Carolina Home (16 page)

“Except at Christmas,” Josh put in. “And Thanksgiving and Easter. Which are the only times we eat in here anyway.”

Tess turned a little pink. “No
wet
dogs in the dining room at any time,” she said.

“It must be nice having a dog,” Allison said to Josh. “I always wanted a pet growing up.”

“You didn’t have pets? Like, not even a hamster or something?”

“My parents didn’t believe in keeping animals in the
house. I brought a kitten home once. But…Well.” She stabbed at her salad with her fork.

“I have a cat,” Taylor volunteered.

This was the first Matt had heard about it.

Allison smiled at her. “What’s your cat’s name?”

“Snowball.”

“And where is Snowball now?”

Taylor lowered her gaze to her plate. “I don’t know.”

Ouch.

Allison met Matt’s eyes for one brief moment before she turned her attention smoothly back to Josh. “So, is your dog’s name really Fezzik?”

“Yeah. It’s from a movie.”

“
The Princess Bride
. I know. Did you ever read the book?”

He shot her a grin. “Is it a kissing book?”

She must have recognized the quote, because she laughed.

“That was Josh’s favorite movie when he was little,” Tess said. “We used to watch it together when he stayed home sick from school.”

“Isn’t there a movie of
The Scarlet Letter
?” Josh asked. “Maybe I should watch that. You know, instead of reading the book.”

Allison raised her eyebrows. “Demi Moore rescued by Indians? Please.” She turned to Tess. “This is wonderful lasagna. I don’t think I’ve had it with sausage before.”

And as easily as that, she turned the conversation.

Maybe it was a teacher thing, Matt thought.

Maybe it was something else. Call it class, manners, breeding. But there was more to her than mere politeness, a genuine warmth, an actual interest, that made people respond.

“Lasagna al forno. It’s a family recipe,” Tess said. “My parents owned a restaurant in Chicago. My brother runs it now.”

Allison glanced from Tess to Tom. “Then how did you two meet?”

“I was at Great Lakes,” Tom said. “Naval Station. Walked into Saltoni’s for dinner, walked out with the waitress.”

“He was a big tipper,” Matt said.

Tess looked fondly at her husband. “We were married two weeks later.”

“Wow.” Allison blinked. “That must have been an adjustment.”

“Sure was. I thought I’d be a bachelor all my life,” Tom said.

Tess rolled her eyes. “She means for me.”

“And for your family,” Allison said. “How did your parents react to you relocating to North Carolina?”

“We didn’t right away,” Tess said. “Tom had fifteen more years in the Corps, so we moved around a lot. We even stayed with my folks awhile when he was in Lebanon. I think they were grateful when we finally settled in one place.”

“It seems like a wonderful place to raise a family,” Allison said.

Matt reached for his wineglass. Kimberly sure hadn’t thought so.

“That’s why I brought Josh back. Eat your salad,” he said to Taylor.

“I don’t like this lettuce.”

“Then eat the carrots.”

“So, what brings you to the island, Allison?” Tess asked. “You must have had opportunities to teach elsewhere.”

“This isn’t my first teaching job. I interned one summer at the childhood development center of the Yankton Sioux in South Dakota. And I spent two years in rural Mississippi with Teach for America. What I discovered is that I love to teach, I enjoy natural surroundings, and I want to be part of
a tight-knit community. Basically, I came here hoping to find all of that in a school system with more resources and slightly less isolation.”

“Then you haven’t been here after a hurricane,” Tom said. “We’re not just isolated then. We’re completely cut off.”

Tess shot him a look across the table. “Don’t you listen to him. We didn’t get hit nearly as hard last time as the folks on Hatteras.”

“Road washed out,” Tom said. “And the bridge. Couldn’t get any cars or supplies across for two weeks except by ferry.”

Allison nodded. “I read about that. I also read that even before help reached you, the island had already organized rescue and cleanup efforts.”

“That’s what we do,” Tom said. “A man’s got to help his neighbors.”

