Charmed By You ((Destiny Bay Romances-The Islanders 5)) (22 page)

Danny entered the kitchen to practice on his guitar, because that was the room best insulated from the noise
of the jukebox in the bar. While she listened to his playing,
Heather’s thoughts returned to Lizzie and her problem. When Kevin came in to kidnap her, taking her out into the dining room for a cup of coffee and a chat, she tried
her idea out on him.

“I want to take her back to Flagstaff,” she explained. “I’m sure I could raise enough money for her operations
through the service organizations I have contact with.
What do you think?”

Kevin frowned. “I don’t know, Heather. Why should
you get so deeply involved in the life of some strange
little island girl you don’t even know? Why not just forget
about her?” He watched her closely, waiting for her an
swer.

She considered his questions for several minutes. “I
have to,” she said at last, knowing how little that simple statement really explained. “I’m an artist, and I love my
work. It’s very rewarding to me. But for the first time I see a way to do more than make pretty pictures. I see a way to make someone’s life better. If I don’t take hold
and push it through, I’ll... I don’t know, I guess I’ll just never really respect myself again. Can you understand that?”

He nodded slowly, smiling. “You sound a bit like
Mitch. Do you realize that?”

That confused her. She wasn’t ready to analyze this change in her so closely. Not yet. “What do you think about the idea itself?” she asked anxiously.

He took a deep breath. “I think it’s wonderful. In fact, I think it’s so wonderful, I’d like to get in on it myself. How would you like a medical advisor to go along to help coordinate things at the hospital end?”

She stared at him. “But your work here...”

He laughed. “Let’s face it, Heather, I have no work here. I’m not doing anyone any good. I’m no doctor.”
He shook his head. “But I find your idea very interesting.
Maybe following through on it will suggest other possibilities for a new career for me.”

They talked about it, getting more and more excited,
until Mele’s scowls sent Heather scurrying back to work. Late that night Heather fell into bed and went straight to
sleep, exhausted, but happier than she’d been in a long time. She had her man again, though not quite in the way she might have wished. And she had a purpose in life, not to mention a whole new set of friends and experiences to treasure. Life was rich.

She worked hard
most of the next day, hanging Chinese
lanterns in the hotel yard and streamers in the dining room. At one point, pins in her mouth and paper decorations in her hand, she found herself humming along with “Jackson County.” She had to stop to laugh a bit ruefully. She really was beginning to fit in.

She didn’t see Mitch all day, so she assumed he was out making calls. When she finally did see his Jeep in
his carport, she raced across the road, eager to share
news of the last twenty-four hours with him.

She knocked on the door of his house, smiling brightly
and ready to step into his arms when he opened the
screen. But the look on his face stopped her cold. “What’s
the matter?” she said, hand at her throat. “What’s hap
pened?”

He shook his head coolly. “Nothing unexpected.
Dede’s back, that’s all.”

“Dede’s back?” she echoed, not remembering at first
what that meant to them.”

He nodded. “She had the papers with her. I’ve signed
them for you.” He reached onto the shelf beside the
doorway and handed them out. “Here they are. Hope
you get a good price on the house.”

She took them from him numbly, wanting to shake
her head and say, “No, wait, you don’t understand. I don’t need them now. I’m staying.” But his face was
hard and cold, and she didn’t know what he was thinking.
Did he want her to go after all? Why didn’t he ask her to stay? Why didn’t he take her in his arms and force
her to confess her love?

“The fellow who runs the boat Dede uses is making
a run to Guam,” Mitch continued. “He’s leaving first thing
in the morning and has agreed to take you along.”

She swallowed. “Mitch...” she began, but the words
wouldn’t come.

He shrugged, his eyes revealing no emotion. “I guess
that’s about it. I’ve got more calls to make.” He started
to push past her, but stopped when she put her hand on
his arm.

“Mitch...” Her voice was strangled, but he avoided
her eyes.

“Let’s just make a clean break now, Heather,” he said coldly. “It’s better that way.”

He pulled out of her grasp and she watched, stunned,
as he headed toward the Jeep. She was still standing in his open doorway as he roared down the road, sending up a plume of red dirt behind him.

Anger warred with the sharp flash of pain that cut through her. He didn’t want her to stay at all. If he had, he would have worked a little harder at keeping her. Instead, he seemed almost glad to be rid of her now. Perhaps he’d grown bored with this game. Maybe he’d
suddenly remembered why he’d left her in the first place.

But he couldn’t leave like this, not even giving her a chance to talk. She had to tell him what she thought of the way he’d treated her. She looked around helplessly. She had to let him know how she felt.

She stepped into his house, searching for paper. She would write him a letter, spill out all the hurt and... and maybe even all the love. He’d read it when she was too far away for it to do any good. She gritted her teeth,
knowing how childish she was being. But she was beyond
caring. She hurt, and she wanted to hurt back.

She pulled open one drawer after another, looking for
paper. She found old check stubs and wrinkled receipts, but no stationery. Then she came across something curious. In a bottom drawer in the kitchen, below the tea
towels and silverware, she discovered a bundle of letters
tied together with string. They were the letters she’d mailed to Mitch over the last few months asking him to sign the papers she’d sent him. She pulled at the string to get a better look. There among the violet notepaper
were the two sets of forms she’d sent, one after the other,
waiting for his signature to release his hold on the house.
He’d had them all along.

At first she stared at them, wondering what they could
possibly mean, but little by little it became clear to her.
He’d received them and stored them away, knowing she
might have to come after him. He’d set her up. He’d
manipulated her. He’d forced her to come to him.

