Sail Away with Me Page 4

  Perhaps Julian heard the resolve in her voice, or he, too, craved time alone, because this time he didn’t protest. “I’ve enjoyed talking to you, Iris. Let’s do it again.”

  “Oh!” Her eyes widened. It was the last thing she’d expected him to say. “I . . .” She could see Julian again. But today was special. She’d managed to communicate semi-articulately and he’d been understanding, sensitive. Another time, she’d be tense, get tongue-tied. If she never saw him face-to-face again, she could hang on to this magical memory.

  “Are you involved with someone?” he asked.

  She ducked her head to hide the longing in her eyes. The longing for something more than would ever be possible between them. “No,” she said softly. “But I don’t think it’s a good idea, us seeing each other again.” She rose and gathered her blanket, not bothering to fold it, picked up her basket, and hurried away.

  Chapter Three

  In the several days since he’d visited the old commune, Julian hung on to the memory of those few hours of peace, of music, of Iris’s company. He spent most of his time helping Forbes and Sonia. A few of his dad’s close friends dropped by to offer assistance, but fortunately Bart Jelinek wasn’t one of them. Julian didn’t know what he’d do if he ever came face-to-face with the man.

  You’re a special boy, Julian.

  Would he, who’d never hit a person in his life, haul off and beat him up?

  Remember, this is our secret.

  Or would he turn into the cringing kid again, feeling dirty, broken, vulnerable? One thing was certain: he never wanted to find out.

  Midmorning on the first Sunday in November, Julian was cleaning up the kitchen after a late breakfast, while Sonia got Forbes settled in the front room. They were expecting Julian’s stepbrother and his family.

  Luke, despite being busy with his work as the island’s only vet, raising twin boys, and being recently engaged, had popped in at least every couple of days. He’d done shopping for them, picked up prescriptions, delivered goodies his fiancée had baked. Until today, Forbes hadn’t felt well enough to deal with his grandkids’ boisterous enthusiasm, so Miranda and the kids had stayed at Luke’s house—the house she and her young daughter had moved into. Julian counted it as a great sign that yesterday Forbes had suggested this family visit.

  And here they were, chestnut-haired Luke coming through the kitchen door along with his four-year-olds and Miranda. It seemed they hadn’t brought Ariana, Miranda’s daughter. Before Julian could ask, Brandon and Caleb sprinted toward him yelling, “Uncle Julian!”

  It was the first time he’d seen his nephews since his brief visit back in May. Squatting down and hugging an armful of squirming, reddish-haired boys, Julian said, “Who on earth are you guys? You can’t be my favorite nephews. Caleb and Brandon are little kids, and you’re so big.” It was true; they’d grown inches and pounds. Though they were identical twins, there were superficial differences—like clothing choices and Caleb’s longer hair—and they had different personalities, so Julian never had trouble telling them apart.

  “It’s us, it’s us!” Brandon, the outgoing, impulsive twin insisted.

  “We’re your only nephews,” Caleb, the quieter, more reflective boy, stated reproachfully.

  Julian laughed, his spirits lighter. The kids were a shot of pure sunshine. The same as Iris. Thoughts of her gave him moments of solace. Though she’d turned him down when he phoned Dreamspinner and asked if they could get together, he would try again.

  After a mock wrestling match with the twins, he rose. “Take off your jackets and shoes, kids. Then you can go find Grandma Sonia and Granddad Forbes. But be careful, okay? Granddad is hurting and you can’t hug him.”

  The boys shed their outdoor clothing on a chair and roared off, and Julian faced Miranda. She was slim and pretty in jeans and a long-sleeved blue tee, a late-summer tan accenting her blond hair and grayish-blue eyes. Her face bore a wary expression.

  He hadn’t seen her since May. The night they’d met—and kissed. She and Luke had been broken up and Julian hadn’t even known they’d been dating, because she hadn’t told him. But she’d stopped the kiss immediately, confessed the truth, and said he wasn’t the man she wanted. Julian had been pissed off because even though he and Luke weren’t particularly close, his stepbrother was a good guy and Julian would never betray him. But when Miranda had explained, Julian saw she wasn’t a bad person, just hurt and confused.

