Beyond the Misty Shore (15 page)

He wanted to choke her. To shout some sense into her. He wanted to kiss her until she was dizzy, put her and her things into her car, and drive away with her. But he
hadn’t
thought about it. Even if they could leave,
where
could they go? When pursued by an entity with mystical powers, there was no place to hide...

“Sure,” she said. “I’ll be happy to run it over. Be
there—”

She stopped midsentence and laughed out loud. The sound had him aching.

“It’s the least I can do. Mmm? Yes, I love apples. Oooh, cobbler sounds great. Gee, I don’t think I’ve heard of anyone putting that in cobbler before. I definitely want to try it.”

She’d weigh a ton by the time she reached forty. But, he let his gaze drift down her slim body, she was perfect now. Petite, but not boyishly slim. Slender, but softly curved and very feminine. He’d loved her hair down and loose, but he loved it in a French braid, too. Accessible neck. Pretty, accessible neck. Tempting, pretty, and accessible neck.

“Miss Millie’s. All right. Yes, I saw it the other day. Near the post office, right?”

Enough. Enough. Uncle! T.J. walked up behind her, wrapped his arms around her stomach, then bent down and planted a kiss on her neck. It tasted sweet, and he laid a trail of kisses along it, from right behind her ear down to her shoulder. She smelled like spring. He loved spring. Sighing, he slid his hands from her ribs to the waist on her jade blouse. The silk felt soft, her body smooth, and its heat seeped through the fabric and warmed his palms.

“I’ll, um, tell him.” Her face flushed. “See you.” Maggie hung up the phone.

Finally.
With a hand at her shoulder, T.J. urged her to turn toward him, anticipation burning deep in his belly.

She looked like the cat that had swallowed the canary—and its cage.

“I, um”—she cleared her throat—“have a message for you from Miss Hattie.”

“Oh?” He didn’t like the sound of this—or Maggie’s smirk.

“Uh-huh.” Again with the throat clearing. “She says Lydia Johnson at The Store says to tell you that she’s sending the razor blades you asked for on the phone this morning, but she can’t send the condoms because she promised the pastor she wouldn’t sell them to anyone who wasn’t married.”

“What!”

“She, meaning Lydia, also said that she called Jacky Landry over at Landry’s Landing cuz, being a pseudo-hippie, Jacky will sell anything to anyone except for bait—won’t cut in on Bill Butler’s turf—but Jacky doesn’t have the brand you wanted. Trojans, was it? Anyway, Lydia said not to worry. She’s added them to the shopping list on the bulletin board over at the Blue Moon Cafe and Jimmy Goodson will pick them up for you on his next trip over to Boothbay Harbor—which is on Friday—and she hopes that in light of AIDS and all those other dreadful diseases, you’ll refrain until he gets back.”

“On the bulletin board?” T.J. shouted. “For—”

“And, Lydia says she’s awfully sorry about this inconvenience, but the pastor’s already in a snit because Horace insists on putting a keg full of crushed ice and canned beer by the front door of The Store on weekends, and he’s not too happy about Jimmy’s X-rated girlie calendar—the skimpiest and most sinful excuse for swimwear Lydia’s ever seen—so she just couldn’t risk upsetting the pastor anymore. He’d be long-winded sure as certain come Sunday, and it absolutely mortifies her when Horace dozes off during services. The man’s a fine mayor, but his attention span on Sunday mornings runs a wee bit on the short side and he could wake the dead with his snores.”

T.J.’s face had to be purple. The veins in his neck felt ready to explode.

Maggie swallowed a belly laugh, but the damn thing danced in her eyes.

“Is that it?” If she didn’t laugh soon the woman would blow a gasket.

She clenched her teeth. “I’m to run into the village to bring a book to Miss Millie for their Historical Society meeting. Miss Hattie’s going to make me an apple cobbler tomorrow for the favor. And she doesn’t use cinnamon in her blueberry pie, but she does add a dash of nutmeg.” Maggie leaned back against the wall and tapped her lips. “I think that’s it.”

“Go ahead, then.”

“What?”

“Laugh. Get it out before it chokes you to death.”

She did. She laughed until tears streamed down her face. “Oh God, MacGregor, isn’t it a riot? Proves what they say about small towns. If it’s happening, everyone knows it.” She laughed some more.

“Uh-huh.” He folded his arms over his chest. “Done yet?”

“Yeah.” She swatted at her eyes with one hand, and held her side with the other, as if putting pressure on a stitch.

“Good.” He gave her a smile that even he felt was more akin to a snarl. “Two small points that might be of minor interest.”

