Rainbow's End

Chapter Two

It wasn’t noise that roused Keith from a deep slumber the next morning. In fact, the stillness was absolute. Instead, the culprit was a cheery beam of sunlight that danced across his face and tickled his eyes until he finally gave in and opened them.

For a few seconds, he lay motionless, taking stock of his surroundings—his usual orientation ritual after a year of waking up in a new environment on a sometimes-daily basis. What wasn’t usual, however, was the odd sense of…peace, was the word that came to mind…that enveloped him, like the cozy, soothing warmth of a downy comforter on a cold winter night. Calm had replaced the restlessness that had been his constant companion for more months than he cared to remember. The question was, why?

His mind went into rewind. He was on Orcas Island, in the widow woman’s cottage where he’d taken refuge from last night’s raging storm. A storm which had now blown out to sea, if the rays of sunlight slanting through the grimy windows of the tiny cottage were any indication. His location didn’t seem to offer the answer he sought, however. But whatever the cause, this sense of serenity was a balm to his soul. Instead of trying to analyze it, he’d just enjoy it while it lasted.

Throwing back the patchwork quilt on the double bed that was crammed into the miniscule, spartan bedroom, Keith rose and stretched muscles stiff from too many hours behind the wheel. His wet jeans and shirt lay on the floor where he’d dropped them the night before, when he’d been too weary to do more than kick them into a soggy heap. Stepping over the limp pile, he padded into the only other room in the structure—a combination living-eating area that was furnished with an eclectic mix of odds and ends. A tiny galley kitchen was tucked into a corner alcove, the door to a bare-bones bathroom beside it. Not quite the Ritz—but at least it was dry.

Cleanliness was another story. When he bent to pick up his bag from the floor, then dropped it onto a dated plaid couch, a puff of dust rose, generating two monumental sneezes. His landlady might be charitable, but her housekeeping skills seemed rusty, at best.

Fifteen minutes later, however, fortified by a hot shower and clean clothes, Keith took a better look at his temporary home and revised his assessment. This didn’t seem to be the sort of place that required housekeeping. Although the cottage was furnished, suggesting that someone had lived here at one time, it now seemed to be used more as a storage shed. Several wicker baskets were piled on the kitchen counter beside the crumpled paper from the sandwich he’d wolfed down last night. A stack of boxes labeled Miscellaneous Kitchen Items stood beside the couch. And artist supplies were piled in one corner. An easel, blank canvases, brushes of different sizes, a bag of rags, some well-used palettes. Had the previous tenant been a painter, he wondered?

A sudden, loud rumble from his stomach distracted Keith, reminding him that his eating habits of late had been dicey, at best. His appetite had vanished along with the life he’d once known, and these days he only thought about food when meals were long overdue and his body began to protest. Considering that his diet yesterday had consisted of a doughnut and a deli sandwich, the hollow feeling in the pit of his stomach wasn’t surprising.

A quick inspection of the cabinets in the tiny kitchen and the refrigerator yielded nothing edible, as he expected. Why should an unused cottage be stocked with food? He’d been lucky to find a dry—albeit dusty—place to lay his head.

Shoving his palms into the back pockets of his jeans, he wandered over to the window and looked across the field toward the widow’s house. The compact two-story structure looked far more trim and tidy than his humble abode, and a lush, well-tended garden edged the foundation. Except for a missing piece of light gray siding on the second level—storm damage, he speculated—it seemed to be in pristine condition.

As if to confirm his theory, a figure in a bulky jacket and wide-brimmed hat, wielding a large ladder, appeared around the corner of the house. From his distant vantage point, it was hard to determine the age, weight or even gender of the person, though he or she was struggling a bit with the awkward piece of equipment. Was it the widow? he wondered. But when the ladder was turned, lifted and propped against the house with minimal effort, he dismissed that notion. Most older women wouldn’t have that kind of strength. Still, he’d gotten the impression that the widow lived here alone. And there was a certain grace of movement, an inherent lithe fluidness in the person’s posture, that suggested femininity. Perhaps the figure in the distance was, indeed, his landlady. If so, she seemed quite capable in the handyman role.

Another rumble from his stomach reminded him that he needed to scrounge up some food. But his conscience nagged at him. The woman had, after all, given him shelter from the storm—at no charge. The least he could do was repay her kindness by taking care of the siding problem. His father had instilled good carpentry skills in him, and he could bang out that job in ten minutes. Maybe that wasn’t the way he’d planned to start his day, but it was the right way.

