Текст книги "Native Affairs"

Автор книги: Doreen Malek Owens

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Текущая страница: 2 (всего у книги 37 страниц)

Cindy got up to answer it, taking care to look through the peephole before she threw the bolt.

Andrew Fox was standing in the hall.

Her heart beating a little faster, Cindy opened the door.

He leaned against the jamb and folded his arms.

“Hi, Lucinda,” he said quietly. “Remember me?”

Chapter 2

Cindy was silent, painfully conscious that her hair was screwed into a straggling bun on the top of her head and that there was a badly chewed pencil stuck in it. She was also barefoot and wearing ancient, paper thin jeans faded to white at the seams. These were topped by a bleach spotted sweatshirt bearing the slogan: “Run for Life—The 1983 Juvenile Diabetes Marathon.” Why, just once, couldn’t she be wearing a black lace negligee when an attractive man appeared unexpectedly? Or at least a cocktail dress with high heels. But no. On such occasions she was invariably attired in the most ragged, ridiculous clothes she owned. It seemed to be a curse from which there was no escape.

He shook his head. “No response,” he mourned. “How quickly they forget.”

Cindy snapped out of it. “Of course I remember you,” she said, recovering.

“Good.” They stared at each other. “Well,” he went on, “do I stand out here in the hall like a student selling magazines?”

“I’m sorry, come in. Please excuse me. I just wasn’t expecting anyone.” She stepped aside and he walked past her into Paula’s apartment.

“Paula’s not home,” she said, watching as he looked around.

His light eyes moved back to her face. “I know that. I came to see you.”

Cindy’s pulse jumped. “Oh, yes?”

“Nice place,” he commented. “Last time I saw this apartment it was a mess.”

“When was that?”

“A couple of days before Paula moved in. She was having it painted, and Johnny and I carried some stuff up for her. He was here for a visit.” He eyed her levelly. “Paula didn’t seem to know what to do with me. I think she was afraid I was going to set a signal fire on the balcony.”

This so accurately described Paula’s attitude toward him that Cindy couldn’t suppress a giggle. He smiled at her response.

The telephone rang, interrupting their shared moment. Cindy moved to get it, took the message for Paula and hung up. She glanced around for a pencil with which to write it down. Fox stepped in front of her and removed the mangled pencil from her hair.

“Looking for this?” he asked mildly.

“Thank you,” Cindy said briskly, as if she had placed it there for safekeeping. This attitude was a little difficult to maintain as her hair, loosened by his action, tumbled from its confinement and fell over her right eye, obscuring her vision. Coughing delicately, she shoved it behind her ear unceremoniously, bending to scribble quickly on the pad.

“Lucinda, Lucinda, let down your hair,” Fox recited softly.

“I didn’t let it down, it fell down. Besides, that line is supposed to be for Rapunzel.” She tossed pencil and pad onto the telephone table.

“A princess by any other name...” he said, shrugging.

“I’m not a princess.”

He nodded wisely. “Oh, yes, you are. Take it from me. I can spot a princess a mile off, Lucinda.”

“Please stop calling me that,” she said faintly. “It makes me feel like I’m back in fourth grade, being called on the carpet by one of the nuns.”

“Okay. Cindy it is,” he replied, chuckling.

Annoyed at her loss of composure, Cindy gathered her hair in her hands, planning to bind it up again. Standing there facing him with it falling about her face made her feel childish and awkward.

He saw her intention and stayed her hand, closing his strong brown fingers around her wrist. “Don’t do that,” he said quietly. “Your hair is so pretty, such a nice color, not too brown or red and just a little gold at the tips. What do you call that shade?”

“Golden brown?” Cindy replied, swallowing, intensely aware of his touch.

“It looked beautiful this afternoon, like a beacon in that dull street, a glossy mane flowing over your shoulders.” His hand moved to touch the strands lying against her neck, and his fingertips brushed her skin.

Cindy closed her eyes. She had to put him at a distance, fast. She was definitely getting out of her depth.

