Kingdom by the Sea (Romantic Suspense) (7 page)

“No,
no, you
don't
understand,” Nicole insisted.  “I didn't 'have company'
last night.  I was attacked—right out there on the beach.”  She was pissed off
now, and she didn't get pissed off that easily. 

“But...I...Well,
that
man
is still out there.”  Hazel jutted her chin in the direction of
the water.  “I have to assume...well, I just assumed he was a friend of
yours—of some sort.”

Nicole
ignored the innuendo embedded in the phrase “of some sort.”  “No, that's
incorrect,” she said firmly.  Thrown off her game, Hazel appeared momentarily
flummoxed.  “Out on the water is the man who saved me.  I never met him before
last night.  His name is Michael King.  And if he hadn't come along...”  Nicole
didn't bother finishing the sentence, because she didn't want to contemplate
the idea herself. 

“I
see...but...”

“Luckily
the police got a lead on the man who grabbed me, heading south, and they are on
the lookout for him.”

“Well...that's
certainly good to hear,” Hazel agreed, choking on a bit of humble pie.  Then
she seemed to spit it up.  “But nevertheless, I really think you ought to ask
that man to stay in a hotel.” 

“Michael?”
Nicole said incredulously.  “I can't do that!  I mean, I think he wants to stay
with his boat until it's fixed.  I certainly have no problem with that.”  More
than that, she kind of liked the idea of him being nearby. 

Dramatically,
Hazel's stark black eyebrows arched beyond their illustrated intentions. 
“Perhaps it's not my place, but I urge you to do what's right.  It is highly
inappropriate for a strange man to be camped out there in our backyard.”  Well,
Nicole didn't want to be obvious and point out that Hazel Baker didn't own the ocean
any more than Nicole did.  Unless Michael was doing something to disturb them
in some way, he was allowed to be on the ocean. 

Still,
Nicole swallowed down her burgeoning irritation.  She reminded herself that
Hazel Baker was a life-long resident of
Chatham
, understandably ruffled by the
police siren last night and possibly concerned that this was the beginning of
other such nuisances.  “There's nothing I can do about him being out there,”
Nicole explained calmly.  “But as I mentioned, he will be on his way very soon,
once he gets the part he needs for his boat.”

“This
is all terribly distressing,” Hazel insisted.  “When Ginger and I heard the
commotion outside, we were out of our wits.  It would be the
right
thing
to do for this man to stay in a hotel for the duration.  He could be courting
more trouble out there, for all we know!  This is not fair to good people here,
like me.  And my sister, of course.  Oh, and you.”

Just
as perhaps Nicole thanked too much, perhaps she didn't roll her eyes enough.  Here,
too, she held herself back.  “Were you the one who called the police last
night?” she asked then.

“I
called,” Ginger said.  “I’m so glad everything worked out.”

Her
soft sincerity was endearing.  Again, Nicole found herself thanking the woman. 

Meanwhile,
she acted oblivious to Hazel's lingering disdain.  A long moment stretched
between them.  Calling it a “Mexican Standoff” would probably be too
dramatic—but it was the
New England
librarians' muted, repressed equivalent,
she supposed.  Finally Hazel muttered.  “
Well!
  We actually came over to
discuss something
else
.”

“Oh?”

Hazel's
straightened her boxy shoulders.  Her voice was still sharp and unforgiving
when she said, “Perhaps I'm wasting my time.  However I will do what's right
anyway and do my part.  Are you familiar with our Harvest Parade?”

“No...”

“This
year it will be held on October 18
^th
, which will only give you two
weeks.”

Confused,
Nicole said, “Two weeks to do what?”

“To
finish what your aunt started.”

***

BOSTON

“I'm
sorry, Mr. Kelling.  Your account appears to be overdrawn.”

“What
do you mean it ‘appears’ to be overdrawn?” he demanded anxiously.

“Your
account is overdrawn.” 

God,
this was not Lauren Warner's morning.  If there was anything she hated most
about her job, it was telling desperate older people that they had no money. 
Whether they had frittered it away themselves without paying attention or their
spouses stole it, it was never pleasant to watch their faces fall.  To see the
terror of the words as it sank in.  She didn't know why she still bothered with
that “appears” crap.  She supposed she still believed that it might help soften
the news. 

I
should have been a lifeguard
, she thought.  Those were the days. 
Lifeguarding in college, the sun baking her skin, her squiggly little ponytail
at the top of her head, full of curlicues and flyaways.  Her butt was cute and
round then—not the uninspired pancake it had become sitting in an office nine
hours a day for the past five years.  Her hair went flat, too—compliments of
the flat iron she used each day to “look professional.”  What a different
feeling, too, when she was a lifeguard, to be the one who might, on occasion,
save a life.  Rather than the one to deliver the news that life sucked at the
moment.

“How
could this be?” Abel Kelling demanded now.  “It's not possible.  I had a
shitload of money!”  Angry and exasperated, he was clearly on the verge of
yelling. 

“I'm
sorry,” she said evenly.

“What
about my other accounts?”

Lauren
furrowed her brow and consulted her computer screen.  She hit a few buttons and
then said, “Your checking account is the only account you show with us.”

“Oh...” 
He rapped his thumb on her desktop and looked down for a second, obviously
absorbing all of this. 

“Perhaps
another bank...?”

“That's
right, that's right...” he mumbled.

Lauren
waited.  She didn't have much choice.  It wasn't like she had a button to press
and his chair would eject him out of the building.

At
the moment, Abel Kelling did not look in the frame of mind to be consoled. 
Honestly, he looked shocked to the point of disbelief.  “There must be some
mistake,” he argued, his thumb rapping anxiously on the top of her desk,
shifting her nameplate by inches.

