Chapter 3
He had made up
his mind to speak to her. Today. It would be so simple. All he had
to do was walk out on the beach and say hello. But what would she
say, what would she do, when he told her he was M. R. Hayden?
Common sense warned him to stay away from her, not to ask for the
impossible. His own gut instincts told him he was a fool. Emily
Jordan didn’t need him in her life.
But he needed her.
He needed to hear her say that she
forgave him, that he should stop punishing himself, that it was
time for him to move ahead and let go of the past.
Mitch was restless and lonely today,
more so than most days. Sunday was his only off day. The Banning
Construction Company worked six days a week on the Gulf Shores
resort project. He should be taking it easy on his one off day, but
he couldn’t. He had seen Emily leave around nine-thirty this
morning with the middle-aged man he’d seen visiting often. He was
sure the guy was Fowler Jordan, her late husband’s uncle, the man
who hadn’t missed a day of Mitch’s trial. From the way they’d been
dressed, Mitch assumed Emily and Jordan were headed for church.
Emily was a good little girl, the type the old Mitch Hayden had
avoided like the plague. That alone should have been enough
warning. But no, it had simply increased his desire to know her,
the hauntingly beautiful woman who often watched him from her
porch.
She had no idea who he was, of course.
Even if she had seen the few newspaper photographs of him taken
during the trial, she wouldn’t recognize him. He’d changed so much
in the past five years, he doubted his own brothers and sisters
would recognize him. The man he was now bore little resemblance to
the man he’d once been.
When he had rented the cottage on the
beach, he hadn’t meant to become so fascinated by Emily, hadn’t
meant to think of her as anything more than a victim to whom he
owed recompense. He had told himself all he wanted to do was make
certain she was okay—really okay—and find out if there was anything
he could do to help her.
Hell, it wasn’t as if he needed a
woman’s company so damn bad. If he did, all he had to do was take
up the offer he’d seen in that waitress’s eyes, the bosomy blonde
at Andy’s, where he often ate supper after work.
Getting a woman wasn’t his problem. A
sexual relationship with Emily wasn’t the reason he was here. Guilt
and remorse motivated him, and the hope for
redemption.
The spring sunshine warmed his face and
heated his body through his jeans and shirt. Cottony white clouds
filled a brilliant blue sky, and the tawny white sand crunched
beneath his feet. A soft breeze floated in off the Gulf as the
murky blue-gray water of Mobile Bay drifted in and out to the
rhythm of the ocean’s heartbeat.
There was a dreamlike serenity to this
private stretch of beach, and only the sound of a piano could be
heard over the lapping surf and mild wind. Slow and soft, gentle
music filled the air. Mitch listened carefully, not recognizing the
tune, but immediately aware that it was something classical. It
figures, he thought. Emily Jordan looked like the classical type.
He wasn’t surprised that the melody coming from her small cassette
player would be something written hundreds of years
ago.
Even though he was standing a good
twenty feet away from his neighbor, he could make out her delicate
features as she sat, concentrating on the sketch pad in front of
her. Her oval face was as golden tan as her slender arms and legs.
Her nose was small and slightly tilted at the end. Her chin held a
hint of a dimple. Her mouth was full and pouty—the kind of mouth
that made a man want to taste it.
She had tied her pink cotton blouse in
a loose knot at her waist and hiked her full floral skirt up to her
hips. She’d bent her legs at the knees so she could use them as a
makeshift prop for her pad. Mitch had a perfect view of her long,
trim thighs and shapely calves.
Fabric in the same design as her skirt
draped around the widebrim straw hat she wore. Long tails of
flowery pink material cascaded down her back and covered part of
her sun-streaked, dark-brown ponytail. Loose tendrils of hair
curled about her face, clinging to her forehead where perspiration
dampened it.
When he was within a few feet of her,
Mitch stopped. She seemed totally oblivious to his presence as she
continued using the charcoal in her hand to create a sketch of the
bay. When the music ended, she didn’t stop drawing; she merely
reached down with one hand to where the cassette player lay on the
quilt beneath her and turned over the tape. Another tune,
completely alien to Mitch, permeated the air, mixing the sound of
harp with the light spring breeze.
