A Knight In Rusty Armor

She nodded again, but he could tell he wasn’t getting through. In fact she looked just about ready to fall face first into her soup bowl.

“Ma’am—Ru—why not turn in? They say sleep’s the best medicine for a cold. While you’re sacked out I’ll go retrieve whatever else you need from your car. With my four-wheel-drive, I ought to be able to get through.”

While he was at it, he’d clean the thing out in case it didn’t make it through the night. It wouldn’t be the first time a vehicle had disappeared without a trace.

“Keys in my purse,” she said, her voice momentarily improved by the hot soup and coffee. “May I try to call Moselle again?”

“Be my guest.” He didn’t think much of her chances. Even if she made contact, it wasn’t going to do her much good with the road washed out.

She stood and gathered up her bowl and cup, looking lost and helpless. Against every grain of common sense he possessed, Trav found himself wanting to take them out of her hands, wanting to take her in his arms and promise her that everything would be all right. He held back, partly because he was in no position to promise her anything, partly because, like every other serviceman, he’d been trained to avoid anything that could possibly be construed as sexual harassment.

But mostly because the temptation to hold her, to reach out to her, was so strong. He didn’t trust his instincts where women were concerned.

He looked her over and reached the conclusion that she was a lot stronger than she looked, despite appearances. There might be shadows under her eyes and a droop to her pale lips, but somewhere underneath that fragile exterior he had a feeling there was a solid core of steel.

“I think you’d better hit the sack, ma’am. I changed the sheets this morning. If you need more covers, look in the locker at the foot of the bed.”

Personally, he liked to sleep with the windows open year round. Under the circumstances that might not be a good idea.

For the next two days Trav found himself playing reluctant host to a stubborn, close-mouthed, suspicious woman in a small, bare house with only one finished bedroom and a few mismatched pieces of furniture. It was not a comfortable situation, but he didn’t see what choice he had. If his guest had a single social grace, she must have left it hidden under the floormat of her car, which by now was probably buried under a few tons of sand and salt water.

At last report, one tow truck was stuck in the washout south of Frisco, another one had been caught on the wrong side of the S-curve, north of Chicamacomico until the road crews could scrape the highway. And that would take a while because a section of the Oregon Inlet bridge, which had been damaged and rebuilt a few years ago after a barge slammed into it in a storm, was showing signs of sinking again. Heavy equipment was being held back until they could get a ferry up and running.

Life on the Outer Banks wasn’t always easy, but of all the places Trav had been stationed in his twenty-year career—Alaska, Hawaii, Connecticut, the U.S. Virgin Islands, not to mention all the places he’d lived as a kid, following his old man—he’d never found one that suited him better.

Mostly the woman, whose full name was Ruanna Roberts according to the registration on her car, slept. It was just as well. Trav had things to do, and he didn’t need any more delays.

He stopped by the exchange and picked up extra milk, extra coffee, a few more cans of soup and a supply of aspirin, just in case. While he was out he bought some groceries for Miss Cal, fed her chickens and walked her dog. After listening to her comments, mostly unflattering, about the government, old bones and cable TV, he loaded her porch with firewood and drove home.

Ru was still sleeping, but the coffeepot he’d left half-full was empty and unplugged. Evidently she hadn’t slept all day. It felt odd, having someone else in the house. Not necessarily bad, just odd.

Get used to it, Holiday. With any luck at all, you’ll be sharing quarters on a permanent basis.

Feeling a familiar tug of emotion, he put through another call, reached Sharon, took a deep, steadying breath and asked to speak to his son.

“Matt’s in school.”

He’d forgotten the time difference. There was a long silence, and then, “How come whenever I call, he’s never available. If it’s not school it’s soccer practice. If it’s not that, he’s sleeping over with a friend. Give me a break, Sharon. He’s my son, dammit.”

“I see you haven’t changed. If you don’t get your way, you resort to swearing. Maybe it’s better if I don’t let you meet him at all. I don’t think you’d be a very good influence.”

