Page 73 of A Change of Location
Before returning to the bed, he took the water bottles out of the mini fridge. “You wouldn’t believe the fallout from that asinine article. Ex-girlfriends were outraged, thinking I’d passed on their names. Milver Vale old-timers weren’t fussed about it. New people, enlightened about my purple-haired past, give me strange looks.” He swallowed some water. “During all the furor, Mother told me about her dodgy blood test. I promptly forgot about Posh and almost everything else. Except you.” His fingers roamed across her collarbone.
She shimmied beneath the sheet. “And the wicked awesome sex?”
Their hope of showering together was thwarted by their inability to fit themselves into the shower stall. Martin let Hannah go first. When it was his turn, she laughed to see him crouching under a shower head several inches too low. He stepped out and pulled her close. Slipping his hand under her knickers, he tickled her bum until she shrieked.
She unwrapped the towel from her hair and combed out the tangles. Reapplying sunscreen, she told him to hurry up and dress. “Take the key back to the office. Say we’ve been invited to have dinner with some people in Falmouth, and we’re spending the night at their house. And that’s absolutely, indisputably the truth.”
Chapter 22
Their return to Bear Knoll was delayed by heavy holiday traffic on Route 1. Dinner preparations were underway by the time they arrived. While Hannah sliced strawberries and whipped the cream, she recalled doing the same in the Stanwell House kitchen after discovering so many troubling facts about Martin in the Posh article. The pint of fresh blueberries on the counter inspired her to create a variation of Eton Mess to satisfy the British and the Americans—both nations had a red, white, and blue flag.
Because they would eat on the porch, she covered its table with a red-checked cloth and laid out plates and cutlery and arranged an assortment of chairs. The shish kebabs and couscous were a big hit with the Latimers. She crushed the perfect meringues Mum had baked and added them to her Eton Mess variation, which received enthusiastic accolades.
When they moved to the living room, Martin sat down to read a local author’s book about a shipwreck recovery. Isobel sketched. Mum and Dad discussed the weather outlook and plans for a Fourth of July boat excursion.
“Rain coming,” he said, his fingers scratching behind Bess the border collie’s upright ears.
“Late in the day. Not that English people mind getting wet,” her mother insisted.
Martin laughed. “We whinge about it all the time.”
Hannah, seated on the rug with Sasha and Sadie, the Shelties, was relieved that Martin had asked her about the missing Morris Minor instead of her parents. She’d very nearly slipped up and given the reason Mum and Dad sold their beloved British motorcar. Chase’s sentence included a fine of several thousand dollars, far beyond his ability to pay.
Although his name had surfaced several times, none of her relatives had mentioned his prison years. She hoped they wouldn’t. Despite her curiosity about his plans, she couldn’t ask questions when the Latimers were present. She’d have to join Dad in the goat barn during milking. Or offer to help him shuck corn on the porch steps, when no one else was around to overhear. Looking up, she caught Isobel staring at her with those gray eyes so similar to her son’s.
She’s drawing me, Hannah realized. Curiosity was stronger than self-consciousness, and she wondered how she was being depicted. “May I see?”
Isobel handed down the sketchpad.
Even in its unfinished state, the portrait was eerily precise. Her curly head filled the entire page. Her expression was thoughtful, perhaps even wistful, and graceful lines indicated her neck and the curve of her shoulders.
“It’s a start,” Isobel said, reaching for the pad. “Even before Martin asked me to sketch you, I was thinking you’d be a lovely subject. I hope you don’t mind.”
“I’m flattered.” By Martin’s request even more than his mother’s complimentary version of her.
***
Clouds marred the morning sky, but no rain was falling when Martin and three Ballards—Hannah, her father, and her grandfather—boarded Jenny’s Dream. Arthur Ballard guided his vessel into Casco Bay, as far as the shore of Chebeague Island. Hannah stood beside Martin and pointed out the shiny rounded heads of the harbor seals, and cormorants standing on jagged rocks. The water surrounding the vessel seemed to intensify the sun’s glare, and the breeze whipped his hair into a quiff.
On their way back to Ballard’s Landing, Arthur pulled up next to each of his bobbing white-and-green buoys, and the flock of rapacious gulls swooped low, clamoring for morsels of fish. He and Neil, both wearing orange waterproof overalls, winched up the traps. They used a gauge to measure each greenish-brown creature, and tossed most of them back to the sea.
“The breeders have to be v-notched before being discarded,” Hannah shouted over the roar of the diesel engine. Rubber gloves protected her hands and she used special pliers to band the claws of the legal-sized lobsters before flinging them into the keeper tank. Holding up one whose pincers were safely bound, she explained to Martin how she determined its sex.
He was reunited with several of the same lobsters later that day, when Arthur Ballard delivered a portion of their morning harvest to Bear Knoll.
“Wow, that’s a lot,” Hannah commented.
“Steam ’em all. You’ll have plenty of meat to chill or freeze for lobster rolls or salad.” Grinning at Martin, he added, “Girl eats up them bugs like she was a seal.”
Martin and Neil lugged the cooler into the kitchen. Before they were out of earshot, Martin overheard her grandfather tell Hannah, “I like your Limey fella. But if he don’t treat you good, I’ll start a whole ’nother revolution.”
He was setting the bowl of coleslaw on the table when a red pickup pulled into the area between the house and barn. Hannah arrived with a basket of nutcrackers, picks, and miniature forks—necessary utensils for a lobster dinner.
“Oh, my God.” She froze, watching the dark-haired man who was greeting the trio of barking dogs.
He came up the porch steps and let himself in.
“Happy Fourth of July, Hannah-Banana. Long time no see.”
