Wild Thing (The Magic Jukebox Book 3) (3 page)

He
strolled back to Atlantic Avenue, figuring he was least likely to miss the
turn-off to the marina if he stuck close to the ocean. The tide was low, the
water calm. Hardly a breeze. He was lucky he’d sailed into port earlier, when a
low but steady wind could power him in to the slip. The sky above the ocean was
a deep blue, with thin purple clouds rippling through it like veins in marble.

Yeah,
he definitely needed a bike, or a car. His legs were feeling sluggish. The
ground was too unyielding beneath them. His feet would hit the pavement and
stop, no give beneath them, no play. His knees weren’t used to the lack of
motion. If he couldn’t spend the night in the arms of the wild-thing woman, he
needed to spend it cushioned by the ocean. The limbo of sailing—a world where
the earth kept shifting, the wind ruled, and he had only himself for
company—seemed a lot more reliable than the world of bars and booze and old
jukeboxes.

After
a long half-hour, he spotted the turn-off to the North Cove Marina. A narrow
asphalt lane sloped down to the east, spreading into the parking lot, which was
mostly empty at this time of night. At the base of the parking lot was the
building with the anchor painted onto it, beyond that a grid of docks extending
out into the water. Just knowing he was only minutes away from the Freedom made
him pick up speed. If he got to the boat, he could rid himself of visions of
the woman and memories of the song. He could be himself again.

He
almost didn’t notice the pale gray lettering painted onto the darker gray sides
of two large sedans parked nearest the dock where the Freedom was moored:
Brogan’s Point Police.

He
slowed his pace slightly, wondering what was up. Coast Guard vehicles at a
marina were rarely a good sign, but police cars?

He
ventured past the main building and started down the ridged ramp to the
Freedom’s dock. And halted.

Wayne
MacArthur’s boat was where he’d left it, but it was surrounded by yellow police
tape. Three men stood on the slip, which rocked gently beneath them. Even in
silhouette, Ty could tell that two of them were uniformed officers and the
third was in street clothes. In the stillness of the evening, their voices
drifted across the water in an indecipherable murmur, accented by the metallic
clanging of ropes and clamps against masts.

Why
were the police at Wayne’s boat? Why was the boat surrounded by “Do Not Cross”
tape? What the fuck?

Ty
had two choices: continue down to the slip and find out what was going on, or
make a U-turn head back to town.

If
he were a moral, upstanding grade-A citizen, he’d go down to the slip.

But
he was Ty Cronin. A carpenter. A marina rat. A guy who had thwarted death. A
guy who didn’t trust authority figures. A guy who preferred motorcycles to
cars, and sailboats to cruise ships. A guy who’d just gotten a cash influx of
twenty thousand bucks into his bank account. A guy who trusted his instincts.

His
instincts told him to U-turn and walk away. Actually, they told him to
run
away, but that would draw unwanted attention. So he U-turned and walked.

At
the edge of the parking lot, he paused and gazed back at the dock. They were
still there, two cops and the third man who, despite his lack of a uniform,
looked even more formidable. And that bright yellow tape, marking the boat,
cordoning it off.

Ty
had a really bad feeling about this.

His
stuff was on the boat: clothing, laptop, toothbrush.
Fuck
.

He’d
worry about his gear later. Right now, he needed a place to sleep. Exhaustion
tugged at him like a riptide, threatening to drag him under. This day had been
too long. Sailing. Docking. Drinking. The bar, the song, the woman. And now the
police. Thoughts of voodoo and Salem witches pinballed inside his skull.

All
right. He’d get some sleep. In the morning, maybe things would make sense. Even
better, he might wake up and discover that the world was once again the
familiar place he knew, and he’d only just dreamed all this strange shit.

He
continued through the parking lot to the road, tapping his phone, searching for
hotels and motels. A couple of places were located within a five-mile radius of
Brogan’s Point, but they were all down on Route 1, where, according to the
waitress at the bar, traffic was a bitch. And Route 1 was too damned far to
walk.

The
only hotel less than a mile away was a place called the Ocean Bluff Inn. It was
just up Atlantic Avenue a ways. Probably cost an arm and a leg, but he could
afford it. His bank account had just increased by twenty thousand dollars.

He
hoped he could buy a toothbrush at the Ocean Bluff Inn.

Following
the map on his phone, he hiked in the direction of inn and tried to ignore the
noise in his head. Cops.
Wild Thing
. The stacked woman trying to pick
him up. The slender woman who’d fled from him—no, not from him. From the bar.
From her friend. From the song.

The
Freedom gift-wrapped in a police-tape ribbon. Had someone boarded the boat
while he was gone, and gotten injured? Or tried to steal something? They were
welcome to his clothes, but his laptop… He’d locked it beneath the bench in the
cabin. He hoped it was safe.

