Safe Harbor (17 page)

"Well—terrorizing me, for one thing. He was this close to knocking me down and searching the place for
Eden
," Holly said, pinching her thumb and middle finger together. "He's convinced that I'm her friend and hiding her."

She stood up and went over to the mantel, then propped her hands on he
r hips in her best I-demand-an-
explanation pose. "How do you know this guy, anyway? Please don't tell me he's a golfing buddy."

"He's a dealer," Sam said.

Holly laughed and said, "Of what? Marijuana?"

"I wouldn't be surprised. At the moment, he also has a gallery full of what looks like forged or stolen art. But I'm no authority; I was picking up on the ambiance more than anything else," Sam said dryly. "Anyway, he found a buyer who was willing to buy the engraving no questions asked.
Eden
—"

"Cut him out of his commission?"

He smiled and said, "You're quick."

"I understand dealers and commissions. You did meet Claire at the Flying Horses Gallery, didn't you? Cut Claire out of a deal, and you wouldn't be left with hands to create
any
art, good, bad, or forged." She added thoughtfully, "But then, Claire's from
New York
."

Sam laughed and then suddenly they were standing there, in front of Holly's sweet and cozy hearth, with nothing much to say.

It was Sam who broke the awkward silence. "Holly, I'm sorry I dragged you into this. I mean that." To say that he looked sheepish would be grossly overstating it; but he definitely looked sincere.

"Oh, that's all right," she said, feeling a fierce blush overtake her features. She hated that, hated the way her emotions paraded themselves over her face whenever they felt like it. Holly Anderson, daughter of a Dane! Where was the justice? Where were the genes?

He said softly, "No, really. You've been
a great sport about everything.
"

"Especially the seaplane," she stuck in, harking back to the event fondly now.

Sam grinned and said, "Billy sends his regards, by the way."

"He made the wedding in time?"

"Yep. The bride got airsick. She's suing Billy in small claims court for the cost of the wedding dress."

"Oh, well."

"Holly, I
..." Sam blew out air and tried again. "I never meant for you to
get caught in the crossfire. I've come
back to the Vineyard for two reasons. One of them
is
to wait for the
Vixen's
return. The other
is
to ask for your apology. I haven't exactly been—
well!
Friends?" He offered his hand.

Her kite-heart had been soaring, but that last word sent it plummeting down to earth.
Friends.
The word had such a pre-emptive ring to it. Friends. She didn't want to be his stupid friend.

Whether it showed in her face
—safe guess—she never afterward knew, but as soon as Sam had her hand in his, he pulled her gently into his embrace. With a sigh of consent, she let him hold her in his arms. Inhaling deep, she closed her eyes and savored the moment of him. Her joy ran deep; maybe being friends wasn't so awful after all.

Still, it seemed to Holly that the hug went on a little longer than a friendly hug should. It must have seemed that way to Sam, too, because after he separated from her, he held her at arm's length and said gruffly, "Okay, then. That's settled."

Her eyes got wider. "Settled" seemed strong. She tried not to smile and more or less succeeded. Sam looked confused. Good.

She said, "You can have the apartment."

More confusion. Sam glanced off in another direction, then looked back into her eyes—with an effort, she thought. "That wasn't my motive."

"In offering to be friends? Of course not."

"No, seriously, I—" He pulled himself up short after he saw the smile she could no longer hide. Smiling himself, he said. "You're a witchy kind of innocent, you know that?"

"Not me. Everyone says I'm as sweet as scilla in spring."

"They judge you through your art. I'm going by the look in your eyes."

She wanted to hold that look, whatever it was, but she could feel it go. Her lashes fluttered down and she said, "Do you want the key?"

"I do."

"I'll get—oh, nuts. It's in my purse, and I left my purse at my mother's house. She's in bed with another mi—anyway, I don't dare telephone."

The word had barely tumbled from her lips when the phone on her sofa table rang. It was her mother calling, a not uncommon coincidence between the two. "Hi, Mom," she said, purposely cuing Sam in. He wandered over to the French doors that led to a small brick patio and made a pretense of looking at the garden that surrounded it.

"How are you feeling?" she asked, but she could hear by her mother's rapid breathing that it couldn't be very well.

"Holly, Holly," her mother said in a voice of anguish. "I was just out on the deck. It's back. It's back. The
Vixen
is back!"

F
eeling like a helpless passenger in a runaway stagecoach, Sam watched through half-shut eyes as Holly blasted into and out of the slow-moving cars headed for downtown Vineyard Haven. The wild ride came to a welcome if abrupt halt in the drive of the
Andersons
' enviably situated house, and Holly jumped out of the truck with Sam hard on her heels.

As they waited for Charlotte Anderson to answer the bell, Sam noted with approval that the house hadn't been tricked out to boring perfection. The weat
hered shingles were loose in
spots, and the trim was peeling here and there. The black, louvered shutters were thick with generations of paint. The brass light fixtures flanking the massive door had not been lacquered into an unnatural state of shine, but over the years had acquired a pleasing patina of verdigris. The overall effect was of a large, genteel house that had been allowed to age with charm and grace.

Too bad that Eric Anderson wasn't letting his wife do the same.

