chapter 14

The thing about turning a guy down for sex—especially when you really wanted to have

sex with him—was that it was hard to know how to act when you saw him in the

breakfast room the next morning.

While Julia was gathering up her coffee and her blueberry muffin in the little sunfilled

dining room downstairs at the B&B, part of her hoped that Colin would happen to

come downstairs at just that moment and join her, so they could continue with the sexual

chemistry that had ignited the night before.

But part of her hoped that he wouldn't come in, hoped that he would have breakfast

in his room or get something in town so there'd be no chance of early morning

awkwardness. After all, she didn't know his state of mind. Was his pride injured? Would

he do that defensive man thing, where any woman who said no was suddenly dead to

him? Julia had come across that type before—she suspected every woman had—and it

would make for rough going until this thing with Drew was sorted out.

She really hoped he wasn't that kind of man, because when she'd said no the night

before, what she'd meant was, not yet. She'd wanted him last night, and she wanted him

now. She just didn't want him when she was drunk and emotionally fragile.

If he couldn't understand that, she decided, then she didn't want him at all.

She finished her muffin and went back for a carton of yogurt, having pretty much

decided that he wasn't coming. Maybe he was a late sleeper. Maybe he was on his laptop,

already dealing with the many unfathomable demands of managing the Delaney wealth.

Maybe he was such an early riser that he'd already come and gone.

Or, maybe he was avoiding her.

In any case, she was starting to relax as she finished her yogurt and then refilled her

coffee mug. A handful of people were having breakfast around her, eating toast and

Danishes and hard-boiled eggs in the cozy room with its hardwood floors, its lace

curtains, and its smells of hot coffee and fresh baked goods. She could hear the murmur

of conversation from an elderly couple at one table, and a mother and child at another.

Gradually, her tension eased. The B&B really was a pleasant little retreat, and the

island was beautiful and serene. She wouldn't mind coming back here sometime under

less fraught circumstances. Maybe in the spring.

She was just musing about the possibility of canoeing and hiking when a familiar

form filled the doorway.

Julia wasn't sure whether to feel excitement to see him or intense discomfort after all

that had passed between them the night before. So she just went right ahead and felt both.

Colin was wearing jeans and a blue sweater that was probably cashmere, layered

over a white T-shirt that peeked through under his sweater's V-neck. His shoes looked

expensive and inappropriate to the surroundings, as they always did. She wondered

whether he even had any sneakers or hiking boots, or if he bought all of his footwear

from designer boutiques.

He waggled his fingers at her in greeting, a shy smile on his face.

Not defensive, then, but a feeling a little awkward. Well, she could relate to that.

He came to her table and stood there with his hands stuffed in his pockets, waiting

for an invitation—which she couldn't help thinking was pretty damned cute.

"Sit down," she said. He pulled out the dainty chair across from her and settled into

it.

"Listen. About last night …" he began.

Julia wondered how many difficult early morning conversations, over the history of

mankind, had begun just that way. Thousands, certainly. Millions. Perhaps billions.

She held up a hand to stop him. "I'm not going to make you have this conversation

before you've even gotten your first cup of coffee. God knows what you might say. And

anyway, it would just be cruel." She gave him a little half smile, and he grinned

gratefully.

"Good point," he said. "Hold that thought."

She waited while he went to the buffet table, filled a mug, and doctored the coffee

with milk and sugar.

When he was back, again seated across from her, he leaned closer so the others in

the room wouldn't hear.

"Just to make it clear where I stand," he began, "I'm not sorry I hit on you last night.

I hope to hit on you again sometime soon. But I am sorry that I did it when you'd had

such a hard day, and when you'd had too much to drink, and when you were dealing with

so much difficult stuff. I won't make another move if you don't want me to. But if you do

want me to, I promise to work on my timing."

She felt a bloom of warmth in her chest. Maybe he wasn't feeling as shy and

awkward as she'd thought.

