How to Keep a Secret

“If you’d talked,” he said, “you wouldn’t be standing here now trying to find answers to the questions you should be asking her. You’re staying in the house, not with your sister?”

“Yes.”

“If you’re in your old room, which I’m guessing you are because it has the best views and the windows are sound, then that means you’re less than five strides away from the room your mother uses.”

“I don’t see what—”

“Instead of knocking on her door and having a conversation, you chose to drive over here when it’s barely light and confront a man you hoped you’d never see again.”

She was struggling to close the door on her feelings but they kept finding ways to sneak through the cracks. Her heart started to beat harder, thumping against her ribs like a warning.

“I didn’t hope that.”

There was an ironic gleam in his eyes. “You took one look at me on the dock that day and passed out.”

“I hadn’t been sleeping, or eating—”

“And the last person you needed to see was a man you hate with every bone in your body.”

“I don’t hate you.” Her voice gave up on her and emerged as a croak. “I never hated you.” Didn’t he know her better than that?

He turned away and carried on unloading the last of the bags. “I wouldn’t blame you if you did. I gave you reason.”

He was pushing against that door and she no longer had the strength to keep it shut.

She felt raw and exposed. This wasn’t how the conversation was supposed to go. It wasn’t supposed to be about them. “What about you?” She’d seen the effect he had on women. She’d seen the way heads turned. After they’d parted ways she’d occasionally imagined him with one of those women, but the vision was so painful she’d done her best to delete it. “Was there anyone serious for you?”

“No.”

“You’re telling me you didn’t have other relationships?”

“No, I’m not telling you that.” He glanced at her. “I’m telling you there wasn’t anyone serious.”

A warmth spread across her belly. “I thought you’d forget me.”

“Forget you? How?” He

gave a humorless laugh. “You were the one person who understood me. Certainly the only person I ever trusted. There was never any chance I’d forget you, Laurie.”

His use of her name was intimate. Personal.

She thought about the way he’d whispered it against her lips as they’d lain naked.

She’d known, almost from the start, that anything they had wouldn’t last. If anything, that had deepened the intensity of their feelings.

It had been years since she’d seen him, but it could have been yesterday. She knew how it felt to be kissed by him. Touched by him. She knew his lips, his hands, his mind and that knowledge fed the chemistry that still simmered.

“I didn’t come here to talk about the past. I want to talk about the present.” And the future. If he intended to buy a house, then that meant he’d be a permanent fixture on the island. She wouldn’t be able to stand it. “Why would you want our house? You’re the man who doesn’t want ties or responsibilities. You live on a boat so that you can sail into the sunset at a moment’s notice—” She realized she was repeating a conversation they’d had more than sixteen years ago and almost choked on the words. “I don’t understand why you’d want to saddle yourself with property when you didn’t—” She broke off and his gaze locked on hers.

“When I didn’t want a child? Is that what you were going to say?”

“I understood why you didn’t want that. I don’t understand this.” She eyed the rip in his jeans and the battered jacket that seemed to have seen its share of winters. She had no idea what The Captain’s House would be worth, but she was pretty sure it would be a small fortune. How could he begin to afford it? “You were never interested in settling down.”

“That was more than sixteen years ago. Are you telling me you’re the same person you were sixteen years ago?”

At that moment she felt as if they were back where they’d started.

“What are you saying? That you suddenly want a house, a mortgage and a yard where you grow your own vegetables? I know you better than that, Scott.”