Her heart began to thump loudly in her chest. Did that
mean he still loved her? Did that mean he still wanted
her to stay?

No, it only meant he’d wanted her to come to his
island. She bit her lip, worrying it with her teeth. What was the matter with her? All she ever did, all she’d ever
done, was sit around wondering what Mitch really meant
by what he said and did. That was how she’d lost him
the first time. That was how she’d almost lost him again.

Almost, but not quite. Trembling with excitement,
she left the house and began to run down the road to where
Kevin lived in the blue Quonset hut. This time she would
face Mitch and have it out. If she asked him directly, she
might find out what he really wanted. And while she was
at it, she might try giving him the scoop on what
she
really wanted. What a novel idea, she thought sarcasti
cally. What a wonder she’d never thought of it before.

“Kevin!” she called, rousing him from a chair in his
living room, “let me borrow your car!”

In another few minutes she was speeding down the island roads in Kevin’s blue Mustang, taking the bumps
like a race car driver. She didn’t know where Mitch had gone, but she was bound and determined to find him.

She cruised through three villages before she discov
ered someone who’d seen where he went. “He was head
ing toward that new house he just built up on the sea
cliff,” a farmer told her, leaning on his hoe. She thanked
the man and hurried toward her destination, not sure if she was going to be rejected again, but certain she had to risk confronting him.

Sure enough, the Jeep stood beside the gleaming house.
She parked close by, then turned off the engine and slipped quietly from the car. The front door was open, and she walked right in.

Mitch was standing in the doorway of the living room, leaning against the wall with one arm, his eyes dark and unwelcoming. Once again he reminded her of a panther,
but this time it was a dangerous cat, one whose lair had been violated and who meant to eject the intruder.

“What are you doing here?” he asked coldly.

She paused, feeling sick and light-headed with fear. He didn’t want her here, that was plain. “I think we should talk,” she began, but he shook his head.

“We don’t have anything left to say to one another,”
he replied quietly. “You want to leave, and you can now.
There’s nothing to hold you here.”

Her throat was too dry to speak. She gazed at him miserably. “There’s everything to hold me here,” she forced out. “There’s you.”

He frowned, turning away. “Don’t do this, Heather,”
he answered quietly. “Just go back and get ready for your
great escape. I know how much you hate it here.”

Tears were springing to her eyes and she took a step toward him, then stopped, too afraid to touch him. “I don’t hate it here,” she protested. “You’ve taught me to like it. Some day I think I might even love it.” Taking
all her courage in hand, she reached out to touch a trem
bling finger to his cheek. “I know I love you,” she whispered. “I can’t leave you again. Oh, please let me stay, Mitch. I don’t need marriage. I wouldn’t force you to go through that again. But I need you. I can’t...”

Her flow of words was stemmed by surprise as he took her shoulders in his hands, practically shaking her to silence. “Don’t torment me, Heather,” he grated out.
“I won’t have you here hating every minute. I won’t have
you here at all if you won’t marry me again. If you don’t think you can make that commitment, I couldn’t stand the wait, wondering when you were going to leave.”

“Do you mean you’re asking me to get married again?”
she said with a gasp. “I thought you didn’t want that.”

He frowned. “I only said that to put you at ease. I thought you might fell less pressured.”

They stared at one another, not quite ready to trust what they’d heard. Suddenly they were both chuckling, holding one another tightly and laughing without restraint. “I found the old sets of papers in your house,”
she said breathlessly. “Did you really hold them back to
force me to come out here?”

“Of course.” He dropped a kiss on her nose. “I missed
you so badly, and I was so sure we might make it together
again if only we could make a fresh start, somewhere
far away from Flagstaff and your parents and your cousin
Trevor.”

She pulled back and looked into his eyes. “Were you jealous of Trevor?” she asked incredulously. “How could
you have been so silly?”

He grimaced. “Trevor was always there as an example
of how you wished I would act.”

“No!” she denied. “I never wanted you to be a carbon copy of Trevor.”

Mitch shrugged painfully, his eyes haunted by memories. “It seemed that way at the time,” he said simply.

She buried her head against his warm chest. “Oh, Mitch,” she whispered. “If only we’d talked things out more honestly then.”

He stroked her hair. “Is it really true, Heather?” he asked almost shyly. “Do you think you could learn to like it here?”

She nodded. “I know I can. A whole world of possibilities is opening up for me here—things I never dreamed I might be interested in doing.” She raised her head again to meet his dark gaze. “I’m going to take Lizzie to Flagstaff; that is, if she and her mother agree. Kevin wants to go along to set up the medical care.”

“Wait a minute,” Mitch protested, frowning. “I thought
you just said you were going to stay here with me.”

She smiled teasingly. “I’ll come back. In fact, Kevin and I have been talking about doing this sort of thing on a regular basis, finding poor children here in the islands who need something they can’t get here—medical care, education, whatever—and raising money to take them to where they can get help.”

Mitch regarded her skeptically, but at least he wasn’t condemning the project outright. “We’ll talk this over later,” he told her, stopping her words with a finger on her lips. “Right now I want to talk about us, you and me, and when we’re getting married.”

She grinned, pulling out of his arms. “Remarried, you
mean. Did you really plan to lure me here from the beginning? Do you know how romantic that is?”

He leaned back against the wall, studying her with narrowed eyes. “I only know how desperate I was. In
Flagstaff everything seemed so confused and tangled with
bad emotions. When I had some time to think, I realized
how little chance we really gave our marriage. I knew I had to try again.”
 

He grinned sheepishly. “I built this house for you. I wanted a place as good as something you might find in the States.”