Текст книги "A Highlander Christmas"
Автор книги: Джанет Чапмен
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“My car was recovered?”
Grace set the plate down in front of him. “Jack and his deputy brought it back just this morning.
It’s parked in the upper driveway behind the kitchen.”
“Really, Dr. Sutter, I don’t think I’m the one to go after your daughter.”
“Of course you are, Luke. Because if I know Camry, the moment you work up the nerve to tell her that Podly is scattered over half of Springy Mountain, she’ll drag you back here so fast your head will be spinning.”
Luke snapped his navy blue eyes to hers, his face draining of color. “Y-you know about Podly?” he whispered, glancing at Grey before looking back at her. “You knowit was your satellite that crashed here last summer?”
Grace went to the fridge to get him some juice, giving her equally stunned husband a smug smile as she walked by. “Do you honestly believe I wouldn’t know someone was eavesdropping on Podly’s transmissions?” she asked, bringing the juice back to Luke. “All the time you and Camry were burning up the Internet with your e-mails, I was watching you watching Podly.”
“Did Camry know?” he asked, absently taking the juice she handed him.
“I never told her. But if she’d bothered to check, she’s certainly smart enough to have found out. But then, I doubt she would have been looking for an eavesdropper.”
“But you were?”
Grace shrugged. “An old habit from my days working for StarShip Spaceline.”
He looked down at his plate. “Then you also know that I caused the satellite to malfunction.” He looked up at her, his eyes filled with sincere remorse. “I’m sorry. I really don’t know what I did to make it crash. I spent three months going over the data in my own lab, and the last two months scouring the mountain, hoping I could find enough salvageable parts to figure out what went wrong.” He turned in his seat to face her fully and took her hand in both of his. “You have my word, Dr. Sutter, I was going to bring whatever I found directly to you. I-I’m sorry,” he repeated.
Grace patted his shoulder. “I believe you, Luke.” She nudged him around to his plate of rapidly cooling food. “Now eat, so we can get you packed up and headed to Go Back Cove. The sooner you find Camry, the sooner you can talk her into helping you find our satellite. Podly had heat shields in case something like this happened, so there’s a good chance the data bank survived reentry. Camry knows these mountains quite well, and between your trajectory data and her love of a good challenge, I’m sure you’ll both be locked in my lab with Podly by the winter solstice. Eat,” she repeated, pointing at his food when he tried to say something else.
He snapped his mouth shut with a frown and picked up his fork.
Grace took hold of her also frowning husband and led him up the back stairway.
“That’s it?” Grey asked as soon as they reached the upstairs hall. “The man destroys your life’s work, and ye not only hand it over to him, you practically hand him our daughter as well?”
“Luke didn’t destroy anything,” she said, pulling him into their bedroom and closing the door.
“He just told ye he crashed Podly.”
“No, he told me he thinkshe caused Podly to crash.” She stepped into his arms and started toying with one of the buttons on his shirt. “And I merely let him believe that he did,” she said softly.
Grey’s hands went to her shoulders. “Did youcrash the satellite?”
“I was rather busy right about then, Grey. If you remember correctly, our baby girl was giving birth to our granddaughter at that precise moment.”
“Then if you didn’t make it crash, and Pascal didn’t, who did?”
“I have no idea.” She started toying with his buttons again, undoing the top one. “Maybe the same person who sent us that Christmas card? Because what are the chances that my satellite would crash so close to my home?” She looked up. “The odds of that happening are astronomical, Grey. It hasto be the magic.”
He reached up and stilled her hand just as she undid the next button. “I find myself growing worried about ye, wife.”
“How’s that?” she asked, still managing to undo the next button.
“You’ve been acting far too much like melately.”
Grace went perfectly still. Oh God, he was right! She’d turned into a warrior,only instead of wielding a sword, her weapon was deceit.
She headed for the door. “I’m going to go tell Luke everything.”
“Oh, no you’re not,” he said, sweeping her up in his arms with a laugh and striding to their bed. “If ye confess to Pascal, then I’llbe forced to go get Camry, and I agree it would turn out badly for all of us.”
