When She Was Bad...

“Me?”

He nodded. “You.”

“How badly do you want to capsize?”

Cole threw back his head and laughed. Then he extended a hand. “C’mon. I’ll help you.”

PARADISE WAS WEARING a bit thin, Irene thought as she looked at the stretch of white sand and turquoise-blue water ahead of her. As scenery, it rated full marks—ten out of ten. Still, after an hour of walking, it was beginning to annoy her.

She shot a look at the man walking beside her. “How much longer do you think we have?”

He smiled at her. “An hour or so. We’re making good time so far.”

Irene studied him for a minute. Did the man never lose that positive attitude? “You know you’ve been a good sport, coming along with me like this.”

“No problem. I came here looking for a bit of adventure, and you’re providing it in spades.”

Irene stopped short. “If you’re looking for a sexual adventure, you’re not striking pay dirt here.”

Happy’s smile widened as he walked forward. “Yeah. I think I got that part. You’ve got a man on that other island. Why don’t you tell me about him?”

Irene double-stepped to catch up with him. “Why would I do that?”

“To pass the time. As beautiful as it is, this scenery gets a bit boring after a while.”

“Doesn’t it though,” Irene said. “The color of that water doesn’t even look real to me. It’s beginning to annoy me. Maybe I’m not cut out to live in paradise, you know?”

Happy chuckled. “Yeah. It’s a nice place to visit, but I wouldn’t want to live there?”

Irene frowned. “Yeah. I just thought about getting here. I haven’t given much thought to what would happen next.”

“So what’s his name?” Happy asked.

She glanced at him, but he was looking straight ahead. She might as well tell him about Butch. What did she have to lose? And talking about it might help her to sort through all the thoughts that had been tumbling through her mind. “Butch Castellano. He owns the resort over there on Escapade Island.”

“Ah,” Happy said. “So he’s committed to living here.”

“Yeah. He decided to build his own retirement home and a business venture at the same time.”

“Smart man,” Happy commented.

Ahead of them, the beach curved sharply. As they rounded it, Irene saw another seemingly endless stretch of sand and water ahead.

“So how long have you known this guy?”

“Forty years,” she said.

Happy missed a step. “I never thought to ask. Are you married?”

“No,” Irene muttered. “I thought we were going to be. That was the plan, but a little while ago, he changed his mind, sort of. I came here to change it back.”

Happy said nothing.

After a moment, she turned to him. “Have you ever fallen in love at first sight?”

Happy met her gaze, and for the first time, his expression was serious. “Maybe. Maybe I did on that plane.”

She frowned at him and resisted the urge to give him a good hard shove. “Don’t even start. You’re too old to fall in love at first sight. You should know better. I was only eighteen when I first met Butch Castellano. So I have an excuse. I was just a kid and he was only a couple of years older, handsome as sin and just a bit wild. He rode a motorcycle.”

“What happened?” Happy asked as they resumed walking.

“That was it for me. I fell in love with him, and I’ve never fallen out.”

“Why didn’t you get together and live happily ever after?”

“He had some family problems. He’d been born into a crime family. An accident of birth. My parents didn’t approve of him. His family didn’t approve of me either, for that matter. Long story short, they all ganged up on me. Even Butch. He told me he wasn’t good enough for me and that he couldn’t see me again. My parents packed up and moved from New Jersey to San Francisco. And I went along with it. I thought that in a few years, when I was a bit older, everyone would see it differently. And then Butch went to jail.”

“Bummer,” Happy said. But he sounded pretty cheerful about it.

Irene frowned at him. “It wasn’t his fault. He took the rap for someone, and while he was in jail, he went straight. Every single cent he’s earned has been legit. And he’s made a fortune.”

“Okay, okay,” Happy said. “I believe you. I take it you kept in touch with him all these years.”

“Yeah. We were supposed to get together when he finally got out of jail. But he changed his mind. He drummed up some lame excuse about still not being good enough for me. He values our friendship and doesn’t want to ruin it. It’s bullshit. All of it.”

“And you came here to set him straight?”

Irene fisted her hands on her hips. “Yeah. Not good enough for me. Ha! I showed him. I stole a Monet to prove to him that I’m bad enough for him.”

Happy stopped short and stared at her. “You stole a Monet?”

She whirled to face him. “I did.”

Happy’s smile was the brightest she’d ever seen it. “You’re a real pip of a woman, Irene. Your Butch is a stupid man if he doesn’t see that.”

“Yeah. But I had a better chance of proving it to him before that jackass Frenchman drugged me and stole the painting. I’m betting he’s on that island right now, selling the damn thing to Butch. I can’t let Butch buy a stolen painting. That’s why I have to get to the island.”

“Right,” Happy said moving forward. “Let’s pick up the pace, shall we?”

8

Friday, February 13—5:30 p.m.

COLE KEPT HIS HAND over Pepper’s on the tiller as the small sailboat raced across the cove. He was acutely aware that time was flying by just as fast.

Ever since Butch had come up with his theory that Irene might have taken the connecting flight to Eden Island by mistake, he’d known that his time alone on the island with Pepper was running out.

At any moment Butch might call. Cole was pretty sure that if Irene was on that island, Butch’s man would find her and bring her back posthaste. And there was so much he wanted to show Pepper, to share with her. He wondered if Adam had felt this same kind of urgency with Elena.

“Think you’ve got the feel of it?” he asked.

“Maybe.”

“I’m going to take my hand off. Ready?”

She nodded, and he lifted his hand.

“Now, push to the left a little.”

She did, and suddenly they were cutting across the wind, picking up speed. When they were nearly to the other side of the cove, he told her exactly what to do to turn the boat in a half circle, warning her to duck when the boom came around. Seconds later, they were racing across the surface of the water once more, and she was laughing.

He knew that moment would remain with him for ever.

“What do you think?” he asked.

“It’s amazing.” She laughed again for the pure joy of it. “It’s even more fun to be in control.”

“Always. To the left now.”

She did what he suggested, and he could see that she was beginning to get the feel of it. But he didn’t move away. He didn’t want to. He liked the feel of that small slender body resting against his side. He’d waited a long time to get this close.

“Where did you learn to sail?” she asked.

Without thinking, he said, “One of my foster parents was ex-navy. He kept a small boat, just a little bigger than this one, and the one summer I lived with him we’d sneak off for a sail whenever the weather was good enough.” He hadn’t allowed himself to think of that summer for years.

“What happened?” she asked.

“We had a great time. He talked about adopting me. A little to the left.”

“Did he adopt you?”

“No. He died in a car accident over Labor Day weekend, and his wife didn’t want the responsibility of a twelve-year-old. She preferred babies. You can’t blame her.” He hadn’t thought of that rejection in years either.

She reached out and placed her free hand on top of his. “I’m sorry. You must think I’m very ungrateful the way I ranted on and on about how rejected I feel because Peter never contacted me until I was twenty-five. And my grandmother and I may have had our issues, but she didn’t reject me either. She did her best to raise me the way she thought a Pendleton should be raised.”

“It was a long time ago.”

“You never got adopted?”

“No. I never expected to be after that. The longest I ever stayed anywhere was two years. By the time I met Luke in college, I was on my own. Your father and brothers have always made me feel a part of the Rossi family.”

“Good.” She tightened her grip on his hand.

He said nothing as a wave of feelings swept through him. Her concern had something inside of him softening again. He never spoke about his past. He seldom thought about it anymore. But she shouldn’t be feeling sorry for him. “There’s nothing about my past that I regret. For better or worse, it’s made me the man I am today.”