She blinked. “What?”

“One. Just who do you think everyone in the village—including Miss Hattie—figures will be my partner, regardless of whether or not I can refrain until Jimmy gets back from Boothbay Harbor with the goods?”

The smile lurking at the corners of her mouth faded. “I—we—” She sputtered. “We haven’t even discussed that. Geez, it’s on the bulletin board, MacGregor! Everyone in the world around here goes to the Blue Moon!”

Finally hit her. “And, two, I didn’t call Lydia Johnson at The Store this morning and place an order for razor blades, condoms, or anything else. The phone’s been out of order since last night. Remember? You tried calling your mother.”

“I did!” She frowned. “But... Then, who—?”

“Or what?” He frowned with her.

Her eyes stretched wide. “Our mystical entity?” She shot him a look of total disbelief. “Don’t you think that’s stretching it—”

“Who else?” He shrugged. “We know it can effect a man’s voice.”

“Great.” Maggie grumbled and sighed. “Great. Just what I need. A man with an attitude and a mystical entity with a warped sense of humor.” She flung up her hand and walked toward the gallery. “God, I love it here.”

When Maggie came back downstairs
with
Tall Ships
tucked under her arm, MacGregor was sitting in the rocker beside the fire, his foot tapping the floor on every forward rock, his expression grimmer than her mother’s stories of the Reaper.

“I’ll be back in a bit.” She zipped up her brown jacket. The stiffer suede patches rubbed at her elbows.

He looked at her, almost accusingly.

“Look, MacGregor, would you just spit it out and let’s get it over with?”

“What?”

“Whatever burr is under your saddle now.”

He looked into the fire. “Go on. Miss Millie’s waiting.”

“She’ll have to wait a few minutes longer then.” Maggie leaned forward, braced a hand on each of the rocker’s arms. “I have the feeling I know what’s eating at you, and I’m telling you that it isn’t my fault.”

He glared at her, nearly nose to nose.

“You’re ticked because you can only cross the boundary while we’re touching.”

“We don’t know that for a fact. Just because it happened once—”

“No,
we
don’t know it,” she interrupted. “But
you
do.”

He clamped his jaw.

“I know you made another attempt this morning,” she confessed. “I saw you and Miss Hattie down at the bench from upstairs.”

He didn’t say a word. Wouldn’t look at her. Why was she beating herself to death over this? She hadn’t asked for any of this to happen. And if she had her rathers, none of it
would
be happening.

It was the frustration. He was a proud man. After his family experiences, being vulnerable to anything made the blow to his ego that much stronger. He needed Maggie and that pegged the problem. MacGregor didn’t want to need anyone.

She pecked a kiss to his temple. “I’m sorry, MacGregor. I really am. But it isn’t my fault and it isn’t fair for you to punish me for something that’s out of my control.”

That he didn’t respond didn’t surprise her. It disappointed her, but it didn’t surprise her. Maggie left, closing the mud room door.

All the way around the corner of the garage, she pouted a little herself. Hearing hammering, she waved to the two men putting new shingles on the Carriage House roof. They looked to be about half-done. If the weather held, it wouldn’t be long before MacGregor could move back into his suite there and have his privacy.

A little ache settled over her heart, and she swore that she’d left her good sense back in New Orleans. Getting more and more deeply involved with him—heart and all—which after seeing what heart-to-heart relationships had done with her parents she’d sworn she’d never do. Sneaking around like a thief in the night, checking the Registration Book and finding Carolyn never had made it to Seascape, though she had reserved a Carriage House room—the same Carriage House room MacGregor had occupied for the last nine months. Finding no evidence proving the man in any way involved in Carolyn’s possible non-accident/accident, and half-suspecting him guilty as sin anyway—even though every bone in her body swore he could never hurt any woman—not after losing his mother and Carolyn as he had. Contending with the sorry sense of humor of some mystical entity without so much as a grunt of protest when she should be scared stiff. And loving MacGregor’s kisses. Geez, she hadn’t just left her sense at home. She’d left her sanity!

True, she didn’t feel insane. She felt calm and at peace. Serene. And, she might as well admit it—if only to herself—on the brink of falling in love.

That alone proved she’d stacked up a brick short. That alone should have her lunging headlong beyond scared stiff and firmly entrenched in mortified.

So why didn’t it?

How she wished she had a clue.

The sounds of the waves lapping against the rocks enticed her closer to the shore. At the boundary line, her stomach fluttered and she hesitated for a mere twinkling. Giving herself a good mental shake, she stepped over the line.

