In McGillivray's Bed (10 page)

“What's wrong?” she asked.

He shot her a glare. “Nothing's wrong.”

“You're snapping my head off for no reason at all?”

His jaw tightened. Then he consciously seemed to relax
it and flexed his shoulders, which still looked stiff. “It hasn't got anything to do with you.” His tone was barely more than a mutter, determinedly dismissive.

But Syd had felt a part of something tonight. And she wasn't going to be dismissed easily. “So, if it's not me, what is it?”

“If I said, ‘Mind your own business,' would you?” he asked dryly.

“No.”

“It's that Margaret St. John tenacity at work, is it?” He flicked her a sardonic look.

She did a double take. “I thought you didn't know who I was.”

“I found out.”

“How?”

He shrugged. “While I was waiting for Doc today I was flipping through a couple of magazines.”

She named them and he nodded. “So you know I am good at what I do.”

“Yep, I know that.” His mouth twisted.

“Is that the problem?”

“Of course it's not a problem! Why the hell would it be a problem? You do what you want! It's got nothing to do with me!”

“Then what…?” She was at a complete loss.

McGillivray frowned at her, then raked a hand through his hair. “Didn't you see them tonight? Didn't you hear them? They're just so bloody happy!”

Now it was Syd's turn to frown. “Happy? You mean Molly and Lachlan and Fiona? So what? What's wrong with that?”

“Nothing. Everything! It's what they're happy about!” He looked almost anguished.

Syd stared at him, clueless. “What are they happy about?”

“You. And…me.” There was a grim twist to his lips
now. “They're thrilled. They're over the moon at the thought of us…together!”

He made it sound like the end of the world. “Yes. So?”

“That's all you can say?” He gave her an accusing look.

Syd shrugged. “Well, what do you want me to say? What's wrong with that? I thought passing me off as your girlfriend was the whole point. That's what you said.”

“To Lisa. Not to them!”

“This is an island,” Syd reminded him. “A very little island. How could only Lisa think that? By now everyone on Pelican Cay thinks I'm your girlfriend. Maurice. Amby. Erica. The girl at the Straw Shoppe and the guy at the bakery.”

“Jesus!” McGillivray shut his eyes. “Lisa must have shouted it from the rooftops.”

“I wouldn't be surprised,” Syd said dryly. “Certainly everyone in town knew who I was as soon as I said my name. But,” she told him firmly, “you can't blame Lisa for all of it. Molly said you told her.”

“Like hell!”

“Well,” she amended, “perhaps not in so many words. But she took one look at me and said it was no wonder you wanted her to stay away from the house today.”

“You needed to sleep.”

“You should have known she'd jump to conclusions.”

He groaned. Then he paced the room, cracked his knuckles, muttered under his breath.

Syd watched, trying to fathom it, trying to understand why it mattered so much. Finally she asked, “Is this because of Carin?”

McGillivray's head whipped around and his gaze bored into hers.
“What do you know about Carin?”

Which answered the question.

“Not much,” Syd said quietly, placating him. “Molly just sort of mentioned her and…and you.”

“Damn Molly and her jumping to conclusions! I never told her! Never said a word!”

“She's your sister, McGillivray! She's not blind. Obviously, she knows you well enough that you didn't have to say!”

He stared bleakly at her, then dropped into the armchair and leaned back to stare at the ceiling. The sound of the ocean and the lazy whirl of the overhead fan were the only sounds in the room. Syd stood looking at him, wondering if there was anything she ought to say, uncertain what it might be. Finally she just picked up the dish towel again and another plate.

Not until she had finished them all and wiped off the countertop did she come back to where he was sitting. He looked at her, then raked both hands through his hair and dragged his palms down his face.

“Now what?” he said. “What the hell am I supposed to do now?”

“About…Carin?”

“Hell no, not about Carin. That's over! It's past. It never was anything, damn it! We're friends,” he said with an ironic twist to the word. “We've
always
been friends. And like a fool I bided my time. Figured she'd come around.”

“Molly says—” Syd winced at the look on his face when she once more quoted his sister. But determinedly she pressed forward. “Molly says Nathan is the father of her child.”

“So what? I loved Lacey like she was my own.”