He opened his arms and dropped her on their bed, then quickly settled on top of her. “I’m not upset ye guilted Pascal into going after Camry, only that I hadn’t thought of it myself.” He started undoing the buttons on her blouse. “But then, I didn’t have all the pieces of the puzzle, did I? So when were ye going to tell me your little satellite is scattered over half of Springy Mountain? I would have found it for ye, Grace.”
“I know you would have, and I love you for that. But Podly really isn’t mine anymore, Grey. It’s Camry’s future. And I need for her to wantto go find it herself.”
“And is the secret to ion propulsion sitting under three feet of snow right now?”
“Yes.”
He stopped undressing her. “Ye solved the puzzle? Then we have to go get it!”
He started to get up, but Grace pulled him back. “No, we don’t. Podly’s been holding the secret for twenty years; I think it can wait another couple of weeks.”
“Twenty years! Ye solved the problem twenty years ago, and you’ve been letting it orbit the Earth all this time? Grace, that’s been your life’s work!”
“Don’t get so excited,” she soothed, cupping his cheeks and setting her thumbs over his lips. “I didn’t find the answer, Camrydid—when she was twelve.”
He tried to sit up, but she held him over her. “One day when Camry was twelve, she was down in the lab with me, working on a project for her school science fair. But then she started looking over my shoulder and asking me one question after another about what I was doing. And when I told her the particular problem I was having, she merely pointed at the screen and asked why I simply didn’t transpose two seemingly disconnected integers in the equation I was working on.”
She gently patted his cheeks when he frowned, and gave a soft laugh. “Don’t ask me to explain it right now, or we’ll still be in this bed come spring. Anyway, it might have been a question from an unschooled child, but it was pure genius. I reversed the numbers, which forced me to change several more, and within an hour I knew I could make ion propulsion work.”
“And why didn’t ye shout it to the world?”
“Because unlocking the code actually created a whole new set of problems. I couldn’t really claim I had mastered ion propulsion, because I hadn’t figured out how to actually controlit.” She sighed. “Ions can be used for more than just propulsion, Grey; they can also be used as a weapon. I wasn’t ready to go there, because I wasn’t sure the world was ready to go there.”
“And now?” he asked. “If Camry and Pascal find Podly like ye hope, and they discover the secret, is the world ready now?”
“Don’t you think I’ve been asking myself that question all this time?”
He reared up slightly. “So that’s what you’ve been doing for the last twenty years, when ye locked yourself in your lab? Instead of trying to figure out how to make ion propulsion viable, you’ve been working on how you can keep it from being used as a weapon?” He frowned again. “Have ye succeeded?”
“Almost. But I’m sure that if Camry, Luke, and I put our heads together, we can hand the world a propulsion system that can be used for space travel.” She cupped his cheeks again. “And if some other scientist takes our work and turns it into a weapon . . . well, I’ve finally made peace with the fact that all I can control is mycontribution to mankind, which will be a more efficient propulsion system.”
“And if Pascal doesn’t feel the same way?”
“Then he will have to live with his decision, as every scientist must.” She smiled. “But sometimes we simply have to trust the magic, don’t we, when it starts messing with us? If you look at all the coincidences that brought Luke to our door, you have to realize there’s no such thing as a coincidence.”
Grey groaned, laying his forehead on her. “If you’re trying to tell me that Winter or Matt had anything to do with any of this, I swear I’ll—”
Grace placed her finger over his mouth. “Not them,” she said with a laugh. “I believe it’s someone even more magical.”
“Who?”
“On the winter solstice, when my house is overflowing with allmy children and grandchildren, then I will tell you who I think it is. Make love to me, husband. Take me traveling beyond the stars under yourpower.”
Chapter Three
At about the same time a half-frozen Lucian Pascal Renoir was walking across the drawbridge of Gù Brath, Camry MacKeage was being dragged toward the beach of Go Back Cove by three massive dogs and one clueless dachshund that thought it was God’s gift to the world. As soon as she saw that the beach was completely deserted—which wasn’t surprising, considering it was only a few degrees above freezing—Camry unsnapped all four leashes and released her charges.
“Go on!” she shouted, racing after them with a laugh. “Run until you drop so we can get home and take a nap. I have to tend bar tonight!”
