Читать книгу You Had Me At Goodbye - Jane Blackwood - Страница 8

They walked silently, side by side, with the Atlantic Ocean to their right and Victorian water-view cottages to their left. Any brief sense of camaraderie that they’d had in the cottage was gone, and they were strangers thrown together with nothing in common but the awkward silence they were sharing. Kat put her attention on the houses they passed, mostly ornate Victorians with front porches, tower rooms, and gingerbread trim. The houses had been built at the turn of the century as summer cottages for New England Methodists who camped annually in the summer there. While the Methodists were long gone, many of the homes were still used only as summer homes or had been transformed into inns or bed and breakfasts like Roy had done.

Kat looked to see if Roy was on his porch and had a sudden pang of sadness for Carl, who’d wander over to Roy’s at martini time, sometimes with Lila and sometimes without. “I bet Roy misses Carl,” she said wistfully.

“I know he does. He’s talked about him often,” Larry said, looking over to his bed and breakfast. “I like Roy. He’s the only American I’ve met who actually read one of my books.”

“Ah, so he obviously makes the cut.”

“Absolutely,” he said without a hint of irony.

“Did he like your book?”

Larry looked out at the beach where several families were digging in the sand or splashing in the mild surf.

“He didn’t?”

“He didn’t actually dislike it. He just felt it was lacking something.”

“What?” Kat asked.

“Soul. He said my book lacked soul. He must have read The New York Times review because that is precisely what that reviewer said when he tore it to shreds.”

He’d said it lightly, but Kat had a feeling both the Times review and Roy’s criticism didn’t sit very well. “Not everyone can like everything. I’m sure someone liked it.”

“I’m beginning to wonder.” He stopped, braced both hands on the pitted, green-painted railing that separated the boardwalk from a steep drop to the beach, and looked out at the sea.

“Are you having a pity party?” Kat asked with a grin.

“A what?”

“Are you feeling sorry for yourself?”

He looked at her and gave her the oddest smile that, for some reason, made her breath catch in her throat.

“Actually, yes, I am. I’ve been lamenting my inability to write, but I’m beginning to fear that even if I could write, I’d end up writing…” he floundered.

“Something without a soul?” Kat offered.

“Yes,” he said grimly. “Precisely.”

“Maybe you need to suffer more. You’ve lived a privileged life, right?” He nodded. “So you need to suffer, to live.”

“I’ve suffered enough, thank you.”

Kat let out a snort. “Let’s go find something fun and middle class to do. You’re bringing me down.”

Kat loved Oak Bluffs. Although Martha’s Vineyard was a relatively small island, its small towns were decidedly different. Edgartown was posh, trendy, and touristy. Chilmark, with its green rolling hills and isolated beaches, was quiet and rural; Vineyard Haven, quaint; and Oak Bluffs, fun and a bit rough around the edges. Oak Bluffs, one of two towns on the island that served alcohol, teemed with activity in the summer months, thanks mostly to nonstop ferries that dumped boatload after boatload of day trippers onto its shores. It was one of the few places on the island where a family could eat for under thirty bucks. But its most well-known characteristic was the tiny gingerbread cottages that spread out in a labyrinth of narrow streets, placed side by side and painted fairy tale colors like pink and bright yellow.

The center of town was tacky and loud and wonderful, and its centerpiece was a century and a half old carousel called the Flying Horses that attracted hundreds every day. It wasn’t one of those run-of-the-mill plastic carousels. Its carved wooden horses with real horsehair and glass eyes weren’t all that fancy, and they were getting a bit worn, but riders actually tried to catch the brass ring as the horses whirled about the hot, wooden barnlike building.

Kat adored the carousel, and she made certain to ride it at least once every time she came to the island. Of course, Brian always refused and told her she looked ridiculous riding on it without a child, but Kat didn’t care. She’d ridden the thing at least half a dozen times and never gotten that blasted brass ring.

She knew the place well enough to know that midday in July was the absolutely worst time to enter the carousel because it was always teeming with families and the temperature inside soared into the nineties. It was the worst place to be on a hot summer day if you were over the age of twelve. Kat brought Larry directly to the carousel.

It was a hot madhouse, the music seeming nightmarishly loud above the screaming of a little black-haired girl who apparently wanted to go on the ride again. Her parents looked sweaty and harassed, and they were probably wishing they were anywhere else on earth at that moment.

“This,” Kat said with a flourish, “is normal people.”

“Good God.”

“And this is what we look like, what we do, what we are.”

Larry looked at the screaming little girl, at her parents who were trying to push her stroller through the thick crowd, and turned around and walked back to the street. Kat jogged after him.

“How are you ever going to learn about us lower classes unless you mingle with us?” she asked innocently.

“I do not find you amusing.”

