Siren Song

Judy Gill

Chapter 1

It was a form of insanity, Don figured, the leading edge of his midlife crisis. From the moment he’d seen Professor Maxwell’s grant application, he’d been able to think of nothing but returning to Blackfish Island in Johnstone Strait—and to the scene of an event that for years he had managed to keep out of his conscious mind.

He wondered if he would have come back even if the board hadn’t approved Professor Maxwell’s grant. As a member of that board, he’d abstained from the vote, claiming a conflict of interest because he’d once worked under the professor. That was the proper pro­cedure, tradition. It was also tradition that each appli­cant who won a grant receive the news directly from a member of the five-person board. Those visits were always made in strict rotation.

He knew the traditions and procedures as well as anyone; he’d worked for the foundation for nearly five years. Yet, once the vote was in, he’d shamelessly finagled his way out of the set order and begged from the director the privilege of conveying the good news to Blackfish Island Orca Research Station himself. He still wondered how much of that decision had come from his desire to revisit BIO Research and his old professor, and how much from his steadily growing itch to renew the acquaintance of the professor’s daughter.

One brief meeting six years earlier had brought back memories now fifteen years old. The professor’s grant application had simply intensified them.

He sighed. Did all men his age find themselves harking back to the follies of their youth? It was some of kind of masochism, he suspected, the way he let her image continue to haunt him.

Tall and wand-slim she’d been, a girl too young for him to touch. Sleek and firm and strong, with eyes that could be fiery one second and darkly moody the next, and a red, pouting mouth that begged to be kissed, molded, taught. She’d come to him with a body ripe with hot young hormones aching to be channeled, and the kind of determination that just wouldn’t take no for an answer, regardless of how tactful he’d tried to be. Finally, he’d decided that what tact had failed to accomplish, a good scare might. His actions had backfired on him so badly, he’d thought he’d never recover from the need that one kiss had loosed within him.

For years he’d tucked the memories, along with the shame, deep into a corner of his mind, as he’d tucked one small photograph deep into the recesses of a book he never read.

Until he’d seen her six years before. Then he’d opened the book unerringly at the right page to find her picture.

He gripped the hard plastic of the steering wheel as he directed the boat across the choppy water, steering around Griffith Point, which jutted in a southeast­erly direction like a thumb stretched away from the half-closed fist that was Blackfish Island. In the lee of the point, the water was calm, mirroring the golden, mossy bluffs of the shore. Tall cedars surmounted the island, a backdrop for the low, sprawling house set above the shore halfway between the base of” the “thumb” and Lyon Head, which formed the bent knuckle of the “index finger.” Even after a fifteen-year absence, he felt a sweeping sense of familiarity and automatically veered wide to avoid the kelp bed mark­ing a reef he’d once piled a boat onto.

He slowed as he approached the wharf and scowled. The entire place looked deserted; no boats tied up or anchored out in the bay, no activity on­shore, no groups of students willingly attending to chores in exchange for the privilege of living with orcas in the wild. This time of year, the place should have been swarming in anticipation of the whales arriving, if they hadn’t already done so. Where was ev­eryone?

He scanned the windows of the house, seeing only silver-blue glints of reflected ocean, no curious faces, no hand lifted in greeting. No big golden retriever came lolloping across the sloping grounds, tail wagging as it ran. Of course not. Fifteen years had passed. The dog was long gone. Yet the passage of time couldn’t account for the doors that stood closed on the sheds and workshops, and on the boathouse at the head of the bay.

* * * *

Tracy heard the approaching outboard and felt a chill prickle her arms despite the warm mid-June afternoon. A glance out the windows showed a runabout with the markings of a Sointula boat rental company heading her way. Her heart stopped for a second and her knees went momentarily weak. She’d tried to hope it was all a mistake, but it was true. Don Jacobs really was coming. In fact, he was nearly there. Not for a second did she entertain a hope that the boat carried anyone else, like a lost fisherman or a curious tourist. The Fuller Brush man.

Her luck hadn’t been that good in recent years.

She had no idea why he was coming to BIO Research Station. His secretary, who’d called that morning, had said only that he was “expected” at their station sometime that day, which Tracy knew to be patently untrue. No one was expected there. She took great care to keep unexpected visitors from turning up.

She had been too stunned to ask for details and was only grateful that the woman had called, that she’d had those few hours warning.

It had been long enough to get her sister, Edie, and her father safely away.

The tone of the outboard changed from high­ pitched whine to low rumble, and she ran to the corner windows in the living room for a better view inside the bay. The boat’s bow had dropped; its rooster tail died down. She pulled in a long, unsteady breath as she saw sun­light glint on blond hair highlighted against blue wa­ter.