Damn
it, damn it, damn it.

The
entrance to the inn loomed ahead, screaming
expensive.
A picturesque
gravel driveway bordered in white stones curved up from the road. Granite
pillars stood on either side of it, illuminated with decorative lamps. Well
groomed plantings flourished at the bases of the pillars. An elegant white sign
read, “Ocean Bluff Inn.”

More
than expensive, the place looked like a destination, not a motel you’d stay at
for a night while passing through town but a resort where you’d book a room for
a week. He hoped the place wasn’t full. If it was, hell. He’d go make a bed for
himself next to the ocean on the sand. And probably wind up arrested by those
cops. Brogan’s Point seemed like the sort of town that would have ordinances
against sleeping on the beach.

He
trudged up the driveway, hoping this inn had an available room that wouldn’t
cost a major chunk of the money Wayne MacArthur had wired to Ty’s PayPal
account. After about fifty yards of pretty drive and prettier landscaping, he
reached a parking area surfaced in loose gravel and crushed shells. No more
than a dozen cars were parked there. He might get lucky.

His
gaze journeyed from the lot to the building beside it—a grand four-story
structure of white siding, an angular roof, and wide windows framed in black
shutters. The building extended a good seventy feet from side to side and then
spread back beyond the parking area. A broad porch with a white railing abutted
the entire front of the building. Wooden Adirondack chairs and rockers lined
the porch. One was occupied.

By
the slender woman with the dark hair and the darker eyes. The woman who’d gazed
at him across the tavern and then run away.

Wild
Thing.

She’d
changed her clothes since he last saw her. Seated in an oversized Adirondack
chair, she wore jeans, some sort of skimpy top and a hoodie over it, zipped
partway up. Her bare feet were propped on the edge of the seat, her chin
resting on her knees, her arms wrapped around her shins. Even in the dim amber
light from the fixtures on either side of the double-width front door, he could
tell that her toenails were painted red.

He
felt a stirring in his groin. Totally inappropriate. Lots of women painted
their toenails, and he’d wager a substantial proportion of them chose red
polish.

But
this woman… There was some sort of weird vibe between him and her. He had no
idea what it was. But given how strange the evening had become, he figured
there was no point in questioning it.

“You
staying here?” he asked.

“I
live here.” Her voice was smooth and darkly sweet, like the bourbon he’d drunk
earlier.

He
was so busy contemplating its kick, her words almost didn’t register on him.
“You
live
here?”

She
nodded, not an easy maneuver with her chin resting on her knees.

He
had no idea what that meant, so he plowed ahead. “I need a room for the night.
Do they have any vacancies?”

She
regarded him silently. A breeze rustled through the bushes surrounding the
porch and ruffled her hair. “I know where you can stay,” she finally said.
“Follow me.”

Thoughts
of the boat, the cops, every footstep and nautical mile, every drink and word
and song that had carried him to this place, this moment, this woman… It all
evaporated from his brain. She’d told him to follow her.

So
that was what he did.

***

She
was crazy. Absolutely. Certifiably.

Or
maybe she was just…
wild.

She’d
thought leaving the Faulk Street Tavern might have been enough to shake off the
spell that song had cast upon her, but it hadn’t. She’d returned to her tiny
apartment at the back of the inn’s main building, changed from her work apparel
into comfortable clothing that was as unsexy as possible, and tried to think
about what she should eat despite having no appetite whatsoever. She wasn’t in
the mood to cook anything, but if she moseyed over to the inn’s dining room,
Jerry and the rest of the kitchen staff would either take offense or summon a
doctor if she didn’t consume a proper meal.

She’d
opened a can of tomato soup, heated it in the microwave in her apartment’s
closet-size kitchen, and forced it down, thinking about how much more delicious
Jerry’s lobster bisque would taste—and how that sweet, subtle flavor would have
been wasted on her if she’d gone to the dining room and asked for a bowl of it.

She’d
tried watching television. Had TV shows always been this stupid? Surely the
news was worth watching…. No, it wasn’t. If watching meant she’d have to sit
still, staring at the screen while a babble of voices and images of violence
and people behaving badly assaulted her senses, she would not watch the news.
Or anything else.

Nor
would she review the inn’s maintenance budget. Once Memorial Day arrived, the
place would be full—bookings had been strong this year. For the past few weeks,
the maintenance crew had been working from dawn to dusk, getting the place
spruced up before the summer season began. Painting. Landscaping. Grooming the
parking lots and the tennis court. Cleaning and filling the swimming pool.
Moving all the pool patio furniture outdoors. Clearing the path down to the
beach. The expenditures were high; most of the crew had put in overtime nearly
every day. She needed to review the numbers.

But
when she turned on her laptop and opened the spread sheets, all she saw was a
jumble. The data awaited her attention, but the Excel pages couldn’t pierce the
fog that swaddled her brain. Random, meaningless numbers filled the monitor.