“Oh, and I suppose Saint Andrew is a great influence,” he jeered. Trav had never even met the man. For all he knew, Andrew Rollins was an ideal role model, but dammit, Matthew was his son, not Rollins’s. Trav had never even spoken to the boy, much less seen him. He still found it hard to believe that for the past twelve years he’d had a son, and until eleven months ago he hadn’t even known about him.

Damned if he wasn’t tempted to threaten her again with a lawyer, but if he knew Sharon—and he did, having been married to her for a few miserable years a long time ago—that would only get her back up. As she’d been quick to point out the first time he’d mentioned joint custody, the law would side with her. At the time he’d been a bachelor living in rented rooms, and she was able to provide a home and a stable family. “Three guesses which side social services will come down on,” she’d taunted.

Trav had bitten his tongue and reminded himself that she’d been the one to get in touch with him after all this time, to tell him he had a son. She’d hardly have done that if she meant to keep them apart.

Trav had never claimed to be a family man. What he was, was a duty-bound, by-the-books career serviceman. He’d been called a loner. If so, it was only because he didn’t know how to be anything else. He was no better at relationships than his own father had been, as Sharon had pointed out more than a few times. But sixteen years ago, head over heels in lust, if not in love, he’d been willing to learn.

Evidently he hadn’t learned fast enough or well enough. Now, at the advanced age of thirty-nine, he might not know much about families and forming close ties, but he was determined to give it his best shot. Matthew was his own flesh and blood.

Trav’s first impulse on learning that he had a twelve-year-old son was to fly out to the West Coast where Sharon now lived with her second husband, their two daughters and Matthew. But she’d told him to wait. To give her time to prepare the boy for the fact that Andrew Rollins was not his real father.

So he’d waited, and then waited some more. While he was waiting, he’d bought a few acres and started building a house. Next he’d looked around for someone to help him create some semblance of a stable family, to tip the scales in his favor in case it was needed. Meanwhile, he’d sent money and arranged for child support to be taken from his paycheck, and he’d started writing to the boy. He’d sent pictures. He’d sent a baseball glove, soccer gear, a football and a spinning rod, complete with a fully equipped tackle box.

He’d written a bunch of stuff he probably shouldn’t have, all about how his own father had been career Coast Guard, and how one of Trav’s mother’s ancestors had owned thousands of acres in northeast North Carolina, but by the time her descendents had found out about it, it had dwindled to a few hundred acres of swamp that was now part of a wildlife refuge. He’d promised that one day they’d explore it together, canoeing, backpacking—whatever it took.

Oh boy, he’d gone way out on a limb. Trying to establish some kind of a relationship, he’d barged in without waiting to be invited. Being able to size up a situation quickly and act on it was an advantage in his line of work. It could mean the difference between success and failure. But in personal matters it could lead to a situation he didn’t know how to handle.

Matthew had never written back, but Sharon had assured him that it was only because he was ashamed of his poor handwriting and was working hard on improving it. She’d said something about one of those learning disabilities that had been discovered recently. A lot of bright kids had it. Some of them even took pills for it.

Things had changed since he was a kid. Trav was just beginning to realize how much he didn’t know about being a parent.

After giving up on another fruitless attempt to reach his son, he dialed the number of Ru’s friend, Moselle Sawyer, and got the same irritating message. He yawned, then sneezed and then turned as his houseguest shuffled into the living room.

“Someone named Kelli called while you were out. She said she’d call back. I left a note in the kitchen.”

“You sound better.”

“I’ve decided to live ”

“Glad to hear it.” She looked better. In fact, she looked a hell of a lot better, even with her hair in a shaggy braid down her back and a limp black sweater that did nothing at all for her looks.

“Who’s Kelli?” She handed him a note she’d written on the back of an envelope.

Trav glanced at the note, then looked over at the woman who’d spent the past forty-eight hours in his bed The thought that ran through his mind was not only inappropriate, it was impractical. She was a lot better looking than he’d first thought, if a man happened to like his women long, lean and chilly.

Personally, he liked them warm, with a little more meat on the bone. Plus a lot more animation. But then, he’d traveled down that road before and had no intention of repeating the mistake. “She’s my fiancée. My ex-fiancée, that is. We’re, uh—still on friendly terms.”

