Two Weeks in August (19 page)

 
“She can be an ogre,” Nina agreed sadly, “I’ve seen that firsthand.”

“Well, mark my words, young woman, I warned ye. Watch out for her. She’s too much a man by half, crashing in an’ takin’ what she wants, then movin’ on, with nary a look back.”

She studied Nina, amusement entering her eyes. “Feel better? I sure can cheer it up now, can’t I?” Her laughter was warm and deep.

 
Nina allowed a small smile. “Yeah, I feel a lot better,” she said sarcastically.

“Well, come on out here in back and get your mind off what’s troublin’ you.” Mrs. Loreli beckoned, holding the screen door open invitingly. “I don’t know why none of the young island women won’t appeal to you, like Mander there. You’ve such a beauty about you and can have any of them, I’m sure.”

They walked around to the back of Mrs. Loreli’s trailer and into the lovely garden she had designed and planted there. Large, strangely luxuriant scrub pines shaded the area and provided a separated alcove from the bay that reached within several feet of Mrs. Loreli’s home. And though the water could only be glimpsed briefly through foliage, the gentle slap of the water carried easily to them.

Mrs. Loreli bent and swiped viciously at her calf. “Darned bugs, they love ta heat.”

“Why have you never moved from the island?” asked Nina, her voice pensive. She was propped atop a rock wall on the far side of the garden.
  

“Move from the island?” Her tone was one of incredulity. “Why would I want to do that?”

 
Nina shrugged. “Oh, I don’t know. To escape the insects, the hurricanes, the isolation.”

“Why, Nina Christie! Tom must be rolling in his grave. We both thought you had the island in you, else he never woulda left the house with you.”

 
Nina felt chastened. “I’m sorry. I was just curious about your life. I understand why you love it here, I do too. Really.”

Mrs. Loreli studied Nina with arms folded across her chest. “You are in a rotten place today, aren’t you? About my life, it’s nothing too glorious. You know most of the story. I came ta the island from the shore as Chester Loreli’s wife back in ’fifty-two. We bought this land here when land was still agoing dirt-cheap and started buildin’ rental houses. We was lucky too, you know, because we got in right on the crest of the tourism wave. There were still a lot of ponies then, and the pony penning had only been held a couple of times regular. We did well, able to make a livin’ without Chester having to go out on the boats.”

She paused and deftly pruned pale leaves from a lush myrtle bush. “I never felt any urge to leave, even after my Chester died. The island is my home and I have the trailer here till the day I die,” she finished. She turned to Nina. “It’s your home now too, you know.”

 
Nina stared out at the bay. “Yes, and I’m glad.”

Mrs. Loreli nodded curtly. “Good then. And don’t let the tourists get to you. They come in like a lion but they peter out like a lamb. They come and they go. A good way to mark time.” She chuckled as if admiring her wit.

Later, as the two women walked along Little Oyster Bay, Mrs. Loreli shared the history of the islands with Nina, much as she had done when Nina was a child and they had walked with Grandpapa Tom. They speculated on pirate’s treasure. Mrs. Loreli held a firm conviction there was still much gold buried on Assateague Island while Nina pooh-poohed the idea.

Another point of contention was the ponies; Mrs. Loreli said pirates brought them, while Nina held that the Indians rescued them from an English ship. Neither believed they were of Spanish stock as the brochures allowed.

When the sun’s shadows lengthened across the bay, Nina took her leave of Emma Loreli and headed for Main Street. She browsed for some time in various clothing and souvenir shops, finally purchasing a wind chime for her new house and a new pair of silvered sunglasses.

She tried very hard
not
to think of Hazy. She almost succeeded.

Chapter 25

Hazy was in the living room of cottage eight when Nina returned to Channel Haven later that evening. She sat on one end of the sofa, one bare foot on the floor and one on the sofa cushion. Her hand, holding a smoldering cigarette, dangled from the upraised knee.

She seemed oblivious to the rapidly darkening room so Nina crossed to the light switch and turned on the overhead light. Only then did Hazy look up at her.

“You forgot to lock your door,” she said softly.

“And you decided to come in and make yourself at home?” Nina wasn’t fond of having her privacy invaded and her voice displayed this fact.

“Just protecting my livelihood. You get ripped off, I get ripped off.” She took a deep drag from the cigarette, the red tip blooming into new life.

“Well, thanks,” Nina murmured. She glanced to the desk to verify her computer was still there.

She moved into the bedroom and laid her bags on top of the bureau. Then she re-entered the living room and studied Hazy doubtfully.

“I didn’t know you smoked,” she said as she crossed to the refrigerator.

“Don’t,” Hazy replied, her tone curt. “Just felt the need for one.”

“I don’t have beer, will soda do?” Nina asked returning with two cans.