The temperature cooled.

It didn’t plummet, but it dropped enough to chill her through her jacket and raise goose pimples on her arms.

That veil of mist curled at her feet, swirled and swirled, but it didn’t rise higher, and the icy fingers pressed lightly against her neck. Not debilitating, but dizzying.

Her stomach lurched a level deeper with the onset of each event, and she gasped. “Tyler!” The sense of peace she’d felt drained out of her body. “Tyler!”

He didn’t answer but, as quickly as it all started, the sensations stopped. Maggie spun around and looked back toward the house. Slowly, her panic ebbed, but the sense of peace didn’t return.

Strange. A moment ago...

A moment ago, she’d been on the other side of the line. On Seascape lands.

Her heart skipped a solid beat. She gulped in a deep breath, then stepped back over onto Seascape. The peace still didn’t return. “MacGregor,” she whispered, knowing he couldn’t hear her. “Something weird is happening here...”

An image of him filled her mind, and a deep glow of contentment spread through her heart.

The peace was back.

It couldn’t be. But it was. The serenity and calm and peace—the security she sensed when they were together—all of it had come back. She’d associated all those good feelings with the house—with Seascape itself. But—but somehow, those things had shifted... to MacGregor!

Her heart thudded wildly. Frightened, feeling more vulnerable than she’d ever felt in her life, and more resentful, she shunned the truth, afraid MacGregor had been right. She’d waited too long to leave.

She didn’t
want
those feelings attached to him. Falling for MacGregor was crazy. Something she didn’t understand. Something her mother never would understand. She’d always been devoted to and doted on Carolyn. She’d never forgive Maggie for this. Never.

And Maggie couldn’t help doubting that she’d ever forgive herself.

What was she going to do?

Her ears started ringing. She shook her head, trying to clear them, but the ringing only grew louder... then changed to that godawful whisper.

Stay away from him.

Chapter 9

The woman, damn her, was right.

T.J. snatched up a small stone and hummed it into the ocean. It wasn’t fair, or just, for him to be angry with her because he couldn’t cross the boundary without her. But was that really what had him angry? Or was it knowing she loved driving him crazy like this?

He could just see her. Looking down her sleek nose, snubbing his dependency on her as no more than her due. Flashing him that oh-so-cool and distant half-smile that made him want to punch holes in walls because it degraded him into feeling inferior, then freezing him with that icy blue gaze that held far too many mysteries to interpret whatever emotion, if any, lay behind it. Yeah, he could just see her. Loving every minute of his misery.

Maggie? This is Maggie?

His pricking conscience had him shaking his head to clear away cobwebs of confusion. No, not Maggie. Carolyn. Maggie wouldn’t—
hadn’t yet
—done any of those things to him. When he’d treated her like dirt, she’d reached out and helped him. She’d dragged him...

Why had he confused them? Apart from both being women, the two were nothing alike. He chewed at his lip. Maybe because he had cared for both of them and hadn’t wanted to care for either of them? Maybe. But the comparison still struck him as odd. They didn’t belong on the same side of the planet.

Carolyn, svelte and blonde and never a hair out of place, had chilled like a quarter moon in winter. Cool and distant. More mysterious shadow than sleek, shining sickle. She invited a man’s gaze yet forbade his touch.

Maggie, vibrant and passionate and full of flaming-red sass, burned hot like the summer sun. Searing. Relentless. Far too brilliant not to lure, and far too blinding not to leave a man scorched and sizzling. A heat-hazed rim secreted the source of her flame, but a man could never be so far away from Maggie to not feel her warmth.

He let his gaze drop down below the tree line to the angry waves thrashing against the rocks and swamping the beach. If he had to cross the boundary with someone, why not with Bill, or someone safe like Miss Hattie? Why Maggie? Why someone he could hurt—or kill?

He refused to need her. He’d never need any woman.

Or be needed by any woman.

That sobering truth fueled the resentment that had become as much a part of him as the enamel on his teeth, and left him snarling, then hollow.

The roar of the ocean and the soothing scent of its spray drained his anger. He lifted his face to the mist-laden wind, feeling it cut across his skin, hearing it moaning through the pines. A gull squalled, sounding lonely. T.J. empathized, and accepted the truth winging through his heart. Pure and simple, he missed Maggie.

The woman was an enigma. One minute he thought her brave, the next, a fool. She should leave here—that certainty sank down to the marrow of his bones. Leaving might not do any good but, then again, it might. She
should
at least try.