She ran along behind them for maybe a mile, until a stitch in her side forced her to stop. It was as she was bent over with her hands on her knees, watching her panting breath condense in the cold air, that she heard what sounded like someone sobbing.
Camry straightened and looked around but saw only the dogs racing back toward her, their having discovered she was no longer following. She headed toward the dead grass and dormant rugosa rose bushes separating the beach from the old county road, her ear chocked in the direction the sound was coming from. She suddenly stopped at the sight of a girl, huddled shivering inside a totally inadequate jacket, her face buried in her knees.
“Hey, there,” Cam said, slowly approaching.
The girl snapped her head up, her crystal blue eyes huge with surprise.
Cam stopped several yards away when the girl frantically looked around, as if searching for an escape route. “Hey, it’s okay,” she said gently, shoving her hands in her pockets. She shrugged, smiling at the girl. “I’m sorry if I startled you. I thought the beach was deserted.”
The three large dogs descended on Camry, kicking up sand as they screeched to a halt and started wrestling with one another at her feet. The dachshund, its tongue whipping its cheek as it panted to catch up, suddenly changed direction.
“Tigger!” Camry cried just as the dachshund launched itself at the girl.
The previously sobbing young woman caught the small dog with a gasp, then gave a strangled giggle when Tigger started washing her face.
The three other dogs, suddenly realizing there was a new toy on their beach, took off. Camry lunged after them, but was able to grab only one by the collar. The other two plowed into the girl, sending her onto her back and forcing her to cover her face to protect herself from their slobbering tongues.
“Max! Ruffles! Get off her!” Cam shouted, her lone captive dragging her to the girl’s rescue. She finally had to let go of the whining German shepherd in order to deal with the black Lab and golden retriever. She pushed the two larger dogs off the girl and scooped Tigger up in her arms, then had to use her knee to shove away the shepherd, who was determined to get in a few slobbers of its own.
Desperate to save the girl from getting licked to death, Camry set Tigger down, grabbed the hysterically giggling young woman, and hauled her to her feet. “Jeesh, I’m sorry,” she said, trying to push away the excited dogs. “They won’t hurt you, I promise.”
The girl instantly sobered and blinked at her.
“They’re really just four-legged cupcakes,” Cam said, grabbing Max’s collar when the Lab knocked the girl back a step. Cam shoved the dog away, then picked up a short piece of driftwood. “Fetch!” she shouted, flinging it toward the beach.
The three large dogs immediately shot after it, but Tigger sat down and started whining, staring up at the girl. The young woman picked up the dachshund and hugged it to her chest.
“I’m Camry. And that bundle of ecstasy you’re holding is Tigger.”
The girl said nothing, merely rubbed her cheek against Tigger’s fur.
“Do you live around here?” Cam asked, scanning the road behind the low dunes for signs of a car—although she wasn’t even sure the girl was old enough to drive.
“No,” the girl whispered, her beautiful blue eyes wary.
“Do you have a name?”
“Fiona.”
Cam didn’t even try to hide her surprise. “Really? Fiona?” She smiled broadly. “I have a five-and-a-half-month-old niece named Fiona. Um . . . Fiona what?”
The girl didn’t answer, but merely rubbed her cheek over Tigger’s fur again.
Cam sighed. Judging by the condition of her clothes, and the fact that she was reluctant to give her full name, Camry figured the girl was a runaway. Another contributing factor was that Fiona looked as if she hadn’t seen a bar of soap or hot water for a week, or a decent meal in days. She was pale and shivering, and looked so vulnerable, Cam just wanted to pull her into her arms and hug her senseless.
“If you don’t live around here, then you must just be passing through. Do you have a place to stay tonight?”
“I was told there’s a shelter down in Portland.”
Camry fought to keep her horror from showing. Surely the girl wasn’t hitchhiking! “Portland’s thirty miles from here. I tell you what,” she said, backing onto the beach. “I live close by, and have a spare bed at my place. And I have this really huge fireplace we could build a roaring fire in, and a hot-water supply that will let you take an hour-long shower if you want.” She canted her head with a lopsided grin. “And it just so happens I was planning to drive into Portland tomorrow, so I could give you a ride.”