“I'm sure you did. But maybe Carin never fell out of love with him.”

McGillivray dropped his head back against the chair again. He closed his eyes. Syd watched his Adam's apple move as he swallowed.

Then he met her gaze. “She didn't.”

Syd nodded slowly. “I'm sorry.”

He shrugged and tried for what she was beginning to recognize as his customary determined lightness. “No big deal. Carin's married. She's happy, and I've accepted it.”

Had he? Syd wondered.

“The question is, what the hell am I going to do about Molly and Lachlan and Fiona and their bloody assumptions?” he went on, sounding irritable all over again. “That I'm involved? In love?”

He made it sound like a disease. A deadly one.

Syd shrugged. “Don't do anything,” she said, irritated herself now, though she couldn't have said exactly why. “Why should you have to
do
anything? Let them think what they think.”

“But you'll have to stay awhile.”

“So?”

His lips pressed together in a hard thin line.

“You didn't think I was all that distasteful yesterday,” she reminded him.

“I didn't do anything about it, either.”

Which meant what? That he was going to do something about it now? A nervous thrill shot through her. At the same time she tried to remain cool and calm. “Ms. St. John is unflappable,” one of the articles had said.

She could believe her own press when it suited her.

“I'm not marrying you,” he said firmly.

Sydney's mouth dropped open. “My God, you're obsessed! What is it with you? Do you see me trying to drag you to the altar!”

He gritted his teeth. “I just want it clear. If you're staying for a while I want you to know where I stand.”

“I believe I've figured it out,” Syd said icily.

He gave a quick jerky nod. “Fine. Then when we've convinced them that I'm not pining away for Carin, we can break it off and you can leave.”

“We can break it off,” Syd agreed. “But I'm not leaving.”

“Yes, you are.” His tone brooked no argument, but Syd ignored it.

“I can stay if I want. We can both—”

“No.” He stood up, looking suddenly fierce and powerful. “We can't both. It doesn't work that way. The island
is too small. You
saw
how small it was today. Everyone knows everything. There are no lies on Pelican Cay. Not ones that survive more than a couple of weeks, anyway.”

“But—”

“We can get away with it that long. Then it's over. We're finished. We break up. You go away.”

“I can—”

“You can't,” he said without letting her finish. “You're not going to want to stay, anyway,” he informed her flatly. “You're a woman on the move, remember? You just want to make Roland Whatsit pay.”

Syd would have argued with him, but there was no point.

Of course she wanted Roland to sweat. But she wanted more than that. And it had nothing to do with moving and everything to do with figuring out who she was and becoming her own person at last.

When she'd told McGillivray last night that she intended to find a job here, she'd been blue-skying, throwing out an idea, listening to it echo, testing it against reality.

The clear light of day hadn't changed her mind. In fact, everything she'd seen and done today on Pelican Cay had confirmed it.

She liked the island and everything about it. She liked the soft sand beach, the turquoise water, the jumble of pastel stucco and clapboard houses. She liked the narrow roads and raised wooden sidewalks and the quaint shops that edged the palm-lined quay. She liked the friendly people. There was none of the anonymity she'd grown up with. Everyone knew their neighbors, for good or for ill.

Everyone knew McGillivray. And obviously everyone—not just his sister and his brother and his sister-in-law—cared about him. They'd all said so, in one way or another—Tony at the bakery, Stella at the Cotton Shoppe, the old lady Miss Saffron on her porch when Syd had passed.

All of them, one way or another, had said, “So you're McGillivray's girl? He's a good man. You be good to him.”

It had made her think differently about McGillivray. But more than that, it had made her want someone to care about her that way.

“We'll take things one day at time,” she said.

“And when it's over, you'll leave.” It wasn't a question. Blue eyes bored into hers.

Syd sighed softly. “When the time comes, I'll leave.”

McGillivray's gaze narrowed. “When the time comes? What's that mean?”

“It means that I'm sure we'll both know when.” And it left things open-ended and vague.

McGillivray looked as if he might argue. But finally he let out a slow deep breath. For a long moment neither spoke. Their eyes met. Their gazes locked.

The sizzle was there again. Still. It didn't surprise Syd as much this time. What surprised her was that something else was there, too. Something deeper and even more compelling.

