Stranded in Paradise Read online

  “Everything we brought with us is up there,” Tess said.

  The woman nodded. “Clothing and luggage can be replaced. But a soul—now that’s another thing. I must go, but I’ll see you again.” She stood and walked over to one of the waiting ambulances.

  “She’s an odd duck,” Carter said more to himself than to Tess.

  They watched as fire belched from the kitchen area and flames spread. He sat with his wrists hanging over his knees, staring at the ground. “This is turning into some vacation.”

  She laughed humorlessly. “And I came to Hawaii to get away from it all.”

  He smiled. “Me, too—I’m supposed to be relaxing. Too much stress in my life.”

  “Well—” leaning back on his elbows, he stared at the burning hotel, “things could be worse. Like the lady said, material possessions can be replaced. At least no lives were lost.”

  She nodded. “Wonder how the fire started?”

  He shrugged, and then sat up straighter. “I don’t know about you, but I could use some breakfast. Are you hungry?”

  “Well,” she looked down at the robe and blanket. “I’m not exactly dressed—”

  “Nobody’s going to care. Let’s find some scrambled eggs. We’re down to nothing except what’s on our backs. Do you plan to starve, too?”

  The corner of her mouth quirked “No.”

  “Me either. Let’s go.”

  He ushered her into the warmth of a nearby small café. The eating establishment was deserted—everyone, it seemed, was out watching the fire. Carter chose a table near the back of the room. She pulled the blanket closer around her robe as if it were a queen’s cape, and sat with her back to the wall. Small tables with rush-bottomed chairs waited for customers. Vases of flowers placed on each table added a festive air, and a mural of palm trees and ocean waves covered one wall. The pretty waitress carrying menus and glasses of water looked as if she would feel right at home in a grass skirt.

  “What can I get you?” the woman asked.

  “Black coffee for me,” Carter said without consulting a menu. “Two scrambled eggs, toast, and some of that tropical guava jelly.”

  Tess nodded. “Same.”

  The waitress smiled, a deep dimple creasing her twenty-something face. “You two from the hotel?”

  “Yes.”

  “Too bad. Lose everything?”

  Tess studied the table, the knuckles of her hand white from clutching the blanket that wanted to slip off her shoulders.

  “It would seem so,” Carter answered. “I don’t know when we’ll know for certain.”

  “Lose your money, too?”

  Carter had to smile. “I have my billfold.”

  “Well, if you need to run a tab—I’m Joanie, and I own the place.”

  “Thanks.”

  When Joanie left to retrieve their order, Tess planted her elbows on the table and thrust her fingers into her hair. “I simply cannot believe this!”

  Carter shrugged. “Life sometimes throws sliders. The way I see it, we’re still alive, we’re in paradise, and this vacation has no where to go but up.”

  She leveled her gaze on him. “What planet did you say you were from?”

  “Earth.” He grinned, and then leaned closer. “Temporary journey until the real thing.”

  She groaned. “You’re one of those Christians, aren’t you? I knew when I saw you bow your head at the luau.”

  “You mean the fun luau? Yes,” he said quietly. “I believe in God. He’s seen me through a lot.”

  “I thought so. You’re too … comfortable with disaster.”

  “I’ve never heard that one before.”

  “I’m sure you have your perfect little life; it’s a free ride with God, right?”

  “No.” He leveled a gaze at her. “Why are you so uptight?”

  That stopped her cold. She sat back and let her hands drop to the table. She looked down and noticed some stray strands of hair. Her face flushed.

  “I’m not trying to offend you,” Carter went on. “You just seem … stressed.” She lifted her eyes to his.

  “I’m not a Christian and I’m sorry I got defensive. Maybe I am stressed. With the fire and all …” Her gaze dropped to the bag in her lap. She laughed. “I just realized how stupid I am. I didn’t grab my purse; I grabbed a makeup bag.”

  “Well, you may be broke but you’ll look good,” he said.

  “I wasn’t thinking,” she said. “That’s not like me. I’m usually a logical, organized, in-control person.”

  “Losing your britches to a fire will shake up anybody.”

  “It’s not the fire—or Beeg being gone or the weather or losing my contact. It’s everything—everything about this whole rotten episode called life.”

  The waitress set two cups of coffee on the table. Carter stared at the steaming liquid as silence took over. Finally he reached for sugar packets, eyeing her. “What do you mean by ‘everything’?”

  She sat silent for a moment, wondering if she’d said too much. Yet there was something about a man in a T-shirt and pajama bottoms and a woman wearing a robe and blanket that transformed strangers into confidants.

  “I lost my job.”