She stepped back, away from him. “Do you always pay such extravagant compliments to women you’ve just met?” she asked frostily.

He hung his head, clasping his hands behind his back and staring at the floor. “I think I’ve just been put in my place,” he said, sighing dramatically. His mocking tone and exaggerated attitude of contrition had the desired effect on Cindy: her high-handedness became ridiculous in her own eyes. She was beginning to see that it was impossible to gain the advantage with him. The best she could hope for was a draw.

“Look, Mr. Fox,” she said evenly, deciding to try the forthright approach, “suppose you tell me why you came here.”

“Drew,” he corrected, dropping his chastened schoolboy act and resuming his normal stance.

“Drew,” she repeated dutifully.

“Actually,” he said, “I came here to apologize.”

Cindy frowned, puzzled. “Apologize for what?”

“For your injury. I stopped off at the hospital tonight and Paula fixed me up.” He touched the neat patch of gauze that had replaced his makeshift dressing. “She told me you got cut too, and I feel responsible.”

“Don’t be silly,” Cindy said, turning away. “It’s nothing.”

“I’ll be the judge of that. Let me see.”

Cindy thrust her arm behind her back.

He shook his finger in her face, “Let me see it, princess, or I’ll turn you over my knee.”

He seemed ready to do just that, so Cindy offered the hidden arm reluctantly.

Fox took her hand and pushed the sleeve back from her wrist, turning her arm over to see the inside. He gently probed the edges of the bandage, his touch firm and sure.

“No redness, no swelling. And another nifty wrapping job by Paula Desmond, R.N.” He looked up to meet her eyes. “I guess you’ll be okay.”

“I told you I was all right,” Cindy responded huffily, trying to pull her hand from his.

“Wait a minute,” he cautioned. “Not so fast.” Before she could react he raised her trapped fingers to his lips.

“What are you doing?” Cindy gasped.

“Isn’t it obvious?” he murmured, his mouth caressing her hand.

“No, it’s not,” she replied, tugging harder, but to no avail.

“I’m kissing it to make it well,” he said softly, trailing his tongue along her knuckles.

“My arm was cut, not my hand,” she said logically, trying to hang on to some shred of sanity. The moist warmth of his mouth was traveling up her arm like an electrical current.

“I’ll kiss that, too,” he responded, his lips moving past her wrist.

“Stop!” she cried, in a voice so loud and anxious that he obeyed her, surprising both of them. He released his hold, and she scrambled backward, her eyes wide.

“Are you afraid of me?” he asked, alarmed. He hadn’t intended to scare her.

Cindy didn’t know what to say. Fear didn’t exactly describe what she felt.

Fox watched her, his light eyes vivid, almost otherworldly in his dusky face. His black hair shone like polished ebony in the artificial light, and the white bandage stood out against it like a lonely patch of snow on dark macadam. In his tight jeans and loose cotton shirt, his expression alert, but patient, he looked like the modern embodiment of one of his ancient ancestors, who knew how to wait and listen.

“Just don’t...” Cindy said, leaving the sentence unfinished but gesturing to indicate that he should stand back.

“I won’t,” he replied, in a low tone. He guessed it was not a good idea to push her when she was in this mood.

Cindy took a deep, shaky breath. He waited until she met his gaze directly and then said, “I didn’t mean to upset you. Please allow me to make amends. Let me take you to dinner on Saturday night, that is if you have nothing else planned.”

Cindy heard herself saying, as if by rote, “I have nothing else planned.”

“Then you’ll go?” he asked, searching her face as if waiting for her to change her mind.

She nodded dumbly.

He smiled, his white teeth flashing against his brown skin. “Do you like seafood?”

“Why, yes. I do.”

“Fine. I know a place, Neptune’s Table, down in St. Petersburg Beach. It’s about a twenty minute ride. Would that be all right?”

“Okay,” she said. Anything would be all right.

“I’ll pick you up around seven-thirty.” He moved toward the door, intent on getting out before she called back her acceptance.

“All right.”