He felt like a fool standing there
staring at her. He wasn’t some insecure teenage boy hoping to
impress a girl. He was a thirty-five-year-old man who had learned
the hard way the price a man had to pay to impress a woman. If he
had any sense, he’d run like hell. Obviously he didn’t have any
sense.
He couldn’t stop looking at Emily,
couldn’t stop wanting to reach out and touch her. The afternoon sun
glistened off the locket that hung from a thin gold chain around
her neck. She doesn’t look real, Mitch thought. Wearing that long
skirt and straw hat, she looked like someone from an era when
ladies never went out in the sun without their parasols. Hell! He
shook his head to dislodge such idiotic nonsense.
He was acting like a romantic dreamer,
and that was the last thing on earth Mitch Hayden was. He was a
realist, and often a pessimist, and God knew he was a fool. But
there wasn’t a sentimental, romantic bone in his body.
He’d been too long without a woman.
That had to be the problem. Otherwise he’d never be attracted to
this gentlelooking creature. He preferred his women sexy, earthy
and a lot less a lady. Yeah, lady. That was the first word that
came to mind, and that’s exactly what she was, a lady, and by the
looks of her, an old-fashioned one. So, why did he find her so
appealing, so intriguing? Ladies had never been his
type.
And if she realized who he was, she
wouldn’t find him appealing in any way. If he introduced himself,
would she run from him screaming?
Halting directly in front of her, he
blocked her line of vision. Glancing down at her just as she tilted
her chin and raised her gaze to meet his, Mitch noticed that her
eyes were brown—dark, rich, cinnamon brown—and framed by long,
thick black eyelashes.
She was beautiful.
Somehow he’d known she would be. On
that April morning five years ago, he hadn’t gotten a good look at
her face. But as long as he lived, he would never forget her singed
dark hair and tattered pink nightgown.
The moment their eyes met, she gasped.
“Oh, hello.” Her voice fit her feminine image perfectly. Soft.
Sweet. Slightly sexy.
“Hello,” he replied.
When she smiled, he felt the warmth of
it spread through him. The bottom dropped out of his stomach.
Dammit, this wasn’t supposed to happen.
“It’s a beautiful day, isn’t it?”
Stretching out her legs on the quilt, she laid her sketch pad
aside. “I was hoping it wouldn’t rain this weekend, so I could stay
outside and sketch.”
“What are you drawing?” He wasn’t a man
used to idle chitchat, and for the life of him he couldn’t figure
out why he was bothering with it now. Because she
is Emily Jordan and you want to get to know her. You want to find
out if there is some way you can repay her for the life Styles and
Hayden Construction Company destroyed.
Lifting the pad, she turned it so he
could see the sketch. “What do you think?”
“I’m no art critic, but I think it’s
good.” He pointed to the sketch. “There’s a child in your
drawing.”
“Hannah.” She ran her fingertips
lightly over the sketch of the little girl. “I’m working on
illustrations for a children’s book. Hannah is my main
character.”
“Is your story a fairy tale with a
phony happy ending?” Mitch well remembered his mother reading to
him from the ragged book she’d saved from her own childhood. His
mother had been a hopeless romantic, his father a lazy dreamer.
Together they had almost ruined the lives of their five innocent
children.
Clutching the edge of the pad, Emily
sighed heavily. “If you’re asking whether or not all my stories
will have happy endings, then the answer is yes.”
“Adults shouldn’t lie to children. Kids
shouldn’t be taught that life always ends happily ever
after.”
“I disagree.” She saw the skepticism on
his hard, lean face, and knew it would be useless to argue.
Somewhere along the way, this man had lost his ability to wish for
the impossible. “Simplistic as it sounds, life is a roller coaster
ride filled with ups and downs. Sometimes we’ll have our hearts
broken and our dreams destroyed, but we have to dry our tears and
dream new dreams.”
If Emily Jordan was still this much of
a romantic optimist after losing her husband and living through a
horrible nightmare, then perhaps her life hadn’t been ruined.
Perhaps she had found happiness again. “You’re obviously a
romantic. Your books must fill children’s heads with a lot of
pie-in-the-sky ideas.”
“Not really. At least not yet. I’m
still in the preparation stages for my Hannah books.”
“So you’re not published?”
“Not yet, but hopefully, someday.”
