Two Hearts, Slightly Used

And Sharon would definitely be involved. Brace didn’t kid himself on that score. With Sharon, the bottom line came first; personal relationships limped in a poor second. The deal had been a straightforward one—cash on the barrelhead in exchange for a hefty bundle of stock in the privately owned corporation, a modest salary and an impressive sounding title. Eventually he would take over the design division.

It was a sweet deal for a guy who had never held down a desk in his life. Never wanted to, but now that his choices had narrowed down, it didn’t look all that bad.

Even so, he’d have to do some pretty serious thinking before tying himself up in a long-term deal. Pete had hinted at some of the experimental stuff they were doing, knowing that Brace would find it hard to turn it down, now that his test-pilot days were definitely over.

He’d been right. Brace had been up-front about the fact that he’d been approached by two other outfits and had asked for three months to make up his mind. That had been six weeks ago. The clock was still running.

And now this! Dammit, how the devil was a guy supposed to concentrate?

Scowling at the receding wake of Keegan’s red runabout, he tried to recall if he’d topped off the tank after the last couple of supply runs. Late yesterday, just before she’d showed up, he’d cruised around to the northwest side of the island to check out the three hunting blinds there. He’d run over to collect his mail, and the marina had been closed, and...

Brace swore again under his breath. The lady was beginning to get on his nerves! Thanks to her tricks, he was going to have to put one of the other boats in the water and get another outboard out of storage just to retrieve the runabout.

Stalking back up to the Hunt to finish shaving and get dressed, he told himself to cheer up. At least she was gone. That was the good news.

The bad news was that he’d been the one to chase her off, and he’d lied to achieve his ends. Even at his worst he’d never been much of a liar.

Right on schedule his conscience kicked in again. Until she’d come nosing around his private sanctuary with her holier-than-thou attitude, he hadn’t even known he possessed a conscience. So what if he hadn’t exactly welcomed her to the island? Dammit, it was for her own good! She would’ve hated it if he’d let her stay, and he’d have had to put up with her whining about the wind and the sand and the bone-aching cold. There was nothing here for a woman. Especially not for a woman alone. Women didn’t thrive in isolated outposts, they needed bright lights and lots of attention, neither of which was available on Coronoke.

And besides, dammit, she wasn’t his responsibility!

On the other hand, Keegan’s boat was.

Figuring she’d have had just about enough time to reach the marina if he’d left enough gas in the tank to get her that far, Brace grabbed a pass key off the board and jogged down the wooded trail to her cottage to be sure she hadn’t left behind so much as a single hairpin. Once she hit Highway 12, he didn’t want her to have any excuse to come back.

She hadn’t left a hairpin, she’d left a whole damn suitcase! About a years’ worth of supplies were still piled on the kitchen counter where he’d parked them the night before. By the time he found the toothbrush, the bottle of lotion in the bathroom and the gown tossed across the foot of her unmade bed, the tendons at the back of his neck were so tight his fingers wouldn’t even uncurl.

She hadn’t left. Dammit to hell and back. The miserable little sneak thief had stolen his boat and gone back for the rest of her gear! Hadn’t she heard a word he’d said?

So much for the gentlemanly approach. She wanted to play hard ball? Great. Let’s see how she liked his fast ball!

Working with practiced efficiency, Brace crammed her few scattered belongings into her suitcase, stripped the bed and crammed the sheets in on top of her clothes, then scanned the quarters for anything he might have missed.

He tossed her suitcase out onto the deck beside her laptop computer and stalked back inside for the groceries. She’d bought ‘em—she could damn well have ‘em! He only hoped she hadn’t stocked up on ice cream, because he could do without having his last clean pair of jeans leaked all over!

Although in this weather, the stuff might not even have melted. The temperature hung in the low forties outside. The house, which had been battened down since October, felt even colder.

Once again the conscience Brace hadn’t known he possessed kicked in. She must’ve worn her clothes over the nightgown to sleep in. No blanket in evidence. According to Maudie, most cottage owners provided a few summer-weight blankets, but evidently she hadn’t known where to look.

“Dammit, nobody comes here in the dead of winter, especially not a lone female!” He automatically excepted Maudie Keegan, who had once lived alone on the island year-round as caretaker. Maudie was a different breed of cat. She was a local, used to the treacherous Outer Banks weather, which could go from mild to wild in a matter of minutes; accustomed to being without power, sometimes for days on end.

A small, all but unrecognizable voice whispered that maybe he should give the woman a second chance—show her around, clue her in on the power situation, lend her a few blankets and show her where to plug in her phone—

No way. She might not appreciate it now, but he was doing her a big favor. She’d probably thought she was coming down to some nice sunny beach resort where everything was laid out for her comfort, from cocktails to hot tubs.

Some travel agent somewhere needed to have his license yanked!

Brace took one last look around the cottage before locking up and heading down to the boat with her gear. It took four trips to haul it all. Good thing she hadn’t come prepared for an extended stay!

