet morsel from the tail—and dabbed at the smear of butter on her chin did she break it. “You made a deal with the devil, didn’t you? You traded your soul for the ability to cook.”
He dropped an empty claw into the shell bowl. “Plus being able to see through women’s clothes.”
Those imperial blue eyes had been designed for cynicism, and the sparks in the irises took her aback. She wadded up her napkin. “Too bad about that. There isn’t much around here that’s worth seeing.”
He ran his thumb across the edge of his wineglass, his eyes on her. “I wouldn’t say that.”
A jolt of sexual electricity zipped through her body. Her skin burned, and for a moment, it was as if she was fifteen all over again. It was the wine. She pushed her plate back from the edge of the table. “That’s right. The prettiest woman on the island is right under your roof. I forgot about Jaycie.”
He looked momentarily confused—a monumental fake-out on his part. She tightened her ponytail. “Don’t practice your sexual mojo on her, Theo. She’s lost her husband, she has a mute child, and—thanks to you—she has no job security.”
“I was never going to fire her. You knew that.”
She hadn’t known it at all, and she didn’t trust him. But then something occurred to her. “You won’t fire her as long as you can make me jump through hoops. Is that it?”
“I can’t believe you really swept out those fireplaces.” The slight lift of one indolent eyebrow said she’d been played for a sucker. “If she stayed in town instead of living at the house, she could come out a couple of times a week,” he said. “I can still do that, you know.”
“Where in town? A room in somebody’s house? That’s worse than what she has now.”
“It shouldn’t be a problem as long as I can work here.” He drained his wineglass. “And Jaycie’s kid will talk when she’s ready.”
“The great child psychologist has spoken.”
“Who better to recognize a troubled kid than me?”
She played at wide-eyed innocence. “But Livia isn’t a psychopath.”
You think just because I’m a bad guy, I don’t have feelings?
She’d definitely had too much wine because the voice belonged to Leo.
“I had some problems that summer. I acted out.”
His lack of emotion infuriated her, and she jumped up from the table. “You tried to kill me. If Jaycie hadn’t been walking on the beach that night, I would have drowned.”
“Do you think I don’t know that?” he said with an unsettling intensity.
She hated her own uncertainty about him. She should feel more threatened when they were together, but the only threat she felt came from confusion. Still, was that so different from being fifteen? She hadn’t wanted to believe she was in danger then, either. Not until she’d almost drowned.
“Tell me about Regan,” she said.
He balled his napkin and stood. “There’s no point.”
If he had been anybody else, compassion would have made her stop. But she needed to understand. “Regan was a good sailor,” she said. “Why would she take the boat out when she knew it was getting ready to storm? Why would she do that?”
He strode across the room and grabbed his jacket. “I don’t talk about Regan. Ever.”
Seconds later, he was out the door.
SHE FINISHED OFF THE LAST of the wine before she went to bed and awoke with a giant thirst and an even bigger headache. She didn’t want to go to Harp House today. Hadn’t Theo said he wouldn’t fire Jaycie? But she didn’t trust him. And even if he had meant it, Jaycie still needed help. Annie couldn’t abandon her.
As she left the cottage, she vowed not to let Theo make her jump through hoops with any more jobs like cleaning fireplaces. There was only room for one puppet master on Peregrine Island, and that was herself.
Something whizzed by her head. With a gasp, she fell to the ground.
She lay there breathing hard, the dirt cold and rough beneath her cheek, the world spinning around her. She squeezed her eyes shut. Felt her heart pounding.
Someone had just tried to shoot her. Someone who might, even now, be coming after her with a gun.
Chapter Ten
ANNIE TESTED HER ARMS AND legs, only moving them enough to make sure she hadn’t been hit. She listened hard but heard nothing except the ragged sound of her breath and the pound of surf. A seabird called out. Slowly, carefully, she lifted her head.
The bullet had come from the west. She saw nothing unusual in the thicket of red spruce and stunted hardwoods that lay between where she was lying and the road. She pushed herself higher, the weight of her backpack shifting, and gazed back toward the cottage, then the ocean, then up at Harp House looming at the top of the cliff. Everything looked as cold and isolated as always.
She came to her knees slowly. With only a backpack for protection, she was too exposed. She had no experience with firearms. How did she know that had really been a bullet?
Because she knew.
Was it a hunter’s errant shot? Peregrine Island had no game animals, but every home had guns. According to Barbara, more than a few islanders had shot either themselves or each other. Generally, they’d been accidents, she’d said, but not always.
