Part 4 (1/2)
Why had she done that? Why had she asked him to have coffee with her? For one, she needed some, but she could have gone on her own. For another, the longer she kept him away from certain truths, the better off they both would be. She wanted him to unearth the mystery relative to her aunt, but to unearth all her secrets might be extremely unpleasant for her. As for Dan himself...well, he wasn't ready. Anyone could tell that by looking in his eyes.
He had lovely eyes. Most people didn't trust a man with eyes that color, but she'd always found the color beautiful. When she was very young, she sometimes fantasized about an imaginary friend with eyes like that, pale and clear and deep as the striated coloration of a blue marble. In fact, if the man she sought at the police station had walked in with eyes of any other shade, she would have decided she hadn't had a vision at all, but had reverted to that old companion in her loneliness.
Yes, loneliness made one strange and fey. For a time, Maris had blamed her aunt for that, and later her parents, but really, it was who she was. She discovered as an adult her otherness made her different, and her difference kept her apart from the people around her. The stories went back generation after generation about the women in her family. They had their own community of people who understood. Once Maris and her parents left Alcina Cove, Maris had no one. In fact, if Maris never had a girl child, she'd be the last in a long line of gifted females.
At thirty-two, having a child wasn't beyond imagining, but she'd never found anyone with whom she'd consider that kind of relations.h.i.+p. Maybe, like Alva, she was destined to be alone.
Maris leaned back onto her elbows, tilting her face toward the sky, the step above pressed into the ridge of her spine through her sweater. She began to breathe in a deliberate cadence, willing herself to relax, to accept the present state of her life. She heard a car door open and close quietly, almost as if he didn't want her to know he was there. Her lips curled. The step beneath her hips reverberated slightly with the lowering of a booted foot onto the concrete.
”Wake up. I thought you wanted a cup of coffee.”
She opened her eyes and squinted at his silhouette, his head highlighted by the sun at his back. ”I'm not asleep. And I do.”
He held out his hand. She hesitated and then slipped her fingers into his, allowing him to pull her to her feet. Standing on the step above him, she nearly matched his height, head to head. He looked amused. She wondered what had gotten into him.
”Did you have someplace in mind?”
She shook her head. ”It's been twenty years. The places I remember might not even exist anymore.”
”There's a diner on the edge of town. I haven't had breakfast yet. You?”
”Nope.”
”Good. Let's go.”
Releasing her hand, he started toward the car. Maris lingered on the steps to the porch, something about his behavior throwing her off balance. He opened the pa.s.senger side door for her like an actual gentleman, then c.o.c.ked his head to the side as he looked back in her direction. ”Are you coming?”
Wordlessly, she descended the steps to the sidewalk where she ducked under his arm and into the seat. He shut the door as soon as she drew her leg inside. Suddenly she felt as nervous as a kid in school awaiting the outcome of a test.
He slid behind the wheel. ”You never did say where you were staying.”
”No,” she agreed, ”I didn't.” Her stomach flipped beneath her diaphragm.
He arched an eyebrow but kept silent regarding her reply. Pulling away from the curb, he gave the front door of the house a quick glance. ”That's strange.”
”What?”
”I'm just remembering something incorrectly. I thought those curtains on the front door were closed.”
Maris turned to check. ”They are closed.”
Dan slammed on the brakes. ”They are. What the h.e.l.l. Is somebody in there? I could have sworn they were just open.”
”Nope. They've been closed. I think you're imagining things.” Still, Maris stared at the front door through narrowed eyes, waiting to see movement again. Nothing. What had Stauffer seen? She was beginning to think the man had a hidden talent he would have despised had he recognized it.
After a moment, Dan continued driving. Maris relaxed against the seat. ”Have you given any further thought to what I was saying last night?”
”Nope.”
Maris frowned. ”None at all?”
”It wasn't last night. It was this morning, and I've spent the rest of it trying to catch up on my interrupted sleep. We'll talk about things after I've had something to eat.”
With a snort, Maris focused on the pa.s.sing vista. In the light of day, she recognized the landmark of the sailors' cross beyond the far end of the main street and certain houses on either side as they headed through town. ”Stop!”
Dan jerked the wheel, bringing his car up against the curb. ”What's wrong?”
”That's...that's my house.”
”Right there?”
Maris nodded at the house he pointed out. ”Yes. Right there.”
”It can't be.”
”It is.” The home where she'd spent her early childhood had been converted to a bed and breakfast. The Timeless Inn, it was called. Someone had planted a beautiful English-style garden out front behind a white picket fence. Because of that, she almost hadn't recognized the house itself. But the bones of it remained, the once silvered wooden siding painted a pristine white now. The narrow window of her old bedroom faced the huge Victorian mansion across the street.
”Friends of mine own the place,” Dan said beside her.
”Well that's quite the coincidence. Or don't you believe in coincidence either?”
He didn't answer.
Of course he did, whether he admitted it or not. He believed in the power of coincidence, of meant-to-be. She knew he had to. If he didn't, he'd say so. So far, he hadn't been a man to hold back on his opinions. ”Do you think they'd let me in?”
”I'm not asking them to let you in for a look around. They have a business to run.”
”Right.”
”I'm sorry. I shouldn't have-”
”Nope, it's fine.” Maris swiveled front in her seat. Goodness, they sounded like an old married couple, half-bickering, and they'd barely met. And like the denizen of a fifty-year marriage, she found herself trying to rea.s.sure him. ”I understand, really. It would be rude to ask your friends. Let's go eat, though, I'm starving.”
He, in like form, started to backpedal. ”It's only that I'm not sure what type of thing they might have going this week. Sometimes they have business clients-”
”Don't.”
”Don't what?”
”Don't go back on your original statement. You said it for a reason. And don't try to appease me. I don't need appeasing. I don't need coddling. I don't need...anything.” G.o.d, was that true? Had she designed herself around acceptance to the point of not needing anything from anybody? What a sad state of affairs, if true. ”Except coffee,” she amended. ”And a couple of eggs on toast. I do need that.”
He laughed. The sound of it startled her, yet warmed her through and through. She managed to stop herself squirming on the seat in response, but she couldn't prevent grinning in return.
”Your wish is my command,” he said, pulling back out into the street.
Now he was flirting with her. There was something so not right about their exchanges, as if neither one of them could figure out where they stood. And why should they? This was business. He was a police officer-a detective-and she was a citizen looking for a.s.surance about a death. Period. What else need there be?
As Dan Stauffer pulled his car into the lot of the diner, she thought-what else, indeed.