Trying to ignore his protesting stomach, he slid his arms into his jacket and stepped out into the cool, clear morning air. As he set off down the gravel path—road was way too generous a term for the narrow, overgrown lane he’d negotiated across the field last night—the world seemed somehow fresh and renewed. The still-damp leaves of the trees glistened in the morning sun, and the song of the birds was the only sound echoing across the quiet air.

At least it was until the woman began to hammer. As the discordant pounding reverberated across the tranquil stillness, shattering the contemplative mood, Keith increased his pace. The sooner he offered his services, the sooner he could restore the peace that had soothed his soul.

So intent was Jill on her task that she was oblivious to her guest’s approach until he called out to her from the foot of the ladder.

“I’d be happy to lend a hand with that.”

Startled, she lost her grip on the hammer, then watched in horror as it plummeted toward the ground, heading straight for her visitor’s head. If he’d been less alert, the results could have been nasty. As it was, he jumped back and it landed with a dull, innocuous thud on the wet ground.

A warm flush crept up Jill’s neck as she tucked her head into the collar of her jacket and stared down at the man. In the light of day, his presence was even more disconcerting—and unsettling—than it had been last night. With the golden morning glow illuminating his upturned face, there was no question that underneath the stubble and shaggy hair, he was a good-looking man. Close to forty, she estimated, though she couldn’t tell if the lines on his face were the result of age or weariness. As he raked his fingers through his hair, she realized that it was much lighter now that it was dry. A medium, sun-streaked brown. His striking, cobalt-blue eyes were vivid in the daylight, though there was a dullness in their depths that spoke of defeat and disillusionment. Right now, however, they were regarding her with a wariness that suggested he wasn’t sure whether or not she’d dropped the hammer on purpose.

“Sorry. You startled me.” She set the record straight.

The tension in his features eased. “Then I’m the one who should apologize. Why don’t you let me take care of that for you?”

“Thanks, but I can handle it.”

“I owe you for last night. Besides, I’m a carpenter, so a job like that is a piece of cake for me.”

The man didn’t seem in the least inclined to budge. But Jill was used to handling maintenance on her own. She didn’t need his help. Yet despite the extensive rehabbing she’d done on her house, she wasn’t all that fond of ladders. Or heights. Sensing her indecision, the man grasped the ladder to steady it.

“I’m sure you have better things to do than deal with storm damage. Come on down and let me take care of it.”

Capitulating seemed the quickest way to end the conversation, and once on the ground she could make a fast break for the house, Jill reasoned. With sudden decision, she climbed down in silence.

Back on solid earth, she stuck her hands in her pockets and buried her chin deep into the collar of her coat, keeping her face averted. At five foot six, Jill wasn’t short. But the man beside her was a good five or six inches taller. “Thanks. I do have some things to attend to in the house,” she murmured.

As she turned to go, a capricious gust of wind snatched her weathered, wide-brimmed hat, tossing it into the sky. With a gasp of surprise, Jill lifted her head and attempted to grab it, but it was already beyond her reach. As she watched, the man’s hand shot out and his sun-browned fingers closed over the brim, retrieving it from the wind’s grasp. Then he turned to her.

“Looks like the wind…” The words faded from Keith’s lips as he stared at his landlady, stunned. Up to this point, she’d given him no more than a shadowed glimpse of her countenance. Now, though her face remained in profile, he realized that the old, wizened widow he’d expected couldn’t be more than thirty-five. Fiery highlights in her wavy, light brown hair sparked in the morning sun, calling attention to the long, lustrous tresses that had tumbled from beneath her hat. Wispy bangs brushed her forehead above wide, hazel eyes flecked with gold, and below a straight nose her lips were full and slightly parted. If the voice didn’t match the woman from last night, Keith would never have believed that this was the eccentric widow the storekeeper in Eastsound had described.

Yet there was a different quality about her. She hadn’t yet established eye contact with him. In fact, she was doing her best to keep her face averted. Why?

Curious, he held the hat out to her, letting it slip from his fingers as she reached for it—forcing her to angle his direction as she bent down to grab for it. That move bought him only a quick glimpse of her face. But he saw enough to get his answer. One that shocked him to the very core of his being.

