Alegra's Homecoming

Joe had spotted her at the booth where the ferry tickets were bought before they’d boarded for the trip to the island. She’d stood out in the sea of commuters getting on the ferry’s last run before it shut down for the night. Her clothes had certainly made her conspicuous: the thigh-length jacket with what he’d guess was politically correct faux fur at the collar and cuffs, to the pencil-legged jeans, and the narrow high-heeled boots.

He’d watched her get her ticket, then climb into the car, a sleek black sedan, in front of his old truck. He’d guessed she was in her late twenties, with shoulder-length hair the color of rich cream, and a profile that hinted at a delicate beauty he wouldn’t have minded seeing full face. But she was in the car with its tinted windows, and out of sight by the time the ferry started loading.

He’d been behind her on the deck, letting the truck idle to keep the heater going, and watched her exit her car. No islander would leave the comfort of his or her vehicle to stand at the rail and stare out at the dark waters of the sound. He’d watched her until she disappeared, then decided to go belowdecks to the small concession for some hot coffee.

He’d been up since four that morning, taking the earliest ferry to Seattle, and he was starting to feel the effects of a long day in the city. But before he’d reached the stairs that led belowdecks, he’d passed the woman and heard her mutter, “Damn it all,” in a choked voice. He’d turned and she was there, looking decidedly green around the gills. He hadn’t thought twice about going closer and asking her if she was okay.

Now he was standing facing her, seeing she was as beautiful as he’d thought she was. Alegra Reynolds. The name rang a bell, but before he could get a handle on where he’d heard it, her cell phone rang again.

After reading the LED screen, she answered it. As he turned to look past them at the dock coming closer and closer, he heard her say, “What now, Roz?” Then a long silence before he heard, “Do it. Let me know when the tax attorney gets back to you.” As he glanced back at her, he saw her end the call, but still keep the phone in her hand. “Business,” she said.

“I assumed as much. ‘Tax attorney’ doesn’t usually come up in everyday conversations with friends and family.”

She smiled softly, another expression that was so damned endearing it made his breath catch. “No, it doesn’t,” she said. “You lived here before and then came back?”

He nodded. “Right.”

“You commute to work now?”

Despite her blush when he’d told her his name, she apparently didn’t have a clue who Joseph Lawrence was. “No, I work on the island. I’m a writer for the newspaper, the Beacon—it’s a small weekly for the island. We cover big stories like announcing the best peach preserves and counting the times the local drunk is locked up.”

A spasm crossed her face and he was certain she was going to be sick, but she only exhaled. “You’re a reporter for the paper?” she asked.

He nodded. “A reporter and the owner.”

He could tell that surprised her. “Really?”

“That’s what it says on the flag, owner and editor, at least it has for the past six months. The previous owner, Clive Orr, retired to Florida to sun and fun.”

“Smart man,” she murmured as the wind picked up, bringing cutting cold with it.

When her phone rang again, he heard himself asking, “Does it ever stop?”

She took the device out, saw the LED and hit a button that shut off the ring. “When I turn it off.” She kept it in one hand, and tried futilely to get her hair under control and behind her ears. “It’s business. You know how that is.”

He had a flashback to his other life, before he came home to Shelter Island. Back then cell phones had been his lifelines. Heck, he’d had three. One for business. One for personal calls. And one with a number he only gave a select few. He’d had an earpiece he never took out of his ear while he was awake. Now he still had a cell phone, but seldom turned it on, and truthfully wasn’t at all sure where it was right now. “It can eat up your life, can’t it?” he said.

She took him off guard when she asked, “Why did you leave the island?”

He shrugged. “You know, the old I’m-going-to-conquer-the-world attitude?”

“And you didn’t?”

“I got close, then came back here,” he said, not about to go into details of the twenty years he’d lived away from the island, or why he’d come back here six months ago with his three-year-old son, Alex, to make a life for the two of them where his own had begun.

The ferry slowed even more, and an announcement came over the loudspeaker. “Sorry, folks, we’ve got a bit of a problem docking, and it’ll take a few minutes.”

“Riding the ferry can be an adventure,” he said as the big vessel lurched to a complete stop.