Charlotte Anderson answered the door at last, and Sam was immediately struck with the resemblance between mother and daughter. The same vulnerability in the same deeply luminous green eyes is what hit him first; but he saw that the nose, the chin, the cheekbones were cut from the same cloth as well. Of all things, he saw a spark of
Eden
in both mother and daughter—a kind of don't-push-me-too-far steeliness that surprised him. Of course, with
Eden
, you took that as a challenge; it was almost fun to goad her into a reaction. But with these two
...
.

He made a mental note never to test them.

"Mom, this is Sam
."

"Sam?"
her mother said, turning to him in surprise. "I thought you said he'd—"

"Never mind. It's him. Sam, my mother."

"Pleased to meet you, Mrs. Anderson."

"Uh-huh. How do you do?"

He wanted to say, "Like you: going in
goddamned
circles," but he settled for some mindless pleasantry, which—considering that they were missing a body and getting ready to descend on the man who might have hidden it—seemed especially surreal just then.

"You're sure it's the
Vixen?"
Holly asked her mother.

"Of course I am. Go up and see for yourself."

"I will," said Holly, and she charged up the curving staircase.

Sam wasn't sure that he ought to charge past the mother after the daughter—what was it about these
Anderson
women that they enjoyed blocking his way?—so he stood at the threshold and tried not to shuffle his feet.

"This is an awkward
business," he offered after fu
tilely wracking his brain for something to say.

"Yes, isn't it?"
Charlotte
said brightly. "And just when you think it can't get any more awkward, something awkwarder goes and happens. I'm getting quite used to it!" She flashed him a dazzling grin, then turned and hurried up the steps after Holly, leaving Sam to shuffle his feet some more.

Well, hell, speaking of awkward
...
.

He waited a moment, then stepped onto one of the wide planks of the spacious entry hall and closed the door gingerly behind him. How long could it take to figure out if a boat was at a dock or not? For two cents he'd hijack Holly's pickup and drive down to the marina on his own.

Patience.
He clamped his jaw down tight and made himself stay where he was.

The more he thought about it, the more he was convinced that Eden was simply up to her old tricks—in which case, the trail was getting colder by the minute. He didn't really know if at this point he was looking for cash, or uncut diamonds, or pre-Columbian art, or a deed to a farm.
Eden
could have fenced the engraving for just about anything.

He decided arbitrarily to go with the presumption of cash. The question then became, had she taken it in small bills or in large? The first would be easier to use; the second, to carry. She could cram quite a few thousand-dollar bills into a waterproof knapsack, not to mention a drip-dry tunic to get around in, if she really did have a plan to slip away from the windsurfer after faking her death. Why she'd fake that death to look like murder—that was harder to figure out.

One thing at a time; he reminded himself. One thing at a time.

He had called his parents from
Boston
and had informed them that he was closer than ever to the Durer. In other words, he'd lied. The hope and relief in their voices had made it a foregone conclusion that he would lie again if the need arose.

He had to find
Eden
. Now.
Now,
dammit.

Still no women! Wild with impatience, Sam bolted up the stairs, then followed a trail of open doors through a kind of sitting room that led out to a deck. He found mother and daughter huddled over a telescope, taking turns looking through it. At his approach, Holly looked up from the eyepiece.

"What took you so long? Look through here. Tell us what you see."

She stepped aside and he squatted down to see indeed what he could see. Yes, there it was: a graceful sloop
nestled
in the previously empty slip. Sam couldn't make out the name written in stylized script on the transom, but it looked like about five letters, and it looked like the first one was a
V.
There was no sign of anyone on board. He adjusted the scope some more. Two men were standing on the dock next to some gear and staring at the boat as they conversed. Sam had to assume that neither of them was Eric Anderson.

He stood up and said, "You'd know the boat better than I w—"

He stopped himself, frowned, and hunkered down for a second look. Something wasn't quite right. Yes. There, tied between the dock pilings—a long strip of yellow. Yellow plastic. Crime scene yellow plastic.

Holly said to her mother, "I knew it! He sees it, too. They've cordoned off the boat, haven't they, Sam?"

"Oh, this isn't good,"
Charlotte
said faintly. "This isn't good at all."

"Where's Dad? He can't be on the
Vixen.
Is it possible that he's in jail?"

It sounded so quaint, almost lighthearted, expressed that way—as if she wasn't sure which bed-and-breakfast her father had booked his family at. But when Sam straightened up, he saw looks of genuine agony on both women's faces. It occurred to him with force that neither wife nor daughter was ready to write off Eric Anderson as a lost cause.

Sam had never seen that kind of loyalty up close and personal before—except maybe in Millie Steadman, a kindhearted lady who had taken in an eight-year-old punk and had decided to love him come hell or come high water. Up until now Sam had believed that the Millies of the world were few and far between. These two were making him rethink that.

A thought came from out of nowhere: what about Sam's birth mother? Had she loved Sam's father with a blind and unquestioning love? Would Sam have done it, too, if he had ever been offered the chance?

You don't want to go there, pal.

He forced himself back to the crisis at hand.

"First things first," he told the two. "I presume that you're on friendly terms with the dock help. Let's see if we can get them to talk. After that, we'll go to the police."

"Yes, absolutely," said
Charlotte
. "I'm ready."

Holly wanted to spare her mother that ordeal. She argued that
Charlotte
should stay home; that the police would be just as likely to give information to the daughter as they would to the wife—maybe more so, given the circumstances; and that whatever Holly didn't think to ask, Sam most certainly would.