Sometimes You Stay (Red Door Inn #2)

Chapter 1

One

Lucretia Martin wasn’t willing to call a single corner of the world home. At least not for more than a few days.

And she would know. She’d seen nearly every tourist trap and secret alley of every city worth visiting. She’d eaten croissants at the coziest Paris café and sipped tea from vendors in a bustling Turkish bazaar. She’d seen the Colosseum lit up at night and Machu Picchu on an unusually sunny day.

She’d seen the most amazing things the world had to offer, and none of them had tempted her to stay put.

But the view of North Rustico Harbour on her phone’s screen as she panned across the landscape was almost enough to change her mind.

Almost , but only that.

She had to admit the quaint and colorful buildings on the far side of the bay held a certain appeal, beautiful and soothing. The rich green pine trees overlooking the water surrounded her with their spicy scent as the whisper of the waves lulled her into a sense of calm. Maybe it was a false feeling of peace, but she leaned into it anyway.

She had no problem understanding how someone might decide to settle here. For a time.

Cretia inhaled from deep in her chest, dragging in the salt-tinged air as the sun caressed her face. The late spring breeze off the harbor cut through her sweater and whipped her hair in front of her eyes, far too much for a good selfie. But the weather was perfect for capturing the swaying branches of the trees that lined the sun-bleached boardwalk, which wrapped around the rolling blue water.

Her phone on a stabilizing arm, she panned across the weather-beaten businesses. Bright yellow and blue paint chipped off the wooden walls, evident even at this distance. Turning slowly, she caught the row of houses beyond the bluff across from where she stood. With a quick spin, she captured the embankment dotted with pink and purple wildflowers. They bobbed and danced and stretched toward the water.

Feeling that same tug, Cretia hopped off the gray boards onto a short dirt path. It couldn’t even be ten feet long and ended at a cement bench. When she peered over the edge, she paused. She’d never seen purple water. Perfect emerald green? Stunning blue? Yes. She’d seen the shorelines that made the postcards on almost every continent.

But purple?

She checked her screen to make sure it captured the way the blue water mixed with the red earth beneath it.

Suddenly the wind gave her a shove, and she nearly took a step forward to catch her balance. A step that would have taken her right over the edge and five feet down into the water.

Scrambling back, she chided herself. “Careful there, Cretia.”

She didn’t have time to waste cleaning up after a spill like that. She knew from experience that a clothed dip in the ocean would take up far too much of her limited time on Prince Edward Island. She needed to spend her days exploring and recording the island’s beauty, not searching out a laundromat and waiting for her clothes to be cleaned.

After her first accidental dive into the French Riviera, she’d decided to let her clothes just dry and then packed them with the rest of her clean clothes before moving on. Big mistake. Everything in her suitcase had taken on a decidedly fishy smell.

After that fiasco, she’d discovered the joys of hotels that offered laundry service. But her trip to PEI was short enough that she hadn’t bothered to book a hotel with that particular amenity.

Better to stay on dry land.

Stepping back from the edge, she lowered her phone and spent a moment just enjoying the breeze on her face. Temps back in Arizona would be pushing a hundred already, but the late April weather on PEI was barely warm, still a hint in the wind of the cold the island had survived that winter.

She had some good footage of the area now. When she returned to her hotel room in Charlottetown that night, she’d put it together with a voice-over. Not that she’d think too much about that yet.

She tended to do better without a script anyway, describing the way this place made her feel, explaining how the woman in the seat next to her on the flight into Charlottetown had been from North Rustico. Ginger had gone on and on about how lovely the area was. Though it hadn’t been on her original itinerary, Cretia quickly added this section of the north shore—part of an island that a lot of people thought was merely fictional.

She couldn’t have been the only child who’d thought Anne’s world of Prince Edward Island was too idyllic to be real. And with a little searching, she might just find out she’d been right. No place could be that perfect.

She wasn’t looking for the island’s seedy underbelly or anything. Her followers weren’t interested in dark and depressing. They wanted a real-life look at places they hadn’t heard of or considered visiting. They wanted unexpected experiences and gorgeous views.

And so far, PEI was shaping up to offer a lot of gorgeous views.

It all seemed ... well, like when she’d read Anne’s story as a child and dreamed that she’d be sent to live with Marilla and Matthew. It was just that. A dream. Too good to be true.

She would only be on the island for two days, so she’d have to get moving if she was going to find the unexpected. Opening her carry-on, she tucked her stabilizing arm into it beside her tripod and other equipment. While she’d parked about half a mile away, she’d wanted to have easy access to her gear. Toting her lightweight rolling bag made that easy.

