CHAPTER 1
The squawking gulls woke Alan early. For a change, he was ready to get up with them. Things had been so hectic over the past three weeks, he had not slept much, and when he had, he didn’t feel rested by the time the next day rolled around. His mother’s funeral was four days behind him now though, and other than a few phone calls in the last day and a half, the locals were finally giving him space.
Alan was surprised by how nostalgic the smells and sounds of the home place made him. The memories that had once seemed so hard and painful seemed softer now. Sadness replaced the old anger, now that his mother was gone. The few good ones seemed stronger now that he was in the house alone. The house needed a lot of work, but it was still sound. The east view over the bluffs out over the Atlantic Ocean was still as captivating as it had always been in his memory. To the west, the property rolled for 20 acres into the scrub timber. The rocky salt-sprayed ground was perfect for blueberries, mosses, scrub pine, and juniper. The narrow dirt road wound down into Seal Cove village where the fishing boats and lobster boats were moored. The buildings that were not white washed, or painted in quaint Wedgwood or some pastel enamel, glinted with the weather worn silver sheen of old raw wood.
He hadn’t wanted to come back here. In fact, he’d made a promise to himself that he wouldn’t. But when the call came that his mother was very ill, and was refusing to leave her home to seek care, he put his life aside and came back home. Life on isolated Grand Manan Island was hard for young people who were interested in the bigger world and modern things. For Alan, his youth on the island had been bittersweet.
Most of the year round residents made their living from the sea as fishermen or lobstermen, or subsisted on the seasonal tourist industry. Unemployment insurance was the primary source of income for almost half of the island residents, from the end of September through late April. The communities on the island were small and close knit. Everyone knew everyone’s business, and children were everyone’s responsibility. Stern values prevailed, and although there was tremendous freedom for youngsters to roam, there was no freedom to experiment or test boundaries. The lament was an old one. There was nothing to do for anyone between the ages of sixteen and sixty, besides work, eat and sleep.
His family owned a quaint bed and breakfast, ‘The Spray,’ that became well known for his mother’s perfect touch with country cooking and preserves, and the quilting and knitting guild that set up its home in a shop on the west end of the property. The place ran on the backs of four kids and their mother for many years, while their father fished the lobster beds, and occasionally harvested Dulse.
Alan was the last of the kids to leave. Although they were among the more well to do families on the island, their means came through hard work and the uncompromising demands of a father who believed nothing came easy and nothing was free. His father was an unforgiving and demanding man. All of Alan’s siblings had come up against him hard in the end, and then threw in the towel and left one by one, as they came of age. They’d all had moved out into the larger world and made lives for themselves, cutting off their parents and even each other, in their desperation to put their old lives and the stifling hold of the island life behind them.
In the year before Alan made the same choice, life became particularly hard with his father. His mother was forced to hire day help for the kitchen and the house during the summer. There was constant bickering that the expense of day help was a waste. Alan acted as a buffer for his mother, taking on the burden of fighting with the man whenever the discussions came around to waste and accountability.
The fights and arguments became an almost daily occurrence even after the summer season ended. The final straw was the night after his eighteenth birthday, when his father came after him with a razor strop. The argument began like most of the others. It focused on something to do with the house. But it shifted to Alan’s limited life outside the house, and became heated around the subject of loitering and drinking beer. His father did not get the chance to lay on even one lick with the strap, before Alan was able to take it from him. That final face off between the two men drove the wedge between them even deeper.
In his final year of high school, Alan had been offered a full scholarship to Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia. He put off accepting it that first year, because he worried about leaving his mother alone to cope with all the work and her husband. That final fall and winter pushed him over the line, and by the spring semester he was gone.
His mother also pushed Alan to go after his dreams, and finally helped convince him by showing him the nest egg she had secreted away. The income from the quilting and knitting guild alone had given her enough to supplement what lobstering and seaweed would not cover. The house did not need guests to keep her in pocket money, although Alan knew she would keep it open.
Student loans and grants, his scholarship and part time jobs kept him well enough for the six years it took him to finish a Master’s degree in education. Telephone and the mail was the only string that kept him connected to his mother. Alan hadn’t spoken to his father again since leaving Grand Manan. And, he had only been back home once in the last nine years after the old man died suddenly.