Laying down the pad, she punched the Off button on the cassette
player. “Would you like to sit down and get out of the sun?” Emily
patted the large tulip quilt on which she sat. She had wanted to
meet this man for over a month, and now here he was standing beside
her, talking to her, looking at her with the most incredible blue
eyes she’d ever seen.
Was she a fool to be so friendly to a
stranger? She knew nothing about this man—absolutely nothing. Was
it possible that he was her mystery caller? Had he somehow found
out her name and phone numbers at home and at work? Was the typed
“love letter” she had received yesterday from him?
Her common sense told her to be
cautious, but her feminine desires told her to throw caution to the
winds.
“Are you asking me to share your
quilt?” He watched her closely for a reaction.
Smiling, she looked him directly in the
eye. “Yes.” There was something about this man, about the way he
looked at her, that unnerved her, but didn’t frighten
her.
When he sat down beside her, she turned
and reached inside her small cooler to retrieve two chilled
bottles. “Would you care for some apple juice?” She offered him a
bottle.
Apple juice? He looked down at her
gift. He didn’t think he’d ever drunk apple juice in his entire
life. His fingers grazed hers when he accepted the bottle, and a
sizzling sensation ran up his arm. Touching her, even briefly,
alerted his senses to trouble. “Thanks.”
Emily studied the big, blond man
sitting beside her. Muscular, tanned, robust, and sexy to the point
of being dangerous to any woman who crossed his path. She found him
extremely appealing. Had she let the overwhelming attraction she
felt dull her senses? Was that the reason she had ignored her
common sense and allowed her feminine desires to guide her? Was
that the reason she had decided to trust a perfect stranger, when
she had doubts about Charles Tolbert and Rod Simmons, two men she
knew and liked?
The stranger turned and smiled at her,
his searing blue eyes focusing on her face. When she felt the
warmth of a blush creeping into her cheeks, she abruptly looked
down, hoping he wouldn’t notice.
Was she blushing? Mitch wondered. He
couldn’t believe it. As a general rule, modern women didn’t blush.
Hell, was it possible that Emily felt the attraction between them
as strongly as he did? Was that what was bothering
her?
“My Hannah character was based on a
real person,” Emily said in an effort to distract herself from
concentrating so intensely on her neighbor’s obvious physical
attributes. She took a sip from the chilled bottle of juice before
she picked up her sketch pad.
“Is that right?” Following her lead,
Mitch put his bottle to his lips and took a giant sip. Much to his
surprise, he found the fruity liquid quite refreshing.
“My grandmother’s name was Hannah. She
spent many happy days of her childhood in that house.” Turning,
Emily pointed to the white clapboard cottage nestled on a grassy
knoll above the beach. “When I was a little girl and came here in
the summer, Grammy used to tell me the most wonderful stories about
vacations at the cottage when she was growing up.”
Mitch set the bottle of juice between
his legs. He knew very little about Emily Jordan. Only what Zed had
been able to find out from various sources. After her husband’s
death in the fire, she’d had eight surgeries on her back. Until
recently, she had lived in Mobile with her husband’s uncle, Fowler
Jordan, the respected head of a prestigious accounting firm. Then a
few months ago, she’d moved into the beachfront cottage on Scenic
Highway 98 that she had inherited from her grandmother. And with a
partner, she had opened an art supply store called the Paint Box in
the nearby town of Fairhope.
“You were close to your grandmother?”
Mitch asked.
“My grandmother raised me. At least for
the most part.” Emily had loved Hannah McLain more dearly than
either of her own parents. “My father was killed in an accident
when I was twelve, and my mother remarried shortly afterward. I
chose to live with Grammy.”
“How long have you lived in your
grandmother’s cottage?”
“For a couple of months. But this—” she
spread out her arms in a loving gesture as if she could encompass
the house, the beach, the bay and the sky in her arms “—has always
seemed like home to me for as long as I can remember.”
“I’ve never felt like that about a
place. I haven’t had a real home since I was a kid.” He leaned
back, propping himself up with his elbows. “I’ve spent the last
five years bumming around the country.”
“And before that?” She looked at him
and couldn’t help noticing that his eyes were the coldest, palest
blue she’d ever seen.
He didn’t reply at first, only stared
at her. He was incredibly good-looking and almost too masculine.