Alegra grabbed the railing to brace herself. “This could be a huge story for your paper,” she said.

“I guess so,” he said, aware of more than a hint of sarcasm in her tone. It hit a nerve. “Not like gang shootings or bodies in the Hudson, though.”

That made her smile. “Yeah, not exactly the big, bad city.”

“Alegra Reynolds. You’re from New York.”

It was a statement, not a question, and he could tell it surprised her. “Yes, but how—?”

“The boutique. The one near downtown Manhattan. All black and silver, with headless mannequins in the windows?” He’d gone past that upscale store when he’d walked to work instead of taking a cab. He’d glanced at it more then once, and wondered how anyone could call those tiny pieces of silk and lace clothing. “You’re that Alegra.”

She looked pleased that he knew of her. “You got it right, but how could you?”

“In my other life, I worked at one of the big New York dailies, and our offices were about two blocks south of where your store is. I went past it a lot.”

Her smile slipped, and her mouth formed a perfect O before she finally said, “J. P. Lawrence? You’re that Lawrence?”

He nodded. “Used to be.”

“But now you’re here?” She waved vaguely to the island nearby.

“Yeah, I’m here.”

“But you…” She bit her lip, looking as if he’d said he was from Pluto but chose to live on Mars. She looked stunned. “You were the editor, weren’t you?”

The ferry lurched forward again and the voice came over the speaker. “We’ll be docking in five minutes. Please be ready to disembark.”

“We need to go to our cars.”

It was as if he hadn’t spoken. “What are you doing here running a weekly newspaper?”

So many had asked him that, and so many had gotten his stock answer. “I’m here for my son, to let him grow up where I did.” But a part of him wanted to tell her something that was more truthful than the first statement. “I told you I went off to conquer the world, but what I didn’t say was, it wasn’t worth it.”

She stared at him, then a frown grew. “Oh,” she said. “I understand.”

“What do you understand?”

“Nothing, I’m sure it’s personal. Things happen, and—”

“Oh, no, I wasn’t a drunk or druggie and lost it all. No.” He stood straighter. “I didn’t have a breakdown or punch the publisher in the face.”

She held up both hands, palms out to him, shaking her head. “No, I didn’t mean that.”

He looked at her hands, the long, slender fingers, and realized something. She wasn’t holding her phone any longer. He didn’t remember her putting it in her pocket, either, though maybe she had. “Your phone?” he asked.

She felt in her pocket, then looked back at him. “Oh, no!”

Alegra must have dropped it when the ferry lurched. They both dropped to a crouch to search.

Chapter Two

“There it is,” Alegra gasped, spying it under the railing within an inch of the edge of the deck. She made a grab for it at the same time Joe did. There was a tangle of fingers, and then, as if in slow motion, Alegra saw her phone skitter to the edge and over.

She straightened, grabbed the railing and looked down into the churning water. “Great, just great,” she muttered. “It’s got all of my contacts in it, and my calendar and…” She couldn’t stop a huge sigh. “Everything.”

“It sounds as if it’s your lifeline.”

That about said it all, she thought, but simply closed her eyes to try to regroup. Ever since she’d decided to return to Shelter Island, nothing had gone right. Her flight out of San Francisco had been cancelled, her luggage had been routed to Salt Lake City instead of Seattle. Now her phone. She should have let this place die out of her memories and never looked back.

“Is there a cell phone store on the island?” she asked.

“I really don’t know,” Joe said. He was frowning. “Why don’t you just let it die a natural death and take a break from it all for a while? Just think, no interruptions, no calls when you don’t want them. It could be a good experience.”

He might have left his life behind in New York, but she didn’t want to. “That’s not a choice for me. I have things I need to take care of and—”

“And you’re totally indispensable?”

Why did he make that sound so bad? “Right now, I am.”

“That’s quite a load to bear,” he murmured, and for a crazy moment she wondered if that was pity she saw in his eyes. Though why this man should look at her with pity made no sense.

“It’s business. That’s not always fun and games.”

“Why did you come for the festival if you have such pressing business matters?” he asked.

