Carolina Dreaming: A Dare Island Novel (5 page)

Lauren’s eyes narrowed. “Why do you ask? Is Aidan having a problem at school?”

Jane hesitated, her father’s voice rumbling in her head.
You’re making a mountain out of a molehill
.
Let him handle his own problems.
“Maybe . . . after school, I think? He came home from the playground with a split lip. My dad says all boys fight. But . . .”

Don’t hit
, she’d told Aidan from the time he was very young.
We don’t hit in this family
.

And tried to forget the time when that hadn’t been true, when Aidan’s father had hit her. Hurt her.

I’m sorry
, Travis always said afterward. At least, he’d said it at the beginning.
God, I’m so sorry, Janey
.

“What did he say?”

Jane blinked.
Aidan
. They were talking about her son. “Nothing.”

Not after supper and not at bedtime. When she went to kiss him goodnight, Aidan had turned his face to the wall covered in dinosaur posters, his shoulder rising like a gate to shut her out.

“Have you talked to his teacher?” Lauren asked.

Jane shook her head. “He’s never been in a fight before. It just happened yesterday. I don’t even know if it happened on school grounds. If it’s even school business. If they’d care. I don’t want to get him into trouble.”

She winced at the familiar litany of rationalizations.

The first time Travis gripped her arm, leaving a circlet of purple bruises like a tribal tattoo, she’d convinced herself—or had he convinced her?—that talking would only make things worse. The justifications rushed back, crowding her throat, choking her.
He’s never done it before, he didn’t mean it, if only he wasn’t frustrated, drunk, jealous, angry, disgusted with himself, with his life, with her
 . . .

The excuses piled up and up, like a wall between everybody else and her secret, leaving her cowering behind it, alone with her pain and humiliation.

“Would you like me to chat with his teacher? Sylvie Cunningham, right?” Lauren asked. “I could ask if she’s noticed anything in class.”

The relief that rushed over Jane felt shameful. Aidan was her son, her responsibility. But she honestly didn’t know what to do. “Would you?” she asked hopefully.

“Sure.”

“You don’t mind getting involved?”

Lauren’s lips quirked. “That’s why I became a counselor. Because I like meddling.”

“Because you care,” Jane said. “Islanders are used to handling things themselves. But if you give them time to get to know you, they’ll come around.”

“That’s what Jack says.” Lauren’s voice, her whole face, softened when she said her fiancé’s name.

“Well, he would know,” Jane said, tucking a red velvet cupcake into the box. “He hasn’t been here that long himself. But everybody trusts him.”

Lauren beamed. “They do, don’t they?”

Jane nodded. “He’s a good police chief.”

“He’s a good guy,” Lauren said.

He was. It was hard not to feel a little jealous. Not over Jack, exactly. Though there was a time, right after he’d moved here, when Jane had thought . . .

But beyond one kiss at a wedding two years ago, they had never . . . She would never . . .

Anyway, she probably bored him silly.

Besides, Jack was too dark, too cool, too controlled for her liking. She was drawn to sulky rebels with bad-boy stubble and sun-streaked shaggy hair and muscles like rope.

An image of Gabe Murphy slid into her mind, tall and blond with eyes that weren’t green or brown or gold but some intriguing combination of all three.

No, she told herself firmly, and shut the bakery box. “I think you two are good together,” she said.

“Thanks. So.” Lauren gave her a bright look and swiped a cookie sample from the plate by the register. “How’s your love life these days?”

Jane smiled faintly. “Is this another example of you getting involved?”

Lauren pressed a hand to her heart. “Only because I care.”

Jane shook her head and rang up her order. With the friends and family discount, because, well, Lauren
did
care. “I don’t have a love life. I don’t have time.”

Lauren nibbled another sample. “That’s an excuse.”

Maybe
.

“Don’t you want a relationship?” Lauren continued.

“I have relationships. I have Aidan. My dad. My friends. You.” If she let herself want other things, where would she be? Making the same old terrible mistakes. She could raise her son, she could run her business, she could manage her life on her own.

“What about sex? You must miss sex.”

“I barely remember it,” Jane said.

Probably just as well.

She’d loved sex once—the flush of attraction, the feeling
of closeness, the thrill of the forbidden. But somewhere along the way, sex had gradually become a chore.

