Heroes are My Weakness (16 page)

When that was done, everyone headed to the parking lot. Each plastic grocery crate had a white index card attached with the recipient’s name printed in black marker. Annie had no trouble locating the three crates marked H
ARP
H
OUSE
. They were packed so full she had to struggle to get them to the car.

“It’s always a good day when the ferry makes it,” Barbara called out from the tailgate of her pickup.

“The first thing I’m going to do is eat an apple,” Annie replied as she settled the last crate into the Range Rover.

She went back to get her own meager order from the dozen or so crates waiting to be claimed. She inspected the names on each one but couldn’t find hers. She checked again. N
ORTON
. . . C
ARMINE
. . . G
IBSON
. . . A
LVAREZ
. . . N
O
H
EWITT
. N
O
M
OONRAKER
C
OTTAGE
.

As she searched for the third time, she caught the scent of Barbara’s floral cologne behind her. “Something wrong?”

“My groceries aren’t here,” Annie said. “Only the ones for Harp House. Somebody must have taken mine by mistake.”

“More likely the new girl at the grocery messed up again,” Barbara said. “Last month she forgot half of my order.”

Annie’s good mood vanished. First the break-in at the cottage and now this. She’d been here two weeks. She had no bread, no milk, nothing but a few canned goods left and some rice. How was she going to wait another week for the next ferry, providing the boat could even make the crossing?

“It’s cold enough for your things to hold in the car for half an hour,” Barbara said. “Come to the house with me, and I’ll give you a cup of coffee. You can call the store from there.”

“Could you give me one of your apples, too?” Annie asked glumly.

The older woman smiled. “Sure.”

The kitchen smelled of bacon and Barbara’s perfume. She handed Annie an apple and began putting away her own groceries. Annie called the clerk on the mainland who was in charge of the islanders’ orders and explained what had happened, but the clerk sounded more annoyed than apologetic. “I got a message saying you’d canceled your order.”

“But I didn’t.”

“Then I guess somebody doesn’t like you.”

Barbara put a pair of floral coffee mugs on the table as Annie hung up. “Somebody canceled my order.”

“Are you sure? That girl screws up all the time.” Barbara retrieved a cookie tin from the cupboard. “Still . . . Things like that do happen around here. If somebody has a grudge, they make a phone call.” She opened the lid revealing a waxed paper nest filled with frosted sugar cookies.

Annie sat down, but she’d lost her appetite, even for the apple. Barbara took a cookie for herself. She’d penciled in one eyebrow a little crookedly, which made her look slightly barmy, but there wasn’t anything crazy about her straightforward gaze. “I’d like to say that things will get better for you, but who knows?”

Not what Annie wanted to hear. “There’s no reason for anyone to hold a grudge against me.”
Except maybe Theo.

“And no reason why feuds spring up. I love Peregrine, but it isn’t for everyone.” She held the cookie tin out to Annie, shaking it to encourage her, but Annie shook her head. Barbara snapped the lid back on. “I’m probably nosing in where I don’t belong, but you’re about the same age as Lisa, and it’s obvious you’re not happy here. I’d hate to see you leave, but you don’t have family on the island, and you shouldn’t be miserable, either.”

Barbara’s concern meant everything to her, and Annie fought the urge to confide about the forty-six days she still had to spend here and the debts she couldn’t pay off, about her distrust of Theo and her fears for her future, but she wouldn’t do any of that.

“Thanks, Barbara. I’ll be fine.”

As she drove back to Harp House, she thought about how much smarter age and debt were making her. No more trying to patch a living together with puppets and odd jobs. No more worries about a nine-to-five job conflicting with auditions. She’d find something with a regular paycheck and a nice, cushy 401(k).

You’ll hate it,
Scamp said.

“Not as much as I hate being poor,” Annie retorted.

Even Scamp couldn’t argue with that.

A
NNIE SPENT THE REST OF
the day at Harp House. On a trip to dump the trash, she spotted something odd in front of the tree stump near Livia’s hideout. Two rows of short sticks had been stuck in the ground in front of the gnarled hollow at the base of the stump. Half a dozen strips of bark lay across the top like a roof. She hadn’t seen this yesterday, so Livia must have sneaked out today. Annie wished Jaycie would talk about her daughter’s muteness. The child was such a mystery.