After shoving her phone into her backpack and slinging it over one shoulder, she grabbed her bag’s extended handle and strode toward the boardwalk. It was only a few feet of dirt between the bench and the even gray planks, but the toe of her shoe managed to catch a tree root, and she hissed as her ankle twisted.

She tried to put some weight on her foot, but fire shot up her leg, and she jerked her knee up. Taking a few deep breaths, she rubbed at the bare skin between her slip-on sneaker and the cropped hem of her jeans.

It didn’t seem swollen, but even a little pressure felt like a hammer to her ankle.

With a sigh, she sank to the edge of the boardwalk. She needed a minute or two. Gently she rotated her foot.

Or three.

She’d seen a few people out walking their dogs earlier, but it was an early morning—well before the start of the tourist season—and there wasn’t a soul in sight from her angle.

Parking down by the dock had seemed like a smart idea that morning. There had been plenty of spaces, and she never complained about an opportunity to stretch her legs. Not when so many of her days were spent in airplane seats.

Heaving a big sigh, she closed her eyes and gave her ankle another twirl.

Maybe a little better. Not perfect but better. She could get to her car and then find somewhere to get ice and elevate it for a while.

But first she had to get to her car.

She squinted at the four wheels on her carry-on. She’d tried leaning on the handle once in Florence, and the whole thing had flown out from under her. Utter betrayal. Total embarrassment.

Ironic because she had accepted it from a sponsor and endorsed it in part because of the way it rolled so smoothly.

She wasn’t about to replay that scene on a different continent. So she sat there until a lobster boat chugged into the harbor. Then another.

With each growling engine, she tested her range of motion. Some improvement.

She’d take it.

Pushing herself up on her good leg, Cretia squared her shoulders. Then she took a tentative step on the tips of her toes.

A groan tried to escape, but she swallowed it down. Clearly nothing was broken. She was just going to be a little bit sore. It wouldn’t be the first time.

Grabbing the handle of her unhelpful bag, she hobbled toward the dock, pausing every few steps to catch her breath and let the pain ease.

Halfway to the dock, her face was damp with sweat despite the cool air, and she was fairly certain her cheeks had turned a not-so-pretty shade of red. Dabbing at her forehead with the sleeve of her sweater, she nodded as a jogger rounded the bend in front of her.

The woman in bright pink leggings slowed, then pulled out one of her earbuds. “Everything okay?”

Confirmation of those not-so-pretty cheeks.

Cretia forced a smile. “Thank you. I’m fine.”

With a second concerned glance, the woman gave a quick nod, tucked her earbud back into place, and picked up her speed.

This day was turning out to be less productive than she’d planned. But at least she had a few shots of the harbor and the boardwalk. And after a decent night’s sleep, her ankle would be good as new. Or at least good enough.

She just had to get to her car.

Hobbling on, she let out a sigh of relief as she rounded a bend to see the bustling dock ahead. Almost there.

Fishermen crawled off their boats, unloading equipment and oversized coolers. They hefted awkward wooden traps with ease, hollering to each other from boat to boat. It was a choreographed dance.

One she should be recording.

She grabbed her phone from her backpack and didn’t bother to zip it all the way up as she hurried toward the dock. Ignoring the sting in her ankle, she slipped into the action, hunting for the best angle. She passed a man at least a foot taller than her, his brown overalls covered in wet patches. But he gave her a broad smile beneath his bushy beard. The other men were almost as big, grizzled but somehow kind. One gave her a wink as she zoomed in on him.

“Hey there, sweetheart,” he called.

Cretia laughed and waved at him before spinning to watch a boy probably still in high school toss a round mesh trap of some sort to a man on a boat. The man was an older version of the boy, his lips whistling a cheerful tune. He caught the trap by curling his fingertips into the twine, then tossed it into the stern like he’d done it a million times.

When she swung back to the boy to record his second throw, she turned right into a solid wall. It grunted but had no give, and her ankle screamed as she stumbled backward. Twisting hard to take any weight off her right foot, she turned toward the harbor.

Suddenly the ground disappeared, and she clawed for purchase on anything, only managing to wrap her arm around the handle of her suitcase with those stupid wheels that rolled along far too agreeably.

She didn’t so much hear a splash as feel it, her chest breaking the surface of the water with a clap. And then everything was silent. Except the rushing of her blood through her veins and the bubbles from the scream that insisted on ripping from her throat.

The water swallowed her, pressing in from every angle, squeezing her lungs, and dragging her down.

She opened her mouth to scream again, but the water rushed in. It was salty and heinous, and she couldn’t spit it out without inviting more in. When she blinked, she saw nothing but black. And then her eyes were on fire. Her throat gagging. Her lungs crying for air.