“The old bastard was a horse’s ass,” Alan thought to himself as he broke away from remembering and puttered at making coffee.
None of his siblings came home for the old man’s funeral. And, it seemed they could hardly wait to leave after their mother’s was over as well. When the will was read, and the estate property was left to Alan, it seemed there was nothing left for them on the island in any case.
There were no surprises in the will, and there was no acrimony among the siblings. Alan was the only one who had maintained any ties with his parents, slim though they may have been. And, there was little of value left in the estate other than the land, the house and the shop.
Here he was. Alone in the big rambling house, contemplating what would be next.
When he got word of his mother’s illness only four short weeks before, he’d taken a full semester, leave of absence from the high school in Digby, Nova Scotia where he’d been living and working for the past three years. No one had known she would pass so quickly and now here he was with the whole fall semester free in front of him.
He could close up the house and go back to Digby. It wasn’t too late to have the school board re-assign the substitute and take back his class, but something made him decide to stay on here in the house for a while. He was struggling with the fleeting thoughts that invaded his mind in the last few days. Stay here? Restore and re-open the house? Invite the crafters back to the shop?
**************************
After breakfast, he pulled on a sweater and started down the rough path to the rocky beach. His walk took him up the north east coast away from the village. It was a bright crisp early September morning. The wind off the Atlantic was beginning to get cold, but the lingering summer still gave warmth to the sun. Off the beach, it would be too warm for a sweater, but down by the water, unprotected from the wind, the sun could not win. Alan far preferred the cool to the heat, so the walk was refreshing.
Several miles up the beach, he came to a sheltered cove he remembered well. There was a dock built out into the water that was new, but the place was as familiar as an old shoe. Up above the bluff was the Monroe House. Another B&B that had been run by a family much like ‘The Spray’ had been. As a child, Alan spent many carefree afternoons down here with friends out of the earshot of bossy parents and away from the shackles of chores.
Lost in his memories, Alan walked out onto the dock, and settled on the end to watch the gulls dive for fish in the rolling surf. The wind, the birds, and the washing waves filled his senses. Time passed, and he didn’t even feel it.
“Who the hell are you!?” The stamp of a booted foot on the planks behind him, added weight to the words from a waif’s voice. Alan’s heart nearly leapt from his mouth. If he hadn’t been leaning on the piling, he might have fallen into the water.
He swung around. The culprit was a slip of a girl. She stood with her arms crossed over her chest with a black scowl of suspicion pasted on her face. All five foot of her looked capable of squashing an ant, but not much more. Alan couldn’t help but chuckle as soon as his heartbeat steadied. ‘Saucy, but cute,’ he thought to himself.
“Alan Woodward,” he answered simply. “Who are you?”
“What are you doing here?” the girl ignored his question.
“Killing time. How about you?” Alan’s grin was good natured.
“Trespassing is more like it Mr. You’d best pick yourself up from here and get a move on!” the girl’s tone was full of challenge.
“Public beach last I heard. Always has been,” Alan responded to her tone of voice by putting a bit of an edge on his. Something about her manner peaked his interest.
“You damn tourists! This beach is private property. You’d best haul ass before I call the constable,” she warned again.
“Is that right?” Alan took in her challenge, with a wicked smile. His interest in the pretty little brat peaked even further. He elected to play along with her bad mannered game. “Tell me when they overturned the public access rights agreement then would you?”
“What do you know about it?” she retorted.
Alan had to hand it to her she had spunk, and wasn’t going to give an inch. Neither would he. “I guess I know as much as anyone born and raised here,” he watched her expression change.
“Liar! I know all the locals now, and I don’t know you!” her answer was another challenge.
Alan sat back against the piling, and made a deliberate show of sizing up the unfriendly waif. He made sure to keep his expression one of shocked and sternly paternal annoyance. She couldn’t be much past twenty. She was small, but nicely curved. Her strawberry blond hair was twisted into a long plait that reached her backside. She had the fair skin and features of the Monroe’s, but Alan didn’t recognize her as one of George’s brood.