Oh, yes. There was no doubt about it. That was definitely Don Jacobs standing behind the wheel, head and shoulders over the windshield, face turned shore­ward as if he were scanning for a sign of human habitation. If he found none; wouldn’t he simply leave?

Now, there was a thought. She and Con could hide, pretend there was no one home.

The idea made her smile. Hide Con? Fat chance of that. First, it would take a large dose of anesthetic administered with a dart gun fired from a long range. Con was not the kind of woman who’d ever consider hiding an option. If it had been up to her, Edie and the pro­fessor would still be there, and the three of them would be taking on Don Jacobs as a united front. Con would have no part of hiding, no part of pretending, but since Tracy was calling the shots...

She stepped outside. For a moment her mouth went dry, but she squared her shoulders and told her­self she was more than ready to see him.

Tracy Maxwell would not be daunted by a man or by a memory. She daunted men. Six years earlier, she’d seen Don Jacobs react to her the way most men did. Their reunion had been brief and casual, as well as overseen by her father, but she had known. She’d seen it in his eyes—regret for what he had passed up, a surge of renewed interest, and a brief, swiftly hidden wish to do it all over again differently. Which, of course, his strong sense of morality wouldn’t permit.

All she needed to do was remember that, keep it firmly in the front of her mind. Besides, Donald Ja­cobs would not be staying long. She’d promised her ­sister, and she always kept her promises.

Tilting her chin, she sauntered along the path toward the ramp leading to the wharf. She grinned. “Look out, Jacobs, here I come,” she said softly as the boat sidled up to the float. “Here I come, and away you go.”

If he didn’t bow out on his own bat the moment she said that her father wasn’t available, then she had a surefire plan to get rid of him. All she needed to do was keep her wits about her and she’d win this round.

She wiped damp palms over the wisps of hair es­caping her braid, and stuffed suddenly trembly fingers into the front pockets of her black jeans. Don stepped out of the boat, looked up at her as she descended the ramp, then simply stood there and stared.

“Maxwell one, Jacobs zip,” Tracy murmured, and strode along the dock to greet him.

As he stepped onto the dock Don saw her swinging toward him, the bright sun pouring down on the rich­ness of her dark brown hair, turning her skin to golden cream. Tracy! Everything within him came to a sudden halt, waiting for the world to catch up.

She moved with loose-limbed confidence, her legs swinging gracefully, her arms bent at the elbows, fin­gers tucked into the front pockets of her jeans, throw­ing her breasts into relief within a red T-shirt emblazoned with leaping orcas and the station logo.

He stood watching her, the rope loose and unforgot­ten in his hand, and didn’t move.

He couldn’t move.

At sixteen she’d been pretty, disturbingly so. At twenty-five she’d been stunning, not classically beauti­ful, but immensely attractive and appealing. And now, as she approached thirty-one ... Words failed him.

Then she was before him, a smile on her lips, her hand extended. He thought he detected a whiff of her scent.

He took her hand, finding it strong and cool within his clasp. He forced himself to do nothing more than grip it with gentle firmness as he fought down the urge to pull it up to his face, place his mouth in the center of her palm, and­—

“Tracy ...” he said, trying not to reveal how bowled over he felt. His reaction to her filled his throat with a thickness that precluded more than the uttering of her name.

As if totally unaware of his emotional disarray, she continued to smile at him, her chocolate-colored eyes bright and welcoming, and her lips, still plump, still red, still as tempting as sin, half-parted. Her heavy dark bangs fell in a deep wave over her broad fore­head, half obscuring one eye until she tossed them impatiently aside, a mannerism that was pure Tracy. It made him break into a smile that felt big and loose and inane n his face.

“Hello, Don,” she said, and her warm, husky voice filled him.”

“Tracy,” he said again.

“Welcome back to BIO. Research.”

For a moment, Tracy could say nothing more than that; she could only stare into his eyes, caught by the novelty of looking up at a man, and feel the hard warmth of his hand wrapped around hers until she remembered to pull it free. The sun gleamed in the burnished gold of his hair, imparting a dozen different shades to the full, thick strands, not one of which was gray.

The man is over forty, she’d blithely told her sister that morning. He’ll be bald, paunchy, and wearing thick glasses. ­

Wrong-o, Trace! No balding, no paunch. No thick glasses.

Why had she expected it? Six years before he’d been much as he was now. The only hint that time had passed was the deepened laugh lines around his mouth and eyes. She reminded herself that fair-­haired men seldom showed their age. She shouldn’t have forgotten that. She shouldn’t have tried to forget, not for a minute, the impact he could have on her.