He’d find out soon enough on the last night at the masquerade ball on what was left of the Bartholomew Grace estate. Maybe he’d cover it for his little newspaper. It would all be over for her then, and she could leave the island behind once and for all. “I can mix business and pleasure, despite the old taboos about it.”

“Good for you,” he said, but he didn’t sound congratulatory at all.

She suddenly felt their conversation had taken a turn into something combative. “Are you the welcoming committee, cross-examining people who come for the festival?”

She thought her words hit their mark, but the next moment, he was almost smiling at her. “Now there’s a job that could be interesting, interrogating lovely ladies on the ferry.”

She wasn’t ready to laugh with him, and her phone having gone to a watery grave only added to the tension of returning to Shelter Island. “Now there’s an employment opportunity that would beat the heck out of doing stories on peach picking or drunks.”

She hated the sarcasm in her tone, but couldn’t help it. This man was starting to annoy her.

“I’ll pass,” he said, and now she felt a chill between them. “And good luck finding a cell phone store.”

“Thanks,” she said. The silence that fell between them was beyond awkward. Before she turned and went back to her rental car, she found herself saying, “As far as doing business goes, I was told that you had fax machines, Internet connections and phone lines on the island.”

“Thanks for filling me in. Now we can put away the hammer and chisel and the slabs of stone we use to write our stories for the paper.”

She flushed, and then the bell sounded to let the passengers know they had to get back in their vehicles to disembark. She started to walk off.

“Can I ask you something before we climb in our vehicles and ride off into the night?” he asked.

She felt herself bracing. “What?”

“It came across the wires just a week ago about you coming to the West Coast because you were merging with a competitor.”

She never would have guessed that a story like that would end up in the offices of a small weekly paper. “We’re buying them out, not merging. They’ll become one of our Alegra’s Closet stores.”

His next question was unexpected. “Are you here to open a new store on the island?”

She almost laughed out loud at the absurdity of his question, but simply shook her head. “No, definitely not. I have other things to do, not the least of which is looking for some art at the local galleries.”

He studied her for a moment, then said, “Nice meeting you.”

“Sure,” she said as she heard car engines starting, sending a low roar into the cold air over the sound of the idling engine of the ferry. She called out, “Goodbye,” and headed for her car.

“Goodbye,” she heard him yell after her.

She got into her rental, and as she settled, she glanced in the rearview mirror. She saw Joe open the door to a beat-up pickup truck parked right behind her. He caught her eye in the reflection, lifted a hand in a wave and climbed into the truck. J. P. Lawrence, now known as Joe Lawrence. “How the mighty have fallen,” she said to herself. She wasn’t sure she bought the reason he’d given—that he was here for his son. Why would anyone want their kid to grow up on Shelter Island?

JOE DROVE HIS OLD TRUCK off the ferry and onto the gravel of the landing right behind Alegra’s sleek black sedan. When he’d come back to the island with Alex, he’d bought the truck from his father, instead of having his car from New York shipped out. The pickup didn’t look like much, but everything worked. Besides, the Jaguar would have been totally impractical for use on the island.

As he watched Alegra inch out of the parking area behind the other cars, he thought about what he’d heard about her founding a string of high-end boutiques that sold intimate apparel on the East Coast, then setting up franchises across the country. It was a fast rise for any business, and seemed only set to grow more.

He followed her car past a small cluster of service buildings, then up the steep driveway to the highway that ran around the perimeter of the island. Most of the cars crested the rise and funneled north, and as they did, one by one, they turned off, heading for their respective homes.

He didn’t turn and neither did Alegra. He thought about the cell phone falling overboard and her horrified reaction. He would have laughed if she hadn’t looked so stricken. Those amber eyes had been filled with anger, frustration—and a touch of sadness.

He hadn’t expected that, not when she seemed to be so successful. But then again, he knew someone could have great business success, but be totally lacking in a life beyond that. He had been a prime example of that in his other life. He shrugged that off as they entered the town, passing under the banner hung high above the road proclaiming Ahoy And Welcome To Any And All Who Enter. The Gothic lettering had a skull and crossbones on either side.

