She gave him the towel, and when he had it wrapped around his left foot he hobbled inside. She took his arm, let him lean on her as she guided him to the kitchen table. His flesh was cold, sea-puckered; the touch of it made her feel a tremor of revulsion. It was like touching the skin of a dead man.
When he sank heavily onto one of the chairs, she dragged another chair over and lifted his injured leg onto it. He stripped off what was left of his shirt, swaddled himself in the blanket. His teeth were chattering.
The coffeemaker drew her; she poured two of the big mugs full. There was always hot coffee ready and waiting, no matter what the hour — she made sure of that. She drank too much coffee, much too much, but it was better than drinking what John usually drank. If she—
“You mind sweetening that?”
She half turned. “Sugar?”
“Liquor. Rum, if you have it.”
“Jamaican rum.” That was what John drank.
“Best there is. Fine.”
She took down an open bottle, carried it and the mugs to the table, and watched while he spiked the coffee, drank, then poured more rum and drank again. Color came back into his stubbled cheeks. He used part of the blanket to rough-dry his hair.
He was a little older than she, early thirties, and in good physical condition: broad chest and shoulders, muscle-knotted arms. Sandy hair cropped short, thick sandy brows, a long-chinned face burned dark from exposure to the sun. The face was all right, might have been attractive except for the eyes. They were a bright off-blue color, shielded by lids that seemed perpetually lowered like flags at half-mast, and they didn’t blink much. When the eyes lifted to meet and hold hers something in them made her look away.
“I’ll see what I can do for your foot.”
“Thanks. Hurts like hell.”
The towel was already soaking through. Shea unwrapped it carefully, revealing a deep gash across the instep just above the tongue of his shoe. She got the shoe and sock off. More blood welled out of the cut.
“It doesn’t look good. You may need a doctor—”
“No,” he said, “no doctor.”
“It’ll take stitches to close properly.”
“Just clean and bandage it, okay?”
She spilled iodine onto a gauze pad, swabbed at the gash as gently as she could. The sharp sting made him suck in his breath, but he didn’t flinch or utter another sound. She laid a second piece of iodined gauze over the wound and began to wind tape tightly around his foot to hold the skin flaps together.
He said, “My name’s Tanner. Harry Tanner.”
“Shea Clifford.”
“Shea. That short for something?”
“It’s a family name.”
“Pretty.”
“Thank you.”
“So are you,” he said. “Real pretty with your hair all windblown like that.”
She glanced up at him. He was smiling at her. Not a leer, just a weary smile, but it wasn’t a good kind of smile. It had a predatory look, like the teeth-baring stretch of a wolf’s jowls.
“No offense,” he said.
“None taken.” She lowered her gaze, watched her hands wind and tear tape. Her mind still felt numb. “What happened to you? Why were you in the water?”
“That damned squall a few hours ago. Came up so fast I didn’t have time to get my genoa down. Wave as big as a house knocked poor little Wanderer into a full broach. I got thrown clear when she went over or I’d have sunk with her.”
“Were you sailing alone?”
“All alone.”
“Single-hander? Or just on a weekend lark?”
“Single-hander. You know boats, I see.”
“Yes. Fairly well.”
“Well, I’m a sea tramp,” Tanner said. “Ten years of island-hopping and this is the first time I ever got caught unprepared.”
“It happens. What kind of craft was Wanderer?”
“Bugeye ketch. Thirty-nine feet.”
“Shame to lose a boat like that.”
He shrugged. “She was insured.”
“How far out were you?”
“Five or six miles. Hell of a long swim in a choppy sea.”
“You’re lucky the squall passed as quickly as it did.”
“Lucky I was wearing my life jacket, too,” Tanner said. “And lucky you stay up late with your lights on. If it weren’t for the lights I probably wouldn’t have made shore at all.”
Shea nodded. She tore off the last piece of tape and then began putting the first aid supplies away in the kit.
Tanner said, “I didn’t see any other lights. This house the only one out here?”
“The only one on this side of the bay, yes.”
“No close neighbors?”
“Three houses on the east shore, not far away.”
“You live here alone?”
“With my husband.”
“But he’s not here now.”
“Not now. He’ll be home soon.”
“That so? Where is he?”
“In Merry wing, the town on the far side of the island. He went out to dinner with friends”
“While you stayed home ”
“I wasn’t feeling well earlier.”
“Merrywing. Salt Cay?”
“That’s right.”
“British-owned, isn’t it?”
“Yes. You’ve never been here before?”
“Not my kind of place. Too small, too quiet, too rich. I prefer the livelier islands — St. Thomas, Nassau, Jamaica.”
“St. Thomas isn’t far from here,” Shea said. “Is that where you were heading?”
“More or less. This husband of yours — how big is he?”
“... Big?”
“Big enough so his clothes would fit me?”
“Oh,” she said, “yes. About your size.”
“Think he’d mind if you let me have a pair of his pants and a shirt and some underwear? Wet things of mine are giving me a chill.”
“No, of course not. I’ll get them from his room.”
She went to John’s bedroom. The smells of his cologne and pipe tobacco were strong in there; they made her faintly nauseous. In haste she dragged a pair of white linen trousers and a pullover off hangers in his closet, turned toward the dresser as she came out. And stopped in midstride.
Tanner stood in the open doorway, leaning against the jamb, his half-lidded eyes fixed on her.
“His room,” he said. “Right.”
“Why did you follow me?”
“Felt like it. So you don’t sleep with him.”
“Why should that concern you?”
“I’m naturally curious. How come? I mean, how come you and your husband don’t share a bed?”
“Our sleeping arrangements are none of your business.”
“Probably not. Your idea or his?”
“What?”
“Separate bedrooms. Your idea or his?”
“Mine, if you must know.”
“Maybe he snores, huh?”
She didn’t say anything.
“How long since you kicked him out of your bed?”
“I didn’t kick him out. It wasn’t like that.”
“Sure it was. I can see it in your face.”
“My private affairs—”
“—are none of my business. I know. But I also know the signs of a bad marriage when I see them. A bad marriage and an unhappy woman. Can’t tell me you’re not unhappy.”
“All right,” she said.
“So why don’t you divorce him? Money?”
“Money has nothing to do with it.”
“Money has something to do with everything.”
“It isn’t money.”
“He have something on you?”
“No.”
“Then why not just dump him?”
You’re not going to divorce me, Shea. Not you, not like the others. I’ll see you dead first. I mean it, Shea. You’re mine and you’ll stay mine until I decide I don’t want you anymore...