Travis had barely seemed to notice when she wasn’t in the mood anymore. Or maybe by that point he hadn’t cared. He certainly hadn’t bothered to hide his disgust that the eager, curvy nineteen-year-old he’d married was now tired and bloated all the time.
Jesus, Janey, you really let yourself go
, he’d say, reaching for her.

Her shoulders rounded, remembering.

Lauren’s eyes narrowed. “Jane, did Travis ever hurt you—abuse you—that way?”

Jane blinked. Despite all the books Lauren pressed on her, she’d never identified what Travis did to her as abuse. As—what did they call it?—marital rape.

It was just something necessary and unpleasant to get through, like scrubbing behind the toilet in the bathroom. Something she needed to do to keep the household running. Even when you were exhausted from work, or heavy with pregnancy, you still had to get down on your knees.

“No,” she said.
Not really
.

“Because if you ever want to talk about it . . .”

Ha
. “It’s not an issue.”

“But it could be,” Lauren said.

Jane shook her head. “It’s not like there’s a line of available single men knocking at my door.” Or her father’s door, since she lived with him and her seven-year-old son. Which made the possibility of her ever having sex again in this lifetime even more remote. “If my dad doesn’t scare them off, then Aidan does. Most men who want to get married aren’t looking for a package deal.”

Lauren made a humming sound. “You know, not every relationship has to lead to love and commitment. Sometimes sex is all about the chemistry.”

That’s how Lauren’s relationship with Jack had started, Jane remembered. A rebound relationship for him, a summer fling for her. She glanced at Lauren’s shiny new engagement ring and smiled. “How’s that working out for you?”

Lauren laughed. “Okay, sometimes chemistry can turn into something more. Which proves you should be open to possibilities.”

Jane rolled her eyes. “What possibilities? We live in a fishing village with a year-round population of one thousand eight hundred and some. The good guys, guys like the Fletchers or Sam Grady, are all taken. Or they move away.”

Lauren nibbled on another sample. “There’s your old boss at the restaurant. Adam? He’s hot.”

“Do you know what the divorce rate is among chefs?”

“Okay, what about Nick at the firehouse? I’ve seen him in the weight room. Nice pecs.”

“I’m not going out with a guy who looks better in a wet T-shirt than I do. Besides, he’s five years younger than me.”

“I’m six years younger than Jack.”

“That’s different.”

“Ah ah.” Lauren waggled a finger. “Let’s not fall into traditional gender stereotypes.”

Jane bent her head, carefully counting out change. She knew all about stereotypes. By now she should be used to being dismissed on account of her appearance. Even her friends sometimes looked at her and saw . . . What? Baker Barbie. As if because she spoke with a drawl and spent her time baking cookies, because she had blond hair and big boobs and kept house for her father, she must be some kind of weird throwback to the 50s.

“Stereotypes don’t have anything to do with it,” she said mildly. “You and Jack met as adults. I used to babysit Nick.”

Lauren grimaced. “Okay, I can see that might be a problem.”

Jane smiled. “Face it, if the love of my life was living on the island, I’d have found him by now.”

“What about that guy I saw when I came in?”

Jane closed the cash drawer with a ping. “What guy?”

“Outside. With the rake? I thought maybe you’d hired some help.”

Jane’s brows puckered. She glanced toward the wide front window. “No, I . . .”

Something moved in the yard. A man. The sun glinted off the blond streaks in his hair, slid over his long, lean, muscled arms. He was holding a rake. Her rake.

“What is it?” Lauren asked at her elbow. “Who is it? Do you want me to call Jack?”

“I don’t . . . No.” Jane drew an unsteady breath. “It’s Luke’s friend. Gabe something? He was in the shop yesterday with Luke.”

“Ah,” Lauren said in her therapist’s voice. Withholding judgment.

Did she know about him?

Of course she did, Jane answered her own question. This was Dare Island. Even if Lauren wasn’t fully tuned in to the island grapevine yet, she was engaged to the chief of police.

“What’s he doing here?” Lauren asked.

Jane’s heart hammered. Really, she had terrible taste in men. “I have no idea. I didn’t invite him.”