His height and powerful build gave him an air of rugged strength.
His clothes fit his body with a snug casualness, his shirt
outlining every welldeveloped muscle in his chest and shoulders.
For some odd reason, Emily had the strangest urge to reach out and
run her hands over his broad shoulders.
“Before I started bumming around, I had
a steady job.” He didn’t want to tell this woman anything about his
past—not yet. She probably held him responsible for her husband’s
death; and he didn’t blame her. Even if when he told her who he was
she didn’t run away, how would he ever be able to convince her of
his innocence, when in his very soul he felt guilty?
Emily flipped over a page in her pad,
picked up her charcoal and began drawing.
“Do you live alone?” he asked, trying
to think of something to say to keep himself from taking her face
in his hands and bringing her mouth close enough to kiss. Dear God,
she was a sweet temptation, a temptation to which he could never
surrender.
“Yes.” She knew by the way he was
looking at her that he wanted to kiss her, and oddly enough the
thought of his lips on hers didn’t frighten her. “You’re living
alone, too, aren’t you?”
“Quite alone.”
“No family? Wife?
Children?”
“No.” He finished the last drops of
apple juice and set the empty bottle next to the
cooler.
“You must get lonely.” She
instinctively felt that this man was unbearably
lonely.
“What about you—are you lonely? Or is
there someone in your life?” He wanted her to say that she wasn’t
lonely, that she was happy and her life was good.
“There isn’t a special man, if that’s
what you’re asking, but my life is filled with people. A special
uncle, a dear friend and my art students.”
“You’re a teacher?”
“An art teacher,” she said. “I own an
art supply store in Fairhope. And I teach art classes. Mostly to
children, but I do have some adult pupils.”
“You must like children if you can
endure teaching them.”
“I love children.” If only she hadn’t
lost her baby the night Stuart died, her child would be nearly five
years old. “Don’t you like children?”
“Kids don’t fit into my life in any
way.” He’d grown up in a household overrun with children—crying,
fighting, hungry brothers and sisters with bare feet and
hand-me-down clothes and Mississippi red clay under their
fingernails.
“You don’t plan to have children of
your own someday?” She didn’t think about how personal the question
was until she’d already blurted out. “Oh, forgive me for asking.
It’s certainly none of my business.”
“No, I don’t plan to have any children.
I helped raise several younger brothers and sisters. That pretty
much got the fathering instinct out of my system.” When he’d been
climbing the ladder of success and he and Randy had been raking in
the big bucks, Mitch had helped his younger siblings. Now he was
doing good just taking care of himself. He didn’t have anything to
offer a woman, let alone anything to give a child.
“I was an only child.” Emily lay back
and stretched out on the quilt, then looked up at Mitch. “I’ve
always wanted children.”
“Then I hope someday you have them.”
From out of nowhere the thought of this lovely woman’s very
pregnant body drifted into his mind. She would look beautiful all
round and full, her feminine form nurturing a child. His child.
“Damn!” Mitch sat up quickly, cursing himself for a
fool.
“What?” She’d heard his outburst, but
had no idea what had prompted it.
Deliberately he turned away—to avoid
her searching gaze. Reaching out, he punched the Play button on her
cassette player. A somewhat somber tune began, an elegant blend of
strings and brass. Very gradually the music built, then dropped
away, only to rebuild again and again. “Classical music,
huh?”
“Yes.” Instantly she realized he was
fighting to control his emotions, and she knew instinctively that
it wasn’t something he had to do often. “That’s Tchaikovsky’s
Symphony no. 5 playing.”
“I don’t know anything about that kind
of music. I prefer good old rock ‘n’ roll or some hot jazz.” He
clinked the side of the empty juice bottle with his
fingernail.
“I love all types of music, but I must
admit I’m a sucker for classical.” She watched the way he kept
fiddling with his empty bottle, his hands nervously caressing the
glass surface. “Grammy’s influence. She used to take me to concerts
when I was a child. And the ballet. And the opera.”
“My old man listened to the
Grand Ole Opry when I was a kid.” Mitch
supposed that was why, to this day, he couldn’t stand country
music. “We weren’t very cultured, to say the least.”
“Culture isn’t everything,” Emily said.
