Safe Harbor (11 page)

Eden
. That's how.
Eden
. Sam remembered well how she would bat those long-lashed blue eyes at him and then walk away, implying that maybe he'd get some and maybe he wouldn't. She'd driven him crazy, driven every man she'd ever wanted to, completely crazy.
Eden
.
He could almost taste the sweet honey of her kiss. He definitely could see the soft sway of her hips. Seven years, and he could still see those hips.

Nosirree. Eric Anderson wouldn't have stood a snowball's chance in hell.

"Oh, my God, I think that's—! No," Holly decided, disappointed. She shaded her eyes with her hands against the window. "It's a Roamer 44, but it's not my dad's. Here, Sam, look. Down there. See the boat with the teak decks? The
Vixen
looks like that, except that all her wood trim is varnished to a perfect gloss. The varnish would be
glinting
in the
sun on a day like this
."

Sam craned to look over her shoulder. Caught off guard, Holly pulled away from him the few short inches she could. She seemed uncomfortably aware of him, which wasn't surprising: he was still very near indeed, near enough to see the fine gold fuzz on her cheeks. He smiled sheepishly and said softly, "You smell good," and then he sat up straight in his seat again.

He, of course, smelled like Mennen, laid on thick. But that aura of hygiene could easily dissipate, and he was pretty sure that the sweet young thing beside him wouldn't survive long with a v
ery raw male. Best to leave her
some space, physically and psychologically.

She sighed—with relief, pretty obviously—and went back to searching the waters below them. Up and down the little plane flew, winging over some of the most charming anchorages in New England, dipping low for better views, circling back for second looks, and always, to Sam's bitter disappointment, coming up empty.

The sun rose higher, the water got bluer. Still no boat. It wasn't like looking for a needle in the haystack at all, Sam muttered to the others. It was like looking for a long blond hair in a haystack.

"Correction," said Billy, who clearly was watching the clock. "Make that a long, blond,
moving
hair in a haystack."

"Boy, when the boats are sailing to windward and are on their ears, you really can't identify them at all from up here," Holly confessed. She sounded apologetic, as if it were her fault.

Someone's stomach growled loud enough to be heard over the engine. No one acknowledged it. Foodwise, it was true, they were in bad shape. The Black Dog doughnuts were long gone, and Billy's giant coffee thermos had been drained of its last drop. After a night spent as a vagrant, Sam longed for a steak sandwich, a hot shower, and clean sheets, in that order. It didn't help his mood that he was going to have to throw himself at the mercy of the Chamber of Commerce yet again that night. He settled into a sullen, dogged scan of the water below until Billy eventually broke the weariness of the spell that had them in its grip.

"Okay, folks, that's gonna have to do it for today. I'm low on gas and I got a wedding to get to. Brides get nervous when the chapel doesn't show up on time."

"Are you married, Billy?" Holly asked.

"Nah. Who's got time for that shit, huh, Sam?"

Sam had warned Billy about mentioning his marriage to
Eden
—but then, he'd warned Billy about lots of things over the years. It hadn't made Billy a lick more discreet.

Sam had to settle for smacking his old friend on the back of his balding head. "Watch how you talk," he said cryptically.

"Ow
!
Geez, you two are lethal. Next time we go up, I lash you to the wings."

They were circling Point Judith in Rhode Island, but all they saw were three yachts anchored behind the stone breakwater, and a handful of boats from the fishing fleet tied up to the docks inside the main harbor. Holly was
right: the weather was too fine not to be out and about.

The seaplane banked gracefully and turned away from the sun and back toward the Vineyard. If the
Vixen
was still out there in plain sight, no one seemed to want to know about it: Billy speeded up the plane and Holly sat back in her seat with her eyes shut. Even Sam sat back for a breather; his neck was killing him.

"They could be in
Maine
," Holly murmured without opening her eyes. "My dad likes
Maine
."

"Mmm."

"We shouldn't have wasted time searching the
Cape
. The water there is really too shoal for the
Vixen."

"Oh, well. We were in the area."

"What will you do now, Sam?" she asked, rolling her head tiredly in his direction.

"Keep lookin', I guess. She's got to be out there somewhere."

After a time of quiet, Holly sighed and said, "She's kind of a Siren in reverse, isn't she? She leads men away from the island and out to sea, instead of the other way around."

If only you knew.

Sam smiled wearily and said, "One of these days you'll turn her into a whirligig."

"Never. Please don't joke about that, Sam," she said almost wistfully. "My art is supposed to bring joy."

"Joy?" Sam locked his hands and stretched his arms through the gap between
his knees. "Joy would be a two-
pound steak and a baked potato. Ecstasy would be a topping of sour cream."

"Make that two," Billy chimed in over his shoulder.

"Come back to the island tonight, then, bro. My treat."

"Not a chance. Tonight is all Shirley, all night."

"Ah. Thank you for sharing that with us," said Sam
with a glance of apology at Holly—who so clearly was
not
an all-night woman.

Billy's raunchy explanation brought predictable color to her cheeks. She studied a rip in the liner of the overhead for a moment and then turned to Sam and said, "Tell me about the stolen engraving."

Sam
smiled
. All in all, she was being a pretty good sport about having been kidnapped by two guys in a seaplane.

"The engraving was done by Albrecht
Durer and is known sometimes as
the
'
Fall of Man,' more often as 'Adam and Eve.' It was made in 1504, and if you're really curious to see what it looks like, you can find another print in
Boston
's
Museum
of
Fine Arts
."

