Letters and Lace (The Ronan's Harbor Series) (5 page)

Her mind posted a billboard—
What exactly was that?
Sarah’s throat was dry and her swallow scratched. It wouldn’t take a library shelf’s self-help book to convince her she had hit the pinnacle of her stupidity. Sarah Doodle lived and reined.

“Don’t.” Gigi’s voice broke Sarah’s reverie.

“Don’t what? Vomit?”

“Stop it.”

“Gigi, what the hell is wrong with me? This guy shows up out of nowhere and I wrap myself around him on the dance floor and actually
kiss him?
Did you see the way he made a beeline out of the place as if it was on fire?”

Sarah groaned and covered her face with her hands. She smelled the earthiness of his cologne on her skin. Her hands jerked away.

“Well, I did smell some smoke.” Gigi flashed a wicked look. “Felt the heat from your flames. And the feeling was mutual, apparently. Hell, you made the poor guy so nervous he spilled his beer all over the place.”

“Oh, my God, Gigi,
this
is
a tiny little town. Who knows how many people witnessed my display out on that dance floor? I’m mortified. How am I going to face people? Or worse, face
him
if I run into him again?”

“Will you please just relax, girl?” Gigi said. “For crying out loud, so what? You had a nice, fun night out. Who gives a crap if it wasn’t your typical
style?
Come on, admit it
. You had fun
.”

Sarah’s mouth twisted sideways. Well, her body had had a good time, a blast even. But now, she was left to face its actions. She could still feel Benny’s arms around her. His scent was embedded in her pores. A pathetic-sounding whimper escaped her lips.

“Is that acknowledgement?” Gigi asked with a grin.

“Fine, yes. It was fun. Now, please let me go home and wallow.”

“Bask. Go home and
bask
.”

Back home, and inside her refuge, Sarah locked the door behind her and leaned against it. She closed her eyes. The musky, sandalwood aroma had followed her in and threatened to stay. She needed to get a grip.

She trotted up the stairs to her apartment with a mission. She peeled her clothes from her body, kicking herself out of the garments like they were repulsive rags. She bunched them in a wad and stuffed it into the dry cleaning bin.

She turned on the shower and let the full force run steamy hot before stepping inside. She lathered herself good using Hannah’s fruity body wash. The apple-scented liquid filled her senses with its sweetness, eradicating any hint of
him
.

She toweled off with vigor, her skin pinking. She relaxed into her cottony pajamas, brushed her teeth, and gargled for more seconds than her norm. Her minty mouth had forgotten entirely about that kiss. It was gone.

She slipped into her terry mules and went back downstairs for her nightly regimen. She doused the light in the parlor. She stood for a moment in the darkness, willing the inn’s comfort, needing its embrace.

She was tired and eager to flop into her bed. She needed sleep but more, she needed to close the book on this day.

Sarah made her way back to the front door and wrapped her hand around the brass knob, giving it a jiggle. That’s when she noticed it.

Something peeked in from under the front door. Instantly, she flipped on the porch light and opened the door. There was no sign of anyone. The only disturbance was what she realized to be an envelope wedged in the rubber flashing.

She tugged it out producing a gash of black across the front of the white envelope. Her name was printed on the front in blue ink, all the letters capitalized. The word “confidential” was jotted at the lower corner, and underlined twice.

Gigi had been gone for less than a half hour. Had someone been watching and waiting for her to be alone? The hairs on her neck pricked at her skin.

She shoved the door closed and locked it, testing the knob again. Then, she bolted up the staircase and locked the door to her apartment behind her as well. She didn’t like the feeling of being watched. Her nerves were raw.
What now?

Chilled, Sarah climbed into bed and pulled the quilt up over herself. She tore open the envelope.

The stationery was a sandy-toned page with pale watercolor seashells decorating its top edge. The message on it was simple, also written in all capped blue ink.
“Please stop the wedding. You’ll regret it if you don’t.”

It was as though the words flew from the page and ringed themselves around her neck, squeezing her ability to breath. This was going too far.

Whoever protested her plans was now using fear tactics and she simply wouldn’t have it. She didn’t know much about legalities but this little note sounded like a threat.

She closed the light and tried to sleep but her mind raced. She began a mental list, a habit she’d given up combating a long time ago. Lists made her happy, kept her grounded. At the moment her cozy bed and locally-crafted quilt weren’t providing comfort.

She needed an inventory of possible action plans. Call the police in the morning? Maybe. Call Gigi? Definitely. Tell Hannah? Never.

Another list emerged in her head, a cataloging of all the craziness that had begun in a nanosecond of her life and was now snowballing in a convoluted trail.

She tried to let it go, but her mind zeroed in on a taboo direction—to the music of Bailey’s combo at the Pier House and the new guy in town whom she’d publicly molested. This night sucked.

An hour later she still hadn’t attained sleep. She needed a cup of tea. She wanted the new blend she’d come up with for Hannah’s wedding. She yearned to savor the pungent aroma, have it encircle her in the comforting reminder that nothing would stop her renovation of the sunroom and the wedding would happen as planned,
no matter what
.

She padded down the stairs to the main part of the inn, where she’d left the bag of loose tea she’d named “The Wedding Tea.”

In the stillness of the inn’s kitchen—the big, old expanse of white porcelain appliances with the butcher-block island set in the center of the room—she prepared the tea. One deep sip hit the spot, calming her immediately.

When the cup was empty, Sarah climbed the stairs again and went up to bed where gratefully sleep eventually arrived.

****

After his run, Benny trudged back to the house. Bracing against the cold April wind, his head angled away from the air that stung his eyes. He climbed the rickety steps, feeling the old wood give with his weight.
Damn it to hell.

