style="font-size:15px;"> He released her suddenly. “All right, you don’t trust me. Stick with your brother. Tight. And keep your mouth shut.”
He wasn’t touching her anymore. That should mean that sanity would return. Instead she felt startled, like a doe caught in the headlights.
She stiffened, determined to follow a course based on sense and reason.
He started to walk past her, but she wasn’t done with him.
She found herself running to catch up with him, then caught his arm, swinging him back to face her.
“What does all this have to do with you?” she demanded.
“Nothing. I came to this island to camp, just the same as you,” he told her.
“Then why were you searching the clearing?”
“I told you. It seemed obvious you had hidden something.” He had been impatient, almost ready to pull away. But suddenly he became the one determined to carry on the conversation. He moved toward her. There was a tree behind her, and she backed up against it. He set a palm on the trunk to trap her, leaning close.
“What were you hiding?” he demanded.
“Nothing.”
“A skull?” he queried.
“Of course not!”
He pushed away from the tree and once again started back toward the beach. She followed him, irritated and uneasy.
And oddly determined to keep up with him.
To remain close.
They reached the trail. For a moment Beth was afraid they would run straight into Sandy and Brad, but the couple was nowhere to be seen.
Amber and Kimberly were lying on the beach, exactly where they had been when she had left them. Roger, too, seemed not to have stirred from the hammock.
“Hey, girls!” Keith called out.
Amber rolled over and looked back, seeing Keith. “Hi,” she called, smiling.
“Hey, guys,” Kimberly said.
The girls looked at him, then Beth, then one another. They smiled.
No, she thought. They smirked.
“Did you find any good coconuts?” Amber asked him.
It was Beth’s turn to look from him to the girls and back again. Obviously the girls had known that he hadn’t gone on the boat. Where the hell had she been?
Not paying attention. A mistake she didn’t intend to repeat.
“Hey...that looks like a decent coconut right over there.” He pointed in the direction of the hammock where Roger lay sleeping.
“I’ll get it,” Amber volunteered.
Beth bit her lip, not allowing herself to protest. The girls liked Keith. Trying to draw them away and tell them to be wary would only send them flying to his defense.
Kim jumped up to run after Amber.
Beth’s pepper spray lay forgotten on Amber’s beach towel.
Staring at Keith, she went and picked it up. He smiled, shaking his head.
“What’s that smile for?” she demanded, moving closer to him so the girls wouldn’t hear her.
“Pepper spray...machete. Hmm.”
“Don’t kid yourself, this stuff can blind a man.”
“I wouldn’t dream of mocking your strength, Ms. Anderson,” he told her.
Then he turned and went to accept the coconut Amber had picked up. Beth watched as he slammed it against a tree.
The coconut broke at his bidding. He didn’t look back at her, just offered the pieces to the girls. Only then did he turn.
“Sorry—is it all right if they have fresh coconut?”
Amber giggled. “Silly. Aunt Beth doesn’t have anything against coconuts.”
Beth forced a smile.
She was relieved to see the first of the dinghies sliding smoothly onto the shore, just a hundred feet down on the beach.
The others were back.
“Mahimahi tonight!” Ben shouted. He jumped from the dinghy and dragged it farther up the shore, then reached back to give a hand to Amanda. She accepted it with her usual innate sensuality, managing to bring her whole body against Ben in her smooth effort to step to the sand.
“My recipe tonight,” Ben called to Beth.
He sounded so pleased. Their fishing expedition had clearly been a great success.
Once again, she forced a smile, then waved and slipped into her tent.
She hoped her brother was having a good time.
For herself, it felt as if she had taken the night train to hell.
And, she realized, it could only get worse. She was suddenly longing for something she shouldn’t have.
Perhaps couldn’t have...
But the really scary thought was that he was feeling just the same.
Beth sat on the bent trunk of the palm tree, eating Doritos and watching.
It might have been a family reunion.
The light was gone, but three separate fires blazed, and the portable barbecue was working away, as well. The fires, she decided, were mainly for show, for warmth and light, though the moon was full, and the sky was clear, studded with stars. The fires were still nice, she thought.
Ben was talking to Keith and Matt by the barbecue, explaining the secret to his perfect mahimahi, she suspected. A coffeepot was set over one of the fires. Brad was the coffee brewer. Hank, Gerald and Matt were hanging out with him, probably talking about their day on the water.
As she watched, Amanda joined the group, giggling, laughing and, judging by her gestures, telling a story about the way someone had caught a fish. The men were laughing, obviously entertained, and equally obviously enthralled.
Beth was startled when Sandy sat down at her side.
She had a beer in her hand, and she was watching the group at the fire, as well.
“She’s got a way with her, huh?” Sandy said a little glumly.
“She’s