The silence that followed the girl’s pronouncement that Alan was a liar stretched out and became uncomfortable, as he made his point to look her up and down. Alan kept on his sternest teacher’s expression, and watched her watch him, with some amusement. She certainly wasn’t hard on the eyes. The combined effect of her gamin good looks and spirited demeanor, worked on him in a way he’d never experienced before. He found he could barely suppress simultaneous thoughts of stealing a kiss and landing a few solid smacks to her backside.
After a minute or so, Alan broke the silence.
“If I were you, I’d be careful who you were calling a liar. You’re the mainlander in this conversation young lady, not me. Now, I’ve already given you my name, I suggest you return the courtesy,” he spoke coolly. He smiled to himself as he saw the blush of color bloom on her face. “So,” he thought, “She was embarrassed being spoken to like a bratty child whose bad manners were noticed. Somewhere inside was a little lady who knew the difference between polite and rude. A little lady who knew better than to behave the way she was behaving.” Alan let that awareness sink in with a secret smile. “Just maybe, a little lady who wants to be taught some manners?” his thoughts strayed to a place he rarely let himself go.
“This dock belongs to my uncle. You are trespassing. I suggest you get up off your keester and head back the way you came,” the girl’s retort was even more challenging. She wasn’t sure she liked the odd thrill that was starting to creep into the pit of her stomach. She found herself attracted to the tall stranger who claimed to be a local and a little afraid of him as well. He exuded confidence and authority, at the same time something in his eyes made him seem quite gentle.
“Judging by your manners, I’d say you are definitely a mainlander,” Alan nodded with disdain, as he got to his feet, and brushed the salt dust from his corduroy trousers. “But if you’re George Monroe’s niece, I think I can be reasonably certain your deficiencies there will be remedied in short order. Which of the brothers do you belong to?”
“Never you mind,” the girl’s tone of voice changed almost imperceptibly. She definitely did not want this man going to her uncle to discuss her manners. “You just go on about your business somewhere else please.”
Alan immediately noticed the subtle shift in her body language and tone of voice. He smiled to himself again. There was no longer any doubt that she knew better manners, and the idea that she might have to answer for it, made her nervous.
***********
In the six years that Audrey Monroe, Rey as she was called by friends, had lived in her uncle’s house, she’d come to know only too well how he would respond to a report about the behavior she’d just been indulging in. Her attitude was one of the reasons she’d been sent to the island to live. That and a couple of minor scrapes with the juvenile justice system in Montreal.
Her father died when Rey was eleven, leaving her mother alone with three children. Rey was the oldest, and most affected by the loss of her father. Her reaction to the loss was to withdraw from her mother and siblings. In a misdirected attempt to avoid any more pain from loosing them too, she took herself away from them, and became involved with drugs and petty crimes with a pretty wild peer group. Three failed attempts at probation and one six-month stint in juvenile detention finally prompted her mother to send Rey to live on Grand Manan with her husband’s older brother George.
Rey had not been a bad kid, but her tendency to be impulsive and strong willed, combined with her temper and restless nature to make her a handful. The first year on the island had been the hardest for her. Her uncle’s discipline was strict, and sometimes harsh. At first, she felt she’d been banished to hell on earth, but there was something right and generative about the consistent and ordered life her uncle’s home and methods provided. In spite of her behavior and saucy attitude, the man seemed to genuinely like and care about her. It took most of that year for Rey to let that sink in. She fought it. Most of her fight came out of fear that she might loose anything she cared about, just as she had lost her father and her home. She did settle in, in spite of herself though. In fact, she thrived on the stability, although she would not admit that to a living soul on earth, not even herself.
Recently, Rey had begun to resume some of her old unruly habits. Beginning just before her high school graduation, she became surly, argumentative, and defiant again. She felt restless and anxious a lot of the time. She had decisions to make about her future, as well as the expectations of others to fulfill. For six years, she’d been vocal about her desperation to get off the island and back into the real world, and now that it was time to make good on that promise legitimately, Rey was afraid. Her approach to the dilemma of not wanting to make the decision to go or stay, was to act out so that the world and those around her would push and make the decision for her. Fear and uncertainty that she would make the wrong choice, combined with the stubborn pride that prevented her from admitting that she loved and needed the island worked, to create inertia. At the same time, her aggravation with her own passivity worked with the pressure to do and decide to do something with her life, to leave her feeling aggravated and angry much of the time.