Allison leaned forward, earnest and animated. “That’s my point exactly. You’re all fiercely independent, but there’s this enormous sense of connection with each other as well as with the environment. That’s really what attracted me, those deep bonds, that sense of belonging.” She smiled at Matt. “You told me once the island was the first place that felt like home to you, that it was in your blood. Well, it’s gotten under my skin.”

For a moment, meeting her eyes, he felt he couldn’t breathe.

That’s it, he thought. That’s it exactly.

“‘It is the Force,’” Josh said in a deep voice. “‘It surrounds us, it penetrates us, it binds the galaxy together.’”

Allison laughed. “Thank you, Obi-Wan. The Force is strong in you.”

The boy grinned.

She fit in, Matt realized, unsure how he felt about that. Pleased? Relieved? Regretful? She got on with his family. She belonged on the island.

But for how long?

By her own admission, she was still testing things out, trying things on.

Most visitors to Dare fell in love with its beauty and its beaches. Seduced by the rhythms of the island, maybe they even flirted with the idea of staying. But by vacation’s end, most of them were ready to scurry back to their real lives on the mainland, to big box stores and reliable cell phone service, to twelve-screen movie plexes and four-star restaurants.

Sure, they might indulge in a summer romance with the idea of island life. But few embraced the hardworking reality, the sweat, salt, and uncertainty, of wresting a living from the sea.

They didn’t stay. The first long, dull winter, the first hurricane, sent them packing.

Across the table, Allison was teasing Josh, talking with his mother.

Odds were she wouldn’t stay, either.

Matt stared down at his plate, which at that moment looked a hell of a sight more appetizing than his future.

Ten

“T
HANK YOU
. I had a good time,” Allison said as Matt walked her away from the inn down the garden path. She carried her wet clothes in a plastic Piggly Wiggly bag over one arm, leftovers in another, the recipe for lasagna al forno tucked into her purse next to her blinking cell phone. A quick glance at the display revealed her mother had called.

No doubt with a full report on Johnny-the-divorced-anesthesiologist. Allison pushed the thought away.

Matt slanted a look at her. “You sound surprised.”

She collected herself to smile at him. “Sunday dinners have never been the highlight of my week,” she said lightly.

“Sundays can be tough,” he said, “without family and friends around.”

She appreciated his attempt at comfort. She didn’t need it, but it was…nice. He was a nice man with a really lovely family. Which made her own rather strained relationship with her parents seem even more pathetic.

“Usually I just grab a sandwich or something. I have
papers to grade. Lesson plans to write. Honestly, I prefer it that way.”

“You don’t miss your mother’s cooking?”

Her mother’s staff had Sunday afternoons off. To be with
their
families, Allison realized now.

“My mother doesn’t cook. Sunday dinners are always at the club,” she said.

A memory slapped her of hard white rolls and smooth white tablecloths, of sitting on her best behavior next to Miles, miserable in the jacket and tie required by the dining room.

She made herself joke. “At least now my parents can’t send me to wait in the car when I screw up.”

Matt took the grocery bags from her and set them on the grass.

She frowned, confused and resisting. “What are you…?”

Putting his arms around her, he pulled her against his chest. His unexpected gentleness made her want to weep.

She closed her eyes instead.

“You were supposed to have dinner with them today,” he said. “They wanted you to drive home for the weekend to meet some guy.”

She nodded against his shirt, surprised all over again by his ability to listen. To remember.

“They want parental bragging rights,” she explained. “They don’t like my job, they’re disappointed in my friends, they think I’ve wasted my opportunities. The least I can do, in their minds, is provide them with a big society wedding and a son-in-law they can talk about to their acquaintances.”

“They want the best for you,” Matt said.

“By their standards, maybe. Ever since I graduated from college, they’ve been trying to fix me up with the kind of man they think I should want.” She raised her head from her chest, shaking herself out of her funk. “As long as he’s a high status white male with an investment portfolio, a
penis, and a pulse, he’s good enough for their daughter. Every time I go home, dinner turns into this bizarre ritual, a cross between an arranged marriage and a job interview.”

Matt laughed. “Most parents want to see their children married and settled.”

She smiled, relieved to return to firmer emotional footing. “Yes, but yours are more subtle.”

“I think they’ve just given up.”

