Charlotte Douglas - The Bride's Rescuer

Mrs. Givens laughed with a nervous twittering sound. “He was a gentleman landowner with farms, mines and such.”

His work didn’t sound ominous enough to make him run away to a deserted island. Maybe the illness Mrs. Givens had mentioned had caused his early retirement. “Why did he leave all that behind?”

The housekeeper ceased her stirring and set the mixing bowl down with a heavy thud. Pain contorted her face. “I am never to speak a word about that. And you mustn’t ask. Mr. Alexander has sworn me not to speak of it.”

“You hinted yesterday that he’s ill.” The night before Cameron had appeared strong and healthy, suffering only from the effects of too much brandy and his peculiar insistence that she remain on the island.

“Aye, so I did. Suffice it to say his illness is one of the heart, and let it go at that. I’ve said too much already.”

An illness of the heart? Of the head, more likely, if he believed he could hold her hostage for three months. Celia gauged the set of the housekeeper’s mouth and decided further questions would be futile.

An illness of the heart. Had an ill-fated love affair broken his grasp on reality? It must have been a grand passion to keep him on his island called Solitaire, isolated from the world and its conveniences and pleasures.

She finished her breakfast and left Mrs. Givens to her baking. She would find Cameron Alexander and demand he take her to the mainland, even if she had to bribe him with more money than she could afford.

She stepped off the veranda and headed toward the beach. Cabbage palms provided the house’s only shade, and the tropical sun beat mercilessly on the tin roof. In the dazzling white heat of late morning, not even a condensation trail from a Miami-bound jet marred the perfection of the bright sky. The name Solitaire fit the isolated place.

As she walked north, she discovered a huge pile of driftwood, palm fronds and flotsam someone had cleared from the beach and stacked to be burned. She recalled seeing a box of matches on a kitchen shelf. If Cameron refused to take her to Key West, she’d watch for a passing boat and light a bonfire to signal it. Pleasure boats and fishing crafts filled the Florida waters. Surely one of them would respond to the blaze and pluck her off the island.

A hand touched her shoulder, and she jumped. She’d heard no one approach, but the dark figure of Noah stood beside her, outlined by the sun.

“Howdy, miss. I saw you standing all by yourself. This place seems powerful lonesome when you first come here. I remember.”

For a moment she could see her own unhappiness reflected in the man’s soft brown eyes.

“Thought you might like somebody to talk to, and I’d be mighty proud to show you my garden.”

“You’re right. I was feeling lonesome.”

Glad for his company, she walked down the beach beside him. When they reached the path leading back to the house, Cameron was nowhere in sight, but Mrs. Givens was hanging linens out to dry on a line stretched between two palms behind the kitchen.

Abruptly the house appeared to waver and fade, blending into the surrounding foliage until it seemed to disappear. Celia blinked in disbelief, then squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head to dispel what must have been another touch of vertigo. When she looked again, the house stood solidly before her, its cypress clapboards bleached the pale gray of driftwood by the sun. Lush vines of magenta bougainvillea twined around its stilts and along the balustrades, softening its strong lines. It seemed such a natural part of the island, the illusion that it had disappeared must have been a trick of sunlight and heat, like a mirage in the desert.

Cameron Alexander had chosen his exile well. From a distant boat, the house would be indistinguishable among the lush vegetation of the key.

She followed Noah around the house to the island’s eastern side, where he pointed with pride to his garden, heavy with vegetables, pineapples and papayas. Orange trees with dark, shining leaves and golden globes of fruit and mango and avocado trees formed a wind break along the garden’s northern border. On the south side, a small outbuilding provided shelter for a cow and nesting hens.

A sea breeze rustled the palms, gulls cried overhead, and bay water lapped against a labyrinth of mangrove roots that ringed the eastern shore. Under other circumstances, Solitaire could be paradise.

“Noah, would you take me to Key West? It can’t be that long a trip, and I’d pay you well for your trouble.”

Fear gleamed in the man’s eyes. “Not me. I don’t dare go near the place.”

“Why?”

“I just can’t, that’s all.”

He avoided looking her in the eye, and she realized, like Cameron, Noah had secrets of his own. He was a huge, powerful man. She wouldn’t risk angering him by asking personal questions. “I must return to my business as soon as possible. Do you think I can talk Mr. Alexander into taking me?”

Noah shook his head. “Uh-uh. Won’t nothing make Mr. Alex go where they’s people.”

Frustration engulfed her. Her shop stood closed and empty on a street thronged with tourists, but no one would miss her. Her customers would think she was on her honeymoon. With her parents dead, she had no other close relatives, no one to alert the Coast Guard to search for her when she didn’t return home. Tracey knew Celia had often taken the sailboat out for days at a time. Her friend wouldn’t be worried yet, especially since she knew Celia would be embarrassed about skipping out on her own wedding. Tracey would probably guess she was lying low until the brouhaha blew over.

“Won’t do much good,” Noah said, “but you can try asking Mr. Alex.”

“But I can’t find him! Where can he hide on an island?”

Noah pointed to a break in the mangroves where a dock stretched out into the bay. Beyond it, a white sail flashed on the water as a boat tacked toward the island. Celia squared her shoulders and headed toward the dock for a showdown with her mysterious host.

CAMERON TURNED HIS sailboat north toward the island, where his thoughts had been drawn all morning, no matter how hard he had tried to escape them. Always before, his excursions among the hundreds of small islands helped scour away the painful memories of his past, renewing his spirit and his strength. But everything had changed with the storm that brought Celia Stevens to his beach. What little peace he had wrested from his exile seemed lost to him forever.

She haunted him everywhere he looked. The gulf waters sparkled and shone like her eyes. Her melodic voice murmured in the breeze. The swaying of tall palms mimicked her movements, and the sea oats fringing the dunes glistened as bright as her hair. His conversation with her had been brief, but long enough to recognize the intelligence behind her beautiful face. Damn her! The woman had no obvious faults, gave him no ammunition to resist her.

And resist he must—for twelve long weeks until Captain Biggins and the supply boat arrived to take her away. And then only after he’d sworn her to secrecy about his whereabouts, not only for his own safety but for hers.

He toyed briefly with the idea of sending Noah to take her to Key West, but he could not place the man who had served him so faithfully in such peril. If Noah was arrested, his spirit would wither and die. God knew, Cameron would take her there himself, if he dared, but the risk of discovery was too great.

And what about the risk to her?

He grappled with his conscience as he adjusted the lines of the sail. Celia Stevens was much safer on the island with Mrs. Givens and Noah to protect her than alone on the open sea with him.

And how would he survive twelve weeks with her reminding him of all he had lost? He steered the boat onto the nearest sandbar, dropped anchor and dove overboard fully clothed in a futile attempt to drown the anguish that consumed him.