He raised his eyebrows. “You think I don’t know what I want?”
She gave him a pointed look. “I have no comment on the way you live your life.”
“Point taken.”
Relenting, she stood on tiptoe and hugged him. “I’m glad you’re alive. I’m even glad you’re living here, but I look out for myself.”
She’d been demonstrative and affectionate as a toddler, and she hadn’t changed. She held nothing back. She didn’t guard herself or search for the truth behind the surface people presented. She took them at face value. She trusted. She gave love freely and asked for nothing in return.
It frightened the shit out of him.
“Just don’t say ‘I love you’ to Jared. Those words either encourage a guy to take advantage, or they send him running.”
“You mean send you running. Not all men are like you.”
“Hey, I used to cut up your food and walk you to school. You can’t blame me for being protective.”
“I’m protective, too. How’s your shoulder?”
“It’s fine.” Dismissing it, he glanced at the walls of her classroom, pasted with the colorful artwork. “There’s a woman staying in Brittany’s cottage. I wondered if you knew anything about her.”
“Ah, so now we’re getting to the reason for the visit. A woman.” There was a gleam of interest in her eyes. “Why would I know anything?”
“Because there’s a child.” Ryan thought about the little face he’d seen peeping around the filmy white curtains in the upstairs bedroom. Was the child the reason Emily hadn’t opened the door fully? That didn’t make sense to him. In his experience children made people eager to connect, especially when they were new to a place. “I thought maybe you had a new pupil starting.”
“Not before summer. There’s just two weeks of school left.” Rachel turned away to finish preparing for her lesson. “Why would you be interested in a woman with a child? We both know you’ve had enough of child rearing, and yes, I might just feel a tiny bit guilty about that, given that I’m the reason you can’t stand the thought of settling down and having kids.”
“Not true.”
“Yes, it is. You were stuck looking after three little kids when you were a teenager. You couldn’t wait to get away.”
“Not because I didn’t love you.”
“I know that. All I’m saying is that I’m the reason you run from the idea of settling down. When we lost Mom and Dad, you had to do the serious stuff without any of the fun, so now you’re having the fun. It’s part of the reason you used to keep your bag packed, so you could run at a moment’s notice.”
He looked at her, his sweet-natured sister who had been orphaned at such a young age. “Hey, I’ve been living here for four years. That’s stability.”
She placed a large sheet of paper on the center of each low table. “There are still times I wonder if one day I’m going to wake up and find you gone. Not that it would matter if that’s what you wanted,” she said quickly. “You paid your dues.”
He discovered that guilt could feel like sandpaper on a raw wound. “I didn’t ‘pay’ anything. I did what needed to be done and I was happy to do it.” If you ignored all the times he hadn’t been happy and had complained like hell at the world for putting him in that situation. “And I’m not going anywhere. How could I after all the effort you put into saving me? I owe you.”
“No one owes anyone anything, Ryan. We’re a family. We help each other when we’re in trouble. That’s what family does. You taught me that.” She walked across the classroom and picked up a bucket of seashells.
Even as a very young child she’d loved everything about the sea.
He’d spent hours with her on the beach, hunting for sea glass and building castles out of sand.
Ryan had always envied her calm contentment, a direct contrast to his own restless energy and burning desire to escape.
“What are you doing with those?”
“We’re making a collage using things we found from the seashore on our trip last week. I still don’t understand why you’d be interested in a woman renting the cottage, especially if there’s a child in tow.” She added paints and glue to each table. “Why the mystery?”
The mystery was that she’d been scared.
“I’m curious.”
She flicked him a look. “Curiosity killed the cat, Ryan.”
“If you can’t come up with something more original than that, then there is no hope for the younger generation.”
But he understood the reason for the tension. She was worried this wouldn’t be enough for him. That he’d wake up one morning and decide to go back to his old life.
Since she’d been the one to clear up the mess last time, he couldn’t blame her for hoping that didn’t happen.
“Miss Cooper?” A small voice came from the doorway, and Ryan turned to see the Butler twins, Summer and Harry, hovering with their mother. Lisa Butler had moved to Puffin Island the summer before and had taken over the ice cream parlor, Summer Scoop, near the harbor.
While his sister worked her magic on two excited children, Ryan smiled at Lisa. “Gearing up for the summer rush? How is everything?”
“Everything is good.” Her expression told him everything was far from good, and instantly he wanted to know why. He couldn’t help himself. Some might have said it was his passion, but he knew it was closer to an addiction, this need to find the truth buried beneath the surface. He wanted to know who, what, why, when. In this case he suspected the “what” was the state of the business. After a harsh Maine winter when the mention of ice cream was a joke not a temptation, Summer Scoop had to be suffering. The business had been limping along for years before Lisa Butler had decided to sink her life savings into it.
“I’ll leave you to mold young minds, Miss Cooper.” He nodded to his sister. “Talk to you later.”
And in the meantime he was going to find out more about the woman in Castaway Cottage.
“HAS THE MAN GONE?”
“He’s gone.” But his face was still in her head. Remembering the encounter, Emily felt heat rush through her body. “I’m sorry he woke you.”
“He didn’t.” Those pale green eyes were ringed by tiredness, and Juliet’s long hair fell in tangled curls of gold past narrow shoulders.
Emily looked for signs of tears, but there were none.
The girl seemed remote. Self-contained.
That was good, wasn’t it?
She tried to ignore the simmer of unease in her belly that told her it wasn’t good.
“Was the bed uncomfortable?” Emily had tucked the girl up in Brittany’s old room the night before, covered with the patchwork quilt.
“It was noisy.”
“That’s the sea. You can sleep in a different room tonight if you like.”
“Can I sleep with you?”
Emily swallowed. “Sure.”
The little girl stood, staring up at the shelf in the kitchen. “Why are there jewels in a jar?”
“It’s sea glass.” Emily reached and picked up the jar. “It washes up on the beach. Sometimes it gets trapped in the pebbles and rocks. Kathleen used to collect it. Every time she went to the