Temptation Bay (A Windfall Island Novel) Read Online Free PDF Page A

dwellings rather than the sprawling glass-fronted vacation homes that had begun to spring up on the smaller islands. At the seaward end of the island, clustered around a pretty little bay, sat a handful of buildings, hunkered together against the Atlantic winter about to sock in. At the landward end was the marina with its weathered docks and spearing masts, and the village, population nine hundred eight—not counting three babies on the way.
    From his current altitude, Windfall looked welcoming with its quaint settlement, its checkerboard of neat fields already harvested for fall, and its quiet, forested shorelines. But Dex knew better. Even if his research hadn’t already clued him in to the kind of welcome he could expect, geography would have provided a warning.
    Roughly half the island had direct exposure to the Atlantic. Even on a day like this, with blue skies and mild winds, the surf foamed and sprayed along the jagged, rocky shore. Dex could only imagine what it must be like in agale, winds whipping the ocean into a frenzy, surf thrashing the exposed coast; even the wide channels separating the island from the mainland would be impassable.
    Geography, however, was only part of the story. Isolation might be a physical reality, but the history of the residents made it a way of life. Dex expected a warm welcome. Tourism made up their main source of income, after all, and he was arriving at the tail end of the season. But they weren’t stupid or unobservant. What they were was rarified, and a lone man asking a lot of unusual questions wouldn’t go unnoticed or unremarked for long. It would make his job that much harder, but he never let a little adversity stop him. His eyes wandered left again and he thought,
Nope, one impossible undertaking at a time.
    “Not much to it,” he observed, making an obvious visual survey of Windfall Island.
    “We have everything we need. Where are you staying?”
    “I’m at the Horizon.”
    “Really?” She slanted him a look, surprised. “That’s an efficiency. AJ only rents by the week. You planning to be around a while?”
    “It’s a possibility.”
    She didn’t respond, too busy landing the helicopter, Dex figured, so he left her to it. Not surprisingly, she climbed out as soon as she’d powered down the bird, coming around to unlatch his door before it occurred to him to release his harness. And then he left it on because having her lean across him was irresistible… until her scent went to his head. Since he needed his wits about him he let her step back. But he drew the line at watching her schlep his luggage again.
    Of course, she was still being unreasonable, so he simply took her by the waist and shifted her aside.
    “What the hell?”
    “Finally.”
    “As in finally you’re going to die?”
    “Not exactly.”
    “Put your hands on me again—”
    Dex crowded her back against the Twinstar. He didn’t put his hands on her. “And what?”
    “And you’d better be prepared to swim off this island, because I won’t take you and I can see to it that no one else does either.”
    “Already desperate to keep me around?”
    She plowed a fist into his stomach.
    Dex’s breath whooshed out, in surprise more than anything else. She couldn’t have put much behind it with barely six inches between them, but he stepped away from her, slow and easy. And he was grinning. “I just wanted to see the real you.”
    “This isn’t the real me.”
    “Maybe not,” he said, rubbing a hand over his ribs, “but it’s a hell of a lot more interesting than the tour guide who flew me in from Portland.” Interesting, hell; she was glorious, blue eyes blazing, chin stuck out, that long, lean body all but vibrating with temper. She didn’t show the slightest hint of a pout or sulk, she didn’t pull out the tears or try to inflict guilt. In fact, she looked like she might pop him again. He rounded the helicopter to retrieve his luggage.
    “You didn’t rent a car,” she said,