Mail-Order Matty

“A decade?” She voiced the question softly. “And then a divorce when you no longer need me?”

Now he understood exactly what the question was, and he was almost giddy with relief. “Matty, have I ever mentioned divorce? I’m not planning to divorce you the minute I don’t need you anymore. Heidi needs a mother, not a baby-sitter. She needs the emotional ties that Gretchen can’t give her. I don’t know how long our marriage will last. Maybe we’ll grow to hate each other despite every effort not to. Maybe you’ll decide you need more than I can give you. I can’t see the future. But I’ve never thought this was going to be less than a real marriage. Maybe we have to pretend about our past, but not about our future.”

Her cheeks flushed a delicate rose. “A real marriage?”

“Were you really ready to settle for less?”

She bit her lip, small even teeth pressing hard enough against the soft tissues to be dangerous. He folded his arms over his chest to keep from covering her hand with his own. “We’re adults, and we’re going to be almost alone in paradise. And we’re going to be married. I don’t work in the lab day and night….”

“Well, that puts things in perspective.”

He smiled, dredging it up from some place deep inside that hadn’t been touched by the cruelties and disappointments of the past years. “We’ll take that part slowly. I’m not expecting you to jump into bed with me. I’m not making demands.” The smile disappeared, and he tasted ashes again, because he knew he was not above using his most foolproof weapon. And he used it now.

“I need you. No one will ever need you more than Heidi and I do, Matty.”

She nodded. If she was aware that he was playing on her greatest vulnerability, she gave no sign. “I’ll go with you to Inspiration Cay.”

“And I’ll do everything in my power to be sure you’re never sorry that you did.”

He told himself it was true, but even as she smiled in answer, he wondered what he could ever give her in return that would be half as important as what she was giving him.

CHAPTER TWO

Matty was used to exhaustion. She had worked graveyard shifts, double shifts and even, during the worst years of her father’s illness, around-the-clock vigils, snatching sleep when she could as she hovered at his bedside. What she wasn’t used to was the muscle-clenching, nerve-pinging meltdown of a body stressed to the limits of its endurance. She had survived the flight to Miami with its delays and rerouting, and the first sight of Damon with its emotional intensity. She had survived their lunch together with its revelations and evaluations. She had survived her own decision to accompany him to Inspiration Cay.

But she wasn’t at all certain she was going to survive the trip there.

“Matty, you’re as white as a ghost.” Damon’s voice vibrated against her ear.

She wanted to smile reassuringly, to explain in a cheery nurse voice that nothing was wrong except that her blood had drained to her feet. But she couldn’t summon a smile or an explanation. She closed her eyes and promised her stomach that the flight to George Town was almost over.

“You’ve never flown in a small plane, have you?” Damon shifted subtly closer in his seat. The heat from his body felt like an electric blanket cranked up to nine.

“Tell me we’re almost there.”

“We promised to be honest with each other.”

Something surprisingly close to a groan rumbled through her throat. His voice was kind. “This wouldn’t be bad if it weren’t stormy. But we’re perfectly safe. We’ll pass through this in no time.”

She wanted to keep him talking. She needed to concentrate on something besides the jolting of the plane and the roiling of her stomach. “Tell me about the island.”

He didn’t answer immediately. “First, I’d better tell you about Kevin. And Nanny.”

She knew that Kevin Garcia and Nanny Rolle were the other two adults who lived on Inspiration Cay. During one of their phone calls, Damon had mentioned that much in passing. He had left her with the impression that they were caretakers, and she had pictured them as a friendly older couple who trimmed hedges and swept verandas in exchange for a small cottage in paradise.

“Kevin first,” he said.

Matty waited, but moments passed before Damon began.

“About six months ago I was in Miami on business, and I’d stayed out later than I’d expected at dinner. My colleagues grabbed cabs back to their hotels somewhere on the other side of town, but I decided to walk to mine because it was less than a mile away. About halfway there I met Kevin.”

She frowned. This didn’t jibe with her notions about who Kevin was. “You mean Kevin was visiting from the Cay?”

“No. He was living in Miami.” He paused. “On the streets.”