An empty ache arrowed down his center and spread. Shunning it, he tensed his muscles, clenched his jaw, fisted his hands. He wanted her to leave. He really did.

A phantom wind stirred and whipped, whistling in his ears.

All right, all right. That was a lie.
Part
of him wanted her to leave. But, God forgive him, part of him wanted her to stay. The selfish part who couldn’t see him making it through another exiled day without seeing her face and hearing her laugh.

He stared at the top of the lighthouse. A strong sense of urgency attacked him and the hairs on his neck stood on end.

Jerking back, he looked through the dull gray haze toward the Co-Op. No sign of Bill, Leslie, or their boys—or of anyone else. Toward Seascape, a sliver of weak sun broke through the heavy clouds and glinted on the attic window. A raccoon raced across the widow’s walk, clearly looking for mischief—or running away from it. T.J. frowned. Odd, it was midafternoon. Raccoons are nocturnal—and they rarely race anywhere. Still, nothing evidenced a physical sign of distress anywhere.

The sense of urgency intensified... and attached itself to Maggie.

Not pausing to puzzle it out, T.J. hurried over the jagged rocks to the slick stone path, then headed down to the road at a breakneck clip. When his feet hit the paved street, he gained speed, reached the sloping lawn in a dead run. Then he saw her. Stumbling toward the house, she looked as if she’d seen a ghost.

His heart tripping over its own beat, his sweat-soaked shirt clinging to his body, he ran over to her. “Maggie?” Her face was pale, her eyes as blank as a zombie’s. “You okay?”

“Fine.” Stiff-spined as a sea urchin, she kept walking. Didn’t look at him. Didn’t blink.

“You don’t look okay,” he said, falling into step beside her. “You look upset.”

“I don’t want to talk about it, Tyler.”

Tyler
not
MacGregor.
This was serious. A confirming rush of impossibly warm air blew over the back of his neck. More chilled by it than by any frigid cold, he shuddered. “All right.” A strong gust of wind threatened to knock him back. He shifted against it, stuffed his hands in his pockets, and looked up toward the house. Something had rattled Maggie deeply, but unlike before she had no intention of turning to him with it. Why? What had changed?

Bereft, he cut around the corner of the house then twisted the knob on the mud room door. It creaked open. Maggie breezed past him without slowing down. If he hadn’t opened the door, he had the distinct feeling she was so preoccupied she would have walked right into it. She hooked her coat on a peg, then went on into the house and headed for the stairs.

T.J. followed her. When he passed Cecelia’s portrait, he whispered, “If you’re feeling the least inclined, a little insight here would be majorly helpful.”

Upstairs, at the shadowy landing, he nearly collided with Maggie. She’d been to her room. Shoeless, she clutched her pink robe balled at her stomach. Her pale face now bleached a milk-white that had him feeling sickly.
What the hell had happened to her?
“Headed for the bath?”

“Yeah.” She didn’t stop walking.

Hating her deadpan tone, he stepped aside, off the edge of the white rug, and hugged the wall to let her pass him. “I’ve noticed something about you. Whenever you get upset, you take to water like a duck.”

“I’ll be out later.” She walked right by, stepped inside and gave him a look so sincere it curdled his stomach. “Hopefully before the turn of the century.”

The door closed and T.J. frowned at the nail centered in it. She’d seemed almost... hopeless.

Though no open windows or doors or central heat register provided a source, again he felt that confirming rush of impossibly warm air breeze over his neck. The entity?

The water pipes groaned, filling the tub. When she turned the tap off and he heard splashing, he opened the outer door. She hadn’t thought to turn on the light but she’d shut the inner door that separated the dressing room from the one housing the tub and shower. He flicked on the switch. A rosy glow flooded the dressing room, lifted from the pink-tinge streaking through the tan marble vanity. Pausing at the step up to the tub room, he listened at the door.

No muttering. That was a good sign, wasn’t it?

Had he lost his mind? When irked, Maggie muttered. Furious, she shot visual daggers at him, raised sassy hell, and muttered. Terrified, as at the bench when she’d felt what he’d felt on crossing the boundary, she’d clammed up.

Clamming up was definitely a bad sign.

He lifted his hand to knock, but didn’t do it. He was invading her privacy. Yet she
had
forgotten to put out the sign...

At war with himself, he touched his fingertips to the smooth wood. The defeated slump in her shoulders, the absence of fire in her gaze, and her ghostly pallor had him imagining all kinds of godawful things. If she’d just talk to him, reassure him that she was all right. Damn it, he was worried about her.

He pressed his hand flat against the cool door. “Maggie?”