Kat sighed. “I really would like you to ride that thing. We’ll come back sometime at night. It’s open until ten, and it’s a lot cooler and a lot less crowded then.”

“I don’t understand the attraction. Those poor people looked miserable. What would make them do that?”

“It’s the oldest carousel around. You’d be riding on a bit of history. And…it’s fun,” she said a bit defensively. “I know it seems stupid, but if you ride the carousel enough, you get really good at grabbing the rings. You can get two or three at a time, and your chances of getting the brass ring increase. It’s a game.”

“Perhaps later.”

Kat shook her head. “You’ve got to try it. Then you’ll get hooked. Your problem is that not only are you a snob, you’re also a stick-in-the-mud.”

Larry stopped walking, making the wave of people behind them part and go around. “Are you saying I’m boring?”

“Well, yes.”

“Because I don’t want to ride a child’s amusement ride in sweltering heat?”

“Yes.” And Kat thought, Brian was the same way. She could never get him on the carousel, no matter how much she’d cajoled. Of course, that had only made her want to ride again and again. Her little rebellion. And here was another guy, too stiff, too concerned about what others thought to look a little bit ridiculous and have a little fun.

“I assure you I am not boring.”

“If you say so.”

“Refusing to ride a carousel means nothing. It doesn’t make me boring, and it doesn’t make me a snob. It makes me practical. It was too bloody hot in there. Besides, the line was too long.”

Kat tilted her head at him and studied his expression, trying hard not to notice how drop-dead gorgeous he was. Not that she was attracted to him. No right-minded woman with a broken heart would be attracted to any man. And she was a right-minded woman—who, okay, dammit, was attracted to him. At present, he was a hot, sweaty, gorgeous guy. Poor man was used to England, Kat thought, which had to be a heck of a lot colder than Martha’s Vineyard. His near black hair was glistening with sweat around the edges, making it curl. Her hair drooped in the hot, steamy weather. He must have followed her eyes because he swiped at his hair.

“Is it always so hot here in the summer? I thought islands were supposed to be cool.”

Kat forced herself to look away and began studying a group of teenage boys enthusiastically washing down a large recreational fishing boat with an ancient green hose.

“It gets cool at night. Are you saying you’ll go on the carousel when it’s cooler and the line is shorter?”

“Ah, the carousel. I don’t see why not. I want to.”

“Oh.”

Lawrence looked down at her shining, open face and almost grimaced. He did not want to ride a carousel; he loathed the entire idea of it. But for some reason, Kat’s disappointment got to him. She had him saying he wanted to—wanted to—ride a bloody carousel when he didn’t.

“Let’s walk,” he said abruptly and stepped directly into the path of a little girl, making her ice cream cone fly out of her hands and onto the sidewalk. The scream that came out of her mouth was so piercing, Lawrence thought he had somehow broken one of her bones. He was horrified and immediately bent down to see what damage he’d done, moving his hands along her arms and legs to find any obvious injuries. That only made the girl scream louder until he thought his eardrums might burst.

“I’m so sorry,” he said, looking up at the girl’s parents and recognizing them as the same tortured pair he’d seen in the carousel.

The two rushed to reassure him. “It’s the ice cream,” the mother said. “She dropped it. It’s all right; she’s not hurt.” The father tried to comfort the girl, which simply produced another earsplitting scream.

Lawrence looked around frantically—he wasn’t sure for what—and he spotted an ice cream shop—Mad Martha’s—with a line ten people deep.

“Excuse me,” he said, pushing his way to the front. He spoke to the crowd of sweaty tourists wearing T-shirts and baseball hats. “That little girl screaming over there lost her ice cream because of my carelessness, and I was wondering if I could cut in front of you and buy her a replacement.” En masse, twenty pairs of eyes turned to the little girl and her now mortified parents. When they gave a collective “awww,” Lawrence knew he had them, and he smiled.

Kat watched in amazement as the crowd stepped back in unison and let Larry walk to the front. It’s that smile, she thought. And the accent. Deadly combination.

Holding the ice cream like a hard-won trophy, Larry bent at the waist and presented it to the little girl, who was still wailing about her lost cone as her mother threatened never to buy her an ice cream cone for the rest of her life if she didn’t stop screaming immediately.

“Miss,” Larry said, “a replacement.”

“No.” And she swatted it down, out of his hand, and directly onto Larry’s expensive-looking shoes.

“Kristy, apologize to the nice man,” the mother said, horrified that her child was behaving so abominably.

“It’s quite all right,” Larry said, smiling politely and grimacing only slightly when the devil child screamed again.

“Sorry,” Kat said to the parents, as if the entire episode was Larry’s fault, and tugged on his arm.

