Lead Me On (14 page)

Scott heard someone call his name, but didn't bother responding. He sat on a driftwood log staring at the portion of beach he could see through the tangled trees. The blue waters of the cove stretched out to meet the bright morning sky. No trace of the storm remained except for the scent of dampness that clung to the shadows. Allison appeared at the opening to the clearing, backlit with sunshine. He wasn't surprised she'd found him, since he'd surely left a trail of footprints in the sand, but he was surprised she'd looked.

"Hi," she said in a tentative voice.

"If you came to chew me out for making a scene in front of your other guests, you can save your breath. I've already taken care of it."

She came forward, into the shadows, and sat beside him. "I came to see if you're all right."

"I don't know." He rubbed his face. "Christ. I've never done that before. Yelled at her like that. Ever. I don't know what got into me."

"My guess would be fear."

"Fear?" He gave her a startled look. "I wasn't afraid while I was yelling at her. I was furious. I can't remember the last time I've ever been so angry at someone. Even so, she didn't deserve that. A good talking-to, yes, but not having the one person she thought she could depend on yell at her until she cried."

"Maybe she did deserve it after what she put you through."

He stood and moved to the edge of the shadows, where the leaf-strewn ground gave way to sandy beach. The breeze rustled through the trees, promising a perfect spring day. Down on the pier, two scuba divers were suiting up, checking their tanks. With the sunlight sparking off the blue water, the white beach contrasting with green lawn, the scene looked like a commercial for a tropical vacation.
Pearl Island, come escape all your troubles.

"You remember what I said about life being filled with false expectations?" he asked.

"Yes."

"Well, Chloe is a perfect example. She thinks every kid in the world except her got
Leave It to Beaver
, so she thinks she got a raw deal. How can I make her understand we all got a raw deal? She needs to stop searching for something that doesn't exist."

"Maybe it does exist for some people."

"Yeah, right. There's as much chance of people finding a happy home life as there is of those scuba divers finding Lafitte's lost treasure."

"You don't think anyone in the world is happy?"

"I didn't say that." He turned to her, leaning his back against the trunk of an oak tree. "The people who have learned to stop striving for the impossible at least find contentment. The rest—people who keep thinking that love is this grand prize that will solve all their problems—are destined to suffer one big disillusionment after another."

"You talk as if love doesn't exist."

"Oh, it exists, in all its varied forms. Like with Diane and Chloe; they love the hell out of each other, but it solves nothing for either one of them. It just gives them more freedom to hurt each other."

"That's very sad." She looked at him with a confused frown as if destructive relationships were a foreign concept to her. "I guess it depends on the people involved,

as to whether love makes them weaker or stronger. But you are right about love making you vulnerable to pain."

"Yeah," he said, glancing back toward the cove just as the scuba divers stepped off the pier and splashed into the water.

His mind shifted away from the problem of Chloe to wondering what sort of story he could write about scuba divers. Rather than stopping at the familiar blank screen, his mind continue to drift, anything to keep from thinking about the problem at hand. Vague images began to gather: a hunt for sunken treasure, underwater action scenes ...

He straightened off the tree trunk when he realized a story was forming in his brain.
"Shit!"

"What? What's wrong?" Allison hurried toward him.

"I just realized you're right. My writer's block isn't from too much stress in my life. It's from not having enough."

"You have an idea for a story?"

"No. But it's there. Right there." He tapped the back of his head. "I don't know what it is yet, but I can feel it."

"Well, at least something good came out of this, then."

He raised a brow at her. "I just discover I can't write unless my life is filled with stress, and you think that's a good thing?"

"It's better than never being able to write again, isn't

it?"

"I'm not so sure. If I have to go through something like the last twenty-four hours in order to come up with a story idea, maybe I should just give back the advance and retire."

"Retire from writing? You can't! I love your stories. You can't do that to your readers."

"Alli, there are other writers in the world."

"I know, but if you don't keep writing, I'll never be

able to walk into a bookstore and have the thrill of finding a new Scott Lawrence novel on the shelf. You have to write."

"You sound like my agent." He shook his head, even as pleasure blossomed in his chest. "And while I love the praise, I have more important issues to deal with at the moment, like apologizing to my niece for losing my temper and calling my sister to let her know Chloe is safe."

"You're right. I'm sorry."

"Don't apologize. A little ego boost is always good for a writer's soul." He cocked his head, studying her as he realized she was good for his soul all the way around. "You know, I appreciate you sticking by me through this. Most people are far more interested in what I can do for them, not the other way around."

Her brows drew together. "Maybe you should hang out with more giving people."

"Maybe I should." He smiled into her pretty gray eyes and thought how much he'd love to kiss her right then, in the cool shadows with the sound of the surf behind him.