Water sloshed. “Geez, MacGregor. Are you going to interrupt every bath I take in this house?”

“Maybe.” Oddly relieved by her cranky tone, he sat down on the step and stared at the brass light fixture above the mirror that stretched wall to wall. “What’s wrong?”

“I don’t want to talk about it,” she said, then grumbled, “I already told the man that once, didn’t I?”

“Okay, but that just leaves my mind wide open to all sorts of wild imaginings.” It did. He hadn’t exaggerated a bit. And those imaginings
had
to be worse than anything that had happened to her in the village. “Did someone give you a hard time about the condoms?”

“No one mentioned them. But Miss Millie, bless her heart, blushed until I thought she’d have a stroke.” Maggie sighed. “I intended to go to the Blue Moon and erase them off the bulletin board, but the sheriff’s car was out front and Batty Beaulah had him cornered on the porch—having a field day, nagging at the man. The cafe was crowded, too, so I figured maybe when it wasn’t so busy would be a better time.”

He studied his nails, a smile curling at his lip. Beaulah had zip to do with it. “Embarrassed, huh?”

“Yeah.” More grumbles. “Why does he do that? God, but I hate it when he does that.”

She loved it, pure and simple. He propped his forearm on his bent knee, one foot on the step, the other on the floor. Smelling mint, he spotted an open box of green dental floss near the sink. “You realize I’m going to sit here until you tell me what’s up, so you might as well—”

The door opened, surprising him. He looked over his shoulder, back at her.

Her shoulders hunched beneath her fluffy pink bathrobe, she stared at him, her eyes bright with unshed tears. Without a word, she bent down and kissed him.

Her lips were warm and tender, if not quite steady, and her hand at his shoulder trembled. He tasted her fear, her regret, and her longing. Their combined power shook him to his soul.

She straightened back up, let her fingertips drift down his face to his chin, then leaned against the doorjamb and crossed her arms over her chest. Was she shutting him out or locking herself in, distancing herself from him emotionally?

“That was for me. Because I needed it and it was my turn to get what I needed.” She lifted her chin. “But it can’t happen anymore, Tyler. In fact, nothing can happen anymore—and it shouldn’t have happened, anyway.”

What the hell was she talking about? “Could you put this in English, please?”

“I care about you.” Her chin quivered. “I didn’t want to. I even knew I was crazy to let it happen, and I swore to myself a hundred times that I would put a stop to it.” Her expression crumbled and she bunched bits of her robe in her hands. “I did try. I really did. But it didn’t work.” She drew in a shuddery breath. “It just didn’t work.”

She cared. And she knew he cared. And he knew what happened to women he cared about, but still couldn’t make himself
not
care.

God help them both.

Guilt swarmed in his stomach like angry bees. From the step, he looked up at her. “Maggie, I know this bond of ours hits us both pretty close to the bone, but—”

“It hits a lot deeper than that.” She shoved away from the door jamb, then pulled herself up straight and smoothed her rumpled robe over her thigh. “But it’s finished as of now. It—it has to be. From here on out, I have to stay away from you, Tyler. I—I have to.”

She’d been hesitant and she hadn’t liked issuing the edict—her shaky tone made that clear. But there was more to this than that. She didn’t just fear caring about him, she feared something deeper. Something not at the village. Something... mystical?

Squelching the urge to shout the truth out of her, he frowned. “What happened to you?” How had he gotten himself into this quagmire? “Did our entity pull something?”

She lifted then lowered her gaze from the ceiling to him, a glimmer of sass fringing her tone. “You’re going to nag me until I tell you, aren’t you?”

“Damn right, I am.” Nag, beg, whatever it took.

“Okay. I’ll save us both some heartburn, but I want to go on record that I really
hate
being nagged.”

Didn’t everyone? “Noted,” he said, preparing for another installment of her not-so-subtle revenge.

Lowering her pointed finger, she looked him straight in the eye. “When I crossed the boundary alone, I felt what you feel.” She rubbed her arms as if her bones were cold and she feared they’d never again feel warm. “Not as strong as you feel it—I didn’t pass out or anything, but I got dizzy, and I felt so... desolate.”

A knot of fear exploded in his stomach. “You’ve got to leave here. Now. Please, Maggie.” It was too late for that. He knew it. Yet if she went and he stayed, maybe the entity would be satisfied. Maybe—

“There’s nowhere to go!” She pressed her hands to her temples, shook off some frustration by ruffling her hair. “How many times do we have to go through this, MacGregor? Ten? Twenty? Two hundred?”