Her picture of a smiling old man who would show her shells on the beach and identify tropical shrubs dissolved. “Go on.”

“Kevin ran away when he was fifteen. That was almost two years ago.”

“He’s only seventeen?”

“Not quite.”

“How did you meet him?”

“He tried to rob me.”

The plane lifted, and Matty’s stomach dropped. She squeezed her eyelids shut and pictured herself on the beach with a maniacal teenager who was pelting her with deadly-looking seashells. She forced open her eyes. “I see.”

“He was carrying a knife. A very sharp knife. And I wasn’t carrying anything of interest except a few dollars. I thought I was…” He shrugged.

“Dead?”

“Or thereabouts. Then I noticed the knife was shaking, the kid was shaking. And while I stood there waiting for the right moment to jump him, he collapsed.”

She made a noise low in her throat that was meant to be comforting, but it sounded more like a plea for help.

Damon continued. “He was half starved, crawling with lice, and well on his way to pneumonia. I ended up taking him to the nearest emergency room and telling them he was my nephew, so they would agree to treat him. They shot him full of antibiotics and cleaned him up, then I took him back to my hotel.”

“Minus the knife?” Her voice was faint.

“Definitely. He slept for twenty-four hours straight, and when he finally woke up we had a good long talk. Actually, I did most of the talking, but I found out enough about him to make some decisions. He has no family worth discussion. His mother was an American who died just after he was born. His father’s still living in Cuba. Kevin came to the U.S. with an aunt who moved to California when he was thirteen and didn’t invite him along. His mother’s brother teaches in Peoria, but he doesn’t want a half-Cuban nephew with an attitude. The state stepped in and put him in a group home, which he ran away from three times. The next stop would have been a locked facility, but no one was in hot pursuit. The older a kid is, the less interest the system has in him. At Kevin’s age they’d be only too happy to let him look after himself.”

“But he couldn’t…”

“Of course not.” Damon shifted in his seat so that he could watch her face. “Kevin’s brilliant, Matty. One of the brightest kids I’ve ever met. He’s tough and profane and unpolished, to say the least, but he’s got so much potential. I had to do something to give him a chance to use it.”

As sick as she felt, Matty still noticed the way Damon stepped in through the back door of his own humanity. He hadn’t admitted to compassion or affection for the teenager who had been dealt such a lousy hand by fate. He had rescued Kevin because of his potential. The rational scientist making a decision based solely on logic. Except that there was much more than objectivity in his voice.

“So you brought him to Inspiration Cay?” she said.

“He was too sick to argue. He’s been with me ever since. He works in the lab, helps take care of the place. And he inhales whatever books I give him. He doesn’t know it, but I’m tutoring him. I get books with the information he’ll need for a GED, then we talk about them when we’re working together. Once he gets his diploma and takes the SATs, he’ll be a shoo-in for a good university.”

She digested the fact that in addition to marrying a near stranger, she seemed to be taking on a teenaged boy with a dark past. “And Nanny? She’s not a runaway, too, is she?”

“Of course not.” He paused. “Not exactly.”

Her head was pounding now, in rhythm to the dips and shimmies of the nine-passenger Cessna. She felt for her airsickness bag, just to be certain it was there.

“Nanny is seventy,” Damon said. “She used to cook for a small guest house in George Town. Until everyone refused to work with her anymore. She’s…cranky. And odd. Nanny wants things her way. Her children want her to stop working and enjoy her final years. Nanny won’t have it. She still has moments of genius in the kitchen….”

“And the rest of the time?”

“Her eyesight’s not good, and her sense of smell, or maybe taste, seems to be going. She’s apt to use red pepper as paprika, mix up her herbs, french fry turnips instead of potatoes. Nanny’s meals are an adventure. Her housekeeping is… interesting.”

“Damon, where is Heidi now? She’s not with—”

“Kevin and Nanny have her. But don’t worry. They both adore her. Heidi’ll be perfectly safe, although the things they’ll do for her will be unconventional, to say the least.”

She pictured a sixteen-year-old pirate and a crotchety old woman burying a squalling infant up to her neck in the sand.

“About now you’re wondering what you got yourself into, aren’t you?”

