Nantucket Romance 3-in-1 Bundle (76 page)

The silver cat was notorious in the office, though Dorothy and Tucker had never seen the feline. Nickels had come into the marriage with Beth, and he and Nate had a love/hate relationship. Heavy on the hate.

Tucker wasn’t fond of cats, and they weren’t crazy about him either.

“I’m gone all day,” he said. “I know Beth wouldn’t want her baby orphaned.”

“Count me out.” Dorothy filed a thin stack of papers, leaning so close to the tabbed files she could’ve licked them. “I’m allergic to cats.”

Nate turned pleading eyes on Tucker.

He envisioned his favorite recliner becoming a scratching post, litter strewn across his carpet, and that brought another thought: the smell.

“Just this once?” Nate scrunched up his eyebrows.

“Aw, come on. Can’t Beth ask one of her friends?”

“She already tried. You’re my last resort, man.”

Dorothy smiled innocently, eyes widening behind her thick glasses. She blinked slowly. “You’re his last resort.”

Tucker glared at her, wishing he was the one with a cat allergy.
Very convenient, Dorothy.

He remembered Sabrina’s email from months ago. Something about her cousins having a cat that made her sneeze incessantly. There was his excuse. With Sabrina coming over, he couldn’t have a cat around making her sneeze, making her eyes redden and her nose—

Or could he?

He wasn’t supposed to know who Sabrina was. Wasn’t supposed to know she had a cat allergy. What would happen if he suddenly had a cat? She wouldn’t be able to hide her allergic reaction. Maybe it would flush her out of hiding. It had been a week since she’d started coming over. She was settled in, and maybe this was just the thing to get his plan started. Maybe—

“Just think about it?” Nate continued. “I promised Beth I’d find somebody, and she’s gonna kill me if I come home—”

“I’ll do it,” Tucker said firmly.

Nate’s chin tilted away while he stared suspiciously at Tucker from the corner of his narrowed eyes. “You will?”

“You will?” Dorothy’s fingers stopped on the files, and she looked at him, doubt written all over her pale, wrinkled face. “You hate cats.”

“Hate is a strong word,” Tucker said.

“You hate cats,” Dorothy repeated.

Tucker pulled his hat down firmly on his head. “What are friends for?”

He left the office and began the short walk home.
Sabrina, you’d better enjoy the dander-free air tonight, because when you come over tomorrow, no more Mr. Nice Guy.

Sabrina tapped on Tucker’s door.

“Come on in,” Tucker called from somewhere in the house.

She turned the knob and entered. The house smelled like a mixture of Tucker’s woodsy cologne and the remnants of his supper—something Italian, she thought, detecting the tang of onion and garlic.

Tucker rounded the corner from the kitchen. “Want some leftover spaghetti? I made plenty.”

“No, thank you.” She took a step toward the office, but stopped abruptly when a cat slinked from behind the chair and blocked her path. She pulled in a silent breath.

It stopped and stared up at her, its long, silver tail fanning the air gracefully like a fluffy flag, its back arched high. The cat rubbed against her bare leg.

“You got a cat?” She tried to tame the panic in her voice.

“Just temporarily.” He scooped up the feline and cradled it. “Nickels is going to be my houseguest for a couple days, aren’t you, buddy?” The cat struggled for release, and Tucker set him down.

She opened her mouth to inform him of her allergy, then snapped it shut. He knew Sweetpea had cat allergies. She couldn’t let him know she did too. It would be one more detail that linked them, one more piece of this two-sided puzzle.
You’ll have to avoid that cat and hope for the best.

How long would it take her allergies to kick in? The cat was new to the home, so the dander levels would be low. And he usually kept the office door closed . . . maybe the cat hadn’t been in there.

“Nate from work asked me to take him while he and his wife are out of town.”

“That was kind of you.” She walked down the hall, her heart sinking at the open office door.

“I’m not much of a cat person, but Nate’s a good friend, and he was in a bind.”

She knew he had a distinct dislike of cats. When he was little, he’d rescued a stray cat from its high perch on a tree limb and had been rewarded with a scratch on his shoulder deep enough to require stitches.

Tucker followed her into the office. Nickels came along too. He jumped on her chair and sniffed the keyboard.

She had to get the cat out of there.

“Good day at the café?” Tucker propped his hands on his hips. He wore a white T-shirt that set off his tan, and a pair of frayed jeans that looked as if they’d been washed a hundred times.

“It was fine.” Sabrina set her bag on the desk and looked at Nickels, wondering how she could get him off the chair without touching him.

“Well, I’ll let you get to work. I put your check on the desk.” Tucker left, leaving a wake of yummy-smelling cologne behind. A moment later she heard him in the kitchen, washing dishes. Her paycheck sat beside the computer, a reminder of her deceit.

Never mind the money. She had bigger problems.

She glared at Nickels. She needed a decoy. She looked around for a toy to lure him away. Nothing but computer cords and boxes. Her eyes fell on the blind cord dangling against the window. Well, that would at least get him off the chair. Maybe.

She walked to the window and jiggled the cord. “Here, kitty, kitty,” she whispered. Nickels roosted on the chair’s edge, yellow eyes half-closed, looking like a king on his throne.

She jiggled the cord again, and the plastic weights bobbed up and down, knocking together. “Come here, Nickels!” she said quietly.