He stopped, smiled back at her, and then made a hasty exit. Cindy remained in the same spot for about a minute, trying to absorb what had just happened. Then she went into the bathroom and looked at herself in the mirror.

Her features were the same: straight nose, full mouth, large blue eyes, complemented by pale skin and burnished hair. But she felt different.

“You have a date with a bounty hunter,” she said to the girl in the glass, and then she shook her head.

She must be losing her mind.

* * * *

When Paula unlocked the apartment door at three-forty in the morning, Cindy was sitting on the sofa, an unread book open in her lap.

“You still up?” Paula asked wearily. “Those aboriginal legends must be more riveting than I thought.”

“That’s not it,” Cindy answered, as Paula slung her purse into a chair and slipped off her shoes.

Paula looked at her.

“Drew Fox was here. He asked me to dinner on Saturday night,” Cindy said.

Paula whistled. “Boy. I must say he’s living up to his reputation as a fast worker. What did you say?”

“Yes.”

Paula shook her head. “I can’t understand you. In school you always thought I was too wild; you had to be coaxed along to do anything. And now here you are dating the local heartbreaker, totally unfazed by all the stories I told you about him.”

“I’m not unfazed by them, or by him. As a matter of fact, I find him completely unnerving. But I like him.”

“Of course you do. Everybody likes him; he’s a charmer.” Paula unbuttoned her collar and ran her fingers through her hair. “Listen, kiddo, you’re talking to a veteran of that particular war. I had a monster crush on him the whole time I was in high school, when he was friends with Johnny. But his track was too fast even for me, and he runs it alone.” She peered at Cindy’s face, which was closed. “Okay, that’s all I’m going to say. You’re a big girl, you have to make up your own mind.”

“I have. And I will.”

Paula turned her hands out, palms up, in a gesture of surrender. “Did he say where you were going?”

“Some place in St. Petersburg Beach—Neptune’s Locker.”

“You mean Neptune’s Table?”

“That’s it.”

Paula nodded. “What clothes did you bring? That’s a pretty fancy restaurant.”

Cindy looked stricken. “All I have are jeans and a few skirts. I wasn’t expecting an active social life. What will I wear?”

“Something of mine, I guess. In college that was your usual solution to such a problem.”

Cindy made a face at her. “You forced those clothes on me because you said I was never dressed right.”

“You never were. On the rare occasions that you went out at all you always looked like you were ready for a hot date in the reference stacks.”

“But the sharing was always your idea, right?” Cindy said slyly.

“Right,” Paula agreed wearily, aware of what was coming.

“Then you can hardly blame me for your generous impulses, dear,” Cindy replied. She brightened. “Got any silk dresses?”

“Let’s take a look,” Paula said resignedly, and they went together to her bedroom to ransack the closet.

* * * *

Cindy tried to keep her mind occupied until Saturday came, but found it a difficult task. Her thoughts kept wandering from her work to Andrew Fox and their brief but telling interlude in Paula’s apartment.

She and Paula had found a suitable dress among Paula’s things, a peach silk jersey shift that flattered Cindy’s coloring. It was sleeveless, with a low neckline and a shirred hem that just covered her knees. With her high heeled sandals and appropriate jewelry, Cindy was confident that she would look right for the occasion.

Paula was off Saturday night and had a date also, with a pharmacist who worked in the hospital dispensary. They were going to a rodeo, a prospect that Paula deemed questionable at best, but she liked the guy and was determined to tough it out.

“What do you think?” Paula asked, pausing in the doorway to Cindy’s room. Cindy looked up from the task of examining her panty hose for snags. Paula was dressed in cowboy boots, a tailored shirt with black piping, and western cut jeans; she had a red bandanna tied around her neck. “Too Dale Evans?”

“More like Annie Oakley,” Cindy replied, getting up to look for her bottle of hand lotion.

The telephone rang as she was coming out of the bathroom.

“Will you get that?” Paula called from her bedroom. “It’s probably Mr. Axelrod about his bathtub again. His apartment should be floating like the Ark by now. Tell him the plumber is on the way.”