“About now?” She closed her eyes again. The plane seemed to flutter in the air, then it dropped suddenly.

The tone of Damon’s voice changed. “Matty, are you going to be sick?”

She was, but not with Damon sitting beside her. She unsnapped her seat belt and leaped to her feet. The one advantage of a small plane was the short distance to the one and only lavatory. She found her way there with no trouble. And just in time.

* * *

George Town, with its Caribbean rhythms, its vigorous good cheer and unfailing fascination with its own goings-on, had lost its charm by the time Damon helped Matty off the plane. Her skin defined white. In fact, she was so pale she was nearly translucent. He expected to glance at her in a moment and see her bones etched in full display.

“Technically this is Moss Town,” he told her. “But it’s just a short cab ride to George Town and the boat that will take us to the cay.” He paused. “If Samuel’s waiting…”

“Boat?”

He had told her about the boat. He was sure he had. He suspected that she was firmly into denial, the only way to cope under the circumstances. “I wish we could just stay here tonight and go to the cay tomorrow, but I can’t be away from Heidi overnight.”

“I understand.” Her voice seemed to grow fainter every time she used it.

He considered leaving her at a hotel in George Town, where she could rest and recover. He could return for her tomorrow, when she was feeling better. He could bring Heidi with him, dressed in her frilliest sunsuit so that Matty couldn’t resist her. Then he could take Matty back to Inspiration Cay, where Kevin and Nanny, under his strongest threats, would be on their best behavior. There was only one problem.

He might return to find that Matty had flown the coop.

“It’s still hours to sunset….” He couldn’t make himself say that she would enjoy the boat ride. “We’ll probably make good time.”

“What’s…good time?”

He guided her through the easygoing customs ritual and helped her gather her suitcases before he answered. “The trip takes several hours…in good weather.”

“Oh…”

The weather wasn’t going to be good. He knew that from the turbulence on the plane. “I brought something for seasickness, just in case. You probably should take it now, if you think you can manage.”

She gave a brief heroic nod. He took her elbow. “We’ll get you a drink to wash it down and wait a few minutes. Sometimes the taxi rides into town are enough to make me queasy.”

Her breath caught. He was afraid that at this point it was the most forceful protest she could manage.

* * *

Matty took a double dose of motion sickness tablets. They had nearly worn off by the time Samuel arrived two hours late—Bahamian time, Damon called it—to ferry them to the cay. He was a large man, with smooth dark skin and hands as large as shovel blades. He ushered them on board with friendly chatter as the waves slapping at the jetty threatened to toss Matty to the deck. Damon seemed unaffected.

“The crossing, it’ll be a rough one,” Samuel said with a distinctive Caribbean lilt. “The boat go up and the sea go down, not always at the same time. But we’ll make it, no problem. I’ll be staying at the cay tonight for sure. Just don’ want old Nanny makin’ my supper. Bought food for us to eat.” He lifted the lid on a gigantic plastic cooler. The pungent smell of fried seafood, of garlic and a nostril-tingling assortment of herbs and spices, rose to greet her. “Plenty for all.”

Matty glanced wordlessly at Damon. He started forward to slam the lid, apparently all too aware of her reaction. She heard the click as the lid fell back into place, but it was already too late. She was fumbling blindly toward the side of the boat to hang her head over the rail.

* * *

At some point on the boat trip to Inspiration Cay the waves began to seem like allies. Matty knew that if she could just struggle to the side again and this time manage to throw herself overboard, the waves would swallow her and put her out of her misery. Dying that way seemed preferable to dying by inches. And she was sure she was dying. She would not live to see Inspiration Cay, not live to see the baby she was to raise or to marry the baby’s father, a man she had loved silently and passionately so many years ago.

“We’ll be there before the last rays of light fade away.” Damon said. “Are you going to make it?”

“No.”

Something much too close to a chuckle rumbled through his chest. He pulled her a little closer. Sometime during the last hour he had slung his arm over her shoulders to keep her warm. “I really am sorry about this. Do you always get seasick?”

She had never been on waters like these. She had canoed and rowed on placid Minnesota lakes without a qualm. “How often…?” She couldn’t finish.