The cat seemed insulted by her attempt to lure him with something as juvenile as a cord.
All right, then, mister, have it your way.

Sabrina took hold of the chair’s back and tipped it forward until the cat leapt off. He turned and stared her down.

“It’s not as if you gave me a choice.”

From the other room, she heard the patio door slide open. Nickels’s ears twitched, then he slinked out of the room.

Finally. Sabrina closed the door, making sure it caught so Nickels couldn’t wander back in. Already she felt itchy—or was it her imagination? Like this wasn’t difficult enough without adding a cat to the mix. She sat on the chair, hoping there was a minimal amount of dander in the area.

She opened the email program, noticing the check beside her hand. How was she going to take his money? What she was doing was no better than stealing.

What kind of person was she?

She couldn’t keep it. Bad enough that she was wasting his time, getting his hopes up; she was not taking his money too.

She opened the next message. She could do something else with the money. Something Tucker would approve of. She could donate it to some cause or charity or even to his church. She remembered his first messages on Nantucket Chat about the island’s ecology. He was passionate about protecting it. Maybe she could donate the money to Nantucket Soundkeeper. It wasn’t ideal, but at least his money would be used for a cause he believed in.

She spent the next thirty minutes reading letters and jotting notes. She’d once written that she was going into the city, saying it facetiously at first because Nantucket Town was a far cry from the city, but she left the phrase in the email, thinking it would throw him off track.

She jotted down a note that Sweetpea must live near a big city. Of course, that still left it wide open. She needed to make this mission seem futile; otherwise, after she failed, he’d hire someone else.

She rubbed her eyes and opened the next email—the one where she’d told him about Jared. She’d vacillated about whether or not to tell him. In the end, she’d decided it couldn’t hurt when he didn’t know who she was. She read the end of the letter where she’d summarized her thoughts.

I know Jared and my cousin didn’t set out to hurt me. Things are never that simple. People make their bad choices with a side of justification and a side of entitlement, never considering the pain their overindulgence might cause. Even if they had carefully considered the ramifications, they couldn’t possibly have imagined what deep damage their selfishness would inflict.

“She has a way with words.” Tucker’s voice startled her.

She hadn’t heard him enter the room. He stood beside her, too close. She felt his hand pressing on the chair’s back near her shoulder.

“Almost poetic, don’t you think?” he asked.

Sabrina cleared her throat. “She did say she enjoys poetry.”

Something rubbed against her leg under the desk, and she remembered the cat. She sneezed, hard and sudden.

“Bless you,” Tucker said.

Her nose started to run. She sniffed.

“Tissue?”

The cat curled around her leg. “I’m fine.”

Her eyes started itching. She rubbed casually. She had to get that thing out of there.

“Turn up anything new?”

Sabrina nudged the cat with her foot.

“A few things.” She handed him her list, hoping he’d take it and leave, cat and all.

Instead he sat in the chair beside her.
Great.

“The city, huh?”

She sniffed again. A sneeze was coming. She could feel it. She breathed through her mouth, hoping to squelch it. “She mentioned going to the city,” she said between silent gulps of air.

“She didn’t say which one.”

“True.” Under the guise of shifting her legs, Sabrina knocked Nickels away from her feet.

“Do you know how many cities there are? And who says she even lives near it? I don’t remember her mentioning it other than the one time.”

She tried to blink away the itch in her eyes. Were they turning bloodshot? She needed to blow her nose.

She was surprised she was reacting so severely to a cat that had been in the house less than twenty-four hours. She turned away from Tucker to discreetly wipe her nose and saw something she hadn’t noticed before.

A cat bed. Just then Nickels slinked toward the round sheepskin-covered bed.

Oh, great. This is Nickels’s bedroom.
That explained why she was having such a—

“Uh-CHOOOO!”
The sneeze sneaked up on her. She glanced at Tucker.

His brows hiked upward. “Bless you.”

She had to get out of there. It would only get worse. “Goodness. I must be coming down with something.”
Like allergies. Or insanity.

“Can I get you anything? Tylenol? Orange juice?”

Beside the desk, Nickels curled into a ball and closed his eyes.

Another sneeze was building at the back of her nose. Her throat felt scratchy, and any minute her eyelids were going to swell.

Tucker was going to figure it out if she didn’t get out of there. Quickly. “No, I—I think I need to go home and rest.” She stood, grabbing her bag.

“Oh.” His voice rang with disappointment. “Are you sure?”

She felt terrible, but what could she do? “I’ll be fine by Monday.”
Presuming that infernal hairball is gone.
The pressure at the back of her nose was building.
Get out of here, Sabrina.

“Hope you feel better.” Tucker stood as she walked toward the office door.

The sneeze was coming.
Breathe through your mouth.
She’d reached the hallway when she heard his voice again.

“Don’t forget your check.”

She returned and snapped the paper from his hand as the sneeze ripped through her, louder than the last one. She couldn’t cover her mouth in time. “Sorry.” She turned and rushed toward the door.

“Take care of yourself,” Tucker called, but by then, she was out the door.

Tucker watched Sabrina pedal away on her bike until she rounded the corner and headed toward Main Street. He slapped the wooden door frame with his palm.
Way to go, McCabe.

Not only had he succeeded in causing Sabrina pain and misery, but his plan to force her out of hiding had totally backfired. He’d accomplished nothing except chasing her away. He shook his head.
Brilliant.