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Chapter Six
Amist blanketed the island, as thin and luminous as the skin of a pearl. Trees and rocks rose up from it, humps and towers in a soft white sea.
Mia left the house early. On the slope of her lawn, she stood for a moment, absorbing the serenity, the stillness that was the Sisters on a lovely spring morning.
Her spread of forsythia was a golden fan of color through the morning fog, her daffodils a band of sunny trumpets. She could smell her hyacinths, damp and sweet. It seemed to her that the earth was waiting to awaken, to throw off all memories of winter and burst into life.
She could appreciate the sleepy before as much as she would the beauty of what was to come. She opened her car, her satchel of paperwork on the seat beside her, and started down the long and curving road to the village.
There were several routine chores to deal with before the store opened. She enjoyed that, too - the relative quiet, the repetition, the freshening of stock - as much as she did the business hours with customers breezing in and out, lingering, browsing. And, of course, buying. She loved being surrounded by books. Uncarting them, shelving them, designing displays. She loved the smell and the texture and the look of them. And the surprises uncovered when she flipped one open at random and saw the play of words on paper.
The bookstore was more than a business to her. It was a deep and steady love. But she never forgot it was a business, one she ran efficiently, and profitably.
She'd come from money, and as a result had never had to work for a living. She'd had to work for her own gratification, her own sense of ethics. Her financial base had allowed her to choose the course of her career and establish a business that reflected her interests. Those ethics, and her own skills, effort, and shrewdness had made the business flourish.
She was grateful, and always would be, for the Devlin money. But it was, to her mind, much more exciting and satisfying to make her own.
And to risk her own.
That was precisely what she would be doing by following through with Nell's idea. Expanding the cafe
would change things. As much as Mia trusted and respected tradition and continuity, she was also a proponent of change. As long as the change was smart. And this one, she thought as she wound her way through the mist, could be.
Expanding the cafe could mean tucking in a more appealing, and roomier, event area. Her monthly book club was popular on the island, and the new cooking club already showed potential. The trick would be to make the best use of space and still maintain the intimacy the store was known for. But since Nell had planted the seed in her mind, the idea had taken hold. Mia could see exactly what she wanted, and how it would be. When it came to Cafe Book, she knew precisely what she was doing. Too bad she wasn't quite as confident at the moment about the rest of her life. It was as if a curtain had been lowered, dead center of her vision. She could see peripherally, but straight ahead was blocked. It worried her more than she was willing to admit. Behind the curtain were choices, she understood that. But how could she make the right one if she didn't know the options waiting for her?
One of the choices was Sam Logan. But to what extent did she trust her instincts there, weighing them with logic and past history? Balancing them against a primal sexual attraction that tended to cloud logic. A misstep with him could crush her a second time. She might not survive it whole. More, the wrong choice could doom the island she loved and was sworn to protect.
Once another woman had chosen death rather than bear the pain of loneliness and heartbreak. She had flung herself into the sea, after the lover who had deserted her. And had woven the last threads of the web about Three Sisters.
Hadn't she herself, by choosing to live, to find contentment, even to flourish, already countered that act?
Nell had chosen courage, and Ripley true justice. And so their circle held. And she had chosen life. Perhaps the curse had already been broken, and the dark that hovered in wait around the island had already been banished.
Even as the thought, and the hope of it, ran through her mind, the mist boiled up from the roadbed. A jagged lance of lightning crashed beside her car with an explosion of dirty red light and the stink of ozone. In the center of the road, an enormous black wolf snarled.
Instinctively she slammed on the brakes, jerked the wheel. The car skidded, spun, giving her a dizzying view of rocks, fog, and the dull glint of the guardrail that stood between the narrow edge of road and the sheer drop to the sea.
Fighting back the panic that gushed into her throat, she yanked the wheel again. The eyes of the wolf glowed like embers, and its teeth were long. On its muzzle was a white pentagram, sliced through the black hide like a scar.