Right. Because he didn’t do long-term relationships. The thought was vaguely depressing. She took a step back, finger-combing her hair.

Matt picked up the grocery bags. “Anyway, they approve of you.”

“Mm.” She shot him a sly look. “Your father thinks I’m a good catch.”

A slight flush stained his cheekbones. “You heard that?”

“I’m a teacher. I hear everything.”

Hooked
, Tom Fletcher had said. The prospect left her oddly breathless.

Of course, their parents’ generation thought that way.

Allison wasn’t trolling for some trophy husband to stuff and mount over her fireplace.

“My mother always claimed to have selective hearing,” Matt said. “That way she could pretend not to hear Luke and me when we bitched about doing chores.”

“Your mother is a wise woman.”

“She likes you. She doesn’t give her family recipes to just anybody.”

Allison’s heart gave a happy little hop. “Too bad I get my cooking skills from my mother.”

“It’s not that hard.”

She tilted her head. “You cook?”

He smiled his lazy smile. “I learned to, for Josh. I can manage more than peanut butter sandwiches and scrambled eggs, anyway.”

There was no one in Allison’s life to cook for. To care for. But she didn’t have to be defined by her family. Isn’t that what she’d come to Dare Island to prove?

“I guess if I can read, I can follow a recipe. I’m up for trying new things.”

“Good.” He stopped under the blooming crepe myrtle. Took her by the shoulders and drew her in. “Try this.”

He kissed her.

She was prepared for the familiar rush of blood, the blast of heat. But his mouth was warm and soft on hers, testing, tasting, tempting her with little bites. Not a demand this time. A question. Her body loosened, moistened, as his tongue coaxed hers to play. She sucked in her breath and kissed him back,
yes
, answering with her body and her mouth,
yes
, promising him everything she had,
yes, please, yes
. His arms tightened. She felt him, the hard, lovely planes and angles of him hard against her breast, belly, thighs.
Matt.

“Matt…” She opened her eyes to a pink haze of crepe myrtle and lust, a sweet, melting ache inside her. “Where are we going with this?”

“I don’t know.” He kissed the corner of her lips. “Does it matter?”

The ache was a hollow, begging to be filled.

“I’m not sure,” she whispered.

“I know where I want it to go. I want to come home with you. I want to touch you, Allison. Make love with you.”

He wanted her.

“I want that, too.” Of course she did. “But your parents…Josh…What will you tell them?”

“I don’t have to tell them anything. We’re not kids, Allison. Let me take you home.”

Her heart thumped.
Yes.
All right. Why not?
She’d had sex with other guys for less reason and certainly with less attraction.

But Matt wasn’t like any other guy. Sex with Matt would mean something. She shivered deep inside.

“Give me half an hour,” she said. “I’m not, um, prepared for company.”

He smiled and stroked her hair from her face, his touch gentle. “It’s okay. I’ll take care of it.”

He thought she was talking about birth control.

Her eyes went a little misty. She’d told Gail she wanted an honest, adult relationship. Not only was Matt adult, not only was he responsible, he was sparing her the embarrassment of plopping a big box of condoms in front of the teenage checker at the Island Market. Who, with Allison’s luck, would almost certainly be a student in one of her classes.

“That would be good. Thanks. But I have a few things to do. To get ready.”

Change her sheets. Light some candles. Clear the tornado debris from her bedroom.

“You look perfect to me,” he said.

Her heart expanded like a balloon in her chest.

“Half an hour,” she said. “You can follow me.”

“And how will you get home?” he asked. “You can’t carry all these leftovers on your bicycle.”

She half turned, gesturing to the silver Mercedes coupe under the trees. “I brought my car.”

Matt’s gaze flickered over her shoulder and back to her face, his expression unreadable. “That’s yours?”

She nodded.

He released her. “Nice.”

She felt an absurd impulse to apologize, to explain. “It was my high school graduation present. From my parents.”

He didn’t say anything.

“I hardly ever drive it. I’m afraid of running out of gas. It’s a diesel. My father thought it would be more economical,
but half the time I can’t find a gas station with a diesel pump.”

“Bring her down to the dock. I can fill her up for you. Most boats take diesel.”