Tides of Hope. Irene Hannon

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СКАЧАТЬ that. But he wouldn’t want you to live the rest of your life alone if another man came along who was worthy of your love.”

      “No one could ever take his place, Edith. Besides, my life is crazy enough without adding romance to the mix.” Gesturing toward the sunroom, she rose. “Let’s go check on Maddie’s castle, okay?” Without waiting for a response, she picked up her mug and moved away from the table.

      But a few minutes later, as she and Edith listened to the youngster’s imaginative story about the castle she’d constructed from her blocks, the most annoying thing happened.

      Every time Maddie mentioned Prince Charming, an image of Lieutenant Craig Cole came to mind.

      Chapter Two

      By Sunday afternoon, Nantucket was living up to her nickname—The Gray Lady. But the dismal weather couldn’t dampen Kate’s upbeat mood. Thanks to Chester’s magic touch with all things mechanical, the Lucy Sue’s sometimes-temperamental engine was purring along as her bow cut a wide swath through the choppy seas off Great Point. And despite another asthma attack in the middle of the night, Maddie had awakened with no ill effects.

      Her skin tingling from the salt spray, Kate took a deep, cleansing breath of the bracing air. Nothing could be more relaxing than this, she concluded. And today was the perfect chance to enjoy it. Although she’d be making this trip twice daily with a boatful of amateur anglers once the season kicked off, their need for constant attention would leave her little opportunity to relish the grand view of the majestic whitewashed lighthouse and the long expanse of pristine beach backed by endless sky.

      Today the outline of the tall, stately column was blurred by the gray mantle draped over the island, but the bright white light that flashed every five seconds made the tower easy to locate. In a world where very little could be counted on, Kate took comfort in that steady, consistent beacon. And she appreciated it most on days like this, when Nantucket’s three lighthouses had the chance to do the job for which they were designed—guiding lost souls safely home.

      In truth, Kate didn’t mind the dreary weather. The view might be prettier on sunny summer days, when the heavens were deep blue and the sea sparkled as if it had been strewn with diamonds, but she felt a kinship with this wild, windswept speck of land no matter its wardrobe. Isolated by twenty-six miles of sea from the mainland, Nantucket was a place that bred strength, where self-reliance was a way of life and only the hardy survived.

      Unlike summer people and day-trippers, who came to sample the unique rhythm of the island but whose lives pulsed to a beat far removed from these shores, the lives of year-rounders were inexorably linked to the cadence of the sea. It had been that way back in the bustling whaling days, and it was no different now. Only ten thousand people could claim the title of Nantucketer, and Kate was proud to be one of them.

      Just as Mac had been.

      Swallowing past the sudden lump in her throat, Kate blinked and checked her watch. Time to head back and pick up Maddie from Edith’s. She didn’t want to take advantage of her neighbor’s generosity—or grow maudlin thinking about the man who’d filled her days with sunshine and whose loss had left an aching void in her heart.

      As Kate swung the wheel to port and pointed the Lucy Sue back toward the harbor, she scanned the undulating sea, relishing the solitude. In two months, this prime fishing ground would be dotted with crafts of all sizes. Today she had the spot to herself.

      Or did she?

      A bobbing orange speck in the distance caught her eye, and she eased back on the throttle, squinting through the mist. It could be debris, she supposed. But she’d pulled more than her share of too-confident swimmers out of these waters and had learned long ago never to overestimate people’s common sense.

      Without taking her gaze off the spot where the orange speck kept disappearing among the swells, she felt for the binoculars secured within reaching distance of the helm. Fitting them to her eyes, she planted her feet in a wide, steadying stance and focused on the object.

      In general, the seven-by-thirty magnification was sufficient for her needs. But today it couldn’t overcome the obscuring combination of distance, mist and the rocking motion of the boat. All she could tell with any certainty was that the object was about fifty yards offshore and moving on a steady, purposeful course parallel to the beach.

      Meaning it was alive.

      And it wasn’t a seal or a fish. Fluorescent orange wasn’t in the marine life palette of Nantucket.

      That left only one possibility.

      It was human.

      Shaking her head, Kate huffed out a breath. What kind of idiot would go for a dip off Great Point? These were dangerous swimming waters any time of year, let alone in early April, when the threat of hypothermia amplified the peril.

      It was obvious the swimmer churning through the swells didn’t understand the risks—or didn’t consider them to be a problem. She didn’t know which was worse. The former smacked of stupidity, the latter of arrogance. In either case, someone needed to pound some sense into the guy’s head. And it was a guy. She was sure of that, even if the conclusion reeked of stereotypical sexism.

      Compressing her lips into a grim line, Kate swung the Lucy Sue hard to starboard, shifted into full throttle and headed straight for the bobbing orange speck. Disgust and annoyance vied for top billing on her emotional chart, with impatience and frustration not far behind. Whoever she found cavorting in the heaving gray swells was about to get an earful.

      One, two, three, four, five, breathe. One, two, three, four, five, breathe. One, two, three, four, five, breathe.

      Encased in his neoprene wet suit, Craig cut through the swells with powerful, even strokes, propelling himself forward with strong, steady kicks of his flippers, oblivious to the forty-two-degree water. After all the missions he’d swum in the Arctic, this was a bathtub. The chop was distracting, and the riptide had been a tad annoying, but neither had disrupted his bilateral breathing rhythm. After fifteen minutes of steady swimming, he wasn’t even winded.

      As he sliced through the water, Craig counted each stroke as a victory over the intimidating marine conditions—and over his emotions. It had taken him two years to put so much as a toe in the ocean after the accident. He’d hated the sea with the same intensity he’d once loved it, his anger almost palpable. If it had been an enemy he could have gotten his hands around, he’d have choked the life out of it. Not the most Christian impulse, he knew, but that was how he’d felt.

      Those potent feelings had prompted his request for a transfer from field duty to Washington. Hoping his fury and grief would ebb in a new environment, he’d planned to complete his twenty years of military service behind a desk, as far removed from his previous life as possible. And retirement wasn’t far in the future. Because he’d enlisted right out of college, he’d be able to wrap up his Coast Guard career as a relatively young man. Only three more years to go.

      To his relief, the time and distance provided by three years of desk duty had eased his sorrow and mitigated his rage—to some degree. But much to his surprise, as his hate had begun to recede, his love of the sea had resurfaced. He’d fought it fiercely, overwhelmed by guilt, unable to understand how he could yearn to return to the very thing that had robbed his life of joy.

      Until Paul Gleason had helped him make an uneasy peace with his conflicting feelings.

      The admiral had come upon him one СКАЧАТЬ