The Range Rover disappeared later that afternoon, so Annie left in plenty of time to get back to the cottage on foot before dark. But since she’d filled both a plastic bag and her backpack with groceries from Harp House, she had to keep stopping to rest. Even from a distance, she could see the Range Rover parked in front of the cottage. That wasn’t fair. He was supposed to be gone by the time she returned home. The last thing she wanted was a battle with Theo, but if she didn’t stand up to him now, he’d plow her down.

She entered the cottage through the front door and found Theo with his legs propped up on the arm of her pink couch and Leo slipped over his arm. Theo dropped his feet to the floor. “I like this guy.”

“Of course you do,” Annie said.
Two of a kind.

Theo addressed the puppet. “What’s your name, big guy?”

“His name is Bob,” she said. “And now that the second shift’s arrived—that would be me—it’s past time for you to go home.”

He pointed Leo toward the grocery sack. “Anything good in there?”

“Yes.” She got rid of her coat and went to the kitchen. Fully conscious that she’d walked off with his food, she set her backpack on the floor and put the plastic bag on the counter. He followed her, Leo still on his arm, something she found profoundly disturbing. “Put Bob down. And from now on, leave my puppets alone. They’re valuable, and nobody touches them but me. You’re supposed to be working today, not nosing around in my stuff.”

“I worked.” He peered into the plastic grocery bag. “I killed off a runaway teenage girl and a homeless man. They were torn apart by a wolf pack. And since the scene’s set in civilized Hyde Park, I have to say, I’m feeling pretty good about myself.”

“Give me that!” She grabbed Leo from him. The last thing she needed was Theo putting images of wolf pack attacks in her head.

First, I ripped out her throat . . .

She deposited Leo in the living room, then returned to the kitchen. The sight of Leo and Theo together called for retaliation. “A strange thing happened at the house today when I was upstairs. I heard . . . I shouldn’t say anything. I don’t want to upset you.”

“Since when?”

“Well . . . I was at the end of the hall, right by the turret door, and I felt this chill coming from the other side.” She’d always been a truthful person, and she couldn’t imagine how she’d gotten so comfortable with lying. “It was as though somebody had left a window open, except ten times colder.” She had no trouble manufacturing a slight shiver. “I don’t know how you can stand living in that place.”

He took out a carton with half a dozen eggs. “I guess some people are more comfortable with ghosts than others.”

She looked at him sharply, but he seemed more interested in inspecting the contents of the grocery bag than in being spooked. “Interesting that we like so many of the same brands,” he said.

He’d find out as soon as he talked to Jaycie, so she might as well tell him herself. “Somebody canceled my grocery order. I’ll replace everything when the ferry arrives next week.”

“This is
my
food?”

“Only a few things. A loan.” She began pulling out the groceries she’d stuffed in her backpack.

He grabbed the package closest to him. “You took my
bacon
?”

“You had two of them. You won’t miss one.”

“I can’t believe you took my bacon.”

“I’d liked to have taken your doughnuts or your frozen pizza, but I couldn’t. And do you know why? Because you didn’t order either one. What kind of man are you?”

“A man who likes real food.” He pushed her out of the way so he could see what her backpack held and picked up a small chunk of Parmesan—a piece she’d cut from the wedge he’d ordered. “Excellent.” He tossed it from one hand to the other, then set it on the counter and began opening her cupboards.

“Hey! What are you doing?”

He pulled out a saucepan. “I’m making my dinner. With
my
groceries. If you don’t piss me off, I might share with you. Or not.”

“No! Go home. The cottage is mine now, remember?”

“You’re right.” He began tossing the packages back in the plastic bag. “I’ll take these with me.”

Damn it.
Along with coughing less, her appetite had begun to return, and she’d barely eaten all day. “Fine,” she said begrudgingly. “You cook. I’ll eat. Then you’re out of here.”

He was already rummaging through the bottom cupboard for another pot.

She put Leo away in the studio, then went to her bedroom. Theo didn’t like her—definitely didn’t want her around—so why was he doing this? She traded her boots for sock monkey slippers and straightened up the clothes she’d left lying on the bed. She didn’t want to be around a man she was more than a little afraid of. Even worse, a man some part of her still wanted to trust, despite all the evidence stacked against him. It was too much like being fifteen all over again.