"Would you like for me to walk back with you?" she asked.

An image rose in his mind of walking along the beach, hand in hand with Allison. Such an innocent image, but entirely too tempting. He promptly thrust both his hands in the pockets of his shorts. "No, I'm fine."

"Come on," she coaxed and slipped an arm through his.

Rather than fight it, he let her tug him out of the clearing into the glare of sunlight and they headed down the beach together.

~ ~ ~

Scott stopped by the office long enough to call his sister and let her know Chloe was safe, but he wanted to talk to his niece before deciding on the best way to get her home. Going upstairs, he cautiously opened the door to his room.

"Uncle Scott?" Chloe sat up on the bed with her hair tangled, the silk pantsuit wrinkled, and mascara smeared down her cheeks.

"Hey, kid." Not knowing what to say, he simply closed the door and sat on the bed with his arms open. She threw herself against his chest and burst into tears.

"I'm so sorry," she cried. "Please don't hate me."

"I don't hate you." His chest constricted as he smoothed a hand over her hair. "I could never hate you."

"But you yelled at me."

"I know and I'm sorry. I was just ..." He started to say angry, but remembered what Alli had said. "Frightened, okay? I stayed up most of the night worried sick, imagining all kinds of things. Then suddenly there you stood, all safe and sound, and I wanted to strangle you for scaring me."

"At least you care enough to get mad."

"Your mother's pretty upset, too."

"I'm surprised she even noticed I was gone."

"Chloe, look at me." He eased her away and took both her hands in his. "I know Diane isn't the greatest mother in the world, but she's doing the best she can. That's all any parent can do. She has her own baggage to deal with, and yes she can be self-absorbed, but she does love you very much. This stunt of yours has really hurt her."

"You're not going to make me go back, are you?"

"I have to."

"Why?" she asked in earnest. "Why can't I live with you? I wouldn't be any trouble. I swear."

"Well, for starters, I'm not at home. I'm in Galveston."

"But not for long, right?"

"Through the end of the month."

"Oh." Her shoulders slumped. "Do you have to stay so long?"

He thought about cutting his trip short. But his writer's block was finally lifting, he could feel it. What if being here, on Pearl Island, was tied to that? It would probably sound ludicrous to anyone but another writer, but you never messed with your mojo. If wearing a certain shirt and sitting in a certain chair facing east while Ravel's
Bolero
played in the background worked, you stuck with it. No matter how stupid it sounded to others.

"Yeah," he sighed, "I'm afraid I do need to stay."

"Then let me stay with you."

"Chloe, I can't do that. If it were summer, and school were out, maybe."

"What does that have to do with anything? Mom takes me out of school all the time when she wants to go skiing in Aspen or fly out to L.A. to go shopping with friends."

He pulled back in surprise. "I thought you stayed with Mom when Diane went out of town?"

"Only if she's going someplace boring that I don't want to go."

"But how does that work?"

"You know, like, private school? E-mail?" Chloe gave him her adults-are-so-stupid look. "As long as I keep up with my assignments, I don't have to actually be in the classroom. So, please, Uncle Scott, let me stay."

"I don't know ..."

"
Please.
You don't know how bad it's been. Mom's seeing this new jerk and he's all she cares about. Ralph this, Ralph that. Well, excuse me, but Ralph is married. How can she do that? She always goes on and on about how much she hates John for cheating on y'all's mom, and how much she hates my dad and the others for cheating on her, and then she turns right around and dates married men. It doesn't make sense."

"I know." How could he begin to explain the psychology behind his sister's obsessive need to be the center of a man's attention? How Diane had felt neglected as a child because her father had lavished his lovers with attention that should have gone to his family. And how in some twisted way, this was her way of making up for that neglect. "It doesn't make sense to me, either."

"If you want my opinion," Chloe said in a deadly serious, adult voice, "Mom needs psychotherapy."

"Either that or a frontal lobotomy." He smiled slowly, making her laugh.

"Agreed." Her expression turned worried. "So can I stay with you awhile? Just until this thing with Ralph blows over? You know it won't last long. Her affairs never do."

Scott let out a long breath thinking the word "affair" shouldn't even be in a twelve-year-old's vocabulary. "Okay, I'll talk to your mom. I'm not promising anything—"

"Oh, thank you, Uncle Scott! Thank you!" She threw her arms about his neck. "You are the best uncle in the whole world!"

"Just don't strangle me for it, okay?"

"Okay." She pulled back to smile at him. "I love you."

Oh man.
His insides turned to mush. How did she always do that to him? Shaking his head, he pulled her back against him and rubbed his knuckles on her head. "I love you, too, brat. But this isn't a done deal yet, okay?"