A memory flickered through her mind of what McGillivray had looked like with his eyes closed and his lips parted. She remembered what the hard warmth of his body had felt like, and how solid his arm had felt wrapped across her.

She saw him swallow and wondered what he was remembering.

“I hope to hell,” he said raggedly, “that while you were turning this place into ‘house beautiful' today, you moved into the spare room.”

S
YD
was in the spare room.

Hugh was alone in his. Theoretically.

In fact, memories of her kept intruding. He lay awake long after he should have fallen asleep—thinking, muttering, tossing and turning.

But he didn't just think about Syd. He thought about a lot of things. About life—about goals, purpose, focus, meaning. All the deep and significant issues that, in the course of day-to-day living, Hugh pretty much pretended didn't matter.

He had, after all, built his image on that foundation.

Ever since he'd come along, the second son in a family where the first son had already decided he was Going-To-Be-the-Best, Hugh had committed himself to doing the opposite. Mr. Laid-Back, Easy-Come-Easy-Go, Nothing-Much-Matters-but-a-Cold-Beer-and-a-Long-Nap McGillivray, that was him.

On the surface at least.

Deep down in a place he acknowledged to no one but himself, Hugh knew he had as many goals as his brother. For one, he'd made up his mind to find work that would let him come back to Pelican Cay. And he'd done it. He'd figured out what would work on the island, what he'd like doing, and he'd mastered the skills to make it pay. If it looked like he was loafing half the time, so be it. He liked to loaf, too.

He'd done the same thing when he'd bought his house.
It was all the things Constance had told him it was, but it was also, he'd figured, a good place to start a family.

Hugh had always wanted a family. Lachlan had been the jet-setter. Molly had been the loner, eager to see the world.

Hugh liked to fly, enjoyed going places, but even more he liked coming home. He liked
being
home.

He'd always figured by now he'd be the easy-going family man, settled down with a wife and kids. When he'd met Carin and her daughter, Lacey, he'd simply figured they'd have a head start on the kids.

Right from the start, though, when he'd come back to the island and met her for the first time, he'd known he would have to go slow with her. She'd been hurt, Maurice had told him. She didn't need hurting again.

Hugh knew he would never hurt her. He never had. He'd always been her friend. He'd been Lacey's friend. He'd loved being their friend. He still did. But he'd always wanted more and he'd believed someday Carin would return the feelings he was careful to keep hidden for fear of spooking her. When the time was right, he'd assured himself, she would forget the man who had hurt her and marry the man who loved her.

He never in a million years figured Nathan would come back and make Carin fall in love with him all over again. But he had. And the rest was history.

The trouble was, Hugh admitted for the first time, he still wanted what he'd wanted with her. He wanted a home, a wife, a family.

He'd been playing the field for two long years. Lisa had put a stop to it recently by her persistence, and he'd convinced himself he needed a buffer against her so he could start playing the field again.

But it wasn't true. The truth was he wanted exactly what Lisa Milligan wanted—marriage, a home, a family. Only not with her.

Then who?

And of course that was when the images of Sydney St. John started playing over again in his head.

It was pointless. Futile. Useless. She was gorgeous and there was definitely a spark between them. He felt it at least. But he'd thought he felt it with Carin, and God knew she hadn't.

How much less likely to was the perfect professional Ms. St. John?

It didn't even bear thinking about.

Sydney St. John wasn't going to stay around Pelican Cay. She was, as both the articles he'd read had pointed out, a woman on the move. She was “going places.”

She was here now. This minute. And maybe for the next two weeks. Long enough to help him convince his concerned family that he was well and truly over Carin and getting on with his life.

But then she would be gone.

And someday he would read another article about her society wedding. He had no doubt she would marry. He'd listened to her this evening talking eagerly and a little enviously to his sister-in-law about the baby Fiona was expecting.

“It must be the most amazing experience,” Syd had said, smiling and placing a hand reverently on Fiona's slightly rounded belly.

“If you like throwing up every morning and feeling wrung out by two in the afternoon,” Fiona had replied in her flat no-nonsense way. But she had smiled a conspiratorial smile at her husband as she said it.