But his conscience still wasn’t quite ready to roll over and play dead. She’d come all the way down here, expecting the standard beach resort, and he’d more or less chased her off. It wasn’t her fault—he blamed the guy who’d given her the key. Easing the small fiberglass boat away from the pier, he decided that instead of just kissing her off and good riddance, he would take the time to suggest she catch the Ocracoke ferry, and then the Cedar Island ferry, and head on down the coast until she struck summer. Jekyll Island, or maybe St. Augustine. Hell, why not go all the way to the Keys? Plenty of sunshine, plenty of company—perfect for a single woman looking for a good time.

But whatever she was looking for, she wasn’t going to find it on Coronoke. Not alone. Not in January. Not while he had anything to say about it!

* * *

Frances watched as the marina receded silently in the distance. After poking and jiggling every appendage on the outboard, she had reached the inevitable conclusion that she was out of fuel. There was a single paddle in the boat, and she was wielding it as fast as she could, but it wasn’t working. The harder she paddled, the faster the current carried her away from the island, and the only sign of life was seven pelicans lumbering past a few feet above the surface of the water.

Was there such a thing as carrier pelicans? Maybe she could drop a note to the Coast Guard in their pouch.

How could she have done anything so stupid! She, the practical member of the Smith family—the practical member of the Jones family, for that matter. The one who had always reminded her younger siblings to take along an umbrella and to keep enough spare change on hand to call home—the one who reminded her husband and her in-laws to take their vitamins every day and cut down on their intake of fat, sodium and refined sugar.

A small green-and-red plane droned overhead, and she stood up and waggled her arms. “Help! Down here! Send help!”

When her leather-soled loafer slipped on a patch of wet aluminum, causing the runabout to lurch, she sat down rather suddenly and gripped the sides. Really, she was beginning to feel a bit discouraged. Beginning to feel, in fact, as if she were the only living human being left on earth.

Which was absurd. She had merely run out of gas. She, who was known throughout her family for advising others never to leap without first looking, and never, ever to start the day without breakfast, had committed both sins, and now look at the fix she was in! Starving to death while she was being swept out to sea.

She was mentally measuring the distance to a low, marshy strip of land some thousand feet away, assessing her chances of making it to shore before she turned into an ice cube, when she became aware of a high-pitched hum, like the drone of a distant swarm of bees.

“Oh, help,” she whimpered. Twisting around, she saw not one, but two boats racing toward her from opposite directions. “Thank you, Lord,” she said devoutly. That water had looked awfully cold and deep and swift. “I owe you big-time for this.”

As for Uncle Seymore, she had a small bone to pick with him if she ever got near a phone again. There were one or two things he’d neglected to mention concerning his precious island hideaway.

Jerry reached her first. The other boat was smaller, slower, but still headed her way at a rapid rate of speed.

“What’ja do, flood ‘er?” the gangly boy called out. His lovely teeth sparkled in the pale shaft of sunlight slanting between layers of dark clouds.

“I haven’t the slightest idea, but it’s occurred to me that I might have run out of gas. Is that likely?”

He shrugged. Pulling alongside, he slung a line onto the runabout and stepped aboard, reaching for the red tank near the stern. Frances had never felt so stupid.

Well...yes, she had. And quite recently. But that was another story. “I’m sorry to be so much trouble. And by the way, aren’t you supposed to be in school?”

Before he could answer, the other boat pulled alongside, and the same tall, scowling man who had tried to run her off the island the night before was there. She hadn’t gotten a good look at his face then, but there was no mistaking that tall, rangy physique.

Embarrassed, she stole a quick glance at him. Forbidding was the first word that came to mind. Mad as the dickens was the next. And yet there was something oddly compelling about the set of his features that had nothing at all to do with his expression.

He was scowling—or maybe it was a permanent condition. It occurred to Frances that it was probably a good thing Jerry had reached her first. She wouldn’t trust Flint-Face not to stuff her into a sack and throw her overboard.

“She ran outta gas,” Jerry said cheerfully.

“If she’d asked before stealing my boat,” Flint-Face retorted, “I would have warned her to check the levels first.”

Frances resented being talked around, as if she weren’t even there. “I’m sure you would,” she snapped. “You warned me about everything else. As for stealing your boat, it was the only one there, and I was told there was a boat for the use of the cottagers.” Without waiting for a response, she turned to the younger man. “Jerry, do you know anything about generators? Could I possibly persuade you to—”

“I’ll take care of it,” Flint-Face cut in. His voice reminded her of the ropes she’d used to tie up at the marina. Hard, rough, showing definite signs of wear, but none of weakness.

“Sure thing. He can check you out, ma’am. Prob’ly won’t need it, though. Power’s been real steady lately.” He switched tanks and offered to fill the spare and leave it at the marina to be collected later, and Frances shrugged and left them to it.