Breaker's Passion (2 page)

Sure, it had hurt a little, but she wasn’t sure if it was because she cared for Sarah or because yet another relationship hadn’t worked out. For some reason she had thought about this sad fact of her life on the flight over and realized that her relationships with women had fallen into a pattern, an unsuccessful one. She’d meet someone, they’d hit it off, then the relationship would go stale, and she’d move on.

Halfway into the flight she’d decided she wasn’t interested in a long-term relationship. She wasn’t made for one. She never felt overwhelming desire or craved a woman’s touch. She liked sex, but it never really rang her bell that loud, so to speak, like it did with her friends. Passion, want, that never-ending thrill of a lover’s touch was critical in a partner. She just didn’t have it in her.

The honking of a horn brought her attention back to the road. She was alone in a sleek sports car in paradise and should be acting like it. She was still angry about the luggage fiasco, even though she should just get over it. The navigation system directed her to turn left in one hundred yards. Regardless of why she was here alone, she intended to make the most of this vacation.

She pulled into the wide circular drive of the resort. The valet hurried around the front of the car, opening the driver’s door almost before she slid the gear into Park.

“Good afternoon and welcome to the Carlyle. Do you have a reservation with us?”

“Yes, I do,” she replied, stepping out of the car.

“Wonderful. The lobby is right through those doors.” The young man pointed over her left shoulder. “I’ll have your luggage sent right up.”

She had three bags; one she had managed to squeeze into the practically nonexistent trunk, the others were tossed casually into the backseat. Exchanging her last name for a claim check, she turned toward the lobby, slowing her pace as she approached the sliding doors the valet had indicated. Everywhere else there were open doorways and large spaces where windows would have been in a more traditional hotel lobby, but the open floor plan let the freshness of the warm Hawaiian afternoon drift through.

She walked to the registration desk, her tennis shoes not making a sound on the highly polished marble floor. Two women behind the desk dressed in twin hotel uniforms looked more like leaders of an outdoor adventure than desk clerks in a five-star resort. Both of the stunningly beautiful women smiled as she approached. The woman on the left spoke first, repeating the question the valet had just asked.

“Checking in?”

“Yes, I’m Elizabeth Collins.”

“One moment, Ms. Collins.” The clerk’s fingers flew over the keyboard.

Elizabeth glanced around the lobby again. The sound of birds chirping was so close and clear Elizabeth turned around, fully expecting to see them hovering overhead. The woman drew her attention back.

“Here it is, Ms. Collins. I’m confirming that you’re scheduled to be with us for ten weeks?”

“Yes, that’s correct.” Elizabeth slid her backpack off her shoulder and placed it on the low counter in front of her.

“All right, Ms. Collins. If I could please see your driver’s license, I can finish checking you in. It should just take a minute or two.”

Elizabeth finished the rest of the paperwork, then the clerk gave her directions to the wing where her villa was located. Instead of going directly to her room she needed to stretch her legs a bit. Between sitting at the airport and the flight itself, she had been inactive for the past twelve hours and felt groggy and lethargic. She needed sunshine and fresh air.

She quickly exited the lobby and soon stood in front of an entrance to what appeared to be a miniature tropical rain forest. A brick sidewalk branched to the left and right, and a flagstone path curved out in front of her and disappeared into the foliage. A waterfall at least twenty feet high that flowed into a koi pond at her feet was the centerpiece of the entrance. The fish, between six and eighteen inches long, swam in lazy circles, occasionally breaking the surface as if searching for their own breath of fresh air. As the water cascaded over the rocks, the tension in her shoulders soon drifted away and her head cleared. Water did have amazing healing powers. She looked forward to spending as much time as possible at the beach.

Taking the flagstone path she was quickly engulfed by trees and bushes; barely any light shone through the thick foliage in some places. A few more steps and she stood in a stunningly beautiful courtyard surrounded by dozens of bright pink hibiscus open to the sun that cut through the thick trees. At the other end of the courtyard was a small, blistering white gazebo. She could practically hear the multitude of wedding vows that had been repeated in the splendor of these intimate surroundings.