No, you just fed him
, her conscience mocked.
Don’t you ever learn? You don’t get rid of strays by feeding them.

Lauren’s dark eyes regarded her thoughtfully. “You know, sometimes people can do bad things for good reasons.”

“You mean me,” Jane said flatly.

“Actually, I was talking about Gabe Murphy. Jack says he was charged with killing a man in a bar fight. I Googled him. According to the local paper, some oil workers attacked a local waitress and he intervened.”

He’d been careful not to crowd her, Jane remembered.

Make sure you lock up behind me.

She moistened her lips. “Are you saying he’s innocent?”

Lauren might feel that way. She was pen pals or something, wasn’t she, with a guy in prison? Living proof, if Jane was looking for it, that one experience of violence didn’t have to leave you scarred for life.

On the other hand, nobody blamed Lauren for anything
worse than being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Lauren seemed to bring out the best in people.

Unlike Jane, who attracted the worst.

“Not guilty,” Lauren said. “Not the same. I mean, it’s good that he saved that woman. But he still killed a man. Maybe he could have handled the situation differently. I don’t know him well enough to say. But I know you.” Her gaze met Jane’s. “I care about you.”

Jane flushed, hearing the worry—and the warning—in Lauren’s voice. She didn’t know Gabe, either.

Living with Travis had systematically eroded her faith in her own judgment. But she wasn’t stupid. You didn’t have to be a psychologist to understand that a woman who had been beaten and broken should stay far away from a man who solved problems with his fists.

T
HE
SUN
SA
NK
into Gabe, warming his muscles. The steady, repetitive scrape of the rake loosened the knots in his shoulders.

After his first continuance, his jail guards had decided he wasn’t a violent threat and put him to work in the sunless kitchens. Gabe had been grateful to get out of his cell. But he had hated the stink of the rising steam, the smells of rancid grease and garbage and the chemicals used to clean the cooking pots.

He lifted his head, breathing in the scent of pines and sea, a whiff of baking bread. A bird piped from the trees.

Since leaving Detroit for Parris Island, he had never lived in any one spot long enough to develop an attachment to a place. But he liked it here. It would have been nice, this time, to stay. To have a reason to stay.

But not if his being here fucked things up for Luke.

Florida, that was the plan.

An early morning jogger crunched up the drive, huffing
a greeting. “How’s it going?” The masculine equivalent of have-a-nice-day, no response required.

Gabe nodded without speaking.

A pretty brunette came out of the bakery carrying a big pastry box. He’d noticed her going in. Hard not to, with those piercings. She gave him a long look and a quick smile as she passed. “Good morning.”

“Morning,” Gabe said carefully.

He wasn’t used to all this friendliness from strangers. He’d been living on the street, in the shadows, where passersby averted their gaze, where no one noticed him but the cops.

A few more customers came and went, an old man with a much younger one, a couple of moms with strollers, an older woman with a laptop. Coming or going, they all said hi. It was weird. In a good way. Gabe finished with the front yard and moved around back.

“What do you think you’re doing?” A woman’s voice, torn between amusement and annoyance. “Get away from there.”

Now
that
was more what he was used to.

He turned.

Jane Clark stood framed by the kitchen door, her hands on her curvy hips under a wide, white apron, her blond hair slipping its braid. Like the St. Pauli Girl on a long-neck bottle of beer. His throat went dry. A surge of lust tightened his stomach muscles.

But she wasn’t talking to him.

“That food is for the cats,” she told the dog gobbling kibble from a metal pan a few yards away.

The big, dirty, familiar-looking dog.

Gabe’s mouth relaxed. “Guess he didn’t read the sign.”

At the sound of his voice, the dog raised its head. Abandoning the food, it bounded over and flopped onto its back, waggling its privates in the air.
Dumb mutt.

He hunkered down to rub its belly.

“Is that your dog?” Jane asked. Unlike the dog, she didn’t appear especially overjoyed to see him.

“Nope.” Gabe gave the mutt a final scratch and straightened. The dog scrambled up, trying to lick his face.

“Down,” Gabe ordered.

Its butt dropped. Huh. That was a surprise.

A corner of Jane’s mouth tucked in. “Are you sure?”