The woman’s flawless beauty, which he’d admired in profile, was marred almost beyond recognition on the right side of her face by a large, angry scar that started at her temple, nipped close to her eye, then followed the line of her cheekbone south, catching the very corner of her mouth as it trailed down to her chin.

Before he could mask his shock, the woman straightened. Jamming the hat back on her head, she stared at him for several long beats of silence. Then her expression shifted in some subtle, but disturbing way. It was as if something had shattered inside her. Not in a dramatic way, like a crystal vase smashing into pieces on the floor. It was more like the network of fine cracks that spread across the surface of a piece of pottery when the protective glaze becomes crazed.

Whatever it was, Keith didn’t have a chance to analyze it because she turned with an abrupt move and almost ran toward the back of the house. As she disappeared around the corner, her hurried footsteps sounded across a wooden surface before a door was opened—and closed.

At one time in his life, Keith had been good at dealing with distraught people. They’d sought him out for his compassion, his understanding, his sensitivity. Well, those skills had deserted him today. He’d gawked at the woman, stared at her as if she was some freak in a circus sideshow. He’d been rude, tactless, inconsiderate, thoughtless…in other words, a jerk. Of all people, he should know better. He had plenty of scars of his own. They just weren’t visible. But if they were, they’d be as disfiguring as his landlady’s. Maybe more so. And how would he like it if they drew the kind of look he’d given her?

The short answer was, he wouldn’t.

The bigger question was, how did he make amends?

It had been a long while since Keith had interacted enough with another human being to risk hurting their feelings. And longer still since he’d cared if he did. Yet for some reason this woman had breached the defenses he’d constructed around his heart. Perhaps because she seemed so…solitary. So alone and isolated. Not just in a geographic sense, but at a deeper, more fundamental level. As if she lived in the world but wasn’t part of it.

For the past two years, Keith had felt as alone as he’d thought a person could feel. Angry and lost, he’d turned his back on a world and a God that had betrayed him. Yet he had a feeling that this woman, living in this isolated place apart from society, was even lonelier than he was. He also sensed at some intuitive level that she had accepted her solitary existence, knowing that her physical scars would never heal, shunning a world that looked on her with morbid curiosity and pity—much as he had done moments ago.

That was the difference between them, he mused. When Keith had set out on his trek, he’d hoped his travels would help him discover a way to pick up the pieces and start over, healed and made new again. Although that hadn’t happened yet, deep inside he held on to the hope that it would. It was the only thing that kept him going. The notion of spending his remaining years in a vacuum devoid of all the things that had once made his life rich and full and satisfying was too terrifying. Yet he had a feeling the woman inside this house didn’t have that hope. But how in the world did she go on, day after day, without it?

She wasn’t his problem, of course. He was just passing through, a stranger who knew nothing about her except her last name and marital status. And given her reticence, he doubted whether he’d learn any more. He ought to forget about her.

Yet, as he picked up the hammer, climbed the ladder and set to work on the errant piece of siding, he felt a need to apologize. Trouble was, he didn’t have a clue how to do that without calling more attention to her scar and making the whole thing worse.

Years ago, he would have prayed for guidance in a situation like this. But he didn’t have that option anymore. Instead, all Keith had to rely on were his own instincts. And considering how they’d failed him two years before, he had no confidence that they would help him rectify this situation.

But as an image of the woman’s shattered face flashed once again across his mind, he knew he had to at least try.

Inside the house, Jill stirred the simmering pot of soup she’d made at the crack of dawn, struggling to contain the tears that threatened to leak out the corners of her eyes. Don’t cry! she admonished herself fiercely. As her sister, Deb, used to say, she’d already cried enough tears to sink a ship. Too bad Deb wasn’t here now. In her no-nonsense way, she’d always helped Jill regain her balance when the world began to tilt. She’d done that a lot during the weeks and months after the fire, through the surgeries and treatments and rehab, always an anchor to hold on to when the pain and the grief became unbearable. If it hadn’t been for her older sister, Jill was sure she’d have given up and let the suffocating sense of loss overwhelm and destroy her.

She tried to imagine what Deb would say if she were here. “Get a grip,” no doubt. She’d point out that the man’s shock had been a normal, human reaction, and that he hadn’t intended to hurt her. That once he got to know her, he’d forget about the scars that served as a constant reminder of the tragic night that had forever changed her world.

Yeah, right.

