life. Two sprawling stories of whitewashed brick, set off with magnolias, camellias and banks of azaleas. There was a paved circular drive where Colley, the butler, had taught her to rollerskate and nde a bicycle.
The apartment she’d left the day before yesterday consisted of two furnished rooms, complete with mice and cockroaches. Come to think of it, a shoebox perched on a row of naked pilings looked pretty good, even without a lamp in the window and a roaring fire on the hearth. As long as there was a spare bed inside.
“I’ll bring in your suitcase so you can change into dry clothes.”
Her suitcase. She had three more, plus several boxes, a few framed pictures and two file drawers she’d as soon see consigned to the bottom of the ocean. They were all in the trunk of her car.
“Thank you,” she rasped, trying to remember what was in her carry-on bag besides shoes. Nothing of value. She’d become so paranoid she wouldn’t dream of leaving anything valuable where it could be seen and stolen, which was why she’d crammed all but the smallest bag into the trunk of her car. And forgotten it.
“I’ll deal with your car later, but right now we’d better get you into something warm and dry. I’ll make us a pot of coffee—I think I might even have a can or two of soup. Bathroom’s through there. Help yourself to anything you need.”
She nodded. Even that small exertion was too much. Aspirin, a bed and a dozen blankets, that was what she needed. That and a functioning brain.
“I didn’t catch your name.” Her host glanced at her expectantly.
It didn’t matter, Ru told herself. He couldn’t be the one. She’d left all that business behind. Once when Ruanna’s father, an ardent sports fisherman, had wanted to buy a place out here on the Outer Banks, her mother had described it as the ends of the earth.
The ends of the earth had sounded like Heaven. Or at least a haven.
“It’s Ru,” she said, sounding more like a bullfrog than ever.
“Beg pardon?”
“Ru. Short for Ruanna.” She’d been named for her two grandmothers, Ruth and Anna, but the less he knew about her, the safer she would feel.
“Ru. Right. Well, Ru, like I said, the bathroom’s that way, there’s aspirin in the medicine cabinet and plenty of hot water if you want a bath. What I mean is—well, you’re bound to be cold, and a hot bath might be the quickest way to warm you up again. I’ll heat us some soup.”
She didn’t look much better, Trav concluded some twenty minutes later. She was wearing the same clothes, but different shoes. At least her feet and her hair were dry. Her hair, straight, thick and shoulder length, was some smoky color that wasn’t exactly brown and wasn’t exactly blond. At least she was no longer shivering.
“Find the aspirin?”
“Yes, thanks,” she croaked. “Sorry to be such a nuisance.”
“No problem,” he said as he dished up two bowls of vegetable soup and dug out a tube of saltines. “A bad cold’s nothing to sneeze at.”
Trav waited as she stared at him for about six seconds, and then she groaned. Either her health had taken a sudden turn for the worse or she had a low tolerance for bad puns.
Over the light supper he had a chance to study her. She was younger than he’d first thought. He’d been right about her eyes, though. They were gray, with a hint of green, like Spanish moss after a rain.
He had a funny feeling those clear eyes of hers weren’t quite as transparent as they looked, though. He could read her only up to a point. Enough to know she was hurting. Enough to know she was scared. Enough to know she was hiding something, but as to what it was, he didn’t even want to know.
He did know she was wilting fast. Probably used the last of her strength beating the hell out of her old clunker—for all the good it had done.
“By the way, I called the garage. They can’t get to your car until morning. Washout just below Frisco has everything south of here blocked, and there’s a cut just north of where we left her that’s blocking traffic until they can get a road plow in.”
“Her?”
“Your, uh—car?”
“Oh. That her.” She nodded and winced, as if even that small action put a drain on her resources.
“I’m not sure how much you know about the lay of the land, but Frisco’s the village just south of where we are now. Hatteras is the next one down the line,” he explained. “Technically it’s more west than south, but most people think north and south when they picture the Banks.”
She nodded again, but he could tell he wasn’t getting through. In fact she looked just about ready to fall face first into her soup bowl.
“Ma’am—Ru—why not turn in? They say sleep’s the best medicine for a cold. While you’re sacked out I’ll go retrieve whatever else you need from your car. With my four-wheel-drive, I ought to be able to get through.”
While he was at it, he’d clean the thing out in case it didn’t make it through the night. It wouldn’t be the first time a vehicle had disappeared without a trace.
“Keys in my purse,” she said, her voice momentarily improved by the hot soup and coffee. “May I try to call Moselle again?”
“Be my guest.” He didn’t think much of her chances. Even if she made contact, it wasn’t going to do her much good with the road washed out.
She stood and gathered up her bowl and cup, looking lost and helpless. Against every grain of common sense he possessed, Trav found himself wanting to take them out of her hands, wanting to take her in his arms and promise her that everything would be all right. He held back, partly because he was in no position to promise her anything, partly because, like every other serviceman, he’d been trained to avoid anything that could possibly be construed as sexual harassment.
But mostly because the temptation to hold her, to reach out to her, was so strong. He didn’t trust his instincts where women were concerned.
He looked her over and reached the conclusion that she was a lot stronger than she looked, despite appearances. There might be shadows under her eyes and a droop to her pale lips, but somewhere underneath that fragile exterior he had a feeling there was a solid core of steel.
“I think you’d better hit the sack, ma’am. I changed the sheets this morning. If you need more covers, look in the locker at the foot of the bed.”
Personally, he liked to sleep with the windows open year round. Under the circumstances that might not be a good idea.
For the next two days Trav found himself playing reluctant host to a stubborn, close-mouthed, suspicious woman in a small, bare house with only one finished bedroom and a few mismatched pieces of furniture. It was not a comfortable situation, but he didn’t see what choice he had. If his guest had a single social grace, she must have left it hidden under the floormat of her car, which by now was probably buried under a few tons of sand and salt water.
At
