True Love Read online

  She opened the envelope and saw the distinctive lettering.

  Would you like to go with me to liberate an old truck?

  Alix couldn’t help laughing and doing a little dance around the room. “Oh, yes, I would love to go,” she said aloud as she danced over to Captain Caleb’s portrait. “Are you happy about this?” she asked, looking up at him, then said, “Do not make anything fall down.”

  She was pleased when everything in the room held steady. After taking a moment to compose herself, she headed downstairs. As before, Jared was in the living room reading a newspaper. All their papers and the big prints were gone from the floor and neatly stacked on the shelves.

  “Hungry?” he asked without looking up.

  “Starved. Did we get any cereal?”

  “No,” he said as he put down the paper and looked at her.

  She thought she saw a spark in his eyes, but it was quickly gone.

  “If you can scramble eggs, I can make toast. Toby sent over some jam she made.”

  “The Toby who everyone loves does her own canning?”

  “And baking. She makes a blueberry pie that’ll make you weep. I think she puts cinnamon in it.”

  “When are you two getting married?”

  “Toby is much, much too good for someone like me. I’d feel that I had to behave all the time.”

  “No hijacking of old trucks?”

  “Definitely not,” Jared said, smiling at her.

  As they started for the kitchen, Alix’s phone buzzed and she looked at it, hoping it was Izzy, but it was an ad trying to sell her a used car. She deleted it.

  “Something wrong?” Jared asked.

  She told him that it had been days since she’d heard from her friend and that wasn’t usual.

  “Are you worried about her?” he asked as he went to the fridge.

  “Not really, but I do wish she’d let me know what she’s doing. Have you eaten?”

  “I did.”

  As usual, they worked together like a perfectly aligned machine, getting food out and putting it where it was needed. When Alix picked up the skillet Jared handed her the butter. He’d already cracked two eggs into a blue bowl that Alix remembered seeing being used for eggs. Bread went into the toaster and Jared set the table.

  Within minutes they sat down and he filled their cups with hot coffee.

  “Did I hear voices this morning?” Alix asked, then said, “Even if it’s a lie, please tell me that I did.”

  “What does that mean?”

  If she told him the whole truth she’d have to mention her chapel model and she didn’t want to do that. “Just that another picture fell off a table—and don’t you dare say it’s a drafty old house.”

  Jared grinned as that was exactly what he was about to say. “Old houses always have odd things happening in them, but, yes, this morning Lexie stopped by.”

  “Please tell me she didn’t see me passed out on the couch.”

  “She did and she wanted to know all about you.”

  “What did you tell her?”

  “That you nearly worked me to death.”

  “You’re the one who—!” She stopped and shook her head at him. “Where’s perfect Toby’s perfect jam?”

  “How could I have forgotten it?” he said, his eyes laughing as he went to the fridge and got the jar.

  It had a label with daisies on it and perfect lettering said BEACH PLUM JAM—CLW.

  “CLW?”

  Jared shrugged. “I guess those are Toby’s real initials.”

  “I would have thought that you knew everything about her.”

  “Mortals can’t aspire to reach so high.”

  Alix gave a groan that was also a laugh. “I’m afraid to meet this creature. Do her wings get in the way when she moves?”

  “She’s used to them, so she sort of tucks them under her arms. Are you ready to go?”

  “This jam is great. What are these beach plums?”

  “They grow wild here, and where they are is kept secret from one generation to another.”

  “I guess that means you know.”

  “No, but the man who haunts this house does.”

  Alix laughed as she took her plate to the sink and rinsed it. “Where is this truck you want to steal and why do you plan to take it?”

  “It’s for the Daffodil Festival, for the parade.”

  “For Lexie and the angelic Toby to use? Will Wes drive it?”

  “No, I will.”

  “I thought you didn’t attend it.”

  “Lexie changed my mind. You have any more solid shoes than those? I thought that before we get the old truck I’d show you some land I own. It’s been passed down from one Jared to the next.”

  “Who’s that?” Alix asked without missing a beat.

  He looked puzzled for a second, then gave a half grin. “Jared is the name that comes between the Mr. and the Kingsley.”

  “Before or after the number?”

  “Before,” he said, still smiling. “In fact, it’s what most people call me. Well, except for the peons in my office, the ones who are there to gain wisdom from me.”

  “Ooooooh, that Jared. The wise one. He’s above my league. Makes me nervous even to think about him.”

  “What about Jared Kingsley?”

  “Him, I rather like,” Alix said, looking him in the eyes.

  For a moment they stared at each other. He was the first to break away as he put his hand on the doorknob. “Go change your shoes and meet me outside in five minutes. Don’t make me wait.”

  “Okay … Jared,” she said, then left the room to run up the stairs to her bedroom.

  She closed the door and leaned against it briefly. “Well, Captain,” she said, looking around the bed at the portrait, “what do you think of your grandson and me? Don’t answer that,” she said quickly.

  She slipped off her sandals, opened the big wardrobe to get her sneakers out, and tied them on. When she stood up, she looked at the portrait and suddenly realized something. If there was a ghost in the house, he’d met her mother.

  “I’m Victoria’s daughter,” she said. “I don’t look like her, except maybe my mouth does, and my hair’s a little bit red. I don’t have her talent, but she is my mother. She—”

  Pebbles hit the window and she went to push it up then leaned out.

  Jared was downstairs and looking up. “Are you writing a book? Let’s go!”

  “I’m correcting the errors you made on your cousin’s house. It takes a while.” She shut the window. “Not exactly patient, is he?” She opened the door, then looked back at Captain Caleb and blew him a kiss. “See you later.” She hurried down the stairs, grabbed her bag from the hall table, and kept running.

  Alix got into the truck beside Jared and closed the door with a solid pull. A few days ago she would have wondered why a man as famous and probably as rich as he was didn’t buy himself a new truck. But the longer she stayed on Nantucket, the more the old truck seemed to fit in.

  He drove down one street after another, some of them so narrow she caught her breath. But Jared didn’t seem to notice.

  “Oh, hell!” he muttered.

  Alix looked to see what was upsetting him but nothing seemed to be unusual. They were on a very narrow street and coming toward them was a big black SUV, but that was normal. “What is it?”

  “Off-islander,” he said under his breath and his tone made the term sound vile, maybe even evil.

  The big car looked like all the others, so what made him think it wasn’t someone who lived on Nantucket? “How do you know?”

  His answer was a look that said “How do you not know?” He put his arm across the back of the seat, reversed, and maneuvered the truck into a tiny space against the curb.

  Alix looked with interest as the vehicle passed. Inside was a woman with lots of shiny hair, half a dozen gold bracelets on her arm, a designer linen shirt, and a cell phone plastered to her ear. As she drove past them she didn’t so mu