At least it was until the woman began to hammer. As the discordant pounding reverberated across the tranquil stillness, shattering the contemplative mood, Keith increased his pace. The sooner he offered his services, the sooner he could restore the peace that had soothed his soul.
So intent was Jill on her task that she was oblivious to her guest’s approach until he called out to her from the foot of the ladder.
“I’d be happy to lend a hand with that.”
Startled, she lost her grip on the hammer, then watched in horror as it plummeted toward the ground, heading straight for her visitor’s head. If he’d been less alert, the results could have been nasty. As it was, he jumped back and it landed with a dull, innocuous thud on the wet ground.
A warm flush crept up Jill’s neck as she tucked her head into the collar of her jacket and stared down at the man. In the light of day, his presence was even more disconcerting—and unsettling—than it had been last night. With the golden morning glow illuminating his upturned face, there was no question that underneath the stubble and shaggy hair, he was a good-looking man. Close to forty, she estimated, though she couldn’t tell if the lines on his face were the result of age or weariness. As he raked his fingers through his hair, she realized that it was much lighter now that it was dry. A medium, sun-streaked brown. His striking, cobalt-blue eyes were vivid in the daylight, though there was a dullness in their depths that spoke of defeat and disillusionment. Right now, however, they were regarding her with a wariness that suggested he wasn’t sure whether or not she’d dropped the hammer on purpose.
“Sorry. You startled me.” She set the record straight.
The tension in his features eased. “Then I’m the one who should apologize. Why don’t you let me take care of that for you?”
“Thanks, but I can handle it.”
“I owe you for last night. Besides, I’m a carpenter, so a job like that is a piece of cake for me.”
The man didn’t seem in the least inclined to budge. But Jill was used to handling maintenance on her own. She didn’t need his help. Yet despite the extensive rehabbing she’d done on her house, she wasn’t all that fond of ladders. Or heights. Sensing her indecision, the man grasped the ladder to steady it.
“I’m sure you have better things to do than deal with storm damage. Come on down and let me take care of it.”
Capitulating seemed the quickest way to end the conversation, and once on the ground she could make a fast break for the house, Jill reasoned. With sudden decision, she climbed down in silence.
Back on solid earth, she stuck her hands in her pockets and buried her chin deep into the collar of her coat, keeping her face averted. At five foot six, Jill wasn’t short. But the man beside her was a good five or six inches taller. “Thanks. I do have some things to attend to in the house,” she murmured.
As she turned to go, a capricious gust of wind snatched her weathered, wide-brimmed hat, tossing it into the sky. With a gasp of surprise, Jill lifted her head and attempted to grab it, but it was already beyond her reach. As she watched, the man’s hand shot out and his sun-browned fingers closed over the brim, retrieving it from the wind’s grasp. Then he turned to her.
“Looks like the wind…” The words faded from Keith’s lips as he stared at his landlady, stunned. Up to this point, she’d given him no more than a shadowed glimpse of her countenance. Now, though her face remained in profile, he realized that the old, wizened widow he’d expected couldn’t be more than thirty-five. Fiery highlights in her wavy, light brown hair sparked in the morning sun, calling attention to the long, lustrous tresses that had tumbled from beneath her hat. Wispy bangs brushed her forehead above wide, hazel eyes flecked with gold, and below a straight nose her lips were full and slightly parted. If the voice didn’t match the woman from last night, Keith would never have believed that this was the eccentric widow the storekeeper in Eastsound had described.
Yet there was a different quality about her. She hadn’t yet established eye contact with him. In fact, she was doing her best to keep her face averted. Why?
Curious, he held the hat out to her, letting it slip from his fingers as she reached for it—forcing her to angle his direction as she bent down to grab for it. That move bought him only a quick glimpse of her face. But he saw enough to get his answer. One that shocked him to the very core of his being.
The woman’s flawless beauty, which he’d admired in profile, was marred almost beyond recognition on the right side of her face by a large, angry scar that started at her temple, nipped close to her eye, then followed the line of her cheekbone south, catching the very corner of her mouth as it trailed down to her chin.
Before he could mask his shock, the woman straightened. Jamming the hat back on her head, she stared at him for several long beats of silence. Then her expression shifted in some subtle, but disturbing way. It was as if something had shattered inside her. Not in a dramatic way, like a crystal vase smashing into pieces on the floor. It was more like the network of fine cracks that spread across the surface of a piece of pottery when the protective glaze becomes crazed.
Whatever it was, Keith didn’t have a chance to analyze it because she turned with an abrupt move and almost ran toward the back of the house. As she disappeared around the corner, her hurried footsteps sounded across a wooden surface before a door was opened—and closed.
At one time in his life, Keith had been good at dealing with distraught people. They’d sought him out for his compassion, his understanding, his sensitivity. Well, those skills had deserted him today. He’d gawked at the woman, stared at her as if she was some freak in a circus sideshow. He’d been rude, tactless, inconsiderate, thoughtless…in other words, a jerk. Of all people, he should know better. He had plenty of scars of his own. They just weren’t visible. But if they were, they’d be as disfiguring as his landlady’s. Maybe more so. And how would he like it if they drew the kind of look he’d given her?
The short answer was, he wouldn’t.
The bigger question was, how did he make amends?
It had been a long while since Keith had interacted enough with another human being to risk hurting their feelings. And longer still since he’d cared if he did. Yet for some reason this woman had breached the defenses he’d constructed around his heart. Perhaps because she seemed so…solitary. So alone and isolated. Not just in a geographic sense, but at a deeper, more fundamental level. As if she lived in the world but wasn’t part of it.
For the past two years, Keith had felt as alone as he’d thought a person could feel. Angry and lost, he’d turned his back on a world and a God that had betrayed him. Yet he had a feeling that this woman, living in this isolated place apart from society, was even lonelier than he was. He also sensed at some intuitive level that she had accepted her solitary existence, knowing that her physical scars would never heal, shunning a world that looked on her with morbid curiosity and pity—much as he had done moments ago.
That was the difference between them, he mused. When Keith had set out on his trek, he’d hoped his travels would help him discover a way to pick up the pieces and start over, healed and made new again. Although that hadn’t happened yet, deep inside he held on to the hope that it would. It was the only thing that kept him going. The notion of spending his remaining years in a vacuum devoid of all the things that had once made his life rich and full and satisfying was too terrifying. Yet he had a feeling the woman inside this house didn’t have that hope. But how in the world did she go on, day after day, without it?
She wasn’t his problem, of course. He was just passing through, a stranger who knew nothing about her except her last name and marital status. And given her reticence, he doubted whether he’d learn any more. He ought to forget about her.
Yet, as he picked up the hammer, climbed the ladder and set to work on the errant piece of siding, he felt a need to apologize. Trouble was, he didn’t have a clue