"Another one!" Billy took offense at that. "How the hell can it be worth anything if there's more than one of it? It's like he was forging his own stuff."

"Believe it or not, you've got a point there, good buddy. Durer, no snob, had a tendency to make a lot of prints available to the
hoi polloi.
He made a lot of money that way."

"Tell us about the engraving, Sam," said Holly, deeply interested in what he had to say. It made Sam feel good, the way she was hanging on his every word. He was mildly surprised at how good.

Puffed up with recent knowledge, he said, "Durer was fast, good, and cosmopolitan; he went to
Italy
, soaked up their ideas about Renaissance art, and after a few tries, came up with Adam and Eve, a trailblazing effort in
Germany
at the time. His Adam is muscular and idealized, but his Eve is a little on the fleshy side, more matron than maiden."

He shrugged and added, "Whether the stylistic treatments complement or conflict with one another is up to the critics to decide. Me, I just want to know where the hell
the stolen
copy is."

"Sam? How much do you think the engraving is worth?" Holly blurted.

She looked embarrassed about posing the question; but then, her kind never talked about either money or sex, Sam figured. He tried to sound matter-of-fact about the value, but it was a staggering sum to him.

"I'd say, considering the importance of the piece, somewhere in the mid-six figures. It depends how crazy the market is."

Even Holly gasped. "If
Eden
stole it, wouldn't she run right out and sell it?"

"It's my great fear," Sam admitted.

"But then why stay with my dad and run the risk of being caught? What can she want with
him
? Is it possible that she really loves him?"

"I dunno," said Sam, slumping tiredly in his seat. "What's your father like? What would a woman see in him?"

"He—well, that's not an easy question. I mean, he's my father." She scrunched her face into a thoughtful and slightly freckled frown. "He's
... well, he's really loyal. Usually. You can always count on him. Usually." After a moment she gave up trying to come up with a decent answer and simply sighed. "My mother still loves him, I think."

"Your dad must be some hot ticket," Sam muttered. It surprised him, how much he personally hated the guy. Sixty-two! A man that age was supposed to be hauling his grandkids off to a water park, not waltzing around the
Cape
and islands on a yacht with a babe. No wonder bitter women formed first-wives' clubs. Hell, Sam felt like starting one up for first husbands.

Holly had an inspiration. "You know what? We don't actually know if
Eden
is with him. Maybe she's run off to fence the engraving and she's left him behind. Maybe my dad is alone on the
Vixen
right now, licking his wounds. He'd be too humiliated to come home, at least not any time soon."

She didn't—quite—look gleeful, but she didn't look broken up over the possibility, either. Sam, on the other hand, felt screwed either way. If
Eden
was staying with Eric Anderson for love, that would hurt; but if she'd already dumped him and had sold the engraving, that would be worse.

Damn you, Eden. I'll find you if I have to track you down to the ends of the earth
.

Of course, that determination, and a
couple of
buck
s
, would get him a cup of coffee on the Vineyard. He ran his hands through his unwashed hair and winced. Too bad it wouldn't get him a room.

"Hey—a Coast Guard chopper," Billy announced. He dipped his wings in salute, and the seaplane banked and began its descent toward the Vineyard.

T
he afternoon sea breeze had kicked in right on time, cooling Holly and Sam as they trekked under a bright sun from the seaplane to Sam's Corolla, parked on a side street well away from the docks.

Sam seemed subdued, which wasn't surprising. But he turned down Holly's suggestion that they grab some lunch, and that did surprise her. The two of them had spent the morning in a small plane searching for a fugitive on a boat. Shouldn't that be a little like sharing a foxhole or something?

Disappointment must have shown in her face, because Sam said quickly, "
I
have to find a room for tonight or leave the island altogether. Call me crazy, but I'd much rather wash with water that doesn't have salt in it."

"Salt
? 
Where have you been staying?"

Sam smiled grimly and pointed his car key ahead of them. "Chez
Toyota
."

He may as well have said in a refrigerator box. Holly was shocked. "But
... you have a
book
out. You're a celebrity! Don't you know anyone here who can offer you a guest bedroom?"

"Sadly, no—although one of the ladies working the desk at the Chamber of Commerce did offer to let me sleep in a tent in her backyard. That, however, depends on her grandson's sleepover, which itself depends on the weather. I get the tent if it pours," he said with a wink and a wry smile.

Was it the wink or was it the smile? Something snagged on Holly's heart, her first real hint that she might be in trouble. So far the man had evoked reactions in her that ranged from annoyance to real annoyance. But this was new, this snagging of the heart. The pain felt oddly pleasurable. Baffled by her response, Holly decided to tuck it quietly out of view and then examine it more carefully when she got home. Without Sam around, she'd be able to think more clearly.

Or not.

"You could stay in the apartment above the barn," she was astonished to hear herself say. "As we know, it's currently empty."

"
Eden
's place? You're offering me
Eden
's place?"

She gave him a breathless nod. "Mm-hmm."
 
Big mouth, big mouth—what're you doing?.

He nodded warily in return. "Okay-y-y. That, uh, that would be nice. I'd appreciate it."

"Good. Yes. Well then. Do you have to retrieve your bags? Oh! Obviously you have your bags. In—"

"The lobby of Chez Toyota," he said, breaking into a sudden, wonderfully good-natured grin that took what was left of her breath away. "I'm ready."