Her mark - and her heart slammed painfully against her ribs at the sight of it. Through the roar of blood in her head, over the scream of her own tires, she felt the cold of its breath on the back of her neck. She heard the sly, coaxing voice whispering, whispering in her mind. Let go. Just let go, and you won't be alone. It's so hard to be alone. Tears blurred her vision. For a moment, her arms went weak, trembling as the urge to let it end nudged at her will. In that moment she saw herself, quite clearly, flying over the edge of the cliff. She bore down even as she struggled to control the car, and pulled her power up from the gut. "Go back to hell, you son of a bitch. "
As the wolf threw back its head to howl, she spun the car forward, punched the gas. And drove through it.
She felt the shock, not from impact but from the explosion of greed that pounded the air as her car rammed through the image.
The fog lifted, and the mist, thin and pearly in the strengthening sun, sparkled over Three Sisters. Mia pulled over to the side of the road, laid her forehead on the wheel, and gave in to the shakes. Her own breathing was too loud in the closed car, so she fumbled for the window control. The cool, damp air and the steady chant of the sea revived her.
Still she closed her eyes, made herself sit back until she began to calm again.
"Well, I guess that answers my question about this being over and done. " She inhaled, exhaled slowly until her chest no longer hitched with every breath. Then opening her eyes, she scanned the road behind her in the rearview mirror.
Her tires had left wild, sinuous trails over the pavement - trails, she noted with one quick shudder, that had veered perilously close to the edge.
The wolf was gone, and the mist was already as sheer as gauze.
"An obvious ploy," she said aloud for herself and whatever listened. "Black wolf, red eyes. Obvious and cliched. "
And, she thought, very, very effective.
But he'd borne her mark, the mark she'd put on him when he'd worn another form. He hadn't been able to disguise it, and that gave her some comfort. Much-needed comfort, she admitted, for the ambush had
very nearly succeeded.
She eased the car back on the road, and her hands had almost stopped trembling by the time she parked her car in front of Cafe Book.
He'd been waiting for her. It had been easy enough to time his arrival at the hotel to match hers at the store. She wasn't like clockwork, Sam mused as he strolled across the street. But sometime between eight-forty-five and nine-fifteen she parked her pretty little car and unlocked the store. She wore one of her long, thin dresses today, the kind of dress that made a man want to offer thanks to the gods of spring. It was a soft, pale blue, the color of quiet pools, and skimmed fluid as water down her body.
She wore sexy high-heeled sandals, hardly more than a series of buff-colored straps and a long, thin spike.
He'd had no idea shoes could make the mouth water.
She'd tied her hair back, his only complaint about her appearance that morning. He liked it best wild and loose, but the binding did leave an intriguing spill of red down the center of her back. He'd like to lay his lips there - beneath the spill of hair, beneath the soft, thin dress, and onto the smooth skin at the center of her back.
"Good morning, gorge
ous. "
She jerked when he spoke and turned away from the door. His opening grin faded instantly, and his eyes went dark at the shock still mirrored in hers.
"What is it? What happened?"
"I don't know what you're talking about. " Damn it, her hands were going to shake again. "You startled me. " She angled her body enough to hide the tremor in her hand as she unlocked the door. "Sorry, Sam, no time for a neighborly chat. I have work. "
"Don't pull that on me. " He moved through the door with her before she could attempt to shut it and lock it in his face. "I know you. "
"No, you don't. " Her voice wanted to rise, and she refused to allow it. As casually as possible, she set her satchel on the front counter. "You don't know me. "
"I know when you're upset. Christ, Mia, you're shaking. Your hands are like ice," he said as he snatched one and held it between his own. "Tell me what happened. "
"It's nothing. " She'd thought she was calm. She'd thought she was steady again. But her legs wanted to give. Pride made her lock them stiff. "Damn it, let me go. "
He nearly did. "No," he decided, moving closer. "I did that once. Let's try something new. " He scooped her off her feet.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?"
"You're cold, and shaking. You need to sit down. Put on a little weight, haven't you?"
She sent him one withering look. "Oh, really?"
"It looks good on you. " He carried her to the sofa, set her down. He pulled the bright throw off the back and tucked it around her.
"Now. Tell me. "