"I rehearsed," he said, and a bubble of laughter escaped her lips.

"All right." She nodded, still grinning. "So you'll know where I stand, I do want you

to make another move. Sometime. Just not while I'm so … stirred up about everything."

"Fair enough. It's good to be on the same page." He said it in his lawyer voice, the

one he probably used when he was wrapping up a contract or a negotiation.

"Now," he continued, still in business mode. "Are we going back out there to see

Drew together, or should I go alone?"

Of course they went together, because there was no way Julia was going to let him

go out there alone, and there was no way Colin was going to let her give him the slip

again.

They decided it was best not to call Drew first, because given his state of mind the

day before, there was always the chance that he would take it as a warning and leave the

house to avoid them.

Why anyone would want to avoid learning about an enormous inheritance, Colin

didn't know. But he supposed the whole thing was so wrapped up in Drew's various

emotions that it would be pointless to try to make logical sense of anything the man

might do.

Colin and Julia were mostly quiet as they got into the rental car and drove amid the

pines and ferns, and the occasional deer sprinting across the roadway, toward Drew's

house on the south side of the island.

Colin could sense Julia's tension, and he wanted to give her space. Besides, his own

feelings about meeting Drew McCray were complicated at best. Drew represented an

entire life that Redmond had lived that neither Colin nor any of his family had known

about. It had always seemed to Colin that Redmond was as steady and knowable a man as

any could be. Everyone had a hidden emotional life, he knew that. But Colin had always

believed Redmond to be a man of plain and simple values and integrity. To realize that

Colin had never really known him at all seemed to tilt the earth on its axis.

Still, Colin had a mission, and he meant to achieve it. He was here to make sure

justice was done, that a right was wronged. Drew McCray had been cut out of his rightful

family for nearly thirty years. Colin meant to restore the man to the place where he

belonged, no matter what upheaval that might set into motion.

When they arrived at the house, they parked the car and walked to the front door

under a light drizzle of rain. The sky was a foreboding gray, and the cold pushed in

against Colin despite the shelter of his overcoat.

Huddled under the cover of the front porch, they knocked on the door and got no

answer. The place had the feel of being occupied, though. Drew's car was parked on a

dirt patch of the lot, and they could hear the faint sounds of human activity from

somewhere on the property.

"Let's try the workshop," Julia said, pointing to a large outbuilding behind the

house.

Colin peered around the corner of the house at the big, rectangular building made of

weathered wood. "Workshop?" It occurred to him that he didn't even know what Drew

McCray did for a living. "What kind of workshop?"

"He builds boats," Julia said. "At least, he used to. In Montana. Custom fishing

boats."

Colin's eyebrows rose. "There any money in that?"

"Not so far."

Colin began to head down the front porch steps, but Julia was trailing behind,

hesitating.

"You okay?" he asked her.

She took a deep breath and shoved her hands into the pockets of her down coat. "I

will be," she said. "Let's go."

They found Drew in the workshop, a space heater blowing to make the room

habitable, the shiny, gleaming sides of what would be a twenty-foot fishing boat perched

atop a network of sawhorses in the center of the space. He was sanding the panels when

they walked in, but now he turned off the sander, put it aside, and stood with his arms

crossed over his chest as though he were preparing himself for a confrontation.

Which, Colin supposed, he was.

Colin approached Drew with his hand extended.

"Drew?" Colin kept his voice neutral, even pleasant. "I'm Colin Delaney. I'm here

—"

"I know why you're here." Drew remained in his defensive pose and refused to take

the hand Colin offered to him. "Julia told me."

Colin left the hand out there long enough for it to become intensely awkward for

both of them. Finally, he let it fall.

Colin thought about trying to make icebreaking small talk—something about the

boat, perhaps—but he knew he wouldn't be able to pull it off. A failed show of

friendliness would just make things worse.

"Is there somewhere we can talk?" Colin said instead