Cindy answered on the third ring.

“Hi,” a masculine voice said, and she knew who it was. “Are we still set for tonight? This is Drew,” he concluded, unnecessarily.

“Yes, unless you’re calling to say something has come up and you can’t make it,” Cindy responded.

“Oh, no. I just wanted to tell you that the restaurant is on the marina, and it can get chilly there after the sun goes down, so you’d better bring a sweater.”

“It was thoughtful of you to let me know.”

“Yeah, well, I’ll see you at seven-thirty, then, okay?”

“Okay.”

There was a pause. Then, “Cindy, the sweater was an excuse. I really wanted to hear your voice, that’s all. Look for me when the sun goes down. ‘Bye.”

“Goodbye.” Cindy hung up reluctantly, wondering about his sudden admission.

“Who was that?” Paula asked, walking into the living room with her hairbrush in hand.

“Drew Fox. He wanted to tell me to bring a sweater because it gets cold near the water at night.”

Paula raised her brows. “That was nice of him.”

“You sound surprised.”

Paula drew her mouth down at the corners. “Don’t bait me. I merely made an observation.” She headed back to her room, brushing her hair.

“Anyway, he said that wasn’t the real reason he called. It was just a pretext.”

Paula paused in mid-stroke. “What?”

“He said he just wanted to talk to me, hear my voice. Do you know I recognized his right away? All he said was ‘Hi’, and I knew. And he didn’t mistake me for you, either.”

“‘My ears have not yet drunk a hundred words of thy tongue’s uttering, yet I know the sound,‘“ Paula recited, batting her eyelashes.

“Something like that,” Cindy said, refusing to be cowed.

Paula shook her head, but wisely refrained from further comment. Cindy retreated to her bedroom to finish dressing, and their doors closed simultaneously, as if by mutual agreement.

Cindy was ready long before Fox was due, which was a mistake. She paced up and down the living room, wishing that Paula had not left earlier so that she would have someone to talk to in order to pass the time. When the doorbell finally rang she jumped, as if she hadn’t been expecting it all along.

Fox was standing in the hall, wearing tan chinos with a light brown linen jacket and a pale green shirt. His silk tie blended perfectly with his clothes, but it looked as if it were choking him, and Cindy wondered how long it had been since he’d last worn one.

“Hello,” he said. “You look nice. These are for you.” He handed her a bouquet of flaming hibiscus, the color of an August sunset, which he’d been concealing behind his back.

“Thank you,” Cindy said, accepting the flowers and going back inside to put them in water. He followed slowly, watching her.

“I wasn’t expecting this,” she said, rooting through the cupboards for a vase.

“I wasn’t expecting it, either. But I passed a florist’s and I was thinking about you, so I just stopped and got them. But then, I’ve been thinking about you a lot these past few days. If I’d been passing a furniture store you probably would have wound up with a desk.”

Cindy glanced at him quickly, and he grinned. She smiled back at him.

“How’s your head?” she asked.

“Fine. How’s your arm?”

“Fine.”

“Then I guess we’re both fine,” he said, and she laughed.

Cindy left the flowers standing in an old milk bottle filled with water. She picked up her jacket and purse. “Shall we dance?” he said, extending his arm. She took it, and they walked out together.

Chapter 3

The Gulf Coast night was warm and fragrant, refreshed by a salt laden breeze. Fox led Cindy to a late model sports car standing next to the curb.

‘‘This is your car?” she asked.

“Yes. You were expecting to go in the pickup?”

Cindy shrugged. “I guess I hadn’t thought about it,” she answered truthfully.

“Would you have minded that?” he asked as he opened the door for her, alert to her response.

“Why should I? It’s transportation.”

Fox thought that over while he walked around to get in on his side.

“You know,” he said quietly, as he pulled onto the road, “when I called earlier I half expected you to say that you had changed your mind.”

“Why?” Cindy asked, turning to look at him.

He lifted one shoulder slightly. “Ladies like you don’t usually...”