Kelli was nothing if not friendly. It was one of the things he’d liked best about her—she was always up. Bright, chipper, talkative. If, after a while it had begun to get on his nerves, he figured that was his problem, not hers. “Did she say why she was calling?”

“No. She sounded sort of surprised when I answered. She asked if I was Sharon. Who’s Sharon?”

Somewhere between boot camp and being commissioned, Trav had picked up a few manners. Hell, he’d even graduated from knife-and-fork class, like every other mustang trying to become an officer and a gentleman.

So he politely refrained from telling her that it was none of her business. “Sharon is my ex-wife, Ms. Roberts, currently happily remarried and living on the West Coast. Now, is there anything else you’d like to know?”

So much for gentlemanly manners. If he’d tossed a lit firecracker in her lap, she couldn’t have looked more startled.

Startled?

Make that frightened.

Two

“Sorry. I didn’t mean to be rude, Ms. Roberts.”

“How did you know my name?”

He frowned. “Your name?”

“You called me Ms. Roberts. I didn’t tell you that.”

If there’d been any color at all in her face before, it was gone now, except for the shadows under her eyes. “It’s on your registration. Ruanna Roberts? That is you, isn’t it?”

The lady was a walking minefield. “Look, I’m sorry. If you’re a spook on assignment, or in the witness protection program, I don’t want to know about it. It’s none of my business. I just thought it might be a good idea to clean out the trunk of your car before it—Anyway, I grabbed the papers from the glove compartment while I was at it, and I happened to see the name.”

Her shoulders lifted and fell, making him aware for the first time that she wasn’t quite as skinny as he’d first thought. At least, not all over.

“I’m the one who should apologize. I’m not—not either of those things you mentioned. It’s just that—well, I have this thing about privacy,” she finished weakly.

“That makes two of us.”

“I’m sorry. I’m being silly about this, I know—it’s just that I don’t really know anything about you, yet you’ve taken me in and fed me, given me your bed—given me the shirt off your back. Literally.” Her voice was still husky, but it no longer sounded quite so painful.

“No big deal. Anyone would’ve done the same thing.” As the bag he’d brought along the first night had held mostly shoes, he’d lent her a pair of his old sweats to sleep in, and because her sweater was still damp, he’d lent her a flannel shirt.

“Maybe not to you. I don’t know what I would’ve done if—” She rolled her eyes. “I talk too much. I always do when I’m uncomfortable. Why don’t I just go change your bed and pop the linens and sweats into the washer before I leave? I appreciate all you’ve done, I really do.” She stood up, all five feet six or seven inches of her. All hundred fifteen or so pounds, nicely—if somewhat too sparsely—distributed.

“Don’t bother,” he said, his gaze following her as she walked away. Her hips swayed, they didn’t twitch. It was a subtle distinction, one he didn’t normally notice and didn’t even know why he was noticing now. “I’ll wash ’em next time I get up a load.”

Pausing in the doorway, she glanced over her shoulder. “It’s the least I can do before I leave.”

He shrugged. If she wanted to do his laundry, who was he to stop her? She wouldn’t be going anywhere today, though Too many bad stretches of road that weren’t going to get much better until the scrapers could get down here and uncover any highway that was left under all that sand.

Besides which, her car was a total loss. One of the linesmen had taken a look at it while he was out checking poles. They might be able to use it to help fill up any washout, but that was about all it was good for. He hoped she had insurance on the thing.

She dragged her luggage into the living room, and then she looked at him expectantly. He pretended not to notice. Whether or not she realized it, she was in no condition to go off on her own, even if she had a means of transportation. Whatever bug she’d had had knocked the starch out of her.

This situation was getting pretty dicey. Unfortunately he couldn’t come up with a single regulation that covered it. “I’ve got work to do,” he muttered.

“But—”

“Road might be clear by this afternoon. I’ll check it out in a couple of hours.”

While he laid out another wall of paneling in the room that would be Matt’s, Trav tried to come up with a solution. The woman was sick. She was without transportation and Hatteras Island didn’t run to streetcars and taxis. The friend she was expecting to visit was currently unavailable, and as for the job...

Dicey situation. About all he could say for it was that it took his mind off the frustration he’d felt ever since he’d learned about his son.