Her soaked jeans and sweater dragged her farther below the surface.

She clawed at the water, arms flailing to find anything she could pull herself up on.

Only then did she realize she was still holding her phone. And the open backpack on her shoulders—which contained every bit of electronic equipment she owned—was going to drown her.

Not today.

Scissors-kicking as hard as her denim-clad legs would allow, she fought for the surface, fought for even a single breath of air.

Come on. Come on. She could make it. She had to. The water couldn’t be that deep. She couldn’t have sunk too far.

Ditch the backpack.

Not going to happen. Not now. Not after everything she’d done to get to this point.

Just when her lungs were ready to implode, her head broke the surface and she snatched a breath. She also caught a glance of something huge and furry lunging off the cement dock right at her.

Bear.

Bear!

It was all she could think as a splash echoed through the water.

Perfect. If the water didn’t get her, a bear attack definitely would.

She could see the Instagram headlines already. P OPULAR T RAVEL I NFLUENCER M AULED ON G ENTLE I SLAND .

Oh, the irony.

Muscles trembling, she kicked toward the dock, praying one of those friendly fishermen would help her before her limbs gave out or the bear did any real damage. The rolling waves had carried her only a few yards from the cement wall, but from where she struggled just to keep her head above water, it seemed an impossible distance.

Suddenly an enormous hairy head slid under her arm. Pushing against its snout, she fought for freedom. If she lost a finger or even a whole hand to its razor-sharp teeth, so be it. At least she’d be alive.

She tried to kick and scream, but the water prevented both, her legs useless, moving in slow motion. Sinking, she held her breath.

Every moment, she expected the pain of the animal’s bite. Maybe it had already come, but the freezing water kept her fully in shock.

Her head broke the surface again, and she gasped a deep breath, filling her aching lungs until they remembered their job. With no more strength to fight, she let the animal at her side propel her.

A hand came out of nowhere, snatched her under the other arm, and pulled her up and over the edge of the dock like each of her limbs didn’t weigh a million pounds. She was pretty sure they did at this point.

Then someone was ripping off her backpack, and she fought their hands.

“Calm down. It’s okay. I’m not stealing your bag.”

She’d heard that from a pickpocket in Europe too. But before she could turn far enough to get a grip on her backpack, an enormous hand thwapped her between her shoulder blades. Then again. Harbor water and bile burst out of her, and she folded over, leaning on a trembling arm at her side.

“Would someone help Joe Jr. out of the water?”

The words reached her as though she was still underwater. They weren’t for her. She was pretty sure. But she didn’t know where or who they came from.

Another coughing fit tore from her throat, and she squeezed her stinging eyes shut. When she could finally breathe normally again, she risked a squint into the sun.

And into the face of a man she hadn’t seen on the dock before.

He squatted a few feet in front of her, his forearms resting on bent knees. The wrinkle between his eyebrows didn’t detract from the smooth ridge of his nose. And she imagined that without the tight line of his mouth, he might have a nice smile.

“You all right there? That was a nasty fall.”

As soon as she shook her head, she realized she couldn’t stop. Her whole body began to tremble, her teeth chattering.

“You must be freezing.” In a second, he pulled off his yellow flannel overshirt and wrapped it around her shoulders, pulling the neck closed beneath her chin.

It didn’t help much. The wind still cut through her, and she couldn’t stop twitching.

“Anyone know her?” he asked over her head, and a low mumble of uncertainty came from the fishermen who had surely witnessed the whole scene.

His gaze came back to meet hers. “Where are you staying?”

“Char-Char-Char—”

“Charlottetown?”

She nodded.

“Tourist?”

She managed another jerk of her chin, but the rest of her body had gone nearly numb.

“Well, you won’t make it back to—”

Suddenly the giant black body that had leapt at her—and saved her—bounded to their side. His whole body shook, water flying off every piece of fur and coating them both.

The man waved off the beast with a laugh. “Joe. Come on now. Can’t you see the lady’s been through enough?” Then his tone softened as he reached forward and scratched the big head behind its ears. “Good job, boy.”

Finally she turned toward the animal and managed to get a clear look. It wasn’t a bear but nearly as big. And twice as furry, his black hair shaggier than the sheepdogs she’d seen in Scotland. Big black eyes stared back at her above a dark snout. A wad of drool on his jowls joined the water dripping to the ground below.

She would have recoiled if she’d had an ounce of adrenaline left. Instead, her arm decided to give out on her, and she slumped toward the ground. Before her head could connect with the gravel, the man grabbed her shoulder and scooped her to his chest.

“Whoa there.” He stood up slowly. “Let’s get you somewhere warm and dry.”