And Syd had not been deterred. “It's worth it,” she'd said.

Fiona, meeting Lachlan's eyes with a smile, agreed, “Yes, it is.”

So someday, then, Syd would be somebody's mother. Some little up-and-coming CEO who would follow in Mommy and Daddy's footsteps. She might not marry old Roland Whosits, but Hugh had no doubt there would be a
less inept CEO who would come along and sweep her off her feet, a man whose goals and lifestyle echoed hers.

Not some backwater bush pilot like him.

They would be playing house for a couple of weeks so she could make Carruthers sweat and he could convince his family that he'd moved on with his life.

And then she would go.

That settled, Hugh yawned and rolled over. He wrapped his arms around his pillow and hauled it hard against him. It wasn't nearly as satisfying as having his arms around Sydney St. John.

But it was a whole lot smarter.

If she had another nightmare he could go in and see if she was all right, though.

He listened intently for sounds of nightmares. But other than the sea and the fan and Belle's soft snoring, he heard nothing.

Just as well.

He was finally drifting off to sleep when he remembered she'd never told him what job she'd supposedly got. He was tempted to get up and go to her room and ask her. Sanity prevailed.

He'd ask her in the morning.

But when he got up in the morning, she was gone.

 

“W
HERE
the hell have you been? Don't you know better than to go swimming alone?”

Syd looked at the man blocking her way on the path back to the house, his hair uncombed, his face unshaven, wearing only a pair of shorts that rode low on lean hips, and she swallowed the surge of pure female appreciation of the male of the species and smiled brightly. “And a very good morning to you, too.”

McGillivray grunted. “You shouldn't swim alone,” he repeated.

“Then come with me tomorrow. It's glorious out there. I can't believe how warm the water is.” She kept smiling
at him, even though he didn't move and was still frowning. “Are we going to stand here all day or are you going to let me past?”

Grudgingly he stepped aside, and she nipped past him, wishing as she did so that she dared reach out and touch the muscular chest or press a kiss to the thin, hard line of his lips. The electricity she felt every time she saw him showed no signs of abating. On the contrary, it seemed especially strong this morning.

She turned to look back. “Do you ever swim in the morning?”

“Sometimes.” He was following her back to the house, but taking his time, not catching up.

“Alone?” she asked innocently, with a light of laughter in her voice as his brows drew down. “I wasn't alone the whole time,” she told him. “I ran into some boys playing soccer. Doing drills, they said, like Lachlan taught them. And then they came swimming with me. They told me there's a wreck out beyond the reef. A really old ship, they said, with cannons.” It sounded marvelous.

McGillivray nodded. “Yeah. It was wrecked about three hundred years ago during a storm. It was supposed to be coming through the narrows and got washed up against the reef.”

She climbed the steps, then turned to wait for him. “Have you ever seen it?”

“Of course. Everybody's seen it.”

“I haven't. I've never seen a sunken ship before.” She looked past him toward the ocean in the distance. “The reef's not that far,” she said speculatively.

“Too far to swim,” McGillivray said flatly, “and way too dangerous.”

“Dangerous?” Syd frowned. “Why?”

“Remember your friend, the shark?” A grin slashed across his face.

“But you said everybody went.”

“In boats. And they don't go alone.”

“Fine. Maybe Tommy and Lorenzo could take me. They were two of the boys playing soccer,” she explained.

“I know who they are. Tommy is Fiona's nephew.”

“Oh. Right. Small island. Everyone knows everyone else. I keep forgetting. Sorry.” She felt foolish then and turned to hurry into the house.

“I could take you,” McGillivray said.

She spun around. “Really? You wouldn't mind?”

He shrugged. “Why not? Probably be a good idea,” he said gruffly. “Since we're a ‘couple.'” His mouth twisted as he said the last word.

Syd's joy faded a little at his attitude. But not much. She was having too good a morning to let him ruin it with his grouchiness. She nodded. “Yes,” she agreed. “Then we could tell everyone we'd done it. Together.”

“We won't have to tell anyone,” McGillivray said with grim certainty. “They'll know.”

 

H
E WAS
, Syd discovered, absolutely right.

An hour later, when she was walking into town to start her job, Miss Saffron hailed her as she passed. “I hear you goin' to be workin' for Erica,” she called.