That is, assuming she couldn’t talk her into going home instead.
When she saw that Fiona was following—albeit hesitantly—Cam turned and slowly started walking up the beach toward her house. “I have to go to work tonight,” she continued conversationally, “but the pub where I tend bar has some of the best food this side of Portland.” She smiled over at Fiona, who had fallen into step beside her, still hugging Tigger tightly, apparently enjoying the warmth.
But then Fiona suddenly ran inland, and Cam’s heart sank at the sight of the girl bolting, until she realized she was taking off with Tigger!
“Hey, my dog!” she shouted, giving chase.
Fiona just as suddenly stopped in the grass and set Tigger down, reached behind a bush, and straightened with a large backpack in her hand.
Cam sighed in relief. “Oh, good,” she said, starting down the beach again as if nothing had happened. “I also have a washer and dryer, if you need to do laundry.”
“What will your husband say about your letting me stay the night?” Fiona asked, rushing to catch up, the pack slung over her shoulders and Tigger back in her arms.
“I don’t have a husband.”
“Oh. You’re divorced, then?”
Camry gave her a sidelong glance. “No. I’ve never been married.”
Fiona stopped to blink at her. “How old are you?”
Camry blinked back. “Almost thirty-two. Why?”
“And you’ve neverbeen married?”
She started walking again. “Last I knew, it wasn’t a crime to be thirty-two and single. How about you? You married?”
“I’m only sixteen!”
Cam smiled. “I don’t believe it’s a crime to be single at sixteen, either. So Fiona, what’s so exciting about staying in a shelter in Portland?”
The girl didn’t answer for several heartbeats, then quietly said, “It’s got to be better than living at home.”
“I see. Pretty bad, is it?”
“My father is impossible. It seems as if every time I turn around, he’s lecturing me about something.”
Cam snorted. “Tell me about it. What is it between fathers and daughters, anyway? It’s like the minute we’re born, a man’s lecturing gene kicks into high gear.”
Fiona stopped again. “Your father lectured you, too?”
“Are you kidding? He’s stilllecturing me.”
“At thirty-two?” She hugged Tigger closer. “Sometimes my dad treats me like I don’t have the sense to come in out of the rain. He doesn’t like most of my friends, especially the boys, and he doesn’t like how I dress.”
Camry grabbed the stick from the shepherd’s mouth and threw it down the beach, sending the three dogs scurrying after it. She started walking again. “Oh, yeah? Just wait until you’re two years out of college and still unmarried. Then the lectures change from warnings that ‘all men are wolves,’ to ‘how come you can’t find a man?’ And by the time you’re thirty, they change again to ‘ye can’t give me grandchildren if ye don’t find yourself a husband,’ ” she said, mimicking her father’s highland brogue.
Fiona giggled at the stern expression Camry gave along with the accent and covered her mouth with her hand. “Are you serious?” she asked, her big blue eyes widening. “The lectures are nevergoing to stop?”
“Nope. And you know why?”
“Why?”
“Because we daughters scare the hell out of our daddies. They love us to death, and worry about us so much, that they can’t stand our not having a husband to take care of us.”
“We scareour fathers?” Fiona snorted. “I don’t think anything scares my dad.”
Camry saw the girl hug Tigger on a shiver, and started walking again. “ Youscare him, because he loves you. That’s my house, right there,” she said, pointing to the small cottage sitting on the bluff.
“Wow, you live right on the beach. Are you rich?”
Camry laughed. “Not exactly. I’m just renting. How about you? Are you rich?”
Fiona snorted. “Money isn’t everything, you know.”
“But it sure helps buy designer jeans, expensive backpacks, and fancy watches, doesn’t it?” she said, nodding at the watch on the girl’s wrist.
“I can’t help it if my parents are rich,” Fiona said defensively.
“No, just like you can’t help that they’re probably so worried right now, they’ve got every law enforcement official in the state looking for you. How long have you been on the run, Fiona?”
“Not long enough,” she snapped, spinning around and heading for the house.
Cam gave a sharp whistle and the three dogs bounded up to her. “Come on, let’s get the sand off you before your loving masters come pick you up,” she told them, running to catch up with Fiona. “Hey, I wouldn’t be a responsible adult if I didn’t at least tryto point out that your family is worried sick about you.”
