A Charmed Place (34 page)

The lightkeeper's house, fortunately, came through its ordeal of fire and rain with minimal damage. The rain had beat back the blaze until the firefighters could finish the job. A rafter would need to be sistered, and some sheathing and shingles replaced. It could've been worse. It could've been a Betty or Fred or Virginia.

"As for me, it's lucky I own nothing of value," Hawke told Maddie after a quick check through the house. "The TV's been zapped into oblivion, of course, and I can forget about having cold beer until the fridge gets fixed. The landlord's dryer was busted anyway, so that's no loss. My laptop was on its battery pack and should be okay—by the way, did you bring those disks?"

"Gee, no, it must've slipped my mind," Maddie said with an incredulous look at him as she went from window to window, opening them to air out the house.

It hadn't occurred to Hawke until then that the house really smelled. He took a deep whiff and said, "Is this place habitable?"

"Not up here, for sure," she said, wrinkling her nose. She looked up at the plastered ceiling of his bedroom and added, "That looks ready to fall any time now."

She was right; he was disheartened. "I was planning to insist that you move in with me," he said, rubbing the back of his neck. "I had a speech all ready."

Her gaze went from the ceiling to him. When she was pleased, her eyes had a way of becoming more sparkly, somehow. They were shining now. The breeze lifted strands of her golden brown hair as she sat back on the low windowsill, bracing herself on it with her hands. Beautiful, he thought, aware of an old, familiar ache.

She said with a wistful smile, "I have a teenage daughter."

"I forgot. So help me God, for a while there, I forgot. I was on a high."

"I know," she said softly. "Tell me your speech anyway."

"Anyway?" He scraped his unshaved chin and realized that he must look like hell. She looked like an angel. How could he hope to approach her and lay his proposition at her feet?

He compromised by not approaching her at all. He stayed where he was, planting his hands on his hips and his feet wide apart, while he stared at a knot in the pine plank floor. If he didn't look into her eyes
... if he didn't let himself get blinded by the integrity he saw there, the goodness that radiated from there
... maybe then he could make his case.

"Somewhere between your basement and the thunderbolt," he began, "I realized that we hadn't set a date for the wedding. Now, the date can be as soon as the next plane that touches down in Vegas; that's fine with me. But it seems to me that you deserve more.
We
deserve more. We've waited so long
... we've loved so long. I want the world to know that you and I are going to be wed at last. I want you to wear a beautiful dress, and I
want flowers everywhere, sweet-
smelling roses and honeysuckle that remind me of you. I want us to draw up a guest list together and then keep adding names to it. I want a band! I can't believe I'm saying this, but I want a band."

He risked glancing up at her—would she think he was bonkers?—but all he saw was a vision of what he held dear. She started to say something, but he held his hand palm out like a traffic cop and plowed on, unable to hope, unwilling not to.

"And meanwhile, you're living in enemy territory," he said, grimacing at his own blunt choice of words. He tried to keep the bitterness out of his voice as he added, "and every night that I draw breath without you at my side is one night closer to oblivion. I'm afraid, Maddie," he confessed. "I'm afraid to be without you anymore."

He compressed his lips into a stoic smile and said, "So that was my speech. It never occurred to me that you had to set a moral example for your kid." He snorted and added, "Can you tell that no one ever set one for me?"

He had to stop himself from saying anything more. He was a loner by nature and by training, and he wasn't used to spilling his guts to anyone, even to her. Twenty years in the field had taught him to keep his own counsel. Twenty minutes with her, and he was babbling like a sinner on his deathbed.

It wasn't a bad comparison.

Maddie didn't know what to say. Her eyes were filled with sympathy—not quite the emotion he was trying for—as she came up to him and slipped her arms around his waist and pressed her cheek to his chest. "We can elope," she offered in a poignant voice. "We'll bring our own honeysuckle."

He shook his head. "Eloping is a good idea only for the ones who don't have to. For us it would feel too much like skulking. You deserve more," he said doggedly, rubbing his hands in an idle motion up and down her back. "I don't want us to sneak around in the shadows the way we did then. This time I want—"

"A band. You're right," she said in a feistier voice. "So do I. We'll have a real celebration and we'll invite our friends and family, and whoever comes, comes. And in the meantime I'll sign Tracey up for pottery lessons and cake decorating and—I don't know—model shipbuilding. I'll figure out some way to get her out of the house under supervision so that I can come over here."

He had a thought. "What about summer camp? Aren't you people big believers in it?"

"
Rosedale
is
our summer camp," she told him. "Or at least, it used to be."

He nodded. "When I was a city kid—this is when I was seven or eight—I used to wish that someone like you would invite me to spend the weekend," he said, remembering how he'd hang out on the beach in Southie and dream.

Maddie leaned back in his arms and said, "Well, I'm inviting you now. You don't have electricity or hot water or a phone or even a dry roof over your head. It's the only neighborly thing to do."

He was definitely surprised by the offer. "I can afford a motel, you know."

"As if you could find one, this time of year. No, you'll stay at
Rosedale
, at least until Tracey gets back. We'd do it for anyone else. And it sounds like Mr. Mendoza is counting on you to get the repairs arranged. Wasn't that the deal?"

"That's what he said when I called. He won't be back from the
Azores
until the end of the month. Look, Maddie—I appreciate what you're trying to do, but
... what's the point? Old George would have a conniption."

"Old George can go suck an egg!" she said, showing a flash of anger that was new. "
Rosedale
belongs to all of us! This has nothing to do with you and me and the past. This is about a fire and a neighbor who needs help. Period! Now pack a bag and come on."