  Luke had, by pure bad timing, witnessed the kiss. The next day, he confronted Julian, who enlightened him. And, he liked to think, played a part in getting the couple back together. So, though this meeting was awkward, his conscience was clear. He grinned at her. “Hey, Miranda. Good to see you again.”

  “You too,” she said guardedly.

  “I owe you a thank-you.”

  “You do?”

  “You gave me one of the songs for the new album.” One of only three he’d completed, though he felt good about the Forbes-lark one, “Your Reality,” that he’d started at the commune.

  Miranda’s brows rose, the wariness fading. “You actually wrote that song?”

  After their kiss, she’d been down on herself. He’d told her he figured she was better than she thought, a comment that triggered his muse. “Yeah. It’s called ‘You’re Better than You Think.’ I’ll play it for you—” He intercepted Luke’s scowl, an impressive one from a guy who was a couple inches taller than him and carried a good twenty pounds more of solid muscle. “For both of you,” he clarified. “By the way, congratulations on the engagement.”

  Miranda’s smile was relaxed and genuine. “Thanks, Julian.”

  “I’ll dedicate the song to you. If that’s okay?” His questioning glance went from her to Luke and back again.

  Her smile turned into a wry grin. “You couldn’t dedicate a song called ‘You’re Fabulous and Amazing’ to me?”

  The three of them chuckled, and she went on. “Yes, I’m flattered. As long as you don’t reveal how the inspiration for that song came about.”

  “No one knows but the three of us,” he said, “and I’m not planning on changing that.”

  “The three of us and a girlfriend of hers,” Luke said dryly.

  Was it Iris? “Uh, what friend is that? Might I know her?”

  “Glory McKenna,” Miranda said. “She was in Aaron’s class at school.”

  Relieved, he reflected but didn’t come up with a face to match the name. “I don’t remember her. But then I didn’t hang around school any more than I had to.”

  “You and me both,” she said.

  He wondered what her reason had been. For him, it had started with resentment about being forced to move from Victoria to this backwoods island. Even worse, he’d lost his close bond with his single-parent dad when Forbes went crazy over Sonia. And then the kids at school all knew each other, and Julian didn’t—and wouldn’t—fit in. Then Jelinek had come into his life, and misery had turned to sheer hell.

  Destiny Islanders had a bunch of sayings about how the island was some people’s destiny. In Julian’s case, destiny had sucked.

  “Mommy!” a petulant little voice said, and he gazed down to see a small girl emerge from behind Miranda, one hand gripping the leg of her mother’s jeans. Her brow furrowed as she stared at Julian. She was a cutie, with her curly black hair, dark skin, and deep brown eyes, so unlike her mom in appearance.

  He bent again and smiled. “Hey, who’s been playing hide-and-seek? I bet you’re Ariana. Luke’s told me how pretty and smart you are.” His stepbrother had fallen in love with Miranda’s three-year-old just as deeply as he loved the child’s mother.

  “I pitty,” the girl agreed. “You Luke brother?”

  Luke ruffled her hair. “That’s right. This is my brother, Julian.”

  It felt odd, hearing himself described that way. Julian had been eleven and Luke twelve when their parents married, and the boys had always referred to themselves as stepbrothers. They hadn’t dislike
d each other, but they’d both been less than impressed with the marriage and had kept to themselves. In later years they’d become more friendly, but he’d never thought of Luke as his brother. Still, the concept of stepsiblings was likely too complicated for young Ariana.

  “I get brothers,” Ariana said. “I get a daddy, too. When Mommy marries Luke.”

  “Yes,” Julian told her, “when your mom and Luke get married, he’ll be your daddy. Brandon and Caleb will be your brothers. And me, well I guess I’ll be your uncle.” That aspect of the situation hadn’t dawned on him before. He glanced at Miranda. “If that’s okay with you.”

  The bewilderment in her eyes told him she hadn’t thought of that either, but then it cleared and she smiled warmly. “Uncle Julian. How about that?”

  “I has unc,” Ariana said. “Unc Aaron. He’s a pilot!”

  “I know him.” Miranda’s brother owned Destiny-based Blue Moon Air and had often flown Julian when he visited the island.

