Father Of The Brood

And although as an adult, he did know better, he still couldn’t begin to understand the drive or motivation behind people who purposely put themselves into ugly situations when they didn’t have to. Why would someone like Annie choose to live the way she did? What could she possibly be getting out of it?

Unable to answer the questions, he unzipped his bag and began to halfheartedly unpack. The early afternoon sun hung high in the sky, its rays tumbling through the open window to spill over the hardwood floor in streaks of white and gold. Across the street from the Hanson House Bed and Breakfast, the mighty Atlantic roared and crashed against the beach like a hungry beast. A warm breeze danced with the lacy curtains, redolent with the fresh scent of salt and the far-off fragrance of a barbecue grill warming up for lunch.

Ike paused in his activity to move to the window, inhaling deeply as he pushed it open more. He loved the ocean. Even with Craggedy Annie along for the ride—who, was growing less craggedy, he had to confess—it was going to be nice to get away for the weekend. His work had become so demanding since he’d joined his company with his partner’s some years ago. The merger had come at an ideal time and had suited well both men’s needs. Ike had wanted more business, more opportunity. His partner, Chase Buchanan, had wanted more time to spend with his family. Both men had gotten exactly what they wanted from the deal, and the business had grown by leaps and bounds as a result.

Buchanan-Guthrie Designs, Inc. was now enormously successful, and Ike had more work than he had ever imagined he would. He ate, drank, breathed, slept…he absolutely lived his career, and liked it that way just fine. Working was what Ike did best. Maybe Chase was a family man, the perfect father. But Ike couldn’t imagine living his life that way. He was too full of ambition to ever settle down. What would he do with kids?

Kids. He couldn’t stop thinking about that kid.

That kid at Annie’s. The one with the eyes so big and blue, they seemed to peer right into his soul. The one who had screamed in terror that Ike was going to hurt him. The one who had been so badly abused by his parents he didn’t know any other way of being treated. Even a guy like Ike, who had no desire to have children, couldn’t begin to understand how anyone could do that to a kid.

A soft rap on the door connecting his room to Annie’s pulled him away from his thoughts, and back into his room. The Hanson House was a Victorian wonder, the owners clearly having cared for it as if it were a much-loved relative. Outside, the looming structure was trimmed in yellow and green, and it soared three stories high in a seemingly unplanned zigzag of angles and corners. Inside, the rooms were furnished with period pieces and accessories, painted soft colors suited to ocean living, and filled with sunlight. Ike and Annie had been placed in rooms on the third floor, rooms that had apparently been assigned to the servants way back when the Hanson House had been a private residence. And although his room was a bit small, the ceiling slanted on one side, it was cozy and welcoming and surprisingly accommodating.

“Nice place,” Annie said when Ike opened the door. “Must be setting you back a bundle.”

“Yeah, it is a nice place,” he agreed, deciding it might be best to just avoid commenting on the second, more acerbic, half of her observation. “I guess Hanson House is a world away from Homestead House, isn’t it? Which reminds me,” he added quickly when he saw her frown. “Just exactly what is Homestead House, anyway?”

She rotated one shoulder in what he decided was a defensive gesture. “It’s a house in town,” she told him evenly. “It’s a place where people live. It’s a home.”

Ike nodded. “A home for unwanted kids, you mean.”

Annie shook her head. “No, I mean it’s a home. Period. Exactly like your place—whatever that place may be—is a home.” She straightened as she added, “And just for the record, every one of those kids is wanted. Wanted by me and my staff. They just have nowhere else to go for the time being.”

Ike eyed her thoughtfully. “You don’t like me much, do you?”

“No,” she replied quickly, clearly not at all surprised by the question or quick change of subject. “I don’t.”

“Why not?”

“Because you’re the kind of person who’s in the best position to help other people, but you don’t make a single effort to do so.”

“Because I have money?”

Annie shook her head again. “Not because you have money, but because of the way you use it. And because you have prestige and a position in the community you let go to waste, too.”

Ike took a step forward to lean against the doorjamb, a gesture that brought him close enough to Annie to detect just a hint of her perfume. It was a spicy scent, vaguely familiar. But he couldn’t quite identify what it was. “What do you mean?” he asked softly.

Relentlessly, Annie continued, “People like you run around in an impressive social circle and have a lot of clout. You have the ear of government officials, society leaders and corporate bigwigs. You’re high profile. You could do a lot to improve the situation of other people who don’t have such opportunities. But the only benefits and profits you reap from your status are strictly of a personal nature.”

“Is that so?”

She nodded. “Yup.”

“And that’s why you don’t like me.”

“That’s why I don’t like you.”

“Then I guess we’re even,” he muttered as he pushed himself away from the doorjamb again. “Because I don’t like you, either.”

His blunt statement appeared to surprise her, in spite of the fact that she’d spoken so frankly to him herself. “You don’t?” Her voice was quiet and timid when she uttered the question, and she seemed to be genuinely distressed that he would find her unappealing. “Why not?”

“Because you’re full of anger and resentment, you make snap judgments about people, and you’re completely unrealistic. And dammit, Annie, nobody dresses the way you do nowadays. The Age of Aquarius ended twenty-five years ago. People found out they couldn’t change the world with love-ins and protests. Nobody cared then. Nobody cares now. Deal with it.”

