The Harbor

Eighteen

When Zoe decided to walk to dinner alone, J.B. didn't argue with her, not because he liked the idea but because he might kiss her again, and she could get spooked and throw him out. Then he'd have to camp out on the rocks, in the cold to keep an eye on her. He could anchor his boat off the bluff, but that made a quick reaction to any goings-on impossible.

And he'd probably have to get wet.

Either way he'd be cold.

The larger point was he didn't like what was going on in Goose Harbor. He had a bad feeling about Teddy Shelton. Betsy O'Keefe's visit. Kyle Castellane's documentary on Olivia West. None of it felt right, so not right that he'd dug out his 9 mm pistol from its locked compartment in his Jeep and clipped on his belt holster. Time to go around Goose Harbor armed.

Since he was driving, he gave Zoe a head start before finding his way along the maze of narrow streets behind the library to the yellow clapboard house she'd grown up in.

The two sisters were out back talking gardening with Stick Monroe. Christina, in jeans and a sweatshirt as a change from her café clothes, offered J.B. a glass of Chianti from a colorful pitcher on the patio table. He declined. He'd put on a jacket to cover his pistol, but if Zoe or her sister or her friend the retired judge noticed he was carrying a firearm, they didn't say anything. Which meant Zoe, at least, hadn't noticed.

He'd called Sally Meintz before he left for dinner and given her all the names. Betsy O'Keefe. Luke and Kyle Castellane. Bruce Young. Steven Stickney Monroe. And the Wests. All of them. Patrick, Zoe, Christina. Not because he didn't trust the state and local police to do the job but because he was thorough and he'd been blindsided enough this year. In February, by his father's death. Over the summer, by a violent criminal willing to kill a man in front of his own children.

Sally had typed the names into her computer in silence, then asked if he wanted her to make reservations for him somewhere else, like Costa Rica, because it sounded like he needed something new to keep him busy.

Monroe was in a better mood than last night and tipped his glass to J.B. "We were just discussing the glories of good compost. Are you a gardener, Agent McGrath?"

"Afraid not."

"Do you have any hobbies?"

"I used to fly-fish," he said. "My father was a guide in Montana."

"Is that right? That's a gentleman's sport, isn't it?"

He didn't seem to mean it as a dig, but J.B. didn't answer. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Zoe settling into her seat, tucking her feet up under her. He wondered if she realized how close he'd come to carting her up to bed after their kiss on the porch.

All in all, Sally Meintz was probably right. He should head for Costa Rica for the rest of his vacation.

"You'd hate fly-fishing, Stick," Zoe said. "It involves water."

He grinned at her. "Ah, you're right. I like to look at the water, but I don't care for getting in it. Fresh or salt. A wonder I retired to a seaside village. You'd think I'd have picked the mountains." He gestured broadly with his Chianti glass, obviously not his first of the evening. "Agent McGrath-J.B.You don't mind if I call you J.B.?"

"Not at all."

"J.B. it is, then." Monroe was in shorts and a Princeton sweatshirt despite the dropping temperature, but he didn't seem chilled. "You can see how Goose Harbor grows on a man, can't you? But the locals-I've been coming here since I was a boy and I know better than to think I'll ever be one of them. They're a tightknit lot. One local finds out you're with the bureau, the entire town finds out. You beat one local at darts, you've beaten them all." He grinned broadly. "Especially if it's Bruce Young."

Christina sighed. "I don't know why Bruce is so popular."

"Because he's a nice guy," Zoe said. "Stick, you exaggerate the clannishness of those of us who were born and raised here."

"Be careful, Zoe. You left. You might have to reapply to admission as a native."

She laughed. "Oh, give it up, will you?"

His dark eyes twinkled. "There's a rumor J.B.'s staying with you at Olivia's."

J.B. wondered how long it would be before anyone would refer to the house Zoe now owned as hers instead of her aunt's. If it even mattered. She leaned forward and poured herself some Chianti. "If you want to know the truth, J.B. got kicked out of his inn. He spilled tea on his carpet."

"Actually," J.B. said, "Lottie Martin said there was a problem with the room."

"A rare display of diplomacy on her part," Stick said. "I heard she just got spooked having an FBI agent under her roof."