That morning, Alan was the recipient of that passive aggressive saucy attitude.
**************
“How is George?” Alan asked.
Rey ignored the question, and searched her mind for a way to get on a different, if less vulnerable foot with this stranger. Woodward was the name of the old lady who died last week, maybe this was one of her children, she wondered. Probably it was, since he said he was raised here, and she didn’t know him. There were other Woodward’s on the island, but none who lived in Seal Cove, or walking distance from this stretch of beach.
“You’re one of the deserters aren’t you? One of the ingrate Woodward kids who left their mother alone with a cruel husband and a business to run by herself?” Rey’s saucy tone of voice returned, as she thought she found just the right way to put the confident man in front of her off guard.
Her words stung more than Alan would like to admit. Guilt was a powerful emotion, but not one that most people allowed to come honestly to the surface for others to see as a motivator. Instead, it usually masquerades as something else. In Alan’s case, that was anger.
“You really are a nasty little shit, aren’t you?” he shot back.
It was Rey’s turn to smile wickedly. “Bull’s eye,” she thought.
“Don’t look at me!!! I’m just repeating what I’ve heard. Like you said, I’m a mainlander,” her voice lilted in a needling tone, tossing his words back at him, and at the same time digging her dart deeper under his skin.
“What’s your name?” This time Alan’s voice commanded an answer, and having gotten the reaction she wanted, Rey was inclined to give it to him.
“Rey,” she answered. “Rey Monroe.”
“You need some manners, Rey Monroe,” Alan stated coolly, quickly regaining his air of authority.
“So?” Rey shrugged, and turned away to walk off the dock and down onto the stone beach.
At the water’s edge, she picked up several flat stones, and began to toss them horizontally through the surf so that they skipped off the swells beyond the breakers. That was a skill in itself, one that required hours and hours of practice.
Alan stayed standing on the dock, and leaned back on the piling to watch her. She was as attractive as she was aggravating. Something about her spunky attitude appealed to him. She definitely needed a lesson or two in manners. Alan smiled as he entertained thoughts of taking on that responsibility. The feelings the image of that task brought to his awareness were far from paternal.
“How old are you?” he asked after several minutes passed.
“Old enough,” Ray looked his way, and tossed back a non-answer.
“Fifteen? Sixteen?” Alan challenged.
“Nineteen! If you must know!” she retorted, her pride let her fall for his lure.
Alan smiled to himself. She was still young, but at least old enough that his thoughts were not criminal.
“How long have you been living here with George?”
“You ask a lot of questions,” Rey growled. “Why don’t you do what I told you before? Go on about your business and get off my beach.”
“My business?” Alan smiled again. “My business is a leisurely morning getting reacquainted with home. Maybe I’ll climb the bluff there and go say hello to George?”
“No!” Rey said too quickly. “He’s not home; he’s in North Head picking up guests from the Ferry.”
“Oh good! Then Wanda will have tea and scones on to greet them. I think I’ll head on up and barge in for some, like a good island neighbor.” Alan moved to step off the dock, and start toward the wood steps that were built to make climbing the twenty foot rock bluff safer for the Monroe B&B’s guests.
“Ass hole!” Rey growled just under her breath, as she tried to pretend disinterest in his plan.
“What’s that?” Alan asked. The wind carried her epithet, so that Alan heard it clearly.
“Never mind,” Rey said.
“You’ll go too far with that smart mouth girl, and you won’t like it if you do,” Alan warned.
“So? What’s it to you?”
“Whatever I make it, I suppose. Keep it up and you’re going to find out?” Alan took a few steps toward her.
Rey turned away, to hide the blush that washed over her face. “Man o man, he was aggravating!” she thought. He was also pushing all of her buttons. She let her mind wander there, “what if he did it?” That thought was too intense.
“Get lost ass hole!” she growled under her breath again, as she stooped to collect more stones.
