Persuaded (4 page)

“You
know I can’t be in the sun for long, Hanna. Do I need to remind you why?”

“Because
you’re a vampire and you’ll turn into a pillar of ash?”

Mary
eyed her sister darkly. She had never been one for humor.

Hanna
swallowed the laughter before it escaped, taking Mary by the shoulders. “You’re
not going to die of skin cancer like Mom, Mare. You know that was an extreme
case, right?”

Mary’s
eyes misted over at the mention of their mother, who had died when Mary was
very young. Hanna would be surprised indeed if her sister had much memory of
her at all.

“Anyway,”
Hanna continued, threading an arm through Mary’s and towing her toward the
door, “long sleeves, sunscreen, and hats. Now that I’m here, it’s time to start
enjoying your vacation, whether you want to or not!”

Mary
slit her eyes at Hanna, but allowed herself to be led out the door and onto the
sand all the same.

The
scene hadn’t changed much from the one that met Hanna from her window; the only
difference was that Ella had flipped onto her stomach and unhooked her bikini
top, baring her back to the sun. Charles and CJ were a good distance from
shore, Charles sitting atop his surfboard and CJ doing his best to imitate the
action with his boogie board.

“I
wish Charles wouldn’t take him so far out,” Mary said to Hanna, clucking her
tongue in disapproval as they approached Ella.

“He
has a life jacket on,” Hanna pointed out.

When
she spoke, Ella looked up. “Hanna, you’re here!” Bolting up off her towel, Ella
clamped a hand over her bikini top as she embraced Hanna. Ella had always been
energetic, and it seemed that in her early twenties, her bubbly reserves were
still going strong.

“Hey,
Ella. It’s good to see you.”

“We’re
going to have so much fun! Now that you’re here, I’ll have someone to go
running with in the morning.”

“I
told you I’d go running with you,” Mary reminded Ella as she passed the baby
monitor into her hands.

Ella
backpedaled. “It’s just you’re not usually up when I go, Mary. I’m kind of an
early-morning exerciser.”

Mary
looked away. “Keep an ear out for Walter—if it’s not too much to ask.”

Ella
rolled her eyes and dropped the baby monitor on her towel. “So are we good to
go running in the morning, Hanna?”

“Sorry
to disappoint, Ella, but I don’t run. Like, ever. I’m more of a walker.”

“Speed
walking’s good.”

Hanna
thought of her stroll down Main Street earlier. That sounded much more
appealing to her. But Ella’s face was alight with a hope that pinched Hanna’s
compassion nerve.

“Sure,”
was all she got out before Ella smothered her again. All at once, Hanna’s
getaway felt a lot less like a vacation.

FIVE

HEAD-BUTTING

Her eye half met
Captain Wentworth’s, a bow, a curtsy passed; she heard his voice . . . a few
minutes ended it.

—Jane Austen,
Persuasion

Hanna woke
obscenely early the next day. Glaring at her alarm, she silently cursed her
inability to use the word
no
as she clicked it off. She doubted very
much if her nephews were even up at such an hour, even though they had always
been early risers. Making her way into the bathroom, Hanna silenced the
resentful voice in her head—the one that told her she should still be sleeping.
After splashing water on her face, smoothing her dull hair back into a
ponytail, and brushing her teeth, she felt better. She quickly traded her
nightshirt for shorts and a tank top, layered on her worn gray hoodie (“old
reliable” as she had lovingly christened it), then stepped into a pair of
tennis shoes.

Ella
was already downstairs, stretching and looking more attractive than anyone had
a right to at such an hour. She wore a tight white T-shirt and hot pink bottoms
that barely qualified as shorts for all their length. Her long, dark, wavy hair
had been left down. Hanna never understood how people could exercise without
pulling their hair back. Sure you looked sexier with your hair down, but once
the sweat started flying, did it really matter?

“Morning,”
Ella greeted, bouncing up off the floor and taking a water bottle from the
fridge. “Wow, Hanna, we need to get you out in the sun.”