Zoe sampled her Chianti. She seemed relaxed here with Stick and her sister, maybe more than she realized. She smiled at the judge. "I decided I've burned enough bridges with local, state and federal law enforcement in the past year that the least I could do was offer the guy a room."

After he'd already helped himself to one, she could have added. But she didn't, and Stick slung a skinny arm over her shoulders, fatherlike. "I should be more careful what secrets I tell you-I seem only to have encouraged you to dive deeper into the vipers' nest, not jump out of it." He spoke lightly, a little drunkenly. "But since our Agent McGrath unraveled a network of violent, gun-tot-ing lunatics, he's the hero of the moment. Ah, retirement." He polished off the last of his Chianti, then smiled, letting his arm drop from Zoe's shoulders. "I don't have to worry about being neutral or politically correct. I can call a lunatic a lunatic. Operation Copperhead, I believe it was called. J.B. here was lucky to survive."

Christina blanched. "What happened?"

J.B. said nothing. Too much Chianti or not, Stick Monroe knew he was out of line.

"He had his throat slit. Not all the way, obviously, but here-" He pointed at J.B. with his glass. "You can see the scar."

"Stick," Zoe said. "For God's sake-"

He kept his attention on Christina. "I told your sister yesterday. I told her to take a look-I should be more careful of the advice I give her, shouldn't I? I'm talking out of school, of course, but so be it." He shifted his gaze to J.B., any warmth gone from the older man's eyes. "That's why you're on vacation, isn't it? Because you needed a break. You killed your attacker. Ferocious, hand-to-hand combat. It must have been terrible."

He waited, but J.B. wasn't playing this game. The man needed to go home and sleep it off.

"Unfortunately, the attacker's young children witnessed the whole thing." Stick paused, letting the stem of his glass slide between his fingers. His voice was deceptively sincere, filled with the horror of what he must have supposed J.B. had seen and done. "No wonder you were compelled to take some time off."

Zoe reached over and plucked Stick's glass from him. "No more Chianti for you. Next you'll be giving away state secrets."

The old judge shrugged without apology. "My point is-"

"I know what your point is, Stick. You want me to be careful. Thank you. I get it."

"You always were a quick study." He didn't seem bothered by Zoe's tart reaction to what he had to say- bluntness was obviously a part of their long friendship. "I meant no offense, J.B., but can you honestly say you trust your own judgment right now?"

J.B. broke his silence. "About what? Whether to order haddock chowder or crab cakes for lunch?" He refused to let Monroe provoke him. "I chose crab cakes today. Christina makes good crab cakes, don't you think, Judge?"

He didn't tell J.B. to go to hell but rose, rocking slightly on his feet, and smiled coolly. "Yes. Absolutely. Christina makes the best crab cakes in Maine. Pay no attention to me, J.B. I've had too much Chianti, and all I'm good for these days is gardening advice. Fortunately, I love it." Then he added, smiling, gentleman-like, "Gardening, that is, not giving advice."

He thanked Christina for the Chianti and kissed her and Zoe on the cheek, then gave J.B. a polite nod and headed out. He'd walked. No surprise, since he walked everywhere.

Once he was gone, Christina groaned loudly. "Well, J.B., I'll bet you're just thrilled we found out you're an FBI agent. Too bad you're not working an undercover operation. Then none of us would know. You'd have us convinced you were a lobsterman from up north."

Zoe bit back a smile. "Never. We'd have exposed him in a heartbeat."

"Christina thinks I could pass for a Maine lobsterman," J.B. said.

"It'd be easier for you to pass as-what did Stick call them?" Christina paused a moment, obviously pretending she had to think to remember. "Violent, gun-toting lunatics. How'd you blend into that crowd?"

"Your friend Stick knows I can't go into operational details," J.B. said. "He shouldn't have said anything."

Christina, who seemed to have a slightly off-center but cheerful view of life, made a face. "Does that mean we're going to be handcuffed and gagged and carted out of here in the dead of night?"

Zoe groaned. "My sister has strange ideas about law enforcement, never mind that our father was the police chief for thirty years and I was a state detective. Makes no difference. She gets her facts from movies."

"Serpico," Christina said. "It's one of Kyle's favorites."