****

Hawke was able to convince Maddie to return to
Rosedale
ahead of him. He packed his duffle in a leisurely way, allowing her time to break the news to old George.

Part of Hawke believed that her plan wasn't all bad. A fire in the neighborhood tended to bring out the best in people. He'd seen it happen more than once, neighbors rallying around the victims. On the other hand
... well, Hawke getting screwed by a fire. Could it get more poetic than that? George might just rub his hands in glee and let it go at that.

Hawke locked the door, hiked the strap of his duffle over one shoulder, and struck out along the beach. He had no desire to drive; it was far too fine a morning. The thunderstorms had scrubbed the sky a new shade of blue and the sand was cool and clean. There wasn't a scrap of litter around from the town's party on the Fourth; the volunteer crews had done their job well.

Considering the early hour, Hawke was surprised to see people already on the beach: two young mothers setting up with their toddlers; a family of four with chairs, multiple coolers, a playpen, and an umbrella; a couple with a blanket stripping down
to their swimsuits. If you only
had a week, he surmised, then you damn well had to make the most of it.

It's what he wanted to do with what was left of his life: make the most of it. He was inexpressibly happy that Maddie felt the same way.

The rest of the way to
Rosedale
, it was their future that he thought about, and not their past.

That changed, once he drew near the picket-fenced cottage on
Cranberry Lane
. He saw George loading a smart leather suitcase into the trunk of his Acura, and Maddie hugging her attractive, pregnant sister-in-law on the brick walk in front of the house.

Okay, I got two choices here. I can pass, or I can run the ball into the end zone.

He opted for the touchdown. He walked up to the house, unhooked the latch in the knee-high gate of the picket fence, and, feeling oversized for all that charm, entered the diminutive garden that led to the cottage. He'd never approached through the front before; it made him feel less like a servant and more like
... like what?

A Fuller brush man, damn it, he decided as he returned George's condescending stare.

He tried hard to keep it civil. Apparently—he didn't see any cops around—they were going to allow him entry. He went up deliberately to Maddie's brother and held out his hand.

"George, I appreciate this," he said evenly.

Maddie's brother permitted himself a glance at Hawke's outstretched hand before he closed the trunk and said to his wife, "If you're ready."

Not much progress on that front, Hawke could see. He shifted his duffle strap to a new position on his shoulder, as if he were a sailor on shore leave checking out a boarding house that might or might not have a ban on booze, and then went up to Maddie and Claire.

"M'am," he said, nodding his good morning to the attractive blonde.

Maddie jumped in and introduced them. Claire was as gracious as Maddie claimed she was, and about as neutral.

"I'm so glad to meet you. I'm sorry we have to leave," she said, all with a perfectly straight face.

Leave? Hell, it was an out-and-out evacuation! Hawke had no doubt that if he checked their bedroom, he'd find the drawers still open and hangers on the floor. They'd have hung around longer if he'd had leprosy.

"Have a good trip," he told Claire with a jaunty look.

Maddie stepped around them and went up to her brother with some last parting words, which Hawke couldn't hear. He did hear George mutter, "Do what you want. You won't be doing it for long."

Maddie was far more jumpy than she'd ever thought possible, having Daniel Hawke as her guest. She wanted to prove that she really
had
acted out of kindness when she put
Rosedale
at his disposal. The only way to do that was not to be in the same room with him, and preferably, not on the same floor.

So she laid out her thickest, softest towels in the upstairs bath and while Dan showered, she stayed downstairs making a big breakfast for him. When he sat down to eat, she disappeared into the living room to clear a space for him at the small desk there. When he sat down at the desk to call repairmen and contractors, she returned to the kitchen to wash the dishes. And when he came back into the kitchen and picked up a towel to dry the dishes, she went upstairs to strip the linens from Tracey's bed, where he would spend the night.

"I have a question," he said from behind her as she plumped the pillows on her daughter's iron bed.

Maddie jumped; she
hadn't heard him approach. "Uh-
huh?" she said, glancing at him over her shoulder as she worked.

He was standing in the doorway with a book in his hand and an odd, pensive smile on his face. "Where are you keeping my candlesticks? In the closet with the oil portrait of the ugly aunt?"

"Oh
... Dan, I gave them away," she admitted, more embarrassed than if he'd caught her stealing them instead. "I had to. They were exquisite," she added, as if that helped.

His nod of enlightenment was mostly ironic. "Oh, okay, that explains it, then."

"I know how precious they were," she told him as she gathered Tracey's old sheets into her arms. "I'm sure you went through every antique shop in
London
before you finally decided on them."

"You know me much too well," he admitted, looking rueful about it.

"But I couldn't keep them to use and enjoy
... or exchange them
... or even sell them. I couldn't take advantage of them in any way. You know? It wouldn't have been right."

"So like you, Maddie," he said softly.

She bowed her head and stared at one of the pink cabbage roses on the sheets. "I donated them—anonymously—to an auction benefit, and now I wish I hadn't. It would've been something we shared from our first life together."

"I was thinking along those same lines," he said, but in a much more cheerful voice than hers.

She looked up to see a sheepish grin on his face. For that single moment in time he was a student again, raw and intense and amazingly shy when it came to social niceties that she took so much for granted.

He came into the room and laid a worn, utterly shabby book on top of the laundry that she held in her arms. The covers of the book were wate
r-stained and warped, the gold-
leafed title illegible. Puzzled, Maddie picked up the slender volume with her free hand and read the spine:
Pre-Raphaelite Poetry: A Selection.