At Hazy’s nod, she handed her one, then pulled a chair from the kitchen table and sat facing her.

Out of the corner of her eye, Nina caught a glimpse of an extraordinarily beautiful sunset glowing behind the picture window. “Would you look at that,” she sighed. “That red-orange is an incredible color. I’m glad my grandfather lived on Chincoteague. I can’t think of a better place to live.”

“When will the house be ready?” Hazy asked, crushing her cigarette in the ashtray she had placed on the windowsill.

 
Nina watched as Hazy took a deep swallow of the soda. She loved the clean line of her jaw. “Mander talks like it’ll be complete before the end of next week. My folks are bringing my furniture out next weekend so I hope to move in officially then. Who told you about the house?”

“No one, and everyone. It’s a small island, if one person knows, everyone knows.”

A silence fell then. Nina watched the sunset.

Hazy placed the canned soda on the windowsill next to the sofa and let her foot drop to the floor.

“Come here,” she said softly.
 

Nina turned wide eyes her way. “What?”

“Come here.”

She motioned Nina over with a sideways nod of her head.

Nina retreated, a little frightened. “Why? What do you want?”

Hazy sat forward, resting her elbows on her knees. “I want you, Nina, because you’re driving me crazy. I can’t stop thinking about you, imagining what it would be like to…just come here.” She extended a hand.

Nina was confused. She wanted, with her whole being, to fly into her arms and let Hazy fan the fire that was suddenly suffusing her body, but this desire frightened her. She’d never been so consumed. It was daunting.

Hazy stood and moved sensuously, like a panther, toward Nina. Gaining Nina’s side, she leaned back and pressed a palm to the side of Nina’s neck and jaw, under her long hair. The smell of the cigarette on her was somehow sexy and Nina inhaled deeply as her eyes closed.

The sensation of the hand against the tender skin there almost made Nina stop breathing. The hand was hot, strong and callused. Nina felt surrounded by seawater, from the scent and the power of Hazy.

“Don’t you want me, Nina?” she whispered as she came closer, falling to her knees and pushing the trunk of her body between Nina’s unresisting thighs. “Don’t you want me the way I want you?”

She pressed her lips to the left of Nina’s breastbone, above where the frantically beating heart moved the fabric of her shirt. The electric shock made Nina gasp aloud.

With irresistible force, her arms came up and curved around Hazy’s neck and shoulders. She cradled the platinum-blond head against her body.

Hazy sighed, as if in relief, and laid hot, soft lips upon the thin skin of Nina’s neck above her collarbone as she brought her hand down and smoothed its warmth along Nina’s bare arm.

“Why do you make me feel this way?” she asked, lips and breath tickling and raising delicious gooseflesh. “It’s na fair to stir a woman so, to invade her mind until she can think of little else but how it would feel to touch you this way.”

Hazy drew back to cup Nina’s face in her hands. Her lips captured Nina and Nina felt momentarily dizzy from the possession. The kiss was invasive, but never taking more than was offered, merely coaxing Nina along until she responded with a passion that surprised with its intensity.

Hazy kissed Nina’s eyes, one at a time; moist, lingering kisses.

“Tell me you want me, Nina,” she whispered hoarsely. “You do, don’t you?”

Her hands dropped to stroke Nina’s breasts through her thin shirt and undershirt. Fire leapt throughout Nina’s body and her face felt flushed and warm.

“Yes, yes, I do,” she whispered, wanting to whimper from the ecstasy of Hazy’s touch.

Everything was forgotten—Mama New, Heather, her parents, even Mrs. Loreli’s warning; all were blazed away in this molten core of heat. She was lost, not knowing where—or who—she was. The world was vanishing except for Hazy, herself and the hot cocoon of sensation surrounding them.

Hazy hesitantly lifted the bottom hem of her shirt, as if asking permission. In answer, Nina lifted her arms. Hazy drew both shirts off and, with a sigh, proceeded to worship Nina’s upper body with lips and rough, hot palms.

When Nina was pliant, swaying in the chair from kisses and caresses, Hazy stood. With impatient passion, she snapped off the overhead light and turned to lift Nina to her feet and propel her through the twilight into the bedroom. She pressed against her as she slowly, fully undressed them both, the last shards of sunlight making her golden hair shimmer.

When they lay next to one another on the bed, Nina rose above Hazy and cupped her lean breasts, teasing the small hard nipples into a puckered firmness with lips and hands until she brought helpless moans to Hazy’s lips. Nina touched the thick blond hair, finally allowed, then looked deep into the cobalt of her eyes trying to understand so much.

Hazy took over, welcoming Nina into an embrace. Hazy began to love her, gently, patiently, but urgently. Somehow, even with the aching necessity rampant in both of them, Hazy managed to take the time to discover exactly what pleased Nina and what sent her to the brink of ecstatic insanity.