His eyes, chips of bright blue, squinted against the sun dazzle off the water, traveled over her with slow, deliberate intent as if he were searching for changes, differences—improvements? Suddenly, for one bad moment, his scrutiny left her feeling gawky, ugly, rangy, and much too tall.

In that instant, years of ego­-enhancing masculine appreciation were whipped away, leaving only bitter memories of rejection. It made breathing difficult. She dropped her gaze.

“It’s good to see you, ‘Tracy,” he said.

As swiftly as it had come over her, her awkward­ness was gone and she was once more in control of herself. “Thanks. It’s good to see you, too,” she said, continuing to meet his gaze until she felt giddy. Swiftly, she dropped her lashes and crouched to tie the bow line.

Taking her cue, Don finally remembered the rope he still held in one hand and tied it to the bull-rail on the edge of the float. “I ... didn’t really expect you to be here,” he said, standing erect. He wished his voice had come out stronger, not so close to a raspy whisper, but it was all he could achieve at the moment. Why, when he remembered everything else about her, had he forgotten the things she could do with those lashes of hers?

“I’m so sorry,” she said, rising and brushing off her hands. “I know you expected to see my father.”

He drew a blank for a moment, feeling unexpectedly gauche and ill at ease. Her father? Oh! Of course. He’d come to see the professor. He frowned. That was something to remember. He had, in his official capacity, come to see Professor Maxwell. Focusing on that might help nullify Tracy Maxwell’s devastating effect on his equilibrium. Sex appeal. That was it. She had incredible sex appeal.

Fifteen years earlier, he’d reacted the same way at his first meeting with her, hadn’t he? And again, six years later. Why had he hoped, even faintly, it would be different this time? And he’d been wrong: If hope equaled expectation, then he’d expected her to be here.

“It’s a pity you came all this way, only to be disappointed,” she said. She looked so earnest, he had to smile again, and then he gave in to temptation.

He touched her—a knuckle bent to follow the fine line of her jaw. “Did I say I was disappointed?”

She looked down, then back up quickly, a soft smile on her lips, an oddly—and charmingly—shy light in her eyes, and a pair of pink patches on her cheeks. For an instant she looked so much like the girl he remembered, he felt guilty for touching her.

“No, of course not,” she said. “I’m sure you’re too tactful for that. But what I’m trying to say is that it’s too bad you didn’t let Dad know you were coming. I know he’d have loved to see you.”

Don frowned again. “I did let him know I was coming. We spoke on the phone in early February and chose this as a time when both my schedule and his would be clear—and there’d likely be whales congregating in the strait.”

Tracy could scarcely believe him—except there was no reason not to. Why would he lie about it? And Dad might have called Don, though why, and in what ten-minute lucid period, she couldn’t begin to guess.

“He ... didn’t say anything to me,” she said. “I didn’t know you were coming until your secretary phoned this morning with a message for you to call her.”

Don smiled, and her stomach did a flip-flop. “I’m sure your father meant to tell you,” he said kindly, as if to a child. “It probably just slipped his mind.”

Tracy was absolutely sure of it.

“I even wrote a week or so ago to confirm, though I didn’t hear back from him,” he continued. “I hadn’t expected to, unless there was a problem.” His frown returned. “Could he have forgotten I was coming?”

Tracy managed a cool shrug. “I suppose that’s possible if, as you say, it’s been several months since you arranged your visit. And if your letter of confirmation arrived only recently, he won’t have seen it. I’m hold­ing all his correspondence until he returns.”

“I see.” His brows drew together over his nose. His mouth compressed. “I take it that might not be today?”

She laughed. “Heavens, no,” she said, and launched into the story she and Edie had concocted as they rapidly packed bags for the escape. “He may not be back for weeks. You know how it is. He’s out following a transient pod in Alaska.”

“Alaska?” Don echoed. “Then why are you here?”

“Me?” She affected an innocent attitude. “I just decided to stay home this summer.”

“Are you still teaching at Islands West?”

She nodded, surprised that he knew even that much about her life. “Winters, I teach. I spend them longing for summer so I can come home. I’d rather work with whales than teach unappreciative college students who think they’re getting an easy science course, about bivalve mollusks and tube worms.”

He chuckled. He, too, she knew, had taught marine biology.

“Unfortunately,” she went on, “the whales aren’t cooperating so far this summer, so it seems your trip is destined to be fruitless in more ways than one.”