“How often do we have to make this trip?”

She nodded weakly.

“Only as often as you want. We’ll have to go to Nassau to get our wedding license in a few days. But after that you can stay put if you like. The water’s not usually this rough, and you’ll be rested and ready the next time you brave the waves.”

“Never…”

“It’s been a big day, Matty.”

She wanted to tell him to turn the boat around, that the day had been much too big to absorb, and she had made a terrible mistake. But if he did as she asked, the trip back to George Town would be longer than the trip to Inspiration Cay. And she was a slave to what was left of her stomach.

“There are 365 cays in the Exumas, did you know that?”

She had done her reading. She knew cay was pronounced “key” and that many of the Out Islands of the Bahamas, of which the Exumas were a part, were uninhabited. “One for each day,” she whispered.

“I’ve been to a number of them. Some don’t even exist at high tide. Some, like Inspiration Cay, are high enough above sea level to live on comfortably. The house at Inspiration is on a low rise. It makes for spectacular sunset views.”

She tried to hold on to that thought. The sun was setting right now, and had she not been dying she might have termed it spectacular. As it was, she couldn’t watch the heavenly light show, because every time she focused on the horizon the boat dipped and her head went spinning in protest.

“The house has stood on that rise for almost a hundred years.” Damon seemed to know that she was soothed by the sound of his voice and the warm weight of his arm. Matty knew he was trying to offer his support in the only way he could. Both his voice and arm were impersonal, the comfort anyone might offer. In fact, every time he had touched her—and in their hours together he had touched her five times—he had scarcely seemed to notice what he was doing. She, on the other hand, had noticed every pressure, every movement, every texture.

“It’s a wonderful house,” he said. “Spacious and airy, with sun-filled rooms, and breezes sweeping through that keep it cool enough to bear on the warmest days. You’ll recognize the architecture from pictures of Key West. Double verandas, hipped roof and French windows you can step through into the sunshine. My room—” He broke off abruptly.

She sat very still and waited for him to continue.

“My room’s facing east,” he said, after a moment. “I can see the sunrise, and I’m usually awake to do it with Heidi over my shoulder or on my lap. I don’t expect you to share my room right away. Heidi’s room is beside mine in what was probably a dressing room at one time. And then there’s another room that shares the same balcony. That will be yours until…” He didn’t finish.

He was absolutely right, and she knew she should feel relieved. Instead she felt more dispirited, if that was possible. And what had she hoped? That Damon would be so attracted to a seasick mouse of a woman that he would demand that she crawl into his bed on this, their first night together, and make passionate love to him?

“I’m never going to make any demands on you,” he said. “I’ll never be able to thank you enough for marrying me, and I’m not going to ask you for anything else. When and if you’re ready, you’ll know where my room is.”

“If I’m ever steady enough…on my legs again…to walk that far.”

He laughed, a spontaneous eruption that almost convinced her that he hadn’t given up on her completely. “You’ll be fine after a good night’s sleep. I promise.”

“I’ll hold you…to it.”

“The cay just ahead,” Samuel shouted. “Follow the wide purple streak to the sea, Matty, and look left.”

Damon got to his feet. “Can you stand?”

She really didn’t know. Theoretically it seemed possible. She wanted to see the island that was to be her new home, to get her first glimpse with Damon at her side, his arm around her waist. Surely she could summon up enough physical and emotional reserves to take her in to shore.

He held out his hand, and she took it, letting him pull her to her feet. For a moment she felt fine, as if the mysterious concept of sea legs was a reality in which she shared.

“Rough water here,” Samuel shouted. “Hold on tight. I be takin’ her in to Inspiration slow, and the boat, she gonna shake.”

Samuel’s words were a prophecy. The powerboat began to dance over the water’s surface like a hippo in an out-of-control conga line. Matty had already lost everything she’d eaten. Her stomach was beyond revolt, but her head was not. The world grew black, and just before she lost sight of it, it began to spin. She made one valiant attempt to take her seat again before the deck rushed up to meet her.

* * *

“Matty, this is Kevin,” Damon said.

Matty peered into the near darkness, illuminated by a row of lamps strung along a winding path that rose toward a two-story house set behind palms. Kevin was about ten yards away, nothing more than a hazy man-size shape in the distance.