“They probably don’t even realize I’m missing.”
“Trust me, any father who loves you enough to lecture you definitely knows when you’re not sleeping in your bed. I swear I couldn’t sneak out of our house after dark without running into my father at the end of the driveway.” She opened the door and motioned for Fiona to precede her onto the enclosed porch. “Don’t let the dogs in the house. I have to wipe the sand off them first. Just set Tigger down and go warm up. I’ll be right along.”
“I’ll help.”
Camry handed her an old towel. “Okay. The Lab’s name is Max, the golden is Ruffles, and the shepherd is Suki. I’ve got to get them spit-shined before their parents pick them up in an hour.”
“They’re not yours?”
“Good Lord, no. What would I want with this pack of overgrown babies? I just dog-sit them while their owners work to keep them in kibble. You know, sort of like a doggie day care.”
“That’s it? That’s what you do for a living?”
“It pays the bills. And I also bartend at a pub Friday and Saturday nights.”
Fiona gaped at her.
“What?”
“But you said you’re almost thirty-two. How come you don’t have a real career?”
“You mean like Suzy Homemaker or president of the United States? Or maybe a rocket scientist or something?”
The young woman flushed to the roots of her dirty-blond hair. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean you had to be something as brilliant as a rocket scientist. It’s just that . . . well, you seem so smart and everything.” She motioned toward the dogs. “I mean, is this all you’re going to do for the rest of your life, babysit other people’s dogs and serve drinks on weekends?”
Camry grabbed Max and started brushing the sand off his legs. “Rocket science isn’t all you think it’s cracked up to be,” she muttered. “You going to stand out here shivering all afternoon, or help me clean up these mutts?”
Camry spent the next two days trying to persuade Fiona to call her parents, all the while making sure she didn’t soundlike a parent for fear the girl would take off on her own again. But all her efforts got her was a roommate who suddenly didn’t seem in any hurry to leave.
She’d been stunned speechless the first night, when Fiona had emerged from the shower wearing the clothes she’d lent her. The girl was breathtakingly beautiful; her wavy, waist-length hair was actually strawberry blonde, her complexion was flawless, and in clothes that fit her far better than they did Cam, her figure would have made a dead man sit up and take notice.
Hell, if she was Fiona’s daddy, she wouldn’t waste her time lecturing the girl, she’d lock her in her room until she was thirty!
She’d had second thoughts about taking Fiona to the Go Back Grill that first night, but since she had only three eggs and some outdated mayonnaise in the fridge, Cam had been forced to take her to work. So she’d sat the girl at the end of the bar to keep an eye on her, then stuffed her full of greasy, fattening food.
By the second night, she’d talked Dave Bean—who owned the Go Back Grill—into letting Fiona bus a few tables to pay for all the greasy, fattening food she’d been wolfing down as if she had a hollow leg.
But it was Sunday afternoon, and Camry was feeling more like a worried parent than a roommate as Fiona got ready for work. That’s why she had Dave on the phone, giving him hell for giving the girl a permanent job!
“You can’t have a sixteen-year-old on staff at a bar, Dave,” Cam growled into her cell phone. “Child Services is going to come after you for hiring a minor.”
“That’s not what you said last night, when you kindly pointed out that her busing tables was perfectly legal,” Dave growled back. “Make up your mind, Cam.”
“It’s only legal when I’mworking there. Hey, wait. If you hired her, what name did she put on the W-2 form?”
“Fiona Smith.”
Camry snorted. “She had to give you a Social Security number. What is it?”
“Now, Cam, you know I can’t give that out to anyone.”
Camry looked around to make sure Fiona was still in the spare bedroom getting dressed, and turned her back and lowered her voice. “But she’s a runaway, Dave. I called the police Friday, but they don’t have any missing teens fitting her description. I need that number to find out who she really is so I can call her parents.”
A heavy sigh came over the phone. “I know. But you’re putting me between a rock and a hard place here. I promise, first thing tomorrow morning I’ll turn Fiona’s W-2 over to my accountant and ask him look into it. But it’s probably a bogus number, just like Smith is obviously fake.”