Trav had always considered himself a patient man. He worked hard at cultivating the trait. His father hadn’t had the patience to deal with a wife and a son. His cousin Harrison had ended up in the coronary care unit before he’d learned that a man had to accept certain limitations and shape his life around them the best way he could, if he wanted to survive.

He held up another board and reached for his hammer. Working outside on a pair of sawbucks, he’d measured and cut all the paneling to size before the weather closed in. His carpentry skills were on a par with his housekeeping skills. Adequate, with room for improvement.

Most of the work had been contracted, but he’d wanted to do as much as possible with his own hands, not only to save money. There was a lot of satisfaction in building a home for his son with his own hands.

“Do you want coffee?” Ruanna Roberts called out from the kitchen. Evidently she’d given up on waiting for him to offer to drive her wherever she was going.

He should have offered to drive her to the nearest motel or, at least, the nearest one that was open this time of year. Rescuing survivors was second nature to a man with his training. Rescuing, offering shelter. That much he’d done without hesitation, only what now? He had an uneasy feeling the job wasn’t done yet.

“Travis? Coffee?”

“Yeah, sure—thanks.”

Come to think of it, he could use something hot to drink. His chest ached, probably from trying to sleep on his stomach on the sofa with his feet hanging off the edge. His throat felt kind of dry and scratchy, too, from all this talking. He wasn’t used to having company.

She made good coffee. “What’s this stuff?” He eyed the plate she set before him suspiciously.

“Sugar toast. Haven’t you ever had sugar toast?” The look on his face told Ruanna all she needed to know. He’d never heard of sugar toast. “If I could’ve found your cinnamon, it would have been cinnamon toast. You know—butter, sugar and spice?”

“Yeah, sure.”

The way he said it made her think he’d never even heard of cinnamon toast. Not that it was important one way or the other. All the same, she had to wonder what his childhood had been like. Cinnamon toast had been one of her favorite treats as a child. Maybe it was a girl thing.

“It’s beginning to clear up,” she observed. Sooner or later it had to. She’d been here three days and had yet to see the sun.

Of course, she’d slept through the first two days. Whatever had ailed her, it had been no mere cold. Flu, more than likely.

As for the depression she’d been fighting off, she couldn’t really blame it on a virus. A person would have to be crazy not to be depressed when, one right after another, like a row of dominoes, her marriage had fallen apart, her family had been rocked by scandal and death, her identity was stolen, her credit rating ruined, her job lost. Let’s not forget the crank caller who had insisted on making her life hell. And then, on top of all that, her car had broken down, which forced her to throw herself on the mercy of a stranger.

Being depressed only proved she was sane.

“I’m afraid I’ve got some bad news for you.”

It was all she could do not to laugh. As if she’d had any other kind of news for the past few years. About the best thing that had happened to her lately was finding the owner of a stray cat that had shown up on her doorstep back in November. The last thing she’d needed was a cat.

But then, after it was gone, she’d cried for half a day. “Bad news? No thanks, I don’t care to hear it.”

He shrugged. “Your choice. Look, I’ve got to run out to check on a neighbor. Is there anything you need while I’m out?”

Only my car. Only my friend. Only my job and my life back. “I can’t think of a single thing, but thanks. If you’ll just give me the name of the garage where you had my car towed, I’ll see if it’s ready. It was probably only a clogged fuel line. It acted like it was out of gas, but I’m pretty sure...”

Her voice trailed off. She didn’t like the way he was looking at her, not quite meeting her eyes. “You’re going to tell me it’s not a clogged fuel line, aren’t you? It’s something more serious. Something expensive.”

Ru tried to remember how much money she had left after filling up the gas tank. Three twenties. One fifty. A few fives and several ones. It would have to last her until she was working again. She didn’t owe anyone anything, thank goodness. She would never trust credit cards again; thankfully, she’d learned to get by on practically nothing.

The car had been a necessity. An expensive one, as it turned out—but she could hardly have walked from Atlanta to the Outer Banks. It had been the cheapest thing on the lot, and the dealer had assured her that aside from peeling vinyl and a few dents, it was basically sound. When she’d asked if he thought it would get her to the Outer Banks, he had assured her that it was just what she needed for a long trip. Plenty of trunk space and a comfortable ride.