“Matty’s not feeling well,” Damon continued. “She’s had a rough day. Would you mind helping Samuel with her suitcases, then take him up to the guest house? He’s brought enough food to feed an army, if that’s any incentive.”

Kevin grunted in response, then started toward them, making sure to give Matty a wide berth. She wanted to say something, anything, that might signal good intentions, but she was still trying to cope with ground that didn’t quake and a world that only revolved at its normal speed. “Hello, Kevin,” was the best she could manage to say as he passed.

This time he didn’t even grunt in answer.

“Kevin’s not an easy nut to crack,” Damon said when Kevin was out of earshot. “He liked things the way they were, and until he’s sure you’re not a threat of some kind, he won’t welcome you.”

She nodded, too ill to ask for any pointers on dealing with the teenager.

“Nanny won’t welcome you with open arms, either,” Damon said as they started back up the path. “I’d avoid getting in her way for a while. Don’t make suggestions or changes until she’s sure you’re not trying to get rid of her.”

Despite everything, she was touched that the feelings of two outcasts of such disparate generations mattered this much to Damon. “I’ll be careful.”

“I hope Heidi’s asleep,” he said as they drew closer to the house. “That would be a better introduction for you. She’s tolerable when she’s sleeping.”

She disregarded his attempt at cynicism. She already knew that Damon was head over heels in love with his daughter. Why else would he have orchestrated this amazing situation?

By the time the house loomed just fifty yards in the distance, Matty got her first unimpeded view. It was both grander and shabbier than she had expected, a soft pink twenty-carat jewel trimmed with white latticework along first and second-story porches that wrapped around the house. The roof was metal, a surprisingly homey touch in a house as stately as this one, and the ever-present Bahamian sun had softened the paint into swirling patterns, as if a pricey decorator had hired a crew to sponge it with a dozen different shades of rose. The porch floors were a deep sapphire blue, and so was some of the window trim. The overall effect was of a doll’s mansion, Caribbean-style.

“Like it?” Damon asked.

“Oh yes.”

“It’s called Inspiration. The cay was named for the house. The man who built it wanted this to be a place where artists and creative people of all kinds could come and spend time to gather their thoughts or start work on their next projects. Over the century some very important people spent time here, but no records have been kept. The owner didn’t want people stopping by to ogle Inspiration’s guests. The next owner carried on the tradition, and Arthur is trying to, as well.”

“And that’s why you’re here…”

“Time will tell if Arthur’s made a mistake or not.”

She wanted to ask him more about that, and planned to later. She knew very little about what Damon was doing or why he was doing it on a remote Bahamian island. He had told her that he had needed a place and time to do his research, and Arthur had provided them. But everything else was foggy.

“Can you make it up the steps?” Damon asked.

“I promise…I won’t throw myself at you again.”

“Something tells me that was a new experience for you.”

She apologized, as she had when she had regained consciousness in his arms. “I started out training as a surgical nurse. I never felt dizzy no matter what I had to do.”

“I wasn’t talking about fainting. I was talking about throwing yourself at a man.”

She laughed, embarrassed. “I don’t seem to have much talent for it, do I? I was unconscious during the best part.”

“I don’t know. You made sure I was right there to catch you. That shows some talent. Maybe you just need practice.”

“Not if the aftermath is a pounding headache and total humiliation. I’ll have new sympathy for my patients when I go back to nursing.”

He had been walking beside her without touching her. Now he took her arm, his fingers just barely brushing her skin. “Let’s get the introductions over, then we’ll get you to bed. A couple of aspirin and a good night’s sleep. I bet you won’t even radio for help tomorrow.”

“You’re safe. Getting off the island would be worse than staying.”

“You’ll probably never have to endure another trip in by boat like that one. Normally we can fly in to Staniel Cay and be here by boat in twenty minutes. But I couldn’t charter a flight to Staniel yesterday.”

“Oh…”

“I’ll make this up to you.”

The thought of that sent heat skidding down her spine. She felt suddenly giddy, even without waves tossing the deck beneath her. “I’ll hold you to that.”