The sound of the ocean drifted into her head, and she turned toward it like a horse picking up an unfamiliar scent. Drawn to the ocean, she reluctantly left the sanctuary of the courtyard.

The path led her to another small patio, this one covered by a large green cabana and occupied by a small wedding party. The bride was beaming, the groom looked terrified, and a baby in the front row was crying. She continued past a flat, wide expanse of green grass with the dozens of lounge chairs scattered there supporting resort guests in various stages of dress worshipping the late-afternoon sun. A couple of kids no older than nine or ten were throwing a Frisbee back and forth while another pair tossed a football.

She passed a small restaurant tucked discreetly behind a large hedge. The clink of silverware and smell of seafood greeted her as she rounded the corner. Not particularly hungry, she kept walking past another pool with as many people in the water as out. At several tables guests were relaxing with pitchers of beer. Other vacationers held red or orange beverages and their boisterous laughter indicated they had been drinking for some time. She wasn’t big on alcohol. Rum, the main ingredient of tropical drinks, gave her a headache, but a few mild ones wouldn’t be too bad.

Holding on to a handrail she untied her left shoe, pulled it off, stuffed her sock inside, then removed the other one. Two more steps and she was in the sand. Step after step her toes sank and her calf muscles tightened then relaxed. It was about twenty yards to the water, and in less than a minute the Pacific Ocean was lapping around her ankles.

As she stood there gazing out over the horizon, salt water splashed the legs of her shorts, but she didn’t care. For the first time in years she wasn’t on any timetable. She didn’t have to punch a clock or keep one eye on her BlackBerry for the next meeting reminder to pop up. There was absolutely no place she had to be for the next ten weeks. She was here to relax and work on her new book, but her time was her own. The mere thought of the unending free time, the vast openness of her schedule, her calendar, her life almost overwhelmed her. She seemed to be in the middle of the ocean in front of her with no land in sight in any direction and nothing to hold on to. With no anchor she felt adrift and was suddenly uncomfortable.

Sensing she needed a significant change in her life, when she planned this trip she’d intentionally done nothing more than sketch out how far she wanted to get each day in the research for her book. She could do everything via the Internet these days, which was very different from twenty years ago when she’d gathered information for her PhD dissertation on seventeenth-century tribal warfare in Western Europe. She had spent years in dark, damp rooms in the back halls of musty old libraries digging through volumes of books with pages yellowed with age. She loved books—their texture, their smell, the way they fit in her hands. She missed being able to almost touch the history she knew so well.

Due to technological advances and the green initiative at Embers College, her students didn’t even have textbooks. Everything was digital, either downloaded via the mysterious World Wide Web or uploaded onto their tablet PCs from a flash drive no bigger than her little finger. The college library was small, housing only a few thousand books and reference material that had not yet made it to the digital age. Before leaving for this vacation she had shipped the last case of books to a small college in Nigeria that had asked for books to help their students learn English.

The receding tide tugged at her legs and she looked to her left, then her right, down the shoreline. Two kids laughed as they chased a third, who darted in front of her, forcing her to step back to avoid getting run over. “Sorry, lady,” came a high voice from one of the kids as he raced to catch up with his friends. Smiling at the joy of youth, she turned to her left and started down the beach.

She wandered in and out of the tide, the water soaking her shorts then barely covering her toes as if teasing her to jump in and splash around like a kid again. Because she grew up only an hour from San Diego, Elizabeth had been to the beach as a child more times than she could remember. Her father was the produce manager in a grocery store, her mother a stay-at-home mom tending to the needs of Elizabeth’s two siblings and making magical meals from the various leftovers her father brought home from work every day. Money was tight in the Collins house, so practically every weekend they packed the picnic basket, piled into the station wagon, and headed to Mission Bay, where her brother and sister swam and surfed all day. She preferred to bury her nose in a good book.