Her smile softened her severe expression, making her look approachable. Touchable. She really should stop doing that. Smiling at him. Feeding him. Because every time she did, she only made him hungry for more.

Her mouth compressed. Frowning again.

What? he thought.

Oh, right. She had asked him a question. About the dog. They were talking about the dog that was now pressing against his leg.

He scratched its head so he wouldn’t reach out and pet her instead. “It’s a stray,” he said. “It only likes me because I fed it.”

“You fed it.” He couldn’t read the tone of her voice. Another question?

“Stupid bastard ate half my sandwich.”

She was looking at him oddly. Because, yeah, what kind of idiot fed his dinner to a dog? She was probably insulted he’d wasted her handout.

He didn’t want her thinking he didn’t appreciate her generosity, so he said, “It was a really good sandwich. The cookies, too. Thanks.”

She stared at him a moment longer, as if she expected him to jump on her like the stupid dog. Lick her face. Hump her leg.

Gabe clamped his jaw against disappointment. Right. What did he expect? That she was going to invite him in for a cup of coffee?

She crossed her arms over her mighty rack. “What are you doing here?”

I wanted to see you again
. But he wasn’t admitting that. Not even to himself.

He rested a forearm on the rake, trying to look as
nonthreatening as possible. “Just passing through.” She continued to regard him doubtfully. “Luke Fletcher can vouch for me. I’m having dinner at his place tonight.”

*   *   *

J
ANE
CROSSED
HER
arms a little tighter over her wildly beating heart. She appreciated his attempt at reassurance. But she wasn’t that easily frightened. Or that dumb.

He needed to go.

“I don’t mean here on Dare Island. I meant . . .” She flapped her hand. “Here.”
At my bakery. In my space.

He glanced around the yard, making her see everything he had done with fresh eyes. A winter’s worth of debris had been raked away from the foundation, the leaves neatly piled, the trash bagged.

Her cheeks ignited. She bit back the urge to apologize.

“I thought . . .” he said slowly. He shook his head. “I brought back your thermos.”

He . . . Well. Wow. She wasn’t expecting that. “You didn’t have to do that.”

He shrugged. “It’s out front. On one of the tables.”

“You can keep it.”

His jaw set. “I don’t take charity. And I pay my debts.”

Oh. Understanding surged inside her, a liquid tug at her heart and her knees.

Oh, crap
. She’d misjudged him.

When she was starting over, it had been so hard for her to ask for her father’s help. To accept anyone’s help, especially when it meant admitting her own mistakes. Even yesterday, with Sam, she had balked at accepting charity.

Sometimes, when you didn’t have much else, all you had to hold on to was your pride.

And sometimes that was just foolishness.

“Well . . .” She twisted her hands in her apron, embarrassed by her own bias. “Thank you.”

Gabe nodded shortly.

She stood there a moment, her heart knocking at her ribs,
before she ducked her head awkwardly in reply and retreated to her kitchen.

Running away.

Crap. She leaned against the stainless steel counter, pressing her hands to her hot face. What was the matter with her?

Gabe Murphy hadn’t been anything but helpful and respectful. Yes, he did bear a distressing resemblance to Travis. On the other hand, she couldn’t imagine Travis doing yard work. Or feeding a stray. Or wasting time or energy on anyone but himself.

So her discomfort around Gabe wasn’t his problem. It was hers.

The oven timer went off. Jane bent to pull out a half sheet of strata, her mind churning like a blender. Was she really still so controlled by her ex, by her past, that she couldn’t recognize the goodness in a fellow human being? That she would let her fear dictate how she treated a stranger?

She set the baking sheet on the counter, her cheeks still flushed from the heat of the oven. Being smart was not the same as being afraid. Being strong didn’t mean she had to be unkind.

She cut a slab of strata and nestled it in a take-out tray. When she looked outside again, the backyard was clear of leaves.

And Gabe was gone.

She hurried through the rows of tables to the front door, noting in passing that the sugar dispenser needed refilling and the crumbs around the highchair in the corner, where the moms were having coffee, needed to be swept. But those things could wait.

She burst onto the porch.

The rake was propped neatly in its customary place against the outside wall. And Gabe . . .