Slamming
her laptop shut, she’d tried to conjure Jimmy’s image in her mind. But she
couldn’t. She’d been with him, on and off, for ten years, yet she couldn’t even
picture him. Or remember how he sounded when he talked, when he laughed. Or how
he smelled, how he felt. He was gone, deleted from her memory.

All
she could think of was the man on the bar stool, with his streaky blond hair
and his scruffy day-old beard and his torn jeans, and his mesmerizing blue
eyes. All she could think of was how absurdly attractive he’d been, like a
black hole sucking her in.

Too
restless to remain cooped up in her apartment, she’d gone outside onto the
porch. The inn was about half full—decent business for the third week in
May—but the evening was cool enough that no one was relaxing on the veranda.
She had it all to herself, the freshly scrubbed and painted chairs, the light
from the lobby and front parlor spilling through the polished windows, the
brighter light glowing through the beveled glass of the lamps that adorned the
front entry. Curling up in one of the chairs, she gazed out at the parking lot,
the shrubs beyond it, the marsh grass sloping down to the inn’s small private
beach. The sky was dark and almost cloudless, sliced by a narrow curve of moon.
The cool wind rolling up from the beach smelled rich and salty, the perfume of
mermaids.

And
then he appeared, as if by magic, ambling up the driveway and across the lot,
planting himself directly in front of her. How had he found her?

What
did it matter? He
had
found her. Fate had brought him here. Karma. The
song from the jukebox at the Faulk Street Tavern.

If
she thought about it, she’d acknowledge that bringing him back to her apartment
was an insane idea, possibly dangerous. She didn’t know who he was or what he
could do. All she knew was the song, and the night, and the dazzling power of
his eyes. Logic was beyond her.

They
walked the length of the veranda, around to the side of the main building and
through the back door, which led to offices and a service elevator to the
owners’ suite on the top floor, where her parents lived and she’d grown up. She
and the man passed several platforms designed for truck deliveries and
continued down the back hallway, beyond a few rooms where extra furniture was
stored, beyond the room that contained the housekeeping carts and supplies,
beyond the room stocked with toilet paper, soap, and miniature bottles of
shampoo and moisturizing lotion, to her tiny apartment at the end of the hall.

She
unlocked the door, opened it, and stepped inside. He was right behind her.

He
didn’t speak. Evidently, he saw nothing odd in her having brought him to her
cozy efficiency apartment rather than to the front desk, where she could have
checked him into one of the empty guest rooms. He almost looked as if he’d
expected her to bring him to her own room. His gaze swiftly circled the
diminutive living area, which was separated from the sleeping area by a
freestanding hinged screen of carved wood. She’d always been tidy; she’d folded
her laptop shut once she’d given up on the spread sheets, and left it on the
small writing table in one corner. Her soup bowl sat drying in the dish rack
beside the sink. The floor lamp next to the love seat—the living area didn’t
have enough space for a full-size couch—offered the only light, soft and
golden.

She
turned to him, wondering what to say. Should she offer him a drink? Food? An
explanation? She could provide the first two items on that list, but not the
third.

He
didn’t give her a chance to speak. One long stride brought him close enough to
gather her in his arms, and his mouth came down on hers, firm but not hard.
Fierce but not forcing.

In
that strange, magical moment, kissing him made far more sense than talking
would have. His mouth fit hers so perfectly, his lips persuasive, his tongue
stroking deep, taking everything she was willing to give. His hands were large
and warm, gliding over her shoulders to her back, pulling her against him.

She
knew this was wrong. Yet her intellect had disconnected, and her heart, her
soul, the portion of her brain still functioning told her it was right. For
this instant, she would have this man, this virile stranger who had been
delivered to her by some inexplicable, mysterious force. Tomorrow she could be
sane again, proper and tame. Tonight she would be a wild thing.

She
kissed him back. Kissed him hungrily. Kissed him
wildly
. Her hands slid
across his chest, testing the sturdy muscles beneath the cotton knit of his
shirt. She let him slide her hoodie down her arms and off, then wedge his hands
under her camisole, exploring the curve of her back, the ridge of her spine,
her shoulder blades. His touch made her hips grow heavy and her thighs clench.
Oh, God, she wanted him, wanted him
wildly
.

She
pulled at his shirt. He freed his hands from beneath her camisole to yank the
shirt over his head and off. She had barely a minute to admire his rugged
shoulders and sleekly contoured chest before he had his hands back on her,
lifting her camisole over her head and tossing it aside.

They
kissed again, this time touching skin as they did so. He cupped her breasts,
caressed them, stroked his thumbs over her nipples until they burned with
sensation. She wanted to climb onto him, rub against him, make him relieve the
deep, delicious ache he’d ignited inside her. She wanted everything, now.