She didn’t particularly care for the water. Actually she didn’t like the seaweed brushing against her calves and wrapping around her legs. When she was five, her brother played a cruel trick on her, convincing her that what she felt on her legs was a school of piranhas attacking her. She rarely went into the water again until she was much older. She wasn’t squeamish or frightened anymore, but the feel of seaweed brushing her legs still gave her the creeps. This beach was free of it, though, and she continued walking.

As she passed resort after resort, the tension in her body drained away. “How can you not relax in such a beautiful place,” she said out loud, no one within a hundred yards.

She was surprised when she glanced at her watch to see that more than an hour had passed. Even though it was barely after five, her stomach told her it was definitely past dinnertime. Fighting the urge to keep walking as far as she could around this beautiful island, she turned around and headed back toward her hotel.

A man wearing a scrap of brightly colored material that barely covered his crotch lay prone on a lounge chair to her right. He was far too overweight and hairy for any woman, even a straight one, to consider him the slightest bit attractive. But obviously no one had ever told him, judging by the way he proudly displayed his manliness. He was wearing mirrored sunglasses and she felt his eyes rake over her. She was wearing sunglasses too, albeit much more fashionable, and as much as she tried not to look at him too closely, it was like passing a train wreck. Her eyes kept darting over at him. She quickened her pace and chose instead to look at the adjacent islands off in the distance.

Grabbing her keys and water bottle, Colby Taylor hurried across the small room and out the front door, closing and locking it behind her. She jogged to the narrow driveway, in a hurry to reach the beach before the setting sun began to dip below the horizon. Her surfboard was already secured on the custom-made rack on the back of her Toyota pickup. She had other cars she hadn’t touched in longer than she could remember, but she chose to drive this vehicle every day.

Colby slowly backed out of the long circular drive. When traffic cleared she crossed the road and headed east toward her favorite surfing spot. Her mind was a jumble, as it typically was at the end of the day. She thought about her classes, how she had managed to convey to her students the sometimes-difficult concept of how to stay upright on a highly waxed, eighteen-inch board rocking up and down in three-foot waves. She tried to spend more time with the students who were unable to stand on the board at all. These were the ones she always recalled. She analyzed everything, especially her failures. Her mind started to drift to a previous life, and before she went too far on that downhill spiral she focused on the conversation between two radio talk-show hosts.

Startled, she looked around and found she was in the parking lot at the beach. All too often she found herself driving on autopilot from point A to point B, which was a good way to die. She didn’t have a death wish. Even after everything that had happened, she wanted to live every day, though lately she’d begun to slip back and remember her old life more often than not. She never wanted to go down that backward path again. During the day she stayed busy, focusing on the task at hand. She could concentrate so fully she wouldn’t be aware of a riot around her. That single-mindedness had made her successful in her other life, but she was afraid of it if she ever returned.

Colby hurried out of her truck, unstrapped her board from its protective case, and within minutes was paddling into the deep blue water.

“Hey, Breaker, what’s up?” one of the guys on a bright green board asked.

Every surfer had a nickname. The guys on the water with her now were Striker, Paddle Boy, and Pencil. Every nickname came with a story. She had hers within months of returning to Maui. “Breaker” symbolized the way she attacked and conquered the waves of the Pacific Ocean. That and the trail of broken hearts she had left in her wake her first year back on the island. At least that’s what everybody thought, and she didn’t have the energy or interest to correct them.

“Nothing much.” The greetings continued as she paddled farther away from shore. Seeking solace, she maintained enough distance from the others so conversation was impossible but not far enough to be considered unsociable. She wasn’t having a good day. At least not a good afternoon. Before driving to the beach she had finished her monthly call to her mother. It had begun and ended just like all the others—difficult and repetitive.

“Hi, Mom, it’s me.”

“Colby Morgan Taylor. Where are you?”

No matter how many times she told her mother, she continued to ask the same question.