What the hell was he doing here? He snapped on the small living room’s overhead light. His eyes caught the stack of cartons piled up in the corner. Four boxes of belongings. That had been all he’d bothered to bring with him when he gave up his apartment in Montclair. Everything else had been disposable.

He kicked the bottom box with a tap of his toe. That was all his worldly worth, four measly boxes of stuff that easily could have been narrowed to two.

He sat on a lumpy, stuffed chair, his body’s pressure releasing a scent of dampness that startled his nose. He yanked open the top box and began the search.

That brochure he’d saved from his last trip to Key West was in one of these boxes. Right now he needed to see it, devour every word, believe the day would come soon when he’d be there.

He found sweaters and shirts, a faded bathing suit. He pushed the box aside and grabbed the next, tugging against the hold of the packing tape. Most of it was stuff he’d saved last minute from the Goodwill pile he’d hauled off to the mission.

As he rummaged, his mind fought him. His thoughts boomeranged back to the nice, unsuspecting innkeeper whose life’s plans he’d messed with. Anger brewed in his belly. Sal had painted a much different picture of the whole scenario. Benny could kick himself now for not remembering that Sal always twisted things for his own purposes.

He’d toyed with picking up the phone and calling the fine captain, waking him up in the middle of the night just to tell him off once and for all. But, first, where the hell was that pamphlet?

Benny reached for another box, knowing immediately when he heard the contents rattle that in it was the junk that really had no purpose. For the life of him he didn’t know why some of the crap had come along for the ride to the shore when it should have been rotting at the bottom of the dumpster of his apartment complex.

He tore it open anyway. He picked up the first thing he saw, a carved wooden box. How long had it been since he’d actually held the compass, the so-called heirloom that his father had willed to him? He snickered to no one.

The memory of that day flooded back to his mind. He and brother Sal sat on stiff-backed chairs in their father’s attorney’s office for the reading of the will.

The old man’s meager assets had been split down the middle with no surprises. At the end of the brief meeting, the lawyer presented each son with a token of remembrance that their father had specified they receive.

He now pictured Sal’s gleaming face when he learned Pop had left him his antique coin collection, a treasure worth a major wad of dough. And, Benny—he’d gotten the tarnished antique brass pocket compass.

He wondered then, and he wondered now, if there had been a subliminal message from the old man when he doled out the memorabilia to his sons? The question hadn’t formed in his brain for a long time now. Usually when it had, there’d been a six-pack in his system.

But alone in this foreign place the truth suddenly growled inside of him like hunger. He didn’t need a pawnbroker to tell him which son had received the more valuable bequest. And there was just one real interpretation of that shitty fact.

He lifted the object from the faded satin-lined box. It was cold in his palm. He pressed the side button and the cover popped open. The compass face was clear and unmarred despite its age. The north-pointing arrow quaked in his grasp.

Yes, the old man had made it loud and clear. His younger son didn’t know where the hell he was going, and never had.

Benny’s eye wandered to a gash of turquoise poking out from beneath a couple of useless old photo albums. He knew instantly what it was. He pulled the Key West brochure into his grasp, letting the compass slip back into its box.

He unfolded the glossy paper with a careful, almost reverent gesture. He scanned the photos of silhouetted fishermen, spectacular sunsets, and must-see tourist landmarks. But what appealed most to Benny was the warmth, yet remoteness of the locale.

He savored the italicized page banner that boasted the island as the continental United States’ southernmost point. Any further away from his old life and he’d need a boat.

He pulled the compass back into his hand and held it appropriately to his chest. Glancing at the details in the brochure he’d laid open on his lap, he turned the housing and aligned the needle. It would take a while, but he’d get to the place located at latitude twenty-four degrees north and longitude eighty-one degrees west.

For now, one thing was sure. Benny knew exactly where he was headed tomorrow and he wouldn’t need a compass for the destination.

Chapter Three

Sarah sat on a wooden stool at Gigi’s flower shop workbench. While her friend arranged a spray of yellow roses as part of a sizeable funeral order, Sarah’s anonymous note from last night sat open on the table’s pocked surface.

“I’m with you one hundred percent,” Gigi said as she eyed her project. She looked up. “That little love note’s got to be from whatever asshole made the complaint. Somebody
really
wants to stop your plans. You want me to go with you to the police department? I know some of the guys down there.”

“I know you do, Miss Popularity,” Sarah said. “But, no. I’m heading over now.”

“Okay, call me.” Gigi added a satin bow embossed with a golden statement of devotion. “Old Mr. Griswold sure loved his wife.” She smiled appreciatively at her creation. “She carried yellow roses when they got married more than fifty years ago and he insisted on them now. There’s a real message in that simple gesture, huh?”

“Yes.” Sarah sighed. There were bigger issues in the world, greater obstacles than what she faced. She let the idea of timeless love between a man and a woman warm her.

She reached for the cryptic piece of stationery. This was no tragedy. This was merely an annoyance that she’d nip today, right now, damn it.

She waved the page in Gigi’s direction. “I’m on my way. Hopefully, the police will decide this little
message
is a threat, something illegal—or at least unethical enough to, I don’t know, have the township committee take pity on me and let me go ahead with the work and the wedding.” She refolded the piece of stationary, carefully placing it back in its envelope.

She got up and turned to leave. “Wish me luck.”

A wide grin broke out on Gigi’s face. “Go get ‘em, sister.”

****

Benny Benedetto pulled his Jeep into the Glendale Police Department’s visitor lot.

He climbed the familiar steps to the front door and entered the building that had been his employment home for twenty-five years. Nothing had changed. The threadbare chairs in the waiting area, the fake potted palm in the corner in need of a good dusting, the over-crowded cork bulletin board on the wall, were all just as they were when he had been an officer on the little Northern Jersey police force.