Annie heard something behind her—a noise that didn’t belong—the sound of a horse’s hooves. A fresh rush of adrenaline sent her to the ground again.
Theo was coming after her to finish the job.
As soon as the thought took shape
, she struggled to her feet. She’d be damned if she’d let him shoot her while she was cowering in the dirt. If he was going to kill her, he’d have to look her in the eye when he pulled the trigger. As she spun around and saw the powerful animal galloping toward her from the beach, a terrible sense of betrayal ripped through her, along with a desperate need to believe this wasn’t happening.
Theo pulled up and threw himself off Dancer. There was no gun in his hand. No weapon of any kind. Maybe he’d dropped it. Or . . .
His cheeks were ruddy from the cold, but his jacket was unzipped, and it opened as he dashed toward her. “What happened? I saw you fall. Are you all right?”
Her teeth were chattering, and she was shaking all over. “Did you just try to shoot me?”
“No! What the hell? Are you saying somebody tried to shoot you?”
“Yes, somebody tried to shoot me!” she cried.
“Are you sure?”
She gritted her teeth. “I’ve never been shot at, but yes, I’m sure. How could you not have heard?”
“I was too close to the water to hear anything. Tell me exactly what happened.”
The heels of her hands stung through her gloves. She clenched her fingers. “I was on my way to the house, and a bullet flew past my head.”
“Where did it come from?”
She tried to remember. “I think it was over there.” She pointed a shaking hand toward the road, the opposite direction from the way he had just come.
He studied her, as if he was trying to see how badly she’d been hurt, then took a quick survey of the landscape. “Stay where I can see you. We’ll go up to the house together.” Moments later, he was riding toward the trees.
She felt too vulnerable to stay where she was, but she’d be even more exposed if she walked back across the open expanse of the marsh to the cottage. She waited for her legs to steady, then ran toward the trees at the base of the drive leading to Harp House.
It didn’t take Theo long to pull up next to her. She expected him to chew her out for not staying put, but he didn’t. Instead he dismounted and, taking Dancer by the lead, walked with her.
“Did you see anything?” she asked.
“Nothing. Whoever did this was long gone by the time I got there.”
When they got to the top of the drive he told her he had to cool Dancer down. “I’ll meet you in the house,” he said. “And then we’re going to have a conversation.”
She wasn’t ready to go inside, where she’d have to talk to Jaycie. Instead she slipped into the stable while Theo walked Dancer around the yard. The stable still smelled of animals and dust, although with only one horse housed here now, the smells were fainter than they’d once been. Spidery light seeped through the window above the rickety wooden bench where she and Theo had talked that afternoon, not long before she’d gone down to the cave to meet him.
She slipped off her backpack and called the mainland police number she’d stored in her phone after the break-in. The officer she reached dutifully listened to the information she gave him, but didn’t seem interested. “It was kids. It’s the Wild West out there on Peregrine, but I guess you already know that.”
“The kids are in school,” she replied, trying not to sound as impatient as she felt.
“Not today. The teachers from all the islands are on Monhegan for their winter conference. The kids have the day off.”
It was mildly comforting to think the shot might have come from a kid messing around with guns instead of an adult with a more sinister purpose. The officer promised he’d make inquiries the next time he came to the island. “If anything else happens,” he said, “you be sure to notify us.”
“Like if a bullet actually hits me?”
He chuckled. “I don’t think you need to worry about that, ma’am. The islanders are a rough bunch, but they don’t generally kill each other.”
“Dumbass,” she murmured, disconnecting as Theo led Dancer into the stable.
“What did I do this time?” Theo said.
“Not you. I called the mainland police.”
“I can imagine how well that conversation went.” He took Dancer into the only stall with bedding. Even though the stables weren’t heated, he tossed his jacket on a hook and began to unsaddle his horse. “You’re positive someone tried to shoot you?”
She rose from the bench. “You don’t believe me?”
“Why wouldn’t I?”
Because I never believe what you tell me. She moved closer to Dancer’s stall. “I don’t suppose you found footprints? Or a bullet casing?”
He removed the saddle blanket. “Oh, yeah. With all the muck lying on the ground, that was the first thing I saw. A bullet casing.”
“You don’t have to be so sarcastic.” Since she was almost always sarcastic with him, she expected him to turn on her, but he only growled that she watched too many cop shows.
As he finished taking off Dancer’s tack, she gazed into the next stall, the one where she and Regan had found the pups. Now it held only a push broom, a stack of buckets, and bad memories. She looked away.
