Perfect Chance

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How are you going to explain Chance to Victor, Mary? How are you going to explain Victor to Chance?

She caught sight of another reflection from the full-length closet mirror, and she scowled. How, in God’s name, did a shy, gawky thing like you find herself in the middle of such a soap opera?

Off in the distance, she heard the front doorbell ring. Victor had arrived.

What are you going to do now, Mary?

CHAPTER THREE (#ulink_c8cedccd-1ccd-520d-85ee-0c13381da7f6)

CHERRY Bay’s annual Fourth of July celebration was held at the old lighthouse, which was on a promontory of land that had been established as a local park some years ago. Volunteer firemen were in charge of the fireworks display that was set off from the point. The nearby beach was crowded with both natives and tourists alike, and food and drink vendors dotted the area with striped canvas canopies. Music from a local band blared from the loudspeakers near the whitewashed stone lighthouse, and the smell of hot dogs and the pastry called fried elephant ears filled the air.

Tim appeared not to notice the taut atmosphere that filled the interior of Victor’s Volvo on the trip to the lighthouse, but Mary did. Back at the house, she had met Victor at the door; he was dressed in crisp linen slacks and a white shirt. She’d looked up into his cold eyes and tight features and felt her stomach sink to her shoes.

When Tim had come to the porch to interrupt Chance and Mary, he had left the phone off the hook in the front hall. How much of what had gone on outside had Victor overheard? Could he have heard anything at all? Could his tight expression just possibly be related to seeing her walk out of the hospital earlier that day with a strange man? What did she dare hope for?

With the strong instinct that she was making a mistake, Mary had gone to say goodbye to her grandfather Wallis, who was comfortably ensconced in the library with an old friend of his, drinking brandy and playing a game of chess.

“Good night, Grampa,” she whispered as she kissed him.

A tall, thin man in his eighties with a leonine head of thick, white, wavy hair, Wallis Newman was a gruff man who had a reputation for being terrifying with local politicians and dignitaries. Mary never understood that. Wallis reached up to pat her cheek, his fierce gaze softening into tenderness.

“Have a good time, kiddo. I won’t wait up.”

I want to stay home with you, Grampa, she thought. She glanced toward the hallway and sighed. Victor and Tim were waiting. She threw her arms around her grandfather’s neck, hugged him swiftly, and left.

Now Victor pulled the car into a parking space, and Mary scrambled out thankfully. The parking-lot lamps washed the scene in harsh white illumination and sharp shadows. In the distance, she could see the warmer glow from flickering beach fires and the tiny pinpoints of colored lights strung in the trees and bushes that clustered around the lighthouse.

Tim bounced out happily. Victor locked the car and straightened, his movements slow and deliberate. Mary felt the skin around her eyes tighten as he glanced at her briefly. Then Tim loped around the car, planted a smacking kiss on her forehead so hard he almost knocked her over, and said, “I’m going to get in line for some food. Meet you on the beach?”

“All right,” she sighed, and she forlornly watched him dash away. There goes my chaperon and bodyguard.

Victor curled a hand around her upper arm, and she looked up with a start, then tried to smile. The effort was not returned. “I want to talk to you,” he said tersely.

As if on cue, the first round of fireworks exploded overhead with a rolling boom like thunder, and Victor’s marble-carved features were washed in red and blue.

This was worse than a mistake, she thought, as she glanced again at the crowd on the beach. This was more like disastrous stupidity. There was no way they were going to run into Chance, and Victor was obviously upset, and she didn’t have the energy to explain anything to him. Even if she’d known how to explain it.

Then a small seed of resentment bloomed. She shouldn’t have to explain anything. They may have dated for a few years, but they hadn’t even come to any kind of formal agreement. She never asked Victor what he did when she wasn’t with him. Why was he suddenly treating her like his property?

“Now is not the time, Victor,” she said firmly, and she gave him a no-nonsense nod meant to put him in his place.

Apparently he didn’t get the point. His fingers pressed into her flesh as he said, “When will be the time to talk about it? Tim’s gone for now—we have a few minuets. Who was that man I saw you with earlier? I heard you had dinner with him.”

Mary blinked in surprise. Who’d told him that— Harold Schubert? Another member of the hospital staff? “So I had dinner with him,” she said in an offhand manner. “I was eating—he was eating—we sat at the same table. It happens, Victor.”

“But then you went out the door with him, and your car was still in the parking lot when I left. Did he take you home?”

Boom went another bout of fireworks. The crowd cheered. Mary fumbled for something reasonable and conciliatory to say, but what could that be? He’d taken her home and kissed her, and walked away with her soul in his pocket.

She scowled and said, “So what if he did? Is that a crime? He offered and I was too tired to drive, and anyway—why are you checking up on me like this?”

Suddenly his demeanor changed, became soothing. His grip on her arm loosened, and he rubbed her shoulders. “I’m sorry. That sounded bad, didn’t it? I was just worried about you, darling, that’s all. I didn’t know him and thought you didn’t, either, and if you’d wanted a ride home, all you had to do was ask me. I would have been happy to take you.”

Mary’s bristling smoothed over, and she turned contrite. Poor Victor. He’d had a long, hard day, too. “I knew your shift wasn’t over until eight, and anyway, he was perfectly fine.”

“So who was he anyway?” Victor asked casually, starting to lead her toward the beach.

“He teaches at the university. He was on Harold Schubert’s yacht when the boating accident happened.” And I can still feel his kiss on my mouth. The scorching memory engulfed her; with a shock, she felt the private area between her legs throb gently.

She looked around in confusion, cheeks flaming. She was too tired; the barrier between thought and action was too ephemeral, untrustworthy. She was afraid of what she might inadvertently blurt out if Victor continued his interrogation much longer.

Over the staccato explosions overhead and the noise of the crowd, she could hear the roar of an approaching motorcycle, and absentmindedly glanced in that direction.

The roar subsided into a low engine growl as a Harley-Davidson pulled into an empty parking space. There were two riders, a man driving and a woman riding pillion. They both wore black helmets and protective leather jackets. The man was wearing straight-legged, faded jeans and a white T-shirt, and the woman’s lush, curved legs were bared by a black minidress. She wore, Mary saw with amazement, high-heeled stiletto pumps.

There was something familiar about the man’s large, powerful body. She watched as he lowered the kick-stand with the toe of his boot and they dismounted, removing their helmets.

The man’s overlong blond hair lifted in the breeze. The woman’s hair tumbled out, a long, curling, glorious mass of coppery red. They locked their helmets in the bike’s carrier, chatting together companionably, and turned to the beach.

Mary’s heart emitted one hard, dismayed kick. Chance, his tanned, chiseled features relaxed, the wide breadth of his shoulders a tough, aggressive angle in contrast to slim hips and lithe, muscular legs. The woman, the hourglass shape of her body extravagantly feminine, her leather jacket unzipped to reveal a deep neckline that showcased a lovely, generous cleavage, her long green eyes gleaming like a cat’s.