“Yet you hired her anyway.”
“Because I’m desperate to find bus staff. Kids today don’t want to work for an honest wage; they want Mommy and Daddy to just hand them money. And besides,” he said, lowering his own voice. “I didn’t dare say no when she asked me for a job, because like you, I want her hanging around long enough for us to find her parents.”
Cam sighed in defeat. “At least it’ll buy us time. But how am I supposed to keep an eye on her when I’m not scheduled to work? She’ll be running around your bar, being watched by every single andmarried male in the joint.”
“It’s Sunday night, and I have nearly every table reserved up until nine,” Dave countered. “And you know why? Because all the flyers I’ve been passing out have let everyone know that I’ve classed the place up and hired new staff.”
“Then I want to come to work tonight, too.”
“Betty’s covering the bar tonight.”
“Then I’ll wait tables.”
“I’m still recovering from the last time you waited tables. You’re a good bartender, MacKeage, but you suck as a waitress.”
“I promise, I won’t dump anything on anyone.”
A pained sigh came over the phone. “I’ll keep an eye on your kid. She’s just busing tables.”
“She can bus on Fridays and Saturdays.”
“But I’ve never had more than two reservations on a Sunday night.”
“Which must mean you need extra staff.”
He sighed again. “You promise you won’t get smart-mouthed with my patrons, or dump any food on them?”
“Scout’s honor.”
“And you’ll wear one of my new waitress uniforms?”
“Those . . . thingshanging in the back room are uniforms?” She snorted. “I thought you wanted to turn the place into a familypub, not some pseudo-colonial bar with waitresses dressed like wenches. “
“Go Back Cove was supposed to have been a hideout for pirates back in the 1800s, and I’m simply playing up the old legend. I spent all last night and this morning redecorating the place.”
“Fiona is notwearing a low-cut blouse and one of those leather bustier thingies. I swear I’ll call Child Services myself if you put her in one of those sexist costumes.”
“I have mostly bus boys,Cam. Fiona can wear jeans and a T-shirt, just like they do. But,” he said before she could say anything, “you can wait tables tonight if you’re willing to wear the new uniform.”
Dammit, dammit, dammit. She didn’t want to dress up like a wench!
Then again, she didn’t want Fiona going to work without her, either.
But if she tried to talk the girl out of going to her new job, that made her no better than Fiona’s parents. And she’d be damned if she was going to mother the child.
“What’ll it be, Cam? You coming to work or not?”
“I’ll be there,” she snapped, hitting the End button when she heard Dave chuckle and slinging the phone at the couch.
“Are you going to stay and have supper when you drive me in?” Fiona asked, walking into the room. “Because there’s still nothing in the fridge.”
Camry closed her eyes and counted to ten, suddenly having a whole new appreciation for her own mother, who had managed to raise seven girls without losing her sanity. She opened her eyes, and, yup, her roommate was still dressed like a prostitute. “Um . . . is that one of the outfits your father objected to?”
Fiona looked down at herself, then smiled at Cam. “Yeah. He asked me if I’d stolen it off some hooker the last time he took me to New York City.”
“Well . . . at the risk of sounding like your father,” Camry said with a crooked grin, choosing her words carefully, “is there any chance I could get you to wear an oversize T-shirt and a pair of myjeans tonight?”
Camry held up her hand to forestall the objection forming on Fiona’s lips, took a deep breath, and jumped right into the quagmire. “It’s not that I don’t think that’s a fabulous outfit, but you’re working in a bar,Fiona. And you’re certainly old enough to realize that some men, when they’ve had a little more beer than they should, forget this is the twenty-first century and that women were not put on this Earth merely for their entertainment.” She shrugged. “I know it’s archaic, but I also know that you’re bright enough to realize that sometimes we women are better off downplaying our assets instead of . . . accentuating them.”
Oh God, those words could have come straight out of hermother’s mouth!
Fiona stared at her for the longest time, saying nothing, then suddenly smiled. “Okay,” she said, spinning around and heading back into the bedroom. “Can I wear your black jeans?”
“Yeah, go ahead,” Cam said, closing her eyes in relief, suddenly remembering why the mere thought of having kids scared the hell out of her.