  “Some people,” Miranda said, hugging her daughter against her side, “are lucky enough to have two uncles.”

  The girl processed that and then beamed. “I lucky!”

  “I think we’re all pretty lucky,” Miranda said. Then she frowned. “Except poor Forbes, of course. It sounds as if he has a tough road ahead of him. But Luke says he’s a fighter, and that he’s determined to be able to play at our wedding.”

  She and Luke were getting married between Christmas and New Year’s, which would make for one crazy holiday season, but who was he to judge? In fact, he suspected they might’ve chosen the date in part because of Julian himself, knowing that he always visited for a few days at Christmas.

  “Forbes’s bones may be shattered, but he’s one determined guy,” Julian agreed. “Nothing can break his spirit.”

  “Has he always been that way?” she asked.

  “Uh-huh. Like when my mother ran off with another guy and it was just Forbes and me. There he was, a musician making money from some gigs and working part-time for a construction company, and suddenly he was a single parent with a four-year-old. But he handled it. He was a good dad.”

  Forbes had shared music, his love of it and his knowledge and skill. He’d kept his son fed and clothed, kept a roof over their heads. Julian remembered a series of babysitters—from grandmotherly types to girlfriends of Forbes’s—and sometimes he’d hung out in a corner of a restaurant where his dad was playing, or at the woodworking shop when his dad got an apprenticeship. Social services mightn’t have considered it an ideal childhood, but Julian always knew he was loved and always felt safe. Ironically, it wasn’t until his father moved them to this tiny island to form a blended family, that Julian had felt neglected and been in danger.

  A tug at the leg of his jeans made him look down, to see Ariana’s pouty face gazing up. “Unc Julie, I want to play.”

  He found a smile. “That can be arranged. Hey, do you like music?”

  “She does,” Miranda said. Teasingly, she asked, “Do you know ‘Itsy Bitsy Spider’?”

  He laughed. “I bet I can figure it out. Better yet, maybe she’d like to fool around with a keyboard. How about I take her out to the studio and you two can visit with Forbes?”

  Miranda stooped and addressed her daughter. “Would you like to go make music with Uncle Julian, sweetie?”

  “Yes!” It was an emphatic approval, and the girl held out her hand to him, clearly expecting him to take it.

  Julian accepted that small hand gently, feeling the immensity of the gesture. She was so trusting. So innocent. It broke his heart that a child’s trust could be so easily exploited, her or his innocence shattered as drastically as that accident had trashed Forbes’s body.

  He guided her out to the building that had been the original garage. Soon after Forbes and Sonia bought the house, Forbes, who was a wood craftsman as well as a musician, had renovated the garage to create a music studio and a woodworking workshop.

  In the studio, Julian showed Ariana the keyboard and she pounded away enthusiastically. He picked up his guitar, strumming and plucking in accompaniment, the two of them creating a noise that most people would never call music, but Julian found oddly pleasing.

  The door opened and Jonathan Barnes, the second “B” in B-B-Zee, stepped in, smiling. “Am I interrupting a jam session?”

  Still playing, Julian said, “Want to join? Forbes wouldn’t mind if you used his guitar.” Jonathan normally played the bass guitar, but he’d do fine with Forbes’s instrument.

  “Thanks, but I can’t stay. There’s something I want to ask you.”

  “Okay.” Julian put down his guitar and walked over to him, leaving Ariana in her own world of musical expression. “What’s up?”

  Bald-headed Jonathan stroked his neat gray beard, and the smile had disappeared from his lips. “The band has a booking on November twenty-fourth. I’ve been trying to find another group to fill in, but haven’t located one that’s available and plays the right kind of music.”

  Julian said, not liking the idea one bit, “You want me to fill in for Forbes.” His dad’s two bandmates were talented musicians and good guys, and Julian had played with the band a number of times, for the pleasure of making music with his father. But every time he joined B-B-Zee at Quail Ridge Community Hall, Julian was antsy, fearing that Jelinek would be in the audience. So far it hadn’t happened, which he suspected meant that the man was avoiding him just as much as Julian steered clear of his abuser.