“I—” He paused, wondering how much to tell her. “I had really counted on seeing your father, Tracy. We have matters to discuss.” Merely saying that might be hint enough that a grant was in the offing, but it couldn’t be helped. She’d know officially anyway as soon as he’d spoken to the professor. “Is there some way you could get in touch with him so I could arrange a place to meet him?”

She blinked for a moment, then said, “Why, no. There’s no way at all for me to reach him.’”

Don didn’t buy it. The professor he had known wouldn’t leave without providing his loved ones means of reaching him any more than Don would. “But surely he’ll be calling you at regular intervals?”

She smiled. “No. At least, I doubt it, but if he does, of course I’ll tell him you were here, and possibly we can make some kind of ... arrangements.”

Don stared at her bland expression. Dammit, she was stonewalling him! She didn’t want him to see the professor.

If he told her why he was there, would she suddenly remember a way to reach her father? He seri­ously considered doing just that, but as her lashes flicked down and then up again, his breath caught in his throat. As a teenager, she’d just been learning how to use them and had all too often practiced on him, flirting unmercifully. Of course, she wasn’t doing so now. She likely fluttered them that way unconsciously, but the effect was as deadly.­

What he should do was turn around and run, come back when her father was home, and hopefully, after she’d returned to her post at Islands West University. But then she said, “Anyway, come on up to the house for a little while. I’m sure you’ll enjoy looking around, revisiting old haunts.”

Deliberately—he was sure it was deliberately—she failed to see him glance back at the overnight bag sitting in plain sight on the seat of the boat.

“I understand congratulations are in order,’” she went on, leading the way. “Your appointment to the board of the Meteor Foundation is a big step up in your career.”

He must have made a sensible reply to her statement, because she continued a conversation he was only half aware of, even while participating in it. Fol­lowing Tracy Maxwell, watching her in motion, was a pleasure he was glad he hadn’t missed as he would have if he’d stepped back into his boat and left. Her hair hung in a thick braid over her back. His fingers itched to undo it, set the gleaming brown strands free. He wondered if it would still smell the same.

He clenched his fists, determined not to submit to the strong surges of desire she elicited in him without even trying. Not until he had figured out if his own response was something to be relied on or simply an echo from the past.

She’d worn a short-sleeved, thigh-length satin night­-shirt when she’d come to him that time, hoping to seduce or be seduced. Her hair had been loose and flowing, curling over her shoulders, so dark as to be almost black, delicately perfumed. With her flirtatious eyes she’d beguiled him. With her soft, delicate hands she’d touched him. With her light, sweet, breathless laughter she’d almost bewitched him.

When he’d told her to go away and grow up, her eyes had gone fiery with determination. He nearly groaned, remembering how her body had felt against his when she’d flung herself into his arms, laughing at his whispered, frantic protests. Then, after he’d kissed her and set her from him, her eyes had been deep pools of mystery and confusion, bemused with newly aroused desire.

Now, following her, he found himself wanting to place his hands around her waist to see if it was as supple and firm as memory claimed. He tried to see if she wore a ring on her left hand, but she stepped aside as she reached the top of the ramp and waited for him to come alongside her on the path. He swung into step with her, looking down into her vibrant face and bright, intelligent eyes as she asked about his trip.

Those eyes didn’t look bemused now, or fiery, or even flirtatious. They were the eyes of a woman who knew who she was, was sure of her own place in the world, who knew what she wanted and meant to have it.

Though he tried to repress it, a new thrum of sex­ual excitement coursed through him. What would it be like if he were one of the things she meant to have, even after all these years? Would he be able to resist her seduction now? Would he want to? Would he have to?

Idiot! What seduction? She wasn’t dressed to tan­talize, though on her, a T-shirt and jeans held a defi­nitely sexy allure. Seduction ... and Tracy Maxwell.

He smelled a hint of perfume in the breeze, tasted desire, the memory of that long-ago night and the feel of her in his arms, against his body ... the satin of her skin, her gown. It was all he could do not to wrap his arms around her and pull her close, to see if she felt the same, see if holding her would make him feel the same.

Oh, yes, this must be part of the midlife-crisis syn­drome, lusting after a woman he didn’t even know. But he could get to know her. He could get to know her mouth, to rediscover the feel of it under his, its taste, its texture. He could get to know those breasts scarcely concealed by her T-shirt—their weight, their shape, what made her nipples tense and peak. He could get to know what made her sigh, what made her cry out with pleasure and need.

He could get to know the long, slender thighs, how they’d feel wrapped around him. He could get to know her softness, know intimately the way it would welcome his hardness, the way it would ripple around him in tight, hot spasms as she reached a­—

“Where would you like to start?” she asked.