The Invitation (Matchmaker Trilogy) Read Online Free PDF Page A

doggie bag from the restaurant or room service later?”
    Shaye tucked up her knees and closed her eyes. “Sleep. Tomorrow will be soon enough for superb food and nice dry martinis.”
    *   *   *
    T HE TWO WOMEN HAD NO TROUBLE finding the Golden Echo the next morning. She was berthed at the end of the pier and very definitely stood apart from the other craft they’d passed.
    “Oh Lord,” Shaye muttered.
    Victoria was as wide-eyed as her niece. “Maybe we have the wrong one.”
    “The name board says Golden Echo. ”
    “Maybe I got the name wrong.”
    “Maybe you got the trip wrong.”
    They stood with their elbows linked and their heads close together as, eyes transfixed on the boat before them, they whispered back and forth.
    “She isn’t exactly a tub,” Victoria offered meekly.
    “She’s a pirate ship—”
    “In miniature.”
    “Looks like she’s been through one too many battles. Or one too few. She should have sunk long ago.”
    “Maybe not,” Victoria argued, desperately searching for something positive to say. “She looks sturdy enough.”
    “Like a white elephant.”
    “But she’s clean.”
    “Mmm. The chipped paint’s been neatly scraped away. Lord, I don’t believe I’ve seen anything as boxy since the Tall Ships passed through during the Bicentennial.”
    “They were impressive.”
    “ They were.”
    “So’s this—”
    “If you close your eyes and pretend you’re living in the eighteenth century.”
    Victoria didn’t close her eyes, but she was squinting hard. “You have to admit that she has a certain … character.”
    “Mmm. Decrepit.”
    “She takes three sails. That should be pretty.”
    Her enthusiasm was lost on Shaye, who was eyeing in dismay the ragged bundles of canvas lashed to the rigging. “Three crisp … white … sails.”
    “Okay, they may not be crisp and white. What does it matter, if they’re strong?”
    “Are they?”
    “If Samson VanBaar is any kind of friend to Garrick—and if Garrick is any kind of friend to me—they are.”
    Shaye moaned. “And to think that I could have been in the Berkshires, lazing around without a care in the world.”
    “You’ll be able to laze around here.”
    “I don’t see any deck chairs.”
    “But it’s a nice broad deck.”
    “It looks splintery.”
    “So we’ll lie on towels.”
    “Did you bring some?”
    “Of course not. They’ll have towels aboard.”
    “Like they have polished brass fittings?” Shaye sighed. “Well, you were right in a way.”
    “What way was that?” Victoria asked, at a momentary loss.
    “We are going in style. Of course, it’s not exactly our style—for that matter, I’m not sure whose style it is.” Her voice hardened. “You may be crazy enough to give it a try, but I’m not.”
    She started to pivot away, intending to take the first cab back to Barranquilla, but Victoria clamped her elbow tighter and dragged her forward. “Excuse me,” she was calling, shading her eyes from the sun with her free hand. “We’re looking for Samson VanBaar.”
    Keeping step with her aunt through no will of her own, Shaye forced herself to focus on the figure that had just emerged from the bowels of the boat. “It gets worse,” she moaned, then whispered a hoarse, “What is he?”
    “I’m VanBaar,” came the returning call. “Mrs. Lesser, Miss Burke?” With a sweep of his arm, he motioned them forward. “We’ve been expecting you.”
    Nothing they’d imagined had prepared either Shaye or Victoria for Samson VanBaar. In his mid to late fifties, he was remarkably tall and solid. His well-trimmed salt-and-pepper hair, very possibly combed in a dignified manner short days before, tumbled carelessly around his head, forming a reckless frame for a face that was faintly sunburned, though inarguably sweet.
    What was arguable was his costume, and it could only be called that. He wore a billowy white shirt tucked into a pair of narrow black pants, which were tucked into