  “Lost your job,” he repeated. “That’s all? I thought you were going to say you’d been given three weeks to live.”

  “I might as well.”

  “Come on, now. Losing a job isn’t the end of the world. You’re alive; you’re in good health—I presume. You’re in paradise.” He smiled, as if hoping to coax the black look off her face. “What’s so bad?”

  “I was replaced by the boss’s old fraternity brother. Fired.”

  Carter dumped sugar into his coffee. “That’s bad.”

  She lifted an indifferent shoulder and grabbed for the blanket when it started to slide. “I know it probably sounds trivial to you.”

  “Well, no. Not trivial. But you have to admit it’s not one for the books. It happens more than you’d think.”

  She absently shredded a napkin. “Dave—that was my boss’s dad, who founded the company—had groomed me to be his right hand. I was in line to be the next vice president of human resources. I’d worked hard for the job— my private life the past five years has been practically nonexistent. But then Dave died suddenly …”

  “And sonny came in and the dream disappeared.”

  “Pretty much. He did offer me another position …”

  “And the choice was?”

  “Payroll, two levels below my current position, or leave the company.”

  “Ouch.”

  She piled up the napkin pieces. “I think Len brought in his friend to get back at me. He seemed jealous of the working relationship I had with his father—he felt intimidated by me.”

  Carter sat back in the booth and studied her.

  “That’s pretty cold. Could be the best thing that’s ever happened to you.”

  “Yeah, well, Len has quite an ego. I went back and realized I still had a plane ticket to Hawaii—it was supposed to be a business trip …”

  “He paid for this trip?”

  “Well … technically … yes.” She shifted in her chair.

  “It was a nonrefundable ticket …” her voice trailed off. She really hadn’t given it much thought but when put that way she felt a guilt she hadn’t felt before. “I guess I should pay Connor.com for it when I get back …”

  Carter smiled reassuringly at her. “So what are you going to do for work when you return? A bright, intelligent woman like you shouldn’t let one jerk get you down.”

  “Bright and intelligent, huh? I wonder what kind of impression you’d have of me when I’m not doing a Three-Stooge fest.” She pointed to her ankle and puffy lips.

  “It’s in the eyes,” Carter said half-joking.

  “Oh, the eyes,” she repeated. “Seriously, I don’t know what I’m going to do. Yet.” She balanced her coffee cup in one hand, studying the thick mug as if she’d never seen a cup before.
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  “So, now what?”

  “Now I wait until Len realizes his mistake—and he will. He’ll beg me to come back and I’ll probably go— under my terms. I’ve spent too many years with the company to walk away now.” She leaned back in the booth. “In another five years I’ll move on, manage an even larger Human Resources department, and maybe even move into labor relations.” She looked up sharply. “With my experience I can work anywhere I want.”

  He lifted his hands with mock surrender. “I’m on your side.”

  “Well, don’t think for a minute that Len’s decision is anything but a minor roadblock—because it isn’t. I’ve spent the last five years building my career—Len Connor isn’t going to diminish it or me with one brief conversation.”

  “Got it all under control, do you?”

  Joanie arrived with two plates and slid breakfast in front of Carter and Tess before pouring fresh coffee.

  “Can I get you anything else?” Joanie asked.

  “Nothing,” Carter said. “Thanks.”

  The waitress walked off. Tess sat staring at the plate.

  “Do you want something else?” Carter looked at her.

  “I’m not hungry.”

  “You’ve got to eat something.” Carter spread jelly on a piece of toast and held it out to her. “Try this. One bite at a time.”

  “I can’t—”

  “Tess Nelson’s in control, isn’t she? Eat.”

  She snatched the toast and bit into it.

  “That’s it—I love a woman with an appetite.”

  Picking up her fork, she sobered. She looked up, her eyes intent. “You talk to God, don’t you?”

  “Sure. My faith is important to me.”

  “I suppose He talks back to you?”

  “Every day—in a loud, thunderous voice often accompanied by wind, thunder, and lightning.” He took a sip of coffee, and then dipped his head when he saw the heat in her eyes.

  “He doesn’t talk to me—not in the way you imply. But we have ongoing communication.”

  She shrugged. “My grandmother took me to church once in a while, but I didn’t then nor do I now understand all the hoopla. Lately I’ve been trying to comprehend …” She glanced out the front window of the café. “Right now I have more pressing concerns to consider; do I have any identification left, any clothes, and any money—”

  “Don’t worry about it. I’m sure the hotel will help.”

  She felt herself choke up—she wasn’t sure why exactly, but she sure wasn’t going to let Carter McConnell see her turn into a blubbering mass. “I thought about sending