Once Upon a River Page 0,51

tried to remember being wrapped in his arms, held tight against his chest, but this morning his body seemed stiff beneath his shirt and jacket, and she couldn’t imagine him without clothes. “I wish you would. It’s a very relaxed church. Some people around here call it the hippie church.”

“I’m going home,” she said automatically.

He handed her a cup of coffee with milk already in it. “How old are you, Margaret Louise? I’m twenty-eight.”

“I’ll be nineteen in November.” She then remembered she’d told him she was already nineteen. In fact, she’d be seventeen in two months.

“You know, I had no intention of doing that last night. I don’t really even know you.” He stared at Margo in a way that seemed rude, so she sipped her coffee without looking up at him and stroked King’s head. The silence in the room grew large, and Margo let herself settle into it. Silence was a game she could play.

“And I didn’t use protection. Don’t worry about pregnancy—I’ve been snipped—but still we shouldn’t have. Is there anything you want to tell me?”

She looked into his face. His eyes looked a little frantic, but they were kind.

“I’m sorry,” Michael finally said, sitting across from her and relaxing. “I just don’t know anything about you. For all I know you’re some lost heiress or a girl who just killed her whole family and buried them in a garden.”

“Or a girl raised by wolves?” Margo said.

“Or maybe I’m dreaming you.” His voice grew quieter. “Because, believe me, if I dreamed a girl, she’d be just like you. She’d have beautiful arms like you. She’d be smart, and she’d even smell like you. She’d teach me to live off the land.” He stood up, picked up a dishcloth, and wiped the clean counter with it.

What could she smell like? Margo wondered. She’d just had a shower.

“Except this girl would talk.” He folded the cloth and put it down. “She’d argue with me. And if I was lucky, she really would be an heiress with an island in the river.”

Margo kept his words on the surface. She wasn’t a wolf girl or a murderer or an heiress. Or a dream. She was a girl who needed some matches and gas for the outboard motor. King pushed her head beneath Margo’s hand until Margo resumed petting her.

“But maybe that big guy you live with will come back and use me for bait.”

Margo thought it was the first sensible thing he’d said. She smiled.

“You’ve lived with him since last December, but now you’re afraid of him.”

Margo looked at her cabin. She was grateful no boat was parked there. After last night, she realized she no longer wanted to see either Paul or Brian. Margo had appreciated the home Brian had given her, but she didn’t want to be with him again, not even if he were set free. She had learned a lot from Brian, but last night it had been so nice to be the equal of a man, and to feel safe and comfortable.

Michael took a drink of coffee. “Are you going to live in that cabin all winter? Keep warm with a woodstove? Or do you have a propane or kerosene heater?”

“I might go stay with my ma,” she said. She wanted to hear how it sounded.

“Oh, of course you have a mother! Where does she live?”

“Lake Lynne.”

“Will you come back tonight?” Michael’s eyes were as brown and hopeful as King’s. “We can eat dinner. I could come get you in the Jeep.”

“The closest road is a half mile from the cabin,” she said, slinging her Marlin over her shoulder. “Then it’s just a walking path.”

“And I don’t have a boat yet, so I guess it’s up to you, Margaret Louise.” He watched her stand, drain her coffee, and walk toward the door, just as he had watched her row away with his dog on the day they’d met.

A half hour later, Margo was back at the cabin, sitting cross-legged on the dock, enjoying a warm breeze off the river, watching Michael’s Jeep pull out of the driveway again. She wished she’d told him she would come to dinner. If he asked her again, she would accept his invitation on the spot and offer to bring something—fish fillets, maybe. She watched the Jeep pull onto the river road that led upstream to Heart of Pines and past hundreds of regular houses like his. She should write to her mother and ask if Luanne was living a regular