And she was definitely, positively over the moon about him. She wastoast.
When she slipped back into bed, he woke enough to draw her into a snug embrace against his warm body.
“We’ve still got two left,” she murmured, licking his ear then nibbling on its lobe.
His eyes popped open. “Two?” He grinned, for she knew he was remembering the strip of condoms she’d retrieved last night. “I guess we’d better get to finishing them off,” he said, and she giggled against his cheek.
“I like the way you think.”
And then all thoughts of humor fled when he rolled on top of her.
* * *
Sometime later—much,muchlater—they found it necessary to forage for something to eat.
And to refill the water buckets.
“I’ll get them refilled, then the generator hooked up and started,” Oscar said while Teddy did her best to toast bread over the gas flame.
It turned out pretty well, and she spread four pieces with peanut butter, then drizzled them with honey. She was just cutting up an apple when Oscar came in on his second trip with water pails.
“Eat first, then the generator. You probably need to replenish after all that activity last night,” she added with a sly smile. “I even made tea by boiling water in a pan—though I didn’t check the temperature. Don’t tell Maxine or Orbra.”
“Your secret’s safe with me.” He sat down and began to dunk the teabag up and down in his mug. “There are quite a few branches down outside, and some debris too, probably blown in from the lake.”
After their breakfast, Teddy went with him to survey the damage. While he messed with the generator, she walked around the cottage. This was the first time she’d been outside since being startled away from the room behind the rosebush last night.
As she came around the side of the lighthouse toward the lake, she saw several branches on the ground. And something else that had her hurrying over to investigate.
It was a small electronic device in a zippered plastic bag. Just sitting in the middle of the ground between the lighthouse and a maple sapling.
The hair on the back of her neck prickled because she knew it wasn’t hers, and why would Oscar have something like this outside (though he would for certain have wrapped it in plastic)? It couldn’t have been blown in from the lake—it was too far from the beach and too heavy to have come that far.
Could someone have dropped it last night? It had to have been last night, because she’d been standing over here and walking all around the area yesterday before the storm and would have seen it then.
She picked up the bag and began to examine its contents, then realized the device was a sort of recorder. She pushed “play” then fumbled and nearly dropped the thing when a horrific, bloodcurdling scream—a very familiar one—filled the air.
“Oh my God,” she said, frantically pushing the “stop” button as Oscar came bolting around the cottage.
“Teddy! What— Are you all right?”
She stared at the recorder, then looked up. Because the sound had come from slightly above her.
Oscar took the recorder from her grip as, mouth set in an unhappy line, she scanned the nearby tree and the lines of the cottage and lighthouse. He pushed the button, and she jumped when the scream once more filled the air.
They looked at each other.
“Well, what thehell,” he said. “This puts a whole new spin on the situation.”
Understatement.
“I think the speaker is up there,” she said, pointing to a small black square sitting beneath a shadowy eave. “Wow.”
She could hardly comprehend the situation.
“Someone definitely doesn’t want us around here,” Oscar said, still examining the recorder. “They’ve gone to a lot of trouble to scare us off. There’s nothing on this device that gives any indication who it belongs to—except maybe it could be traced by the serial number. This is a pretty solid piece of equipment. Small and light, and good quality. Not cheap. Must’ve gotten blown down from wherever it was hidden.” He looked at her. “Come to think of it, I didn’t hear the scream last night. Did you?”
She gave him a wan smile. “No. I was pretty distracted. But I’ll bet it didn’t go off because it got blown to the ground.”