“I think honesty and integrity and compassion are far more
important.”
He couldn’t resist turning toward her,
his gaze traveling the length of her slender body. For five years
this one woman had haunted his dreams, had tormented him day and
night. When he returned to the Gulf, he had wanted to meet Emily,
to make sure she was fully recovered from the tragedy his
construction firm had caused. That’s all he had wanted. Just to
check on her. Make sure she was all right. To see if he could do
anything to help her.
But now, after meeting her, all he
could think about was what it would be like to make love to
her.
He looked at her with such undisguised
longing in his eyes that Emily wanted to weep. What would this
devastatingly handsome man think of her if he could see her scars?
Would he be repulsed? Would he cringe at the sight of her imperfect
back covered with disfigured flesh that could never be restored to
its former perfection?
Lured by the undeniable attraction that
pulsated between them, Mitch found himself reaching out to touch
the locket that hung from a thin chain around her neck. His big
finger circled the round gold pendant. “Lady, are you what you
appear to be, or are you some illusion I’ve dreamed
up?”
Her breath caught in her throat when
his hand accidently brushed against her breast as he continued
fondling her necklace. “And just what—what do I appear to
be?”
“A very beautiful, very delicate, very
sensitive lady.” He wanted to pull her into his arms, to see if she
would melt against him. She gazed at him as if nothing would please
her more.
Emily eased away from him, but smiled
as she stroked the gold chain about her neck. Only moments before,
his fingers had caressed the thin metal, and she could almost feel
his touch. She had never met anyone like this man, had never
reacted so strongly to another man’s look or touch or the sound of
his voice.
“I think you could be a dangerous man,”
Emily said, admitting that he posed a threat to her self-control.
Had she been wrong about him? Was it possible that he was her
mystery man? Had he been the one who called “just to hear her
voice”? Was he the one who had quoted Shelley and Byron in the love
letter? “Any woman would be a fool to trust you too
quickly.”
“Did your Grammy teach you to be wary
of strangers? If she did, she was a smart lady.” Mitch sat beside
her, unmoving, but within his own mind, he withdrew from her.
“You’re right. I can be dangerous.”
Dear God, sweet Emily,
I’m the most dangerous man you know.
“My grandmother taught me to trust my
instincts where people are concerned.”
“What are your instincts telling you
right now?”
Swallowing, Emily held back the first
response that came to mind. She’d nearly said her instincts were
telling her that she should give herself to him, that she was meant
to belong to him. Lord help her, had she lost her mind? “My
instincts are telling me to be very careful where you’re
concerned.”
When she gazed up at him, she was
shocked by the look of pure lust she saw in his eyes. This man
wanted her. The thought sent pinpricks of excitement rushing
through her. She couldn’t let this happen. She had no idea who he
was. He was a stranger. She didn’t even know his name.
Mitch told himself to get up and walk
away. The last thing he needed was a relationship with a woman who
would feel only hatred for him if she knew his name. He was having
a difficult enough time trying to rebuild a life that his own
stupidity had destroyed, without succumbing totally to his
desperate need for Emily’s forgiveness.
Mitch lowered his body onto the quilt,
lying down beside her, propping himself up on one elbow.
Run, you damned fool. Run now! he told
himself.
Emily drew in a deep breath. This man
was a stranger, perhaps a dangerous stranger. Why didn’t she tell
him to go away? Why didn’t she gather up her belongings and return
to her cottage? Staying here, so close to him, was bound to lead to
trouble. As ridiculous as the notion was, she wanted him to kiss
her...this man she didn’t know. She longed to feel his lips on
hers.
He leaned toward her, his face so close
that she tasted his breath. “I—I don’t think this is such a good
idea,” she said. “We’re strangers.”
“Are you always so friendly to
strangers on the beach?” he asked, somehow knowing she had never
reacted this way to any other man.
“No,” she admitted, closing her eyes,
wanting to escape the nearness of his body, the smell of his musky
aftershave, the feel of his breath mingling with hers. “Strangers
don’t usually intrude on my privacy.”
“Why didn’t you ask me to leave when I
first approached you?”
“Because I... You’re my neighbor. I
didn’t want to be unfriendly.”
“I’ve been watching you for weeks now,”
Mitch told her. “I’m no good for you, pretty lady, but I couldn’t
stop myself from coming out here to meet you.”