Although Deb meant well, Jill knew better. Oh, sure, people tried to act nonchalant once their initial shock passed. But they were never able to get past the scars. Even here, after two years. The islanders she saw on her trips to church or into the villages were nice. Too nice. That was the problem. They smiled too much, kept up a stream of chatter about inconsequential things, wished her a good day with bright smiles. They tried to act as if they enjoyed seeing her, but in truth they were glad when she left. She made them uncomfortable.

That was just the way it was. The way it would always be. Jill thought she’d accepted that. Thought she’d learned to deal with it. Nowadays, when people stared at her, she felt nothing beyond a twinge somewhere deep in the recesses of her heart. It had been a very long time since anyone had managed to evoke even the hint of tears. Yet this man, a stranger who would soon slip out of her life as suddenly as he had slipped in, had managed to awaken a sadness that she’d long ago subdued. And she had no idea why.

Yes, you do, a little voice whispered at the edges of her consciousness.

Startled, she stopped stirring the soup and grasped the edge of the counter with her free hand, trying to suppress the answer that kept bubbling to the surface much as the herbs in her soup pot were doing. But the little voice wouldn’t be stilled.

Because he’s a man.

It was a truth Jill couldn’t dispute. Her tenant’s reaction disturbed her because he was a man. A scruffy one, no question. Not the kind of man she’d ever have looked at twice in years past. But he was close to her age. And his expression of shock, horror, pity and revulsion had clarified for her, if she’d ever harbored any secret hopes otherwise, that no man could ever look at her again as a desirable woman.

Nevertheless, the strength of her response shook her. Jill had assumed that any romantic yearnings had died along with Sam. After all, she hadn’t thought about love once since then, not on a conscious level. Yet, if the reaction of an unkempt stranger could reduce her to tears….

Taking herself in hand, Jill resumed stirring the pot with vigor and swiped the tears out of her eyes. This was just an aberration. Brought on by too little sleep during the storm-tossed night, she rationalized. As soon as he finished repairing her siding, the man would be gone. Peace would once more descend on her world. She’d have a little breakfast, pay a few bills, then spend the next few hours painting in her sunny studio upstairs. It would be a typical, quiet morning. The kind she always enjoyed and looked forward to.

Except for some odd reason, thinking about her solitary plans didn’t lift her spirits at all. Instead, it depressed her.

The aromas wafting through the kitchen window were driving him mad.

As Keith banged the final nail into the siding, his salivary glands went into overdrive. Chicken soup. That’s what it smelled like. Homemade chicken soup. The kind his mother used to make, its enticing aroma greeting him when he came home from school. To this day, that simple meal always evoked happy memories of home and love and security.

Too bad he’d botched the conversation with his landlady this morning, Keith thought, finding yet another reason to regret his rudeness. He’d have loved to wrangle a sample of whatever was cooking in that pot. But given the woman’s reaction to his insensitive gawking, the odds of that happening were slim to none. Even after the apology he still planned to offer.

Once he double-checked the board to ensure it was secure, Keith descended the ladder, then headed toward the front door and knocked. As he waited for her to answer, he tried to think of how to frame his apology. But when she cracked the door open, he hadn’t yet found the words.

“I’m finished. Where would you like the ladder?”

“Just leave it. I’ll put it away later.” She started to close the door.

“I’d rather finish the job. That means putting away the tools.”

Hesitating, she gave him an uncertain look. “There’s a shed around back. It goes in there.”

Before he could say another word, she shut the door.

So much for the apology, he thought, as he headed back around the house, located the surprisingly well-equipped toolshed and slid the ladder into a slot inside. Someone around here knew tools. And since the woman at the house seemed to be the sole occupant, it must be her. Impressive.

When he stepped outside, a curtain fluttered at the back window. She was continuing to keep tabs on him, it seemed. Not that he blamed her, considering his disreputable appearance. For all she knew, he was some derelict who was up to no good. What surprised him was his reaction. It bothered him that she might consider him dangerous or unsavory. In light of the fact that for the past couple of years he hadn’t cared a lick what people thought about him, his reaction was odd. But for whatever reason he didn’t want this woman to think ill of him—or to regret her kindness to a stranger. All of which brought him back to his apology. It was time.

Combing his fingers through his too-long hair in a futile effort to tidy it, he strode toward the house, stepped up onto the back porch and knocked on that door.

When she eased it open, the delicious aroma that wafted out almost did him in. But he did his best to focus on the reason he’d come to the door instead of listening to the pleas of his stomach.