  He realized his hand had automatically gone into his pocket, and he was fingering the old, mended guitar pick he’d carried for more than ten years. It was his reminder that even if Jelinek had broken him, he had survived. Even if he carried shame and guilt like rot at the core of an apple, he still had worth, something to contribute to the world.

  “It’s Jane and George Nelson’s sixtieth wedding anniversary,” Jonathan said. “You’ve seen them. He’s in a wheelchair and they’re always out on the dance floor when we play.”

  “Oh, man.” Yeah, he’d seen them, her in her husband’s lap as he maneuvered his chair around, both of them obviously still in love with each other. It was like the fairy-tale ending of one of Iris’s books, except that this fairy tale was a real-life one.

  “They’re huge fans. They really want B-B-Zee.”

  “I’m pretty busy helping Forbes and Sonia.”

  “I’m sure, and I don’t want to pressure you.” Jonathan’s brow was furrowed. “It’s just, it’s the Nelsons. And, though he’d never tell you this, Christian could use the income.”

  Julian couldn’t quite suppress a groan, but fortunately Ariana’s keyboard-hammering drowned it out. Jonathan Barnes and Christian Zabec were both, like Forbes, in their sixties, but none of them had retired. Jonathan and his wife did okay, running the Once in a Blue Moon B and B on the harbor, but Christian was a bit of an eccentric. A former American, he’d drifted around until he settled on Destiny, but the island and B-B-Zee were about the only “settled” things in his life. He’d never had a long-term relationship nor a real career. He was good at fixing things and did odd jobs for islanders, but he didn’t have a reliable income. Still, Christian was a decent guy. And Julian’s dad would feel like crap for disappointing the Nelsons.

  How could Julian say no? He couldn’t tell the band members he was afraid Jelinek might be one of the guests. “Where’s the party, and how big is it? Do you know who’ll be there?”

  “It’s at the community hall, so you know the setup, the acoustics. Jane and George’s relatives from all over the place will be there, and many of their island friends. Same as for their fiftieth.” He scratched his bald head. “Oh, I guess you don’t remember that. You weren’t on the island then.”

  “No.” Ten years ago, seventeen-year-old Julian had been in Vancouver. He’d played music on the streets and anywhere else he could, and found jobs waiting tables in cheap diners. He’d avoided drugs and managed to survive without having to sell his body the way so many ru
naways did. Music made life worth living, and he was grateful he hadn’t actually offed himself as had been his plan when he ran away from home. He’d gotten back in touch with Forbes and Sonia after disappearing for almost a year, but no way had he wanted to visit the island.

  “Forget it,” Jonathan said. “I shouldn’t have asked.” Julian saw the disappointment in the older man’s greenish eyes, disappointment not only for having to say no to the Nelsons, but disappointment in his friend’s son.

  He suppressed another groan. Then, fingering the familiar shape of the guitar pick, he realized he’d been ignoring its message. He was no longer a shattered, suicidal kid. Despite his emotional scars and the guilt that would always haunt him, he was a man who’d built a successful career in a tough industry. He had a healthy sex life despite the abuse. He’d come one hell of a long way—yet he was still letting fucking Jelinek control his actions. “I’ll do it.” The words burst out roughly, making Jonathan’s silvery-gray brows rise.

  Tempering his tone, Julian said, “I want to. I’ll need to get up to speed on your playlist. Let’s schedule some rehearsal time.” He took out his phone and brought up the calendar that showed Forbes’s numerous medical and rehab appointments.

  As Jonathan called Christian, Julian had a second revelation. Did Iris work at Dreamspinner on Sundays? If he wasn’t going to let Jelinek rule his life, he should stop avoiding the village.

  * * *

  Iris was busy with a steady stream of customers. The weather’s perfect blend of sunny warm and autumn crisp had resulted in the morning ferry offloading a horde of day-trippers. Most were foot passengers, coming to browse the stores and enjoy a nice lunch. Under the influence of Indian-summer euphoria, they were happy to pull out their debit and credit cards to self-indulge or get an early start on their Christmas shopping with one of Aunt Lily’s silk-screened scarves at Island Treasures, a stuffed seal at Blowing Bubbles for a child or grandchild, a new book to savor on a chilly winter evening.