A Charmed Place by Antoinette Stockenberg Page A

same ghastly, bleak chuckle.
    She recovered first. "Yes?" She sounded almost shrill to herself as she said it, as if he were holding a gun aimed at her belly.
    He held up a Pyrex measuring cup. "Sugar?" he said, with a loopy, sickly smile. "Do you have any to spare?"
    She stared. Whatever it was he had come for—money, jewels, silver, sex, forgiveness—she did not expect it to be sugar.
    "I don't understand," she said humbly. Her mind and her heart were in turmoil. It was much worse—the face-to-face meeting was so much worse—than in her most anguished dreams.
    "Here, take it," he said, thrusting the cup into her hand. "I don't want the damn thing. I jus t... I had to ... I didn't know how ... Maddie. Maddie."
    It was that second ' 'Maddie'' that was her undoing. A tear rolled down her cheek. "Why are you here?" she whispered. "Why?"
    "Let me in," he said, his voice hoarse with emotion. "Maddie, let me in."
    How could she? It was so much worse, so much worse: seeing him again, flogged by the years, lost years, years they'd never get back. And it was worse even than that. Despite the years, he looked so like himself that she was flung violently back to their last meeting. Her head began to ring with the sound of her own furious reproaches, hurled at him like so many javelins.
    She remembered them all, every last one of them. Did he?
    "We have to talk," he said.
    His words brought a startled laugh to her throat. "Don't you think that ship has sailed?"
    "If it has, it's gone round the world and come home again," he said with a burning look.
    But she stood her ground, refusing—unable—to open the door to him.
    He reached over the lower half of the Dutch door and unlocked the door on her side, letting himself in. Maddie watched, mesmerized, as he did it. Dan Hawke: intense, impatient, undisciplined. Dan Hawke: leader of a ragtag band of student radicals. Dan Hawke: bad boy of the campus.
    There wasn't a door built that could keep him out.
    Now that he had gained access to her kitchen, some of the fierceness seemed to slide off him. "You look the same," he said. His gaze swept her from head to sandals and came back to rest on her face. "Like the girl next door."
    "I am the girl next door."
    He smiled at that. "I was counting on it when I signed the lease."
    She pretended not to understand the implication. "Are you starting a second career in the Coast Guard?"
    "No."
    "Then a lighthouse is an odd choice of digs."
    He gave her a raw look that instantly put her back on her guard. "You know why I'm here, Maddie."
    "Actually, I've been wondering for a couple of weeks now," she shot back. Immediately, she wanted to retract the words.
    "I know. I should've come over sooner. But you're rarely alone here. People seem to come and go constantly."
    She said, "I have friends here. Family here." He wouldn't understand that. He was a lone wolf.
    "I'm jealous of every one of them," he admitted.
    That surprised her. Once when they were in bed together, he'd said, "You're all I need. Everyone else is clutter."
    Except for his sister. He did admit to caring about her. But he claimed to have no use for his parents and no love for his other relations. She wondered whether he still felt that way.
    "I can't imagine you being jealous that you're not surrounded by a crowd," she said without smiling. "It was never your style."
    "No, that's not what I—" His face took on a sudden, puzzled frown. "Did you know your phone's off the hook?" he said, pointing to the counter.
    Maddie whirled around. "Oh, my God." She snatched up the receiver and said, "Hello?"
    She was amazed to see that her ex-husband was still on the line. "Who're you talking to, for God's sake?" he demanded to know.
    Without thinking, she answered, "Dan Hawke."
    There was a pause, and then Michael said, "Hawke? What the hell is he doing there?"
    "He's staying in Sandy Point for the summer," she said, turning away from Dan Hawke in a laughable attempt at privacy. "It was in Trixie's