He’d been watching her? Emily’s heart
skipped a beat. All the while she’d been spying on his privacy,
he’d been doing the same thing. “I’ve watched you, too, and
wondered about you.”
“You’re as lonely as I am, aren’t you?”
Why would a woman with so much charm and beauty and intelligence
not have a man in her life? Mitch wondered. It didn’t make sense.
Was it possible that she was still in love with her dead
husband?
“Yes, I’m lonely. My husband died five
years ago, and there’s been no one....” And there never can be
anyone, she told herself. No man would want such an imperfect
woman.
“I’m sorry about your husband. I lost
someone about five years ago, too.” Had he ever really loved Loni?
he wondered, or had she just been a part of his big plans to get
rich, to be important, to once and for all prove to himself and
everyone else that there wasn’t any Mississippi red clay left under
his fingernails?
“She died?” Emily asked.
“No.” Mitch chuckled, admitting to
himself that losing Loni wasn’t the worst thing that had happened
to him. “My fiancée ran off with my former business
partner.”
“Oh.” His business partner? How could
that be? She’d assumed he was a manual laborer—had he once owned
his own business?
“I think it’s about time we introduce
ourselves, pretty lady, don’t you?” He held out his hand. “I’m Ray
Mitchell. My friends call me ‘Mitch.’” He gave her the same name he
had decided to use at work. He’d chosen it hoping that if he’d ever
worked with any of the laborers in the past, no one would recognize
him.
His common sense told him he was a fool
to lie to Emily, to hide his true identity from her. But his heart
told him that there would be time enough to tell Emily who he
really was. Later. When they knew each other better.
Watching the play of emotions on
Mitch’s face, Emily wondered what he was thinking. He was a million
miles away. Somewhere she couldn’t reach him. Someplace he
obviously didn’t want to be.
She touched his arm. He turned to her.
“I’m Emily Jordan.”
Emily. He repeated the name in his mind
as he had done countless times in the past. The name suited her.
Old-fashioned and ladylike. “Would you go out to dinner with me
sometime, Emily?”
She wanted to say yes, to scream her
acceptance, but she couldn’t. It was obvious that Ray Mitchell was
the kind of man who would expect a physical relationship. She could
never offer him her body. Her scarred, imperfect, ugly
body.
“If you’re looking for a
friend...someone to ease the loneliness, then...well, I’d like to
be your friend,” she said.
“I need a friend.” I
need for you to be my friend
Emily wanted to touch Mitch, to run her
fingers down his craggy, beard-stubbled face. There was so much
pain in his eyes, so much loneliness. Perhaps that was why fate had
thrown them together. Perhaps she could ease Mitch’s pain and end
his loneliness, and he could do the same for her.
She had lost so much, suffered so
greatly, that she often wondered why she’d been severely punished
for sins she’d never known she committed. She and Stuart had been
so happy in their new apartment at Ocean Breeze. She’d been five
months pregnant and they had already begun decorating a nursery for
their baby boy. And then their apartment building had collapsed.
Fire had broken out, spreading quickly throughout the expensive,
newly constructed complex. She and Stuart had been trapped. Stuart
had died. And when she’d awakened to learn of his death and the
loss of their child, she had wished she’d died with
them.
But she’d lived to suffer endless agony
as her severely burned back healed, and then more pain when she
endured eight operations on her seared flesh.
Emily had lost her husband, her child
and any hopes of ever loving and being loved again. And all because
an unscrupulous construction firm had been more interested in
saving money than in people’s safety. Even though she’d been too
ill to go to court, to face the monsters responsible for the
destruction of her life, she would never forget their names.
Randall D. Styles and M. R. Hayden.
“Are you all right, Emily?” Mitch
asked.
“Sorry. I was just remembering...things
I’ll never be able to forget.”
“Yeah. I understand. I have a few
demons chasing me, too.”
Emily smiled at Mitch, accepting him
into her life, telling herself that he needed her friendship as
much as she needed his. “Why don’t you stop by the Paint Box
tomorrow after work. We can pick up some fresh seafood and a bottle
of wine. I can cook dinner for us at my house.”
“Pretty lady, you’ve got yourself a
deal.”