Alan took three strides to close the gap and reach her. Before Rey could stand fully and escape him, he caught her with a hand full of sweater, and pulled her upright and back against him. “Come on up with me so you can re-introduce me to Wanda and George,” he growled into her ear.
“Hey! Let me go!” Rey tried to pull away. Her sweater was roomy, and stretched, but she was not able to put any space between them with her effort.
Alan brought his right hand down hard on her backside.
“Ow! God Damn it! Let me go!” Rey yelped.
“Let’s go,” Alan insisted. He reinforced his command with another full swing swat.
“God Damn!” Rey yelped again, as she pulled and twisted down and out from inside her sweater. Before she could slip out of it all the way, Alan moved his grip, so that he had her by her arm. “Stop it!” Rey whined.
“Let’s go,” Alan repeated.
“No! I just got down here!” Hollow as it was, her objection was the best she could come up with. This tall sexy man had actually just spanked her. The exact same thrilling possibility that had run through her mind and body so electrically only a minute before had just happened for real!
“Too bad, let’s go,” Alan’s expression was dark, and full of warning. Rey reacted to the effect it had on her, more than to the promise it contained, and she pulled against his grip.
“No!”
“Yes!” Alan pulled back hard. His effort easily pulled her back against him, and turned her so that he could land four more very hard smacks to her backside.
“Ow! Shit!” Rey twisted her hips ahead of her, so his hand couldn’t connect with so much force. The spanks burned and tingled on the flesh under her jeans.
“Quit that swearing, and let’s go!” Alan repeated. “If you don’t come with me under your own steam now, you’ll do it in a few minutes, but with a very sore butt. Is that what you want?”
Motivated by her own stubborn impulses and a secret desire, Rey might have said yes to that question only three minutes before. But now, her backside was no longer naïve to the reality of Alan’s threat. As turned on as she felt, Rey decided she had enough of the fantasy for now. It hurt too much for real!
“OK!” Rey whined, as she pulled against his grip, and started obediently toward the steps.
Alan smiled to himself as he guided the little brat a head of him up the steps. He was almost disappointed that she’d given in and decided to obey. Not too much though. She’d proven to be a feisty little scamp, but definitely one he thought he could handle.
Up at the Monroe house, Alan enjoyed several hours with Wanda and George in their kitchen. The time flew as the couple filled Alan in on what they knew of his mother’s life over the past years. They also filled him in on Audrey’s life with them, how she came to be there and why. In fact, a good deal of time was devoted to discussion about Audrey and her recent attitude regression. When it shifted finally to Alan and his plans for “The Spray,” the subject of Audrey came back into it.
Alan shared that he was entertaining thoughts of cleaning up and restoring the house and shop, and re-opening it to tourists, as well as the quilters and knitters. That idea pleased Wanda immensely.
“That would be wonderful Alan! And, you know! We could put Rey to work giving you a hand. She has a knack for the decorating and such even if she won’t admit it,” the older woman seemed to launch into plans.
Alan laughed, and so did George.
“If she doesn’t drive the man to drink first!” George smiled. “Audrey honey, come in here!”
When she came in, Rey was surprised to find her uncle in good spirits. She’d made herself scarce when the older man got home, mainly because she didn’t want to be nearby when Alan told him about her snotty behavior on the dock and the beach. She’d been waiting to be summoned, but she was surprised it wasn’t to find herself in for a “talking to” or worse.
The proposal that she help Alan with restoration at “The Spray” was a surprise. Her first reaction was to object, but something inside her managed to intervene and save her from herself. She agreed.
When Alan started back for home, it was with plans that were only fleeting thoughts only hours before. His mind worked over plans, and some very pleasant thoughts about a cute little strawberry blond who’s feisty, abrasive attitude had somehow gotten very deeply under his skin.
Audrey watched Alan from her window, as he strolled south, back toward Seal Cove, this time taking the gravel road along the edge of the bluff above the beach. She wondered why he hadn’t told her uncle about her rudeness, and she wondered other things too. There was only a faint sting left where his hand had smacked her bottom. It was the very different tingle deeper within her that she focused on. That, and the very sexy danger and authority he exuded. She could learn to like Alan Woodward, she thought. She could definitely learn to like him. |
