The House on Mermaid Point

Chapter Eighteen

Avery was fully caffeinated and standing on the retaining wall on the southeastern tip of Mermaid Point the next morning when the rooster puffed out his chest and crowed out his morning wake-up call.

This would have been far more impressive if it wasn’t already nine A.M., the sun already gathering strength, yet his hens clucked around him as if he, and not William Hightower, were the rock star on the island.

“I don’t know,” Avery muttered as she settled her tool belt on her hips and tucked her hair firmly behind her ears. “You must be something in the henhouse, pal.”

Hightower’s fishing skiff was gone and he hadn’t been seen since he’d stormed off the night before. Her own “peeps” stood beside her watching the barge that carried the Dumpster and scaffolding maneuver into position along the retaining wall. A boat filled with workmen tied up beside it.

They’d decided on a “uniform” of shorts and Do Over T-shirts, but their versions ranged from Deirdre’s mostly full coverage to Kyra’s crop top and Daisy Duke cutoffs. There was no sign that she had given birth to the toddler she carried on her hip.

Torn between comfort and a hard-earned awareness of Troy’s preference for unflattering close-ups and gritty reality, their makeup choices also varied. As always, Deirdre’s face was expertly made up, a fact that now struck Avery as only slightly annoying rather than completely ridiculous. Avery had opted for a tinted sunscreen, mascara, and a thin smear of lip gloss, moves she told herself were a nod to the devastating effects of high-def television and not a bid to win Deirdre’s approval.

Maddie’s eyeliner and brighter-than-usual shade of lipstick, teamed with the high ponytail and neon pink sneakers, made her look younger, but signs of what had to have been a sleepless night were hard to miss. Nicole, who rarely appeared in public without her skillfully applied armor, had pulled her auburn hair into a French braid. Her sleeveless T-shirt revealed toned arms; well-cut shorts showcased her runner’s legs. If anyone could bring even a whiff of sophistication to manual labor, it was Nikki.

Soon the air rang with the clatter of metal and the heavily accented shouts of the men as they offloaded the scaffolding then began to assemble it around the house like a giant Erector set. Avery’s heart actually pounded with excitement as the scaffolding encircled the house and then rose toward the roof. The Dumpster clattered into position in the clearing: tangible proof of the official start of her first job as not only architect but licensed contractor.

Troy and Anthony shot from every imaginable angle. Kyra handed off Dustin to Maddie so that she could shoot her own version while Avery consulted her list, checking their assignments off as she gave them. “Deirdre will start sorting through the office and dining room to figure out what stays and what goes. The kitchen and great room come after that, followed by the second floor. Whatever doesn’t make the cut will be run by William and then tagged so that it can be hauled off the island at some point.”

“Got it.” Deirdre stopped just shy of saluting, but she looked pleased, possibly even proud. Avery wasn’t sure if this was a new expression for Deirdre or if she just hadn’t noticed it before.

“Nikki and Maddie and—”

“Dustbin!” Dustin crowed.

“—and Dustin will start emptying and prepping the garage. When that’s done you’ll move to the boathouse.” Avery smiled at the little boy in the child-sized hard hat and tool belt that she and Chase had given him for Christmas. She could still remember her own joy at the pink version her father had given her when she was a child. Wearing his as she did now, always made him feel close. “I have two roofers coming out tomorrow to take a look and give estimates. We need to be ready to start demolition early next week.”

“Aye, aye, Captain.” Maddie nodded and saluted crisply, her ponytail bobbing. “All present and accounted for and ready to get started.”

Avery saluted back. “We’ll regroup in the pavilion at twelve thirty for lunch. Let the sweating officially begin!”

William had left Mermaid Point before dawn that morning with no real plan in mind other than being somewhere else. He’d filled his live well with bait off Indian Key then headed to favorite spots off Yellow Shark Channel. The warm, moist air sank into his skin and the quiet soothed him. No one to bother him, no one to talk to. Nowhere he had to be. No one he had to perform for. Simple. Uncomplicated. Just the way he liked it.

He returned late in the afternoon to find his home encased inside a metal cage, an overflowing Dumpster, and a horde of workmen tromping all over his no-longer-private island. The calm that had enveloped him evaporated like summer rain on hot asphalt. He headed for the pool intent on cooling off and found Madeline Singer in the pavilion, dispensing cold drinks to the workmen who’d gathered around her like kids at a neighborhood lemonade stand.

A lopsided ponytail dangled drunkenly to one side; the hair that had escaped it was matted with cobwebs and dead leaves. Her clothes looked even more bedraggled. She startled when she spotted him and her cheeks, at least the skin that showed through the layers of dirt and grime that covered them, flushed. Was she still pissed? Embarrassed that she’d given him shit? She was so different from pretty much every woman of his experience that he had no clue. For about two seconds he considered simply avoiding her, but he was thirsty and this was still his island, damn it.