The smell of sizzling bacon began to fill the air, along with the faintest scent of garlic. Her stomach growled. “Screw it.” She went back into the kitchen.

The delicious odors were coming from the iron skillet. Spaghetti boiled in the saucepan, and he was beating some of her precious eggs in a big yellow mixing bowl. Two wineglasses sat on the counter, along with a dusty bottle from the cupboard over the sink. “Where’s the corkscrew?” he said.

She drank good wine so seldom that she hadn’t thought about opening any of the bottles Mariah had stored. Now the lure was irresistible. She rummaged through the junk drawer and handed over the corkscrew. “What are you making?”

“One of my specialties.”

“Human liver with fava beans and a nice Chianti?”

He cocked an eyebrow at her. “You’re adorable.”

She wouldn’t let him dismiss her so easily. “You do remember I have a lot of reasons to expect the worst from you.”

He pulled out the wine cork with one efficient twist. “It was a long time ago, Annie. I told you. I was a screwed-up kid.”

“Take this in the spirit with which it’s intended . . . . You’re still screwed up.”

“You don’t know anything about who I am now.” He filled her glass with bloodred wine.

“You live in a haunted house. You terrify small children. You take your horse out in the middle of a blizzard. You—”

He set down the bottle a little too hard. “I lost my wife a year ago this month. What the hell do you expect? Party hats and noisemakers?”

She felt a stab of remorse. “I’m sorry about that.”

He shrugged off her sympathy. “And I’m not abusing Dancer. The wilder the weather is, the more he loves it.”

She thought of Theo standing bare-chested in the snow. “Just like you?”

“Yeah,” he said flatly. “Just like me.” He grabbed a cheese grater he’d found somewhere and the wedge of Parmesan, shutting her out.

She sipped her wine. It was a delicious cabernet, fruity and full-bodied. He clearly didn’t want to talk, which made her determined to force the issue. “Tell me about your new book.”

Seconds ticked by. “I don’t like to talk about a book while I’m writing it. It takes away the energy that belongs on the page.”

A challenge similar to the one that actors faced performing the same role night after night. She watched him grate the cheese into an oblong glass bowl. “A lot of people hated
The Sanitarium.
” Her comment was so rude she was almost ashamed.

He grabbed the boiling pot of spaghetti from the stove and dumped the contents into a colander in the sink. “Did you read it?”

“Didn’t get around to it.” It went against her nature to be so blunt, but she wanted him to know she wasn’t the same timid mouse she’d been at fifteen. “How did your wife die?”

He transferred the hot pasta to the mixing bowl and beaten eggs without losing a beat. “Despair. She killed herself.”

His words made her queasy. There was so much more she wanted to know.
How did she do it? Did you see it coming? Were you the reason?
That last question most of all. But she didn’t have the stomach to ask any of it.

He added the bacon and garlic to the pasta and tossed the mixture with a pair of forks. She grabbed some silverware and napkins and carried them to the table set in the living room bay window. After she’d fetched the wineglasses, she took her place. He emerged from the kitchen with their loaded plates and frowned at the garishly painted plaster mermaid chair. “Hard to believe your mother was an art expert.”

“It’s not any worse than a dozen other things in the cottage.” She inhaled the scents of garlic, bacon, and the roughly grated Parmesan on top. “This smells delicious.”

He put down her plate and sat across from her. “Spaghetti carbonara.”

Hunger must have fried her brain because she did the stupidest thing. She automatically lifted her glass. “To the chef.”

He locked eyes with her but didn’t lift his own glass. She quickly set hers down, but his gaze held, and she felt an odd prickling, as if something more than the draft coming through the bay window had stirred the air between them. It took her only a moment to figure out exactly what was happening.

Certain women were drawn to volatile men, sometimes out of neuroses, sometimes—if the woman was a romantic—out of the naive fantasy that her particular brand of femininity was powerful enough to tame one of these rogue males. In novels, the fantasy was irresistible. In real life, it was total bull. Of course she felt a sexual pull from all that dangerous masculinity. Her body had been through a lot lately, and this reawakening meant she was healing. On the flip side, her reaction was also a reminder that he still held a destructive fascination for her.