Hanna
looked down at her long, slender, pasty legs and suddenly wished her own shorts
were longer—even though they had a good six inches on Ella’s. “Yeah, good luck
with that. I’m pretty sure I’m like one-sixteenth albino.”

Ella’s
answering laugh turned into a startled choking noise when Mary joined them.

“Hey,
Mare. Coming with us?” Hanna said, hoping the forced brightness in her tone
masked her doubt.

“Of
course she’s not!” Ella blurted. “Mary’s, like, allergic to exercise.”

Mary’s
brown eyes flashed. “I am
not
.”

“But
you never come with me,” Ella said, flummoxed.

“You’ve
never asked me. You just assume I don’t want to go.”

“You’re
usually still asleep,” Ella pointed out.

“Well,
she’s here now,” Hanna cut in before Mary could retort. If there was one thing
she detested, it was bickering. “Do you want anything to eat, sis? Or some
water?”

“I’m
good.”

“You
sure?” Hanna pressed. “You shouldn’t exercise on an empty stomach.”

Mary
ignored her, trailing Ella outside like a lost puppy. Hanna followed, shaking
her head. How was it that she always,
always
found herself caught
between a rock (Mary) and a hard place (Ella)? If Hanna had thought that she
would get a refreshing, brisk walk this morning, she was sadly mistaken. Ella,
evidently deciding that Hanna’s company wasn’t worth the addition of Mary’s,
abandoned the speed-walking idea completely and took off at a sprint. Mary
followed, not to be left behind let alone outdone by Ella. Hanna had never been
one for following trends, so she slowed to a stroll. There was an early-morning
chill in the air that had her pulling her hood up. The sky was clear as the sun
opened its eyes over the ocean, illuminating the foamy surf with its watery
light. The rhythm of the tide felt like a beckoning call to Hanna, drawing her
toward it with its hypnotic, lull.

Hanna
made her way down the beach at a deliciously lazy pace. Moments later, her
sluggish progress came to a standstill when she looked up to see Ella flying
back toward her—all alone.

☼

Derick
grasped his right foot from behind and stretched his quad. The sun was almost
up, making its debut in the pale predawn sky. He’d gone to bed early the night
before, his sincere fatigue supplying his excuse for missing the barbecue.
After a good twelve hours’ sleep, he felt like a new man. Rising around five
a.m. this morning, he’d sat on the steps just outside his room and listened to
the waxing and waning of the tide. With his eyes closed and the salty air in
his mouth, his senses were finely tuned to the ever-increasing feeling of homecoming.
It had graced him very few times in his life—that sensation of being in the
right place at the right time, accompanied by an almost audible “click”—like
the last piece of a puzzle snapping into place: yesterday with Sophie, his
first America’s Cup victory, the first time he’d taken the helm of the
Laconia
.

He
felt it again now—his flesh and blood and bones sighing with relief as he
settled into the path meant for him. Having an excess of energy this morning,
he decided to start the day off right by going for a run. Since he’d already
gone back to the
Laconia
for his things the night before, he went the
other way. There wasn’t much on the north beach, at least not for a mile or so.
Then Derick found himself looking at a sign that read,
Old Lyme Carnival
.
The gate was closed, but it seemed that all the necessary components were
there—bumper cars, roller coasters, a Ferris wheel, and games that stole money
with their promise of oversized plush toys.

After
turning back, Derick decided he wasn’t ready to go home yet, and pushed on
toward the breakwater. Maybe he would visit the lighthouse—Sophie had called it
the “Lymelight”—this morning. But as he approached the pier, he saw something
ahead that foiled his plans.

A figure
lay flat on its back in the sand just ahead, and two more leaned over the prone
person. Derick hurried up to the little gathering, seeing as he drew near that
it was three women, one of whom lay unconscious on the sand. At his approach,
one of the three looked up, her mouth popping open as she took him in. She bore
a striking resemblance to a brunette Barbie doll. Derick ignored the feeling
that she probably recognized him, kneeling down in the sand beside her. “Is she
okay?”