At the sound of a boat horn, or possibly the sight of him, the laborers took their plastic glasses and scattered. Madeline watched him warily as he moved toward her, which was just fine with him. At the last moment he checked his stride. Reaching into his pocket he drew out a quarter and placed it on the table in front of her. “I’ll have a lemonade on the rocks,” he said. “I think you better make it a double.” Of all the things he’d begun dreaming of drinking at night, lemonade wasn’t even on the list.

“All right,” she said stiffly. She reached for a cup. “But I think I may owe you an apology to go with that lemonade.”

Damn straight. He liked that she looked him right in the eye. There was no hint of her original stammer. She’d proved herself a hell of a lot feistier than expected last night. Once she apologized, he’d accept and then . . .

“I’m sorry I attacked you the way I did,” she said. “It seems my reaction may have been as out of line as your rudeness.”

May have been? He frowned. “You don’t seem particularly committed to your apology.”

She frowned back, tossing her dark hair back over her shoulder. “Well, I don’t know how large an apology is required for calling you out on your behavior. You were needlessly and hostilely unresponsive, which is downright—”

“Rude. Yes, I think you made that clear last night.” He watched her chin go up; saw a flash of irritation light her eyes. She filled the cup with ice.

“All right, then, how about this,” she said. “I feel . . . pretty badly that I attacked you at your own table.” The tone was grudging. “That was wrong of me.”

He studied her face, saw her generous lips pressed tight, her large brown eyes slightly frosty. “So you wouldn’t be apologizing if you’d attacked me on neutral ground? Say, at Bud N’ Mary’s? Or over at the Green Turtle Inn?”

He had the distinct impression she was about to roll her eyes at him and only just managed to stop herself.

His anger had begun to seep out of him, but he wasn’t quite ready to let her off the hook. “I think you can do better than that.”

One eyebrow went up and she tilted her head to consider him more closely.

“All right, how about: I feel horrible that I drove you out of your own home.” She poured lemonade over the ice.

“And?”

“You want more?” she asked.

“Oh, yeah.”

She blinked as she handed him his drink, which meant he might have gone a little overboard on the innuendo. He was intrigued by her directness. She wasn’t a woman who would say one thing and mean another.

She took a sip of her own drink then licked her upper lip, but missed the lemonade mustache just above it. “And . . . I was a little worried that I irritated you so much that something might happen to you while you were out fishing today.”

Her concern pricked a hole in the last of his anger. He downed the lemonade she’d served him in one long gulp. “Fortunately, I know the flats around here like the back of my hand.” Even as he brushed aside her concern he was surprisingly touched. People had wanted things from him for a large part of his life, but he couldn’t remember the last time someone had worried about him. Without asking she poured him another glass and seemed to relax when he drank that one down, too. He felt like Wally or the Beaver coming home to milk and cookies after school, something that had never actually happened in his own untelevised childhood.

“I know our being here is an intrusion,” she said now. “And even though I may have gone about defending Avery and Deirdre a little too . . .”

“. . . aggressively?”

His tone had turned teasing. Hers had turned sincere. “The bottom line is they’re really talented. And I know we’ll all do everything we can to make this renovation worth the inconvenience.”

He caught himself wondering just how far she might go to make the inconvenience worth his while, but her clear brown eyes telegraphed not even an ounce of guile and even less sexual innuendo.

“What makes you do things like this?” he asked, suddenly curious. “Coming out here with lemonade and iced tea for everyone?”

She shrugged. “It’s so hot out and everyone is working so hard. I’m used to taking care of my family. I guess I just like to take care of people in general.”

Taking care of people. Now there was a concept. He’d never successfully taken care of anyone he cared about. And no one had ever really taken care of him; not in the way that someone like Madeline Singer probably meant.

She reached up to free her hair from the lopsided ponytail, and he caught himself noticing the rise of her breasts beneath the filthy T-shirt.

“Thanks for the lemonade,” he said as she began to pack up the cooler. “And for the apology.”

“I owed you one.” She picked up the cooler; they moved toward the pool. She stopped and looked him right in the eye. “And I think now that you’ve given us the go-ahead you owe us your cooperation.”

She didn’t wait for him to agree or disagree but headed down the path toward the houseboat, her dark hair swinging across her shoulders.

Will peeled off his T-shirt and dove cleanly into the pool. As he broke into a slow crawl, he found himself wondering what a woman like Madeline Singer might be like in bed.