Island Of Second Chances. Cara Lockwood
me,” she shouted, now that she was just feet from the man. “Excuse me!”
The noise was far too loud for him to hear, even though she was less than two feet from him. Laura, losing her patience, reached up and tapped the man hard on his bare shoulder.
The man instantly shut off the saw and glared at her over his shoulder, his eyes barely visible through the work goggles he wore. Seeing her, he put down the saw and raised the goggles, revealing brown eyes that almost looked amber in the morning sunlight. He pushed the goggles up to his short brown hair and studied her.
He had a rugged face, etched a little by the weather, but with that almost ageless quality only middle-aged men have. He could be thirty-five or forty-five. He stayed in shape, clear from the cut of his bare chest. He wasn’t sporting six-pack abs, but his stomach was flat and lean.
Laura realized with a shock that the last time she’d seen a man wearing this little clothing, it had been Dean. In a hotel room.
She shook the thought from her mind and tried to focus on the man’s face, trying not to look at the miles of very tanned and very bare skin before her. He was annoyed, that much was clear by the thin slash of his mouth, and the way his brow furrowed.
“Excuse me,” Laura began, trying to be polite. “Hi. My name is Laura and I’m staying up there in 2-C, and it’s so early, so could you keep it down?”
A smile quirked the corner of his mouth. “Early?”
“Yes, and I’ve been traveling and could you keep it down...until nine?”
“Well.” He looked at his watch. “Considering it’s eleven thirty, that might be hard.” He flashed a winning smile.
Eleven thirty? It was that late? Laura felt a blush creep up her neck.
“Oh, well... I...” But she was so sure it was so early. Her body screamed that it was six in the morning but the sun in the sky told her it was later. She tried to calculate the time zone changes but her brain felt too muddled for the task.
“You’re the tourist.” The man cocked his head to one side, as if she might be a new exhibit at a museum.
“Well, yes, and—”
“Look, I’m sorry this is loud, but it’s the middle of the day. Next time, maybe you should check the time before you...” He glanced down at her ruffled hair and slept-in clothes. His face showed his disapproval. “Get out of bed.”
Now, Laura felt her temper flare and she’d all but forgotten her mistake about the time.
“Could you just please try to keep it down? There are such things as city noise ordinances.”
The man grinned then, a bit of sweat dropping down his squared-off, tanned face. “City ordinance? Just where are you from?”
“San Francisco.”
He studied her with amused, dark eyes. “Well, that explains it.”
“What do you mean by that?” Now, Laura felt the anger bubble up in her, hot and fluid. Was he calling her a liberal hippie? An alfalfa-sprout-granola-eating leftist? She’d heard all the insults, mostly from her right-leaning family who lived in downstate Illinois. She was proudly moderate independent, thank you very much.
He just shook his head, and the sun glinted off tiny slivers of silver running through his hair, just the right amount of middle-aged gray. Laura wanted to tell him he was clearly old enough to know better. Or old enough to show a little more politeness to strangers.
He chuckled to himself then, as if he’d read her mind. Nothing about this was funny, so why was he laughing? She felt off balance with this man. Like somehow this entire conversation was one of his inside jokes.
“St. Anthony’s doesn’t have ordinances like that,” he informed her, crossing his thick arms across his chest. “So, you’re out of luck.”
“What about the other neighbors? This noise pollution is—”
“Noise pollution?” The man put his head back and laughed.
“What’s your name?” She’d have to report him. To someone. Somewhere.
“Mark.”
“Mark what?”
“Tanner.” He grinned. “And you are?”
“Laura Kelly.” She raised her chin in defiance. She didn’t care if he knew who she was. She’d be filing a complaint...with someone, somewhere.
“Well, Ms. Kelly, are you going to call the police? You should know the local chief is a buddy of mine.”
This wasn’t going well. Not well at all.
“What about the neighbors?”
Mark sighed and shook his head, studying her. “Three of the six condos are empty right now. Hurricane season coming and all. There’s you, me and Fred, who’s eighty-three and gets up at six to take his daily walk on the beach, so I cleared it with him to work here.”
“You didn’t clear it with me.”
He took her in, glancing at her flip-flops, to her jean shorts and her T-shirt all the way to the top of her head. “No, I didn’t, sweetheart. But, seeing as you’re just passing through, I don’t see a reason.”
Sweetheart? She wasn’t his sweetheart. Now, that really irked.
“I cleared it with the owners of your condo.” Mark shook a bit of sawdust from his hair, clearly unconcerned. “So if you’ve got a problem with the noise, I suggest you take it up with them. They should’ve warned you in the rental agreement there’d be...what did you call it? Noise trash?”
“Noise pollution.”
He chuckled once more, showing even white teeth. “Right. That.” He shook his head.
“I’ll be talking to the condo board then.”
Mark just grinned. “Considering I own the entire first floor, I’m actually the president of the board.”
That revelation hit her like a ton of bricks. “You own...” She glanced down the way at the entire first floor. Well, that’s how he managed to clear putting a big workshop on the beach in front of the first floor then. He owned it. She couldn’t imagine how much that cost, but knew it was a lot.
“I...” Laura had nothing more to say to that. He had the police in his pocket and he had a controlling share of the condo building, so complaining to the board would do no good. Hell, he was the board, sounded like.
Then he turned his back on her, fired up his saw again and began work once more.
Conversation done, apparently. At least, he thought so. She turned on her heel, fuming. He might think this was done, but, Laura vowed, this little disagreement was far, far from over. She’d been through hell and back, and she wasn’t about to let this man derail her. She was here on this island for a reason—to forget Dean, to find some way to heal—and she wasn’t going to let a rude neighbor get in the way of that. This wasn’t done. Not by a long shot.
MARK TANNER TURNED and watched the feisty woman with the disheveled bob bounce out of his view. The woman needed some sunlight. Her bright white legs looked like neon billboards for the mainland as they furiously walked away from him.
But, he had to admit, her curves weren’t bad, and if you went for bossy types, she’d probably be a feisty go-getter in bed. She was just his type: small, tight and a handful. He shook his head, figuring that wherever she’d come from, she was used to getting her way.
But, Mark didn’t spook. She could rail against him all he wanted, but he had to finish this boat. It was the middle of the day, after