With the festival so close, the main street of Shelter Bay was fully festooned with wood and brass everywhere, street signs all displaying a Jolly Roger overlaying a silhouette of the island, and pirates aplenty in windows and on signs. The park at the center of town, laid out on a piece of land that jutted out toward the sound, had its huge pavilion decorated to look like a huge crow’s nest on a galleon. The lush grassy area, rimmed by wind-twisted trees and bushes, was being filled with booths and food areas, in preparation for the mainlanders who would descend on the island in two days. A life-sized brass sculpture of old Bartholomew Grace, complete with raised sword and a patch over one eye, which had been donated by members of the Grace family still on the island, stood at the entry to the park.

The sedan in front of him slowed just after the park, and the right turn signal came on. Alegra Reynolds was going to the most expensive and exclusive bed-and-breakfast on the island, the Snug Harbor Cottages. A fully restored, three-story Victorian was the original building, and it fronted a series of luxurious cottages built out on the bluffs. Immaculate rose gardens separated the cottages, and strategically placed trees and shrubs added to the sense of privacy in each.

Joe had intended to keep going, but instead he pulled into the lot behind her, slipping into the parking spot next to hers. She got out when he did, and he could see that she’d confined her hair in a clip at the base of her neck sometime during the drive. The style served to emphasize her elegant features and huge amber eyes.

“Hey, there,” he called. “I just remembered something.” She waited for him by the door to her car. “There’s a store farther down the street on the right as you go north. It’s called Farrow Place. It’s a secondhand store, mostly, a consignment sort of arrangement. Earl Money owns it, and he’s the original diversifier around here.” Joe held up a hand when he saw her frown. “I know, I know, that’s not a word, but it describes Earl’s business bent. A bit of everything. I remembered that I heard someone mention that Earl was going to be selling cell phones and pagers.”

“Really? That’s great,” she said with obvious relief. “I’ll check it out as soon as I can. I thought I was going to have to go back to Seattle to get a replacement.”

Doubting it would go over with her, he said, “If he can’t help you, maybe you could consider being phoneless while you’re here. It could be liberating for you.”

She grimaced. “You make it sound as if the phone is a millstone around my neck.”

“Isn’t it?”

She exhaled. “No, it’s a terrific convenience, and a necessary one.”

“Sure,” he said. No point arguing. “Good luck with your phone hunt.” He went around to get in the truck, with a quick glance at Alegra as she strode confidently toward the wraparound porch of the Victorian. He must have imagined any vulnerability in the woman on the ferry. She knew who she was. She was in control. She’d have a phone in an hour, one way or the other, and her world would be right again. Snap. Problem gone. He pulled out of the exit and headed farther north.

Just half a block later, he turned left and slipped into the last parking slot in front of the wood-fronted building that housed the Beacon. He’d only been gone since early morning, off to Seattle to look for a new press for the paper, though he’d soon decided against it. He’d let Boyd Posey, his right-hand man who knew the old press inside and out, take over and find its replacement. He didn’t want to waste time in Seattle.

As he got out of the truck and took the two steps up to the wooden walkway, then opened the half-glass door to the newspaper office, he thought about his attachment to Shelter Island.

When he’d left after graduation, he hadn’t looked back. He hadn’t thought he’d ever come back for more than just a yearly visit or so to see his folks. He’d been out to conquer the world, as he’d told Alegra, and he probably had by some people’s standards. Not his. His world was here, on the island, with his son and his son’s grandparents, a world to be lived in, not conquered.

His parents hadn’t asked too many questions when he came back. He was glad. He was home. That was it.

The Beacon hadn’t changed much since he’d been a kid. The furniture was old, dark and heavy, and the reception desk ran side to side, making a barrier between the entry and the back offices. Stacks of the current issue of the paper sat on the counter, fronted by a brass plaque that held an imprint of their banner—The Beacon, The Island’s Voice. Boxes of handouts from local businesses aimed at the tourists here for the festival were placed on the other end. Photos on the walls dated from years ago to the present, and headlines of their biggest stories were highlighted on a special board near the door. He liked the way the place looked, liked its smell of age.