He hadn’t meant to go off like that, and, too late, Ike realized how awful he must have sounded. There was just something about Annie Malone that put him on edge and made him feel defensive. Something that made him quick to overreact. But before he could apologize and try to explain himself—no easy feat, since he didn’t understand his behavior himself—Annie withdrew, both literally and figuratively.

She narrowed her eyes and clamped her mouth shut, then reached past Ike to curl her fingers over the doorknob, clearly intending to close the door tight, too. But she could only pull it closed a few inches before it hit his big body and stopped. Instead of moving away, he circled her wrist with loose fingers.

“I’m sorry,” he said softly. “That was out of line.”

“Yeah, it was,” she agreed every bit as quietly. She glanced up and met his gaze, then looked past him into his room. “But you’re right. I did make a snap judgment about you. And for that, I apologize, too.”

Neither seemed to know what to say after that, and as much as Ike wished Annie would look into his eyes again, her gaze ricocheted everywhere but there. She did have nice eyes, he thought. Pale green irises ringed by a darker circle of color, and thick, dark lashes that were so perfect, they almost looked false. But if there was one thing Ike was certain about in Annie, it was that there was absolutely nothing false about her.

The silence between them stretched until it became even more uncomfortable than their-angry exchange had been. Finally, he released her wrist and stepped away from the door. Without a word, she began to tug it toward herself again.

“I guess I’ll just have to prove to you that you’re wrong about me,” he said when the door was nearly closed, wondering why it was so important that Annie Malone not misjudge him.

The door paused in its slow movement for only a moment, and he heard her reply softly, “I guess you will.”

“How about grabbing some lunch?” he rushed on before she could close the door completely. “I know a great little place that most of the tourists overlook.”

For one long moment, when she didn’t reply right away, Ike thought Annie was going to tell him to take a flying leap. Not for the first time, he wondered why she had come along on this jaunt when she clearly would have preferred to be anywhere but alone with him in romantic surroundings. Then she surprised him by pushing the door open again.

She surveyed him slowly, literally from head to toe, then lifted her shoulders in a quick shrug. “Okay,” she said. “I guess I am pretty hungry. And I wouldn’t mind doing a little shopping. I promised the kids a couple of souvenirs. Just give me a few more minutes to get unpacked.”

Ike nodded, oddly pleased to discover that he wouldn’t be spending the entire weekend alone after all. He decided it might be best if he didn’t think about how curious a realization that was when he’d awakened that morning wanting nothing more in the world than simply to be left alone. He hadn’t wanted to leave Philadelphia, hadn’t wanted to go anywhere with Annie Malone. But now that he was here in Cape May, alone with the woman he had been so sure would annoy him, he felt anything but annoyed.

What exactly he was feeling, he wasn’t quite certain. But Annie’s presence was doing something to him—something rather weird and wonderful—of that he was sure.

While he was mulling the revelation over, however, the door connecting his room to Annie’s—and to her—closed with a quiet, but resolute, click.

Three (#ulink_5403b806-3721-562c-bf7c-65c6bc3a2b69)

Ike needn’t have worried that Annie would take his remark about her dressing habits to heart. When he knocked on her hotel room door some hours later—the real room to her door, not the connecting one—she responded to his summons wearing an ankle-skimming dress of some crinkly fabric, that buttoned from hem to scooped neck, claret in color and patterned with tiny flowers in pale yellow and ivory. A velvet, burgundy ribbon tied around her neck and simple gold hoops looped through her earlobes served as her only jewelry, and her hair hung down her back in a foot-long, loosely plaited braid. Her shoes were flat, the same texture and color as the ribbon around her neck, and as a result, she was forced to tip her head back substantially to meet his gaze.

She still looked like a hippie, he thought. But there was something about her getup that he found more than a little appealing.

And Patchouli, he suddenly realized. That was the scent that surrounded Annie Malone. But only faintly, as if it were the result of soap or powder, and not a heavily applied perfume. The fragrance was clean and fresh and slightly exotic, much like the woman herself. For some reason, Ike wanted to bend to bury his head in the curve of her neck and drink in great gulps of her scent. Only with a massive amount of restraint did he keep himself from doing just that.

“You look lovely,” he said, surprising himself. He’d never called a woman lovely before. Beautiful, many times, ravishing on a few occasions, and incredible when the word seemed appropriate. But lovely? It was an outdated term, something a person normally used when referring to an elderly aunt. At least, that’s what Ike had always thought before. But the word seemed somehow suited to Annie.

“Thanks,” she said. She eyed his dove gray Hugo Boss suit, his pale lavender Geoffrey Beene dress shirt and his multihued pastel silk tie. Then she grinned mischievously. “You look like an ad for GQ.“

He narrowed his eyes at her tone of voice. “You don’t make that sound like a compliment.”

Her grin broadened, and her tone was playful as she assured him, “Oh, it wasn’t meant to be.”

He smiled back in spite of himself. “I see. You, no doubt, prefer a man in Levi’s, Earth shoes and a Grateful Dead T-shirt, right?”