“Good God,” he said when they were finally away from the family. “That is why I will never have a child. Did you hear her? I think I’ll be hearing those screams for the rest of my life.” He looked surprisingly upset about the entire incident.

“She was probably just tired.”

“Yes, she was tired. She was hot. Children are always something.”

Instead of handing the tissue to him, Kat bent down and cleaned the shoes off herself without a second thought.

“She probably sensed you hate children. Animals and children are like that, you know.”

“Animals and children love me, typically. I’m just not that good around them. I’m missing the correct gene, I believe.”

“You mean the human gene?” she teased. He smiled, and Kat felt inordinately glad that she’d gotten a smile out of him. He’d become way too serious on her. “Kids can also be sweet and love you unconditionally.”

“So can a dog,” Larry said darkly.

“That’s horrible,” Kat said, truly outraged. But she laughed anyway.

Larry seemed mildly surprised that she’d laughed. “But true.”

“You’ve obviously never been around children.”

He looked off to the water as if suddenly interested in the fleet of fishing boats tied up along the wharf. “I’ve been around enough of them to know I need to avoid them. Oh, don’t look at me as if I’m a monster.”

“Thank goodness your mother and father didn’t think that way.”

“They did. That’s why we were sent away to school when we were seven and why when we were home, we had a governess. My parents were exceedingly intelligent.”

Kat stopped and looked up at him. “This explains everything,” she said.

“Explains what?”

“You’ve never been in love, have you?”

“Of course I have,” he said quickly.

“And you didn’t feel loved by your parents,” Kat went on as if he hadn’t responded. “A child who’s never felt love…”

“My parents loved me,” he said, clearly losing his patience with her.

“A man who’s never been in love…”

“You really are beginning to grate, you know.”

“And books without a soul,” she said triumphantly, having a wonderful time baiting him. She didn’t mean a single word that was coming out of her mouth.

“You’re insane.”

“But right,” she said and then started laughing when she took in his horrified expression. “My goodness, I didn’t mean it. I was just teasing you. I do that.”

“No. No, you’re right,” he said.

“No, I’m not. I’m sure your parents sent you to school because they wanted the best for you because they loved you.”

He shook his head, denying her assurances. “No. They sent us to school to get us out of their hair.”

“I was only teasing you.”

“And I haven’t been in love. Not really. I was just a boy then. I thought at the time I was in love, but look at me. I’m thirty-four years old and unmarried, and I have no real desire to get married. I have no one. I’m a shell. Vacant. Soulless, like my books.”

“For God’s sake, Larry, I was just kidding,” Kat said, exasperated.

And then he grinned, and she knew. He’d been playing her, reeling her in like a trophy fish.

She quirked one eyebrow. “Are you finished?”

“I believe so.”

“You are oh so witty.”

“I do try.”

She smiled up at him, and he smiled back, and in that split second, the attraction meter flew off the scale, which made her realize she’d better be very careful with Larry Kendall. Because not only did he have that accent and killer looks, but he could also make her laugh.

“I still think you should keep an open mind about kids,” she said.

Larry shrugged as if he didn’t care or really hadn’t given it much thought.

“I suppose not everyone is cut out to be a parent,” she conceded. “You were nice to that little girl though. You didn’t have to buy her another cone and charm yourself to the front of the line,” she pointed out.

“I just wanted her to stop the racket.”

Kat gave up badgering him. Brian hadn’t had any huge desire to have kids either. She needed to meet someone who wanted children as much as she did. She wasn’t thirty yet, no clocks ticking, but Kat knew kids were going to be part of her future.

They were walking past a T-shirt shop, and Kat stopped. “Perfect,” she said and walked into the store. Five minutes later, she was back holding a large tank top with a cartoony great white shark emblazoned on it. Out of its mouth was poking a furry black tail and the words “Sharks Eat Black Dogs.”

“Very anti-establishment,” Larry said dryly. “It’s perfect.”

“I knew you’d think so,” Kat said with a grin, right before she clutched his arm in horror. “What time is it?”

He looked at his wrist watch and grimaced. “You’re late.” When Kat began to dash off, he held her arm. “Let him wait.”

Kat swallowed. “Right.”

“Are you certain you don’t want to take him back?”

“Yes.” She chewed on her lower lip. “I just wish he didn’t want to talk to me in private.”

And then Larry did something Kat would never forget. He took her face in his large hands and gently made her look into his eyes. “You are the toughest girl I’ve ever met. If you can’t resist him, then you weren’t meant to.”

She nodded, mesmerized by his intense gaze. “I wish I were as confident as you. I’m not as tough as I look.”

He laughed, let her go, and the moment was over. “I didn’t say you looked tough. You look as tough as a puppy.”

“A pit bull puppy?” she asked with mock hope.

“That’s the ticket. Now let’s send this chap packing, shall we?”