“Keep their word?” Cindy inquired, an edge to her tone.

He shook his head. “I just don’t go out with ladies like you a lot.” He smiled, but his eyes didn’t change. “Not much opportunity to meet refined young professors in my line of work.”

“I’m not a professor yet,” Cindy replied. Then she grinned at him. “Maybe I’m not even that refined.”

“I’d have to argue that point with you,” he said mildly. He turned to look directly at her. “Did Paula tell you that I’m a half-breed?” he asked suddenly.

Disturbed by the bluntness of his question, Cindy nevertheless answered him with the same candor.

“She didn’t have to tell me. I knew it when we first met, from your eyes.”

He examined her face briefly before turning his attention back to the road. “My parents were never married,” he went on evenly. “My mother left me with my father right after I was born. She went back to Boston.”

“That must have been very hard for you when you were growing up,” Cindy murmured. It sounded inane to her own ears, but she didn’t know what he wanted to hear.

“Those who knew her say that I look like her, not in coloring so much, but in my features.”

“Then she must have been beautiful,” Cindy said, meaning it, but also trying to make him feel better concerning a subject about which he was obviously very sensitive.

“And you have the nerve to suggest that you’re not refined,” he said, tossing her a teasing glance, and she smiled. She could almost feel the tension leave them like the passing of a dark cloud.

As Fox turned the wheel to negotiate an intersection, Cindy noticed a leather sheath strapped to his midsection.

“What’s that?” she asked curiously, before she considered that the question might be rude.

“What?” he responded, watching the stream of cars moving in the opposite direction.

“That thing around your middle—looks like an eyeglass case or something.”

“Oh. That’s a bowie knife,” he said casually.

“A bowie knife,” she repeated in disbelief.

“Yeah. I don’t like to carry a gun when I go out socially. My father taught me how to throw it.”

He noticed her transfixed stare. “Relax, princess. I’m not going to throw it at you.”

“Why do you have to carry anything at all?” she inquired, still trying to adjust to the idea.

“The people I take back to prison usually aren’t too happy about it, or fond of me for getting them there. On occasion they’ve taken their revenge when I least expected it. Most convicts don’t stay in prison forever, you know.” He glanced over at her. “I’ll leave it in the car if it upsets you.”

“Oh, no, no. I was just surprised, that’s all.” Cindy waited a moment and then said, “How did you get started with what you’re doing, Drew? If you don’t mind telling me.”

“I don’t mind,” he answered evenly. “I was always good at tracking. I learned to hunt animals when I was a kid. I never killed them—my family didn’t believe in it, except for food—and we didn’t need that. But I got a lot of experience following scents and clues, things an animal leaves behind that tell you where it has gone. And people are animals too, they leave spoor just like wildlife in the woods. At first I just tracked down anybody who bolted and then I collected the money. But as I became better and better at it, the cops called me in to find people they couldn’t catch.”

“Paula says you go after big time criminals now,” Cindy observed.

“Oh, yes, I’m a member of the elite these days,” he answered, with a hint of self mockery. “As far as my job goes, anyway. They’ve got computers and radar devices and everything else to assist me.”

“Who does?”

“Whoever I’m working for. I have some stuff of my own too, but the most sophisticated equipment is reserved for the police: state, feds, Interpol.”

“What’s Interpol?”

“International Police.”

“Paula said you went to Mexico not long ago on a case.”

“Paula says quite a bit, apparently,” he commented dryly. “I hope she hasn’t been scaring you off me.”

“I’m here, aren’t I?” Cindy replied defensively, and he smiled slightly.

“Yes, you are,” he said quietly, and left it at that.

They approached Tampa Bay, and Fox pulled onto the causeway, which spanned the gleaming water like a thin ribbon. The bay fanned out from it on both sides, sparkling like an aquamarine in the fading light.

“This is gorgeous,” Cindy breathed, craning her neck to look around her. “But the road is so low, doesn’t it flood?”