Eventually she stopped fidgeting and simply watched Theo work—those long even brushstrokes, the gentle touch of his fingers as he made sure he didn’t miss any burrs or mud clots, the way he’d stop what he was doing to scratch Dancer behind his ears and talk softly to him. His obvious care made her say something she instantly regretted. “I didn’t really think it was you.”
“Yeah, you probably did.” He set aside the brush and knelt down to check Dancer’s hooves. After he was assured that the horse hadn’t picked up any stones, he came out of the stall and turned those laser-focused eyes on her. “No more bullshit,” he said. “You need to tell me right now what’s going on.”
She pulled off her cap and ran it through her hands. “How am I supposed to know?”
“You know more than you’re letting on. You don’t trust me? Fine. But you’re going to have to get over that because right now I’m the only person you can trust.”
“That doesn’t exactly make sense.”
“Deal with it.”
It was time for a quick reminder. “When I came back to the island . . . The first time I saw you, you were carrying a gun.”
“An antique dueling pistol.”
“From your father’s gun collection.”
“That’s right. There’s a whole cabinet full of guns in the house. Shotguns, rifles, handguns.” He paused, his eyes narrowing. “And I know how to fire every one of them.”
She shoved her hat in her pocket. “That makes me feel ever so much better.”
But, ironically, it did. If he truly wanted to kill her for some twisted reason only he knew, he would have done it by now. As for her legacy . . . He was a Harp, and she hadn’t seen any signs that he needed money.
Then why is he living on the island? Dilly asked. Unless he has no place else to go.
Just like you, Crumpet pointed out.
Annie suppressed the puppets’ voices. She might not like it—she didn’t like it—but right now Theo was the only one she could talk to.
Just the way it was when you were fifteen, Dilly said.
He curled his fingers over the stall door. “This has gotten out of hand. Tell me whatever it is you’re hiding.”
“It could have been a kid. The island teacher is at a conference, so there was no school today.”
“A kid? You think a kid tossed the cottage, too?”
“Maybe.” No, she didn’t think that at all.
“If a kid had done it, there would have been a lot more destruction.”
“We don’t know that.” She slipped past him. “I’ve got to go. Jaycie was expecting me an hour ago.”
She’d barely managed a step before he’d planted himself in front of her, his body an immovable wall of hard tendon and solid muscle. “You have two options,” he said. “You either need to get off the island . . .”
Leaving him the cottage? No way was she doing that.
> “. . . or,” he said, “you can level with me and let me try to help.”
The offer seemed so genuine, so seductive. But instead of burying her face in his sweater as she wanted to, she channeled Crumpet at her most peevish. “What do you care? You don’t even like me.”
“I like you very much.”
He said it with a straight face, but she wasn’t buying. “Bull.”
One of those dark arched eyebrows inched upward. “You don’t believe me?”
“I do not.”
“Okay, then.” He stuffed his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “You’re kind of a mess. But . . .” His voice turned soft and husky. “You’re a woman, and that’s what I need. It’s been a long time.”
He was playing games. She could see it in his eyes, but that didn’t prevent the hot kick of her senses. The sensation was unwelcome and unsettling, but understandable. He was a dark-haired, blue-eyed sexual fantasy come to life right from her books, and she was a tall, thin, thirty-three-year-old woman with a peculiar face, berserker hair, and a fatal attraction to men who weren’t as noble as they seemed. She fought his black magic with a crucifix of sarcasm. “Why didn’t you say so earlier? I’ll take my clothes off right now.”
He was all inky silk and plush black velvet. “Too cold out here. We need a warm bed.”
“Not really.” Shut up! Just shut the hell up! “I’m plenty hot enough. At least that’s what I’ve been told.” She tossed her hair, grabbed her backpack, and swept past him.
This time he let her go.
WITH SOMETHING HALFWAY BETWEEN A grin and a grimace, Theo watched the stable door slam shut. He shouldn’t have baited her, even if she was in on the game. But those big eyes kept sucking him in, making him want to play games. Have a little dirty fun. There was also something about the way she smelled, not of the ruthlessly expensive perfumes he’d grown so used to, but basic bar soap and fruity drugstore shampoo.
Dancer nudged him in the shoulder. “I know, fella. She got me good. And it’s my own fault.” His horse poked him in the jaw in agreement.
Theo put away the tack and filled Dancer’s bucket with fresh water. Last night, when he’d tried to get into the laptop Annie had left at the house, he couldn’t break her password. For now, her secrets were her own, but he couldn’t let that go on much longer.