To his
surprise, the answer came from Barbie girl’s companion in the gray hoodie.

“She
passed out,” she answered without looking up. “Ran for a mile straight without
warming up—with no water and nothing in her stomach.”

An
overpowering sense of déjà vu washed over Derick, but it dissipated as Barbie
girl said, “Mary’s so stupid.” She rolled her bright green eyes at him, smiling
in an embarrassed sort of way.

Derick
couldn’t help noticing how attractive the girl was, even at such a moment.
Ashamed of his weakness, he pushed two fingers just under the unconscious
girl’s jaw—Mary, was it?

“She’s
got a pulse and it looks like she’s breathing,” he declared, ignoring the
feeling that he was missing something.

“Let’s
sit her up and try to get some water in her,” hoodie girl suggested. It was
immediately clear to Derick that she had more of an invested connection to this
Mary than Barbie girl did. For some reason, at the sound of her voice an image
burst in his mind—a memory, obscured as if he viewed it through darkened glass.

Summer
rain, drops of moisture on pale skin, soft blue eyes the color of an
early-morning sky . . .

The
memory dissolved, leaving only a vague, niggling impression in its place as
Derick leaned over Mary. He eased his hands under her so that he could use his
own weight as leverage to lift her, then drew back when his head collided
painfully with hoodie girl’s. Pressing a hand to his forehead to stop the
throbbing, Derick looked up to apologize—and that was when his heart stopped.

Summer
rain, drops of moisture on pale skin, soft blue eyes the color of an
early-morning sky . . .

Staring
back at him were those pale blue eyes—eyes set in a face he’d memorized at one
time, then went to the ends of the earth to forget.

☼

For an
instant, all Hanna could see was static and pops of light. It was almost
comical, like in the cartoons when someone bumped their head and had a halo of
stars. As the gray retreated from the edges of her vision, she knew something
was wrong. She had obviously been too worried about Mary to realize that the
voice was familiar to her, that she had entered that place in her life without
warning—that point in time she had both dreamt of and dreaded.

Her
senses were on overkill, the roaring tide almost deafening in her ears, briny
air thick in her nostrils, the tiny, sharp crystals digging into her skin as
she knelt in the sand.

The
gray-green eyes staring back at her were warm at first, concerned and caring.
But as they took her in, they cooled to something she couldn’t name before
hardening to recognition.

In
that moment Hanna knew—more than she’d ever known anything—she was the last
person on earth Derick Wentworth wanted to see.

SIX

TEARS
and TOURMALINES

A few months had
seen the beginning and the end of their acquaintance.

—Jane Austen,
Persuasion

The
ocean air breezed lazily through Hanna’s open window, stirring her hair with
invisible fingers. She sat on her bed, turning a small object over in her
hands, her back flush with the headboard and her eyes fixed on the impending
storm outside. Even in monochromatic tones the view was breathtaking. The line
where the tortured water kissed the brooding sky was fuzzy, smudged like an
impressionistic painting. The weather coincided perfectly with Hanna’s mood,
almost feeling like a friendly embrace.

Everything
that took place on the beach after Mary’s fainting episode was meshed together
in one blurry image. Hanna vaguely remembered the water bottle she’d been
holding slipping from her fingers, serving as Mary’s wake-up call as it smacked
her in the face. Derick—just thinking the name gave her a pang now—and a
suddenly concerned Ella helped Mary back to Uppercross while Hanna tried to
recover from the shock of seeing
him
enough to follow. She managed to
reach the door first and opened it for the others. Derick and Ella tried
guiding Mary to the couch, but instead she directed them to her room, where she
had lain ever since.

Now
the boys were outside with Charles, giving their mother “a piece of quiet,” as
CJ so eloquently put it. Hanna, torn between the desire to hide in the house
for the entire summer and the urge to relieve Charles of the boys (just for
something to take her mind off
him
), settled instead for a
self-inflicted time out in her room.