“Wait until you see it on the way back, when it’s dark, with a hundred lights reflecting in the water. And yes, it does flood, all the time during hurricane season. That’s the reason the Sunshine Skyway was built so high, fifteen stories above the bay at its highest point. It connects St. Petersburg and Bradenton. There are signal lights on the ramparts to warn off planes.”

Cindy shuddered. “I don’t think I’d like to go on that,” she said.

Fox glanced at her. “Afraid of heights?”

She nodded.

“Trust me, princess, I won’t let you fall,” he said softly, and Cindy felt a plummeting sensation in her stomach, as if she were tumbling from a cliff already.

Maybe she was.

Fox drove through St. Petersburg down to the water, parking in the lot of a restaurant that flanked a marina. Small boats bobbed at anchor all around them as he led her up an entrance ramp designed to look like a gangway. Inside, the walls were floor-to-ceiling glass, affording an unobstructed view of the inlet.

“This is lovely, Drew,” Cindy said, as the hostess led them to their table. “Thank you for bringing me here.”

He eyed her speculatively for a few seconds, and then replied, “Thank you for coming with me.”

They sat next to one of the windows and Cindy studied the view as Fox consulted the menu.

“What body of water is this?” she asked, as a soft breeze drifted in through the screen and caressed her face.

“Boca Ciega Bay,” he answered. He watched her rapt examination of the scenery, smiling to himself, and then suggested gently, “Would you like to look at this?” He handed her the tasseled menu.

She glanced at it perfunctorily, reading through the elaborate descriptions of seafood dishes in growing confusion. When she looked up at him he was grinning.

“Want me to chose for both of us?” he asked. When she agreed eagerly, he laughed.

The steward came by and Fox ordered white wine. He poured for her when it arrived, watching her reaction as she took the first sip.

“Okay?” he asked, and she nodded. Fox signaled to the steward that he could go.

When the waitress arrived, Fox ordered a platter of blue point oysters on the half shell as an appetizer and lobster tails for two. Cindy felt a little queasy about the oysters, but gamely decided to say nothing and give them a try.

“I’ve been telling you all about me,” Fox said as the waitress left. “What about you? What does a graduate assistant do? Assist graduates?”

His teasing grin told her he was kidding. She described the way her research program worked, and added that her supervisor, Richard Caldwell, had to approve her paper before she could get her degree.

“Yeah?” Fox said, taking a sip of wine. “So where is he?” He looked around the room as if he expected to find Richard propped against the wall like a garden rake.

“He’s still up at the university. I’ll be sending him copies of my work so he can keep track of what I’m doing.”

Fox toyed with the silver sugar bowl on the table. “So what’s the subject of your thesis?” he asked.

“Seminole legends,” Cindy answered, watching his face to see the impact of this information.

His unusual eyes widened. “No kidding! Hey, I’ll be your research project.”

“You’re only half Seminole,” Cindy said, her lips twitching.

“I’ll be half your research project,” he shot back, laughing.

The oysters arrived and Cindy eyed them warily.

“Seriously,” Fox said. “My grandfather knows an awful lot about the old stories; I’m sure he could help you. Would you like to meet him?”

Cindy stared at him. “Do you mean it?” she asked breathlessly. This was a golden opportunity, the chance of a lifetime to get the inside track. Sometimes it was hard for her to get her subjects to talk.

“Of course I mean it,” Fox replied, chuckling. He reached for the oysters and speared one with a tiny fork. “I have to go away this week, but I can take you out there next Saturday, if that would be okay.”

“That would be wonderful,” Cindy replied, trying to contain her excitement. This became easier instantly as Fox lifted an oyster to her lips.

“Try one,” he said.

Cindy stared at the slimy, gray-blue object. “These are raw?”

“Completely.”

“Not cooked at all?”

“Not at all,” he said, observing her consternation with amusement. “First time, huh?”

“Yes.”

“Come on, princess, eat up,” he said, prodding her lower lip with the fork.

Cindy closed her eyes and opened her mouth. The oyster slid between her lips and down to the back of her throat, where it lodged like a basketball.