It was getting dark and the temperature was falling, but the West sisters were intent on eating outside provided it didn't snow. They went about bringing out supper and turned down J.B.'s offer to help. Christina brought him a glass of iced tea, and he thought about their encounter with Judge Monroe. J.B. saw it differently than the two women did. To them, Stick was speaking out of school because he trusted them and had gotten too far into the Chianti. To J.B., the judge had acted deliberately-it was why he'd shown up. He thought J.B. was a disaster waiting to happen. He wanted J.B. to understand that Steven Stickney Monroe, retired U.S. district court judge, would be looking out for Christina and Zoe West.

Not that they'd asked him to or needed him to but it wasn't a bad thing to have a powerful friend.

"You didn't happen to see Kyle on your way here, did you?" Christina asked as she set a salad bowl on the table.

J.B. shook his head. "No, was he planning to join you?"

"I invited him. I just called his cell phone, but no answer." She seemed put out, not worried, and let the screened back door bang hard behind her when she returned to the kitchen.

Zoe stared at the shut door and sighed. "That bas-tard's going to break her heart."

"Relax, big sister. If he does, Christina will handle it."

"I know." But she sighed again, more deeply. "At least I hope so. She still seems so young to me. I wasn't there for her when she needed me after Dad and Aunt Olivia died. Then I took off for Connecticut."

"Sometimes you have to save yourself."

She didn't answer. J.B. was aware of her mood slipping, noted that the pink color of her sweater seemed out of place amid the burgundy and orange leaves, but maybe she wanted it that way-maybe she didn't want to quite fit in around here. Keep her distance. Avoid getting sucked back into the vortex that had gripped her last fall.

"Anyone ever break your heart, Detective West?" he asked.

She glanced at him, a glint of humor sparking in her pretty eyes. "There was this organic farmer in Connecticut-"

He didn't let her finish, didn't let her use humor to deflect him. "You keep that heart of yours where no one can touch it, don't you? At least you try.You had it ripped out of you last year. You must have felt very exposed."

"I still do." Her voice cracked, and she had to clear her throat. "I don't trust myself, never mind anyone else."

"Some people say that's where it starts, you know. With learning to trust ourselves again."

"Do you? Do you trust yourself? After what you went through this summer?"

"I trust myself with some things. Not all."

"With me?"

He hadn't expected that. He wondered if she could see that she'd caught him off guard, but probably she did-probably she'd planned it that way. She was an experienced detective. She knew how to interview people.

Christina banged out of the house again, and Zoe shot off to help her finish getting dinner on the table, as if she regretted her question and didn't trust herself one little bit around him.

Dinner was grilled chicken, salad, rolls from the café and warm apple crisp. J.B., feeling lazy, insisted at least on refilling the two sisters' wineglasses.

Christina was still obsessing on Kyle's absence. "He must have got caught up in working on his documentary. He was filming background scenes today. The harbor, the library, the lobster pound, other places around town. Just getting a feel for what it all looks like on tape."

"Maybe he lost track of time," Zoe said.

"He wants to do a good job. He knows he can't get by on the Castellane name. In fact, the critics will probably be tougher on him because of it. Of course, he says he's not thinking about that sort of thing now-he's just thinking about the work itself." She smiled, but J.B. could see she was hurt her boyfriend hadn't shown up or called. "I'm sure you're right, Zoe. He hyperfocuses. That must be what it is."

Zoe sat back in her chair, the early evening shadows flickering on her face. "He's serious about this documentary, isn't he?"

"That's what I've been telling you. He says he wouldn't dare touch Aunt Olivia's life if he wasn't se-rious-she'd haunt him."

Zoe laughed. "She would, wouldn't she?"

"I wish you could have known her, J.B.," Christina said. "She was a lot like Zoe, except Zoe never wanted to stay in Goose Harbor and Aunt Olivia couldn't imagine moving. That's where she and I were alike. When I was at the New England Culinary Institute, all I wanted to do was come home and get on with my life."

"It's true," Zoe said. "It's not that I didn't like Goose Harbor, but I couldn't be a police officer in my hometown, not with my father as the chief of police. But Chris-it's like that café was meant for you."

"It's been fun. That's how I decide I'm doing what I should be doing-when it's fun. But I guess that's probably not the case with law enforcement. I mean, it can't be fun in the way making a good haddock chowder is fun."

Zoe smiled. "Satisfying would be a better word."