Syd smiled at the other woman's question. “That's right.”

“You good at all them numbers?” Miss Saffron asked.

“Yes.”

“Maybe you talk to my nephew, Otis, at the hardware store. He need somebody who do numbers. On a computer, yes?”

“Yes. I'll talk to him,” Syd promised.

Miss Saffron smiled. “Good. So, when you an' Hugh goin' out to see that ol' wreck?”

Now Syd stared in astonishment. “How did you know we talked about the wreck?” she demanded. She'd left Hugh eating breakfast at the house an hour ago. She was sure he hadn't picked up the phone and called Miss
Saffron to tell her anything of the sort. He seemed to think the islanders knew far too much already.

Miss Saffron shrugged ample shoulders. “Just makes sense. Lorenzo say he tell you 'bout it this mornin. Say he take you.” She grinned broadly, then shook her head. “But I tell him, no chance. Ain't nobody takin' you nowhere but our Hugh.”

And Syd smiled, nodding slowly. “Right,” she murmured. “That's right.”

“Hurry on now. Erica be waitin'.”

Dismissed, Syd gave Miss Saffron a wave as she started once more down the hill. On the corner she passed the hardware store. Otis was sweeping the sidewalk out front.

“Hey, there, Hugh's girl,” he called to her, “wouldn't mind talkin' to you.”

 

H
UGH'S
girl.

That's what they were calling her. Everywhere he went that morning, he heard about his new girlfriend.

“Hugh's girl,” Amby said. “She's pretty as a sunset.”

“Hugh's girl,” Otis said, “is smart as a whip.”

“Hugh's girl—” everybody made sure they told him “—is just about perfect.”

Hugh wasn't surprised. And he didn't protest. It was, after all, what he wanted them all to think.

But all the same, it was getting under his skin.

He was glad they liked her, of course. He liked her. Too damn much. He didn't want everybody else thinking she was wonderful, too. Then, when she left, they'd really be thinking he was a loser.

Hell. Oh, hell.

Which was why he strode into Lachlan's office at the Moonstone that afternoon.

“Hey, there.” Lachlan looked up from his desk and grinned. “I like your girlfriend.”

“You and the whole damn world.”

Lachlan blinked. He tipped back in his chair and regarded his brother curiously. “That's a bad thing?”

“Of course not.” Hugh cracked his knuckles, prowled the room, craned his neck to look out the window to see who was walking along the beach.

“She's got a lot of really good ideas about island development,” Lachlan said.

“She could run it with one hand tied behind her back,” Hugh agreed grimly.

Lachlan grinned. “Maybe we should elect her mayor.”

“Like hell!”

“Want to keep her home all for yourself?”

“No! Yes! Oh, cripes. I don't know why I even came over here.”

“Neither do I,” Lachlan said. “But it's always a pleasure,” he added piously, still grinning.

“Shut up.” Hugh did another lap of the office.

Lachlan, watching him, shook his head. “You've got it bad, don't you?” He sounded cheerful.

“Got what?”

His brother rolled his eyes. “That's right, deny it. Is she giving you trouble?” he asked almost sympathetically.

Hugh slowed his pacing and shrugged. “It's not that,” he said. But he couldn't exactly say what it was, either.

“Where'd you meet her?”

“I fished her out of the drink.”

Lachlan laughed. “Whatever works.”

“I'm not kidding!”

Lachlan tipped his chair forward again. “Did I say you were?” Blue eyes exactly the same color as his own stared back at Hugh. “When a guy finds the right woman, he does whatever he's gotta do.”

Hugh snorted. “Like you had to do anything to get Fiona.” She'd been sitting here waiting for Lachlan for years, and other than her brief stint in Italy she hadn't any intention of going anywhere.

“You'd be surprised,” Lachlan said dryly over steepled fingers.

Hugh's eyes widened. “I would,” he agreed. “Tell all.”

Lachlan shook his head. “Not on your life. I got my woman. That's all I'm going to say.” He met Hugh's eyes again. “Except that it's worth it, and I'll do whatever I can to help you keep yours.”

“I don't have her yet,” Hugh said. “It might not work out.”