“There you are,” she said. Her voice was too loud. She clutched the cardboard tray a little tighter. “I was afraid you’d left.”

He straightened, his seabag at his feet, as she came down two shallow steps to the yard. Watching her with the same alert look, the same stiffened posture as the dog. As if he were
just waiting for a scrap of encouragement or a sign of weakness to pounce.

“Just finished up.”

“You didn’t have to do that,” she protested.

“Yeah.” A long look. “I did.”

She swallowed and glanced away. “You did a lot of work this morning. You must have worked up an appetite.”

“Some,” he admitted.

Her gaze met his. His eyes were the color of the sun striking through the trees, brown and green and gold. He smelled of sun and leaves and potent male, a vaguely erotic combination. Her breath went short. But he didn’t touch her. Didn’t make any gesture toward her at all.

Why did that make her want so desperately to be touched, to wonder how it would feel?

“I brought you something,” she said.

His gaze dropped briefly to the tray before focusing on her face. “You fed me already.”

“A sandwich. Yesterday. Which you gave to the dog.”

“Only half,” he said.

He sounded defensive, grumpy, like Aidan did sometimes when he kissed her goodnight, as if his sweetness were something to be ashamed of.

She took a cautious step closer.

“I won’t bite,” he said. “Unless you want me to.”

Her gaze flew to his face. His tone was mocking, challenging, almost, but those eyes . . . His eyes were kind. His jaw was hard and stubbled, his lower lip full and soft. Vulnerable. The contrasts of him intrigued her. She wanted to test his textures with the tips of her fingers, wanted to . . .

Oh, no. Nope. Not going there.

Her cheeks burned. She couldn’t think of a thing to say. Boys had been teasing her since she developed boobs in seventh grade. Because of her father, it never went beyond teasing. But she sucked at snappy comebacks. She wouldn’t think of a good putdown until three days from now when she was kneading dough or folding socks. And yet . . .

She held his gaze, and something ignited inside her like a spark. “Bite this,” she said and set down the tray.

Laughter leaped in his eyes, warming them, warming her. “What is it?”

“Strata. Basically a breakfast bread pudding with sausage and Gruyère.”

He picked it up, poking at it with the plastic fork. “Never had it before.” His mouth quirked. “Never even heard of it before.”

Her own smile escaped. “You mean they didn’t serve strata in . . .” Her breath caught.

In jail
. The unspoken words pulsed in the silence.

“In the Marines?” she finished in a weak voice.

“No, ma’am,” he said quietly. Evenly. “They sure didn’t.”

He ate. The dog wriggled closer, its eyes fixed on every forkful that went into his mouth.

Tentatively, she reached out to pet it. The dog shied away, moving closer to Gabe.

“He doesn’t like me,” she said, oddly hurt by the stray’s rejection.

Gabe glanced up. “Are you kidding? You’re the giver of the goodies. The mutt likes you fine. It’s head shy, that’s all.”

“Head shy?”

“Flinches when you go for its head,” Gabe explained. “It’s used to being chased off. It expects you’re going to hit it. Probably been abused, poor bastard.”

Her breath caught.
He doesn’t mean anything by it
, she told herself.
He doesn’t know anything about me
.

The dog nudged against Gabe’s leg. He ruffled the fur at its neck. She watched his hands, strong and long and lean, as he dug in. The dog pressed closer, panting slightly, its eyes half closed in ecstasy.

An inconvenient sizzle kindled in the pit of her stomach, in the tips of her fingers.

“He lets
you
pet him,” Jane said. Good heavens, she sounded as sulky as Aidan.

“He trusts me.”

Her heart beat faster. “Why?”
Why should he? Why should I?

“I’m kind to animals. Plus . . .” Gabe met her gaze, that half smirk tugging the corner of his mouth. “We slept together. It makes a bond.”

That was true.

If Travis hadn’t been the first boy she’d ever slept with, would she have loved him? Stayed with him? At nineteen, she’d believed that her skipping heart and sweaty palms were the signs of some deep, eternal love. That being close to someone, that feeling desired, were worth risking everything for.

She knew better now.

“I need to get back to work. You can, um, just throw out the tray when you’re done.”

Gabe watched her closely, the smirk fading. “Sure. You do what you have to do.”