“Did you swallow it?” he asked, trying not to laugh.

Cindy shook her head mutely.

He grabbed a glass of water and held it to her lips. “Here, drink this, and sort of shoot it down with the flow.”

Cindy obeyed, gasping as the offending tidbit slid down her throat. Her eyes filled and she blinked rapidly.

“We’ll consider that experiment a failure,” he said dryly. He signaled the passing waitress. “Please bring the lady a shrimp cocktail,” he said. He glanced at Cindy. “Okay?”

“Okay,” she said, blinking, vastly relieved.

“Why didn’t you tell me you didn’t like oysters?” he asked gently, as she patted her lips delicately with a linen napkin.

“I never had them, as I said, so I thought I’d give them a try,” she answered. “You go ahead though, don’t let me stop you.”

Fox examined the remaining oysters doubtfully. “I’m not too thrilled with them myself now,” he said, and then looked up at her.

Cindy made a gagging face, and they both laughed.

“I would have thought you’d have a taste for oysters, with your background,” he said, filling her glass again with wine.

“What do you know about my background?” Cindy asked him, amused.

“Nothing, but I can make some good guesses,” he replied.

“Go ahead,” Cindy said, taking a drink, enjoying the game.

“Okay. I would say that your daddy was a lawyer, an accountant, or a teacher. Am I right?”

“A professor of ancient history,” Cindy responded.

“Same thing. And you were the perfect teacher’s daughter. You studied hard and got good grades, and never, ever, disobeyed the rules.”

“I liked school,” she said quietly. “I still do.”

“I’ll bet you loved to read, to sit in your room and dream.”

“Books are better friends than people sometimes,” she answered.

“I’m doing pretty well so far,” he observed.

“Continue,” she said, becoming a little uncomfortable. Her shrimp cocktail arrived, and she nibbled at the succulent, curved pieces as he went on.

“All right. You were an only child, and you kept to yourself. You liked to play alone, and when you got older, the friends you had, like Paula, sought you out rather than the other way around.”

“I prefer a few good friends to a crowd. Is that what you mean?”

“Close enough. And you were the focus of the family, the little treasure coddled by your parents and kept from all harm.”

“My family loved me, yes,” she said tightly. “Did Paula tell you any of this?”

“I’ve never discussed you with Paula. I didn’t have to. What you are is written all over you.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever been dissected before,” Cindy said carefully. “I’m not sure I like it.”

His brown hand covered her white one on the table. “Don’t get mad, princess. I admire what you are. I envy the opportunities you have. Nobody will ever say to you: ‘that’s not yours, you can’t have it, don’t touch.‘“

Cindy met his eyes. “Do people say that to you?”

He looked away. “Sometimes. Money can’t buy everything, you know.”

“It buys quite a bit,” she said resentfully, piqued at his mocking description of her life. “I understand you have a brand new condo on the water. That mustn’t be too hard to take.”

Fox was silent for a moment, swirling the wine in his glass and watching the play of the soft light in its depths. Then he said, “Five years ago, when I first started making good money, I did all the usual things. I got a fancy apartment, bought a Jaguar that cost twice as much as the car I have now, a motorcycle and a boat. I had plenty of pretty toys. Then when I realized I was becoming more interested in things than in people I sold them. The apartment had more alarms than a firehouse, and I decided that wasn’t worth worrying about, either. I went back to Council Rock.”

“Then why the new condo?” Cindy asked curiously.

He smiled mysteriously. “I’ll tell you about that sometime,” he said, as the lobster was deposited on the table before them.

“It must be wonderful to live right on the ocean,” Cindy said dreamily.

“We are all drawn to the water,” he said quietly. “We began there, and we know it. We come back with a sense of peace and fulfillment, like a traveler returning home.”

“What a very Seminole thing to say.”

His emerald eyes caressed hers across the distance that separated them. ‘‘You should know.”

A band began to play dance music in the next room, a pleasant accompaniment to their meal. The lobster was delicious and the wine was wonderful, light and crisp.