“I'm
sorry,” she repeated.  “There is no mistake.”  Again Lauren consulted her computer
screen.  “The last check you wrote was to a...Lea Kelling?” she said, reading
off the screen.  “It bounced.”

He
shook his head, scrunched the flesh of his forehead in his fingers.  “Leo,” he
corrected.  “My brother.”

After
a moment's pause, Lauren folded her hands on the desk.  “Customarily there is a
$35 fee for bounced checks, but we're going to waive that for you.”  Waiving a
fee at a bank?  Forget lifeguard; was there already a “Saint Lauren”? she
wondered. 

But
she felt sorry for the guy.  Normally there was a veneer of shock that peeled
away quickly.  People usually knew they were in trouble and sinking.  With Mr.
Kelling, however, he was so obviously disappointed and disbelieving that Lauren
was half expecting him to ask for an investigation into his account.  In fact,
she steeled herself for that possibility. 

After
several moments, Mr. Kelling's thumb stopped rapping.  He inhaled deeply and
stood.  “Thanks for your time,” he mumbled and left her office.  Lauren watched
him through the plate glass walls that constructed the bank like a voyeuristic
maze, until he disappeared into the revolving door.  She sighed and took
stock.  Sure she'd had better mornings, but things could be worse—she could be
in Abel Kelling's place.

“Explain
why you're doing this again.”

Wedging
her phone in her shoulder, Nicole used both hands to spread a freshly laundered
afghan over the bed.  Again she recapped what Hazel Baker had explained:

The
Preservation League of Ladies, which was a women's group dedicated to the
history and prosperity of the town, was contributing a time line collage to
this year's Harvest Parade.  Apparently each woman helping with the collage was
responsible for a different aspect of the time line.  Before she had died, Aunt
Nina had been working on her part, which centered around the Chatham
Lighthouse.

“What's
the big deal?” she said now to her friend, Cameron Dwyer.  “It's just a
collage; it might be fun.”

Cameron
gave a brief, sardonic laugh.  “Only you would find that fun.” 

Originally,
the two had dated.  They'd met a few years ago when Nicole was interning at
Schlesinger Library at
Harvard
University
and Cameron was working toward his
master's in engineering.  During their brief relationship, Nicole had also
become good friends with Cameron's childhood friend, Trevor Cook.

“Anyway,
I have to do it,” she added.

“No,
you
don't
have to,” Cameron scoffed, “stop feeling so indebted.”

“What
do you mean?”

“Ever
since you found out about this inheritance, it's like you're on some big guilt
trip about your aunt.”

The
words stung.  Indicating there might be truth in them, which was annoying. 
“That's not true,” Nicole protested.  “I just thought...why not?  You know, I
am an archivist and a librarian, research is what I do—it's my shtick.”

“That's
fine, do your thing if you want.  But don't feel like you owe it to someone—or
some
thing
, some cosmic force.  I know you, Nicole.”

Not
prepared to debate it, she let it drop.  Anyway, it wasn't like the collage was
going to be an overwhelming task.  From what she understood, Aunt Nina had
completed a lot of the work already.  Nicole would just be rounding it out and
adding text.  According to Hazel Baker, over the summer Nina had mentioned that
she was planning to ask her niece, Nicole, to come for a visit and perhaps they
would work on the collage together.  Nicole supposed that her aunt had not yet
had a chance to invite her down, then died unexpectedly several weeks ago.

On
the phone, Nicole had intended to tell Cameron what had happened last night,
but then thought better of it.  He would only freak out, and tell her that she
should come back home.  After she hung up with Cameron, she grabbed her jacket
and headed out the back door. 

There
was nothing translucent about the sky today.  It was a bright abiding blue,
like it had been painted, layer by layer.  Once she got down to the water, she
saw that Michael was on the deck of his boat, buffing one of the windows with a
cloth. 

He
smiled, waved at her. 

“Are
you busy now?” she called to him.

“Hang
on, I'll come over,” he called back and tossed the rag to the side.  Within
three minutes, his dinghy was driving up to shore. 

She
smiled at him.  “Hi...any luck with your boat?”

“Yeah,
the part I need is getting shipped here.  I used your address.  I hope that's
okay.”

“That’s
fine.  Listen, I wanted to take you to lunch to thank you for what you did.”

“That’s
not necessary.”

“Fine,
it’s not.  So, are you hungry?”

Michael's
mouth curved.  “Always,” he said.

The
Squire on
Main Street
was dark and cozy with a faint aroma of funnel cake.

“Let's
just sit at the bar,” Nicole said.

“Sure. 
I'll follow you.” 

When
they got to the corner end, he pulled out a chair for her.  It wasn't a careful
or gallant gesture; rather, he did it very casually, dragging the chair out in
a quick motion.  Still, it was charming.  Michael seemed to have this
rough-around-the-edges realness to him—an unpracticed kind of chivalry.

The
only other patrons at the bar were the man and woman sitting diagonally across
from them.  The woman had a mass of curly red hair piled on her head.  She
whispered in the ear of her companion, who chuckled in response.  Every time
the man smiled, he exposed a set of pointy, feral-looking teeth.  The woman
clutched the sleeve of his black shirt with long nails that were painted
silver.

“Want
something to drink?” Michael asked her. 

Once
they both had Cokes in front of them, Michael said, “So tell me, Nicole, what's
your story?  Is it just you in that house?”

“Yes,
just me.”

“You
look way too young to be retired.”

“I
inherited the house,” she explained, skirting the employment topic.  “Recently,
in fact.  From my aunt—she was also my Godmother.  I'm staying here to take
care of a few things.  Normally I live in
Boston
.”

“Oh,
I see.  You're from
Boston
originally?”

“
Lexington
,
Mass.
  It's about half
an hour outside the city.”