J.B. just listened. As different as they were, the two sisters seemed to get along. He'd had no siblings. Forever, it'd just been him and his father. They'd got along fine. His father had never said a word when J.B. took off, never asked him to stay. When he came back for visits, they enjoyed each other's company. J.B. had never felt the lure of going back to stay-he loved Montana but it wasn't where he belonged. He knew that.

Through dinner, whenever something reminded her that Kyle Castellane had stood her up, Christina either sank into her seat, looking hurt and defeated, or slammed something on the table as if she'd chop his balls off when she caught up with him.

J.B. took a stab at teasing her. "What about Bruce

Young? I think he likes you."

Zoe and Christina both almost choked on their Chianti.

"Hey, he's a decent guy," J.B. said.

Zoe nodded. "He's a great guy, but-J.B., the reason you've been able to beat Bruce at darts as many times as you have is because if he's not on the water or at the lobster pound, he's at Perry's."

"That's because he doesn't have a good woman in his life." Both sisters groaned. "Bruce likes lobstering and boating," Christina said. "Women for him are an after thought. He's one of those guys who'll suddenly fall for someone and get married within a month."

J.B. got up and started clearing the table. "If Brucecouldn't make it for dinner, he'd call."

He'd pushed his luck. Christina snatched a plate out of his hand. "I'll clean up. You and Zoe run along. It's a nice night. Enjoy it. Go play darts."

"Christina, I apologize." Never good at apologies,

J.B. sounded stiff and awkward even to himself. "That was supposed to be funny, but it was out of line."

Zoe snorted. "It was way the hell out of line."

"Just go, both of you," Christina said, and fled inside.

"Real nice, McGrath," Zoe muttered under her breath. She started after her sister, but J.B. grabbed her by the elbow. She glared at him. "What?"

"Let's do as she asked and get out of here."

"We can't leave her with this mess-"

"Zoe."

"Okay." She pulled her arm free. "Maybe you did Chris a favor in ticking her off. She was looking for an excuse to let off some steam. She'll bang around in the kitchen, and Kyle'll show up-" She broke off with a shudder. "Yeah, let's get out of here." She called to her sister, "Dinner was great, Chris! I'll see you tomorrow."

There was no answer from the house. Zoe, still clearly reluctant to abandon her sister in this mood, led the way back to the driveway. The sun had gone down, darkness coming fast. She slid into the passenger seat of J.B.'s Jeep. "Lesson learned? No teasing about the boyfriend."

J.B. climbed in next to her. "You had it right, Zoe. That guy's going to break your sister's heart." But she was staring at him. "Damn. That's a 9 mm you're packing, McGrath. What for?"

"Zoe, I can carry a firearm on or off duty."

"I know. But you're on vacation."

He didn't answer and instead checked his cell phone. Luckily, he had a message. A reprieve from explaining to Zoe West, who'd been fired for not carrying her firearm on duty, why he'd decided to carry his off duty.

In a brief message, Sally instructed him to call her back. He did so, and wasn't surprised to have her pick up. "Working late?" he said.

"I have my cot set up in case I had to wait all night for you to call."

He smiled. "Sarcasm doesn't suit you, Sal."

"Did you know that Zoe West was accepted into the academy and dropped out before her first day?"

"I did know that."

"I thought you might. And Patrick West was the chief of police in Goose Harbor until last year, when he was shot and killed? You knew that?"

"I did."

"Am I aiding and abetting your insubordination?"

"No, ma'am."

"Luke Castellane's father committed suicide. He tells people it was a heart attack."

"Interesting. Anything else?"

"Steven Stickney Monroe sentenced Teddy Shelton to seven years in federal prison."

Christ. The local cops either knew and hadn't said or didn't know because they hadn't gotten the break J.B. had. Or they'd checked out the connection and it was nothing. "Anything else?"

"I love Victor Castellane's films," she said, and hung up.

"What was that all about?" Zoe asked.

J.B.'s undercover training and experience kept him from registering any reaction to Sally Meintz's information. Or maybe it didn't.

"J.B.?"

"Nothing. I don't scare anybody anymore."

"Sure." She sat back, dubious. "I believe that. If it's any consolation, you scared the hell out of me."

She wasn't serious. He appreciated that. "Was it the kiss or showing up armed?"

"Take your pick."