He glanced at the man sitting behind the reception desk, and it was obvious Boyd was so intent on what he was doing on the computer he hadn’t heard Joe come in. Sixty years old and bald-headed, Boyd was thin to the point of emaciation, with hawklike features and skin so pale you’d doubt it had ever seen the sun.

“Boyd?” Joe said. Boyd jumped at the sound of his name and closed the lid on the laptop before he turned to look up at Joe, who knew he’d been playing a game. Boyd had been with the Beacon for almost thirty years, as much a fixture as anything else in the office, and Joe didn’t care what he did on his downtime, as long as he could depend on him to get the paper out.

“I thought you’d be gone more than a day,” Boyd said. “Does your quick return mean we have a new press?”

“Nope. It just means I’m back early.”

Boyd crossed his arms on his narrow chest and motioned with his head to the back of the space. “I knew they cost an arm and a leg, so I can understand if we have to nurse that beast along awhile more.”

“That’s not it,” Joe said. “I decided that you know a lot more than I do about what we need and so you should be the one to do the buying. Why don’t you go over during the festival and see what you can find?”

The man’s jaw dropped open. “Me, go and get us a new press?” He got to his feet, and for the first time in a long time, Joe saw color in his cheeks. “I get to pick it out?”

Joe nodded. “That’s about it, within reason.”

Boyd’s eyes narrowed. “How much are we talking about spending?”

Joe named a figure and Boyd exhaled on a low whistle. “That’ll do it. I can get you a terrific press for that.”

“Then make it happen.”

“Can’t say I’ll miss the opening ceremonies of the festival. All that damn cannon banging and explosions. Pirates were a noisy lot.”

“Bloody, too,” Joe murmured, then had a thought. “Do you know if Earl sells cell phones? I heard he did, but…”

“Yeah, that and them expensive white chocolates.” He looked quizzically at Joe. “You want a new cell phone?”

“No, a lady on the ferry lost hers and I told her I thought Earl might be able to help her.” Joe hesitated, then, “Have you ever heard of Alegra Reynolds?”

“Can’t say as I have, Joe. That’s the lady?”

“Yeah. She’s the founder of the Alegra’s Closet boutiques.”

That brought an instant smile to Boyd’s face. “She’s on the island? What’s she doing? Going to start one of those stores of hers around these parts?”

“She said she’s here for the festival and buying art.”

“Shoot, too bad. This place could use a little spicing up. Do you suppose she wears those little nothings that pass for clothes?” He leaned closer. “Is she hot?”

Something in Joe recoiled at the idea of someone talking about Alegra this way, and it didn’t help that Boyd’s words brought images to his mind that made his body start to tighten. “She’s not ugly.” A true understatement.

He went around the reception desk and across to his open office door, then entered his cluttered cubicle. He took his seat behind a desk almost hidden by stacks of paperwork. His old swivel chair protested when he turned in it toward the computer on the left. He booted the thing up and went straight to the Internet. He typed in Alegra Reynolds, then hit the enter key.

ALEGRA GOT TO Earl Money’s store just as he was closing, and thankfully, he’d been more than happy to stay open a bit longer to set her up with a cell phone that turned out to be an upgrade from her old unit. By the time she got back to her cottage at Snug Harbor, it was past dinner and she decided to just eat one of the energy bars she brought. She used the Internet access in her room, got in touch with Roz, and in a few hours, had all of the data from her old phone downloaded into her new one.

After that, she worked on her laptop, going over reports until just around midnight. When she was about to close down the computer, she reconsidered. She went to a search engine and put in the name of the high school on the island. She was a bit surprised to find that the Grace High School had its own Web page. Nothing fancy, just a picture of the school as it was when it started fifty years ago and one of how it looked now.

She saw the links on the left, tapped on the alumni link and entered the year she graduated. The screen flashed with an image of the yearbook, and she entered her old name, Peterson. Suddenly, there she was ten years ago, a head-and-shoulders shot of her with long, pale hair pulled back from her face with a headband. Anyone would have called her expression sober, but they’d have been wrong. It was desperation, the same desperation that drove her to leave a week later.

Under the photo with her name was the heading Predictions For Al’s Future, followed by a blank space, because she’d never given the editor anything to put there.