“They tried to pull it out,” Trav was saying. “Your car? I’m talking about your car.” He had an earth-to-Ru look in his eyes, so she stopped silently damning the used-car dealer and mentally counting her money, and tried to look attentive.

“Like I said, they hooked her up. and tried to haul her out, but she started coming apart They tried digging, but you know how quicksand is.”

“No, I don’t. I’m not interested in learning about quicksand, I just want my car back. In good running condition. There was nothing wrong with it when we left it except that it wasn’t running.”

He said something about a yellow blob rising above the dunes that didn’t register. She stared at his hair. It was cut too short and turning gray. Prematurely, judging from the rest of him. He was weathered, whipcord tough, but he wasn’t old. She was still studying his irregular features when his words sunk in.

“That’s not possible,” she said flatly. “I left it parked on the highway. You were there—you saw where I left it. It couldn’t possibly sink right through the pavement.”

“Yeah, well—these things have a way of happening. First one wave cuts through the dunes, and then a few more pile in behind it, widening the gap. First thing you know, the road’s undermined and whatever happens to be there gets dislodged and starts sinking when the sand traps more water than it can absorb ”

“Well, do something! Cars can’t just disappear!”

“It didn’t disappear. Like I said, it’s still there, only it’s buried up to the rearview mirror. They’ll probably bulldoze it out once they start repairing the road. I’m sorry, Ru. I’ll be glad to drive you to Manteo to look for a new one once the road’s open again. Or you can wait and go with your friend. She might even be able to find you something down here, but I’d have it checked out by a mechanic first. This climate’s not too good on cars.”

Ru swallowed hard. She wasn’t going to cry. She wasn’t going to panic. She’d already lost practically everything in the world she had to lose. What was one noisy, smelly, gas-swilling old junker in the grand scheme of things? At least she had her health back.

Trav watched the parade of emotions pass through those rainwater clear eyes of hers. The rims weren’t red now, they were only slightly pink. Her nose was no longer red, either. Pretty damned elegant, in fact, as noses went. As were the cheekbones. Sharon would have killed for cheekbones like that.

“You all right?” he ventured, after giving her tune to absorb the bad news.

She smiled. Actually smiled. He felt something shift inside him and chalked it up to the sugar toast. He wasn’t much for sweets. Now and then he might buy himself a cake or a pie when the ladies had a bake sale, but only to help out the cause. Basically he was a meat-and-potatoes man.

“It looks as if I’ll have to ask you for one more favor. Could you possibly drive me to wherever Moselle lives? If she’s still not there, I’ll camp out on her doorstep until she shows up. I’m pretty sure it’s not going to rain anymore.”

He wouldn’t bet on it. He wouldn’t bet on her hooking up with her friend anytime soon, either. With tourist season expanding at both ends, February was about the only month the business community had to take a break.

“What’d you say your friend did at the restaurant? She owns it?”

“Not yet, but she hopes to. Right now she’s only the assistant manager.”

Before he could comment on that, the phone rang. He happened to be looking at her at the time. She covered it well, but he’d seen panic before. That was pure panic he saw in her eyes before her lids came down and she took a deep breath.

He reached for the phone, never taking his eyes off the woman sitting tensely on the edge of one of his three chairs. “Holiday,” he said. “Yeah. Sure, I don’t mind. No, it’s no trouble. Who? Kelli, what difference does it make? No, it has nothing to do with Matthew. Look, I’ll take care of it for you, all right?”

He hung up the phone, waiting for the questions to begin. Women. Were they all like this? Curious as cats, wanting to know everything about a man’s private life?

He’d liked to think it was due to jealousy, but any illusions he’d had along those lines had evaporated a long time ago. Before she could be jealous, a woman had to care. The only thing Sharon had ever been jealous of was what other women had that she couldn’t afford.

As for Kelli, she was too pretty to be jealous of anyone. His ego had taken more of a beating than he’d expected when she’d dumped him a week before the wedding date. Not that he’d let on. He’d never been one to show his feelings. It had been a mistake right from the first, thinking a wife might make it easier to stake his claim on his son.