‘That’s the weather for you here,’ she murmured. ‘Especially at this time of year. You’d think summer might be predictable but a storm can erupt out of nowhere.’ She gazed at his hand. He was massaging his collarbone, still frowning, trying to get his thoughts together. Understandable, given what he’d been through. He really was, she thought, stupidly good-looking with that dark, dark hair and olive skin and features chiselled with breathtaking perfection.
Or maybe, at the ripe old age of twenty-four and stuck out here, living a life as predictable as the rising and setting of the sun, she was just easily impressed by someone halfway decent.
She stared at him from under lowered lashes and thought that this guy was far from halfway decent. Halfway decent had been Barry, the guy she had dated for eight months before finally admitting to herself that they were never going to get anywhere and certainly not between the sheets, which, as he had implied with ever increasing clarity, was the destination he had had his eyes on and never mind the business of romance and a courtship to get there. Some straggly flowers and the occasional movie or night out at the local pub, had been top of his game when it had come to wooing her.
‘That’s obviously what happened to you.’ She cleared her throat and fidgeted because he was staring at her with such intensity. ‘Three days ago. You should have checked the weather report before you decided to go sailing. Most people around here do. They know how unpredictable the weather can be but you’re not from around here, are you?’
‘What are you doing here?’
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘Are you a nurse?’
‘No. I...no, I’m not. I suppose you’re wondering why you’re here and not in a hospital, but the local hospital is tiny and Dr Greenway didn’t think it necessary to have you taken by ambulance over to the next biggest hospital, which is quite some distance away. He said you would recover just fine here when I called him over. After I found you.’
‘You found me?’
‘I happened to be looking out of my bedroom window at the time.’
Staring off into the distance and thinking about what it must be like to live out there...in the big, bad world...where adventures happened and the people you met weren’t the same people you went to school with when you were five...where excitement lay behind half-opened doors and sadness and loss were no longer her faithful companions...
She blushed because, although he didn’t say anything, she got the weird feeling that he knew just what was going through her head, which, of course, was impossible.
‘Your boat was just a speck in the distance being tossed around in the storm.’
‘At which point you...?’
‘Dad wasn’t around,’ she said bluntly. ‘And I’m as confident on the water as anyone else I know.’ She saw his eyebrows shoot up and her mouth thinned in a defensive line. She knew nothing about the stranger lying on the bed but she knew enough to realise that, given his staggering good looks and an air of confidence that couldn’t be concealed even wearing her father’s weathered clothes, he wouldn’t be short of female company. And the female company wouldn’t, she was thinking, be the sort capable of sailing the high seas in stormy weather.
‘Are you, now?’
‘Better, probably.’ She shrugged. ‘I got my captain’s licence when I was eighteen and I have every qualification needed to fish at sea. I know everything there is to know about sea survival, including what to do if there’s a fire at sea, and I have brilliant first-aid skills.’
‘So you rescued me because I was stupid enough to get behind the wheel of my boat without first checking the weather forecast. How did you manage to do that?’
‘I used the fastest and most robust boat from my father’s collection and headed out. It didn’t occur to me to ask anyone for help. I knew that if someone was on the boat and in trouble, then aid had to be immediate.’
‘I am remiss in not thanking you. I remember taking the boat out and I remember the storm rolling in but after that...’
‘You were out of it. I know. You were in the water clinging to the side of your boat when I got to you. Semi-conscious.’
‘And yet you managed to haul me into your own boat.’
Cordelia thought of all those dainty five-foot-nothings she had always longed to be. Fragile and delicate, demanding the adoring attention of boys who had always seemed genetically geared to leap into the protective mode the second they came near.
She’d never been one of those. She was five ten and sinewy. She could swim like a fish and sail with the best of them and it showed in the strong lines of her body.
‘You weren’t completely out of it,’ she muttered. ‘You easily helped yourself. Getting back in one piece was a far bigger problem with the storm kicking up a gear and the waves big enough to take us both under.’
‘But you never answered my question. Why are you here?’
Cordelia shot him a puzzled frown. ‘I told you. I work here. With my father. I help run his business. He owns eight boats. He fishes but also does a rental business to subsidise his income.’
‘A challenging life for a young girl.’ The green eyes were curious and assessing.
Now she knew what he was getting at. Why was she here? Was that what was going through his head? Instead of living it up in a city somewhere? With a boyfriend and a giddy round of parties and clubs? Doing all those things girls her age did? Nearly all of her friends had disappeared off to university somewhere and those who had returned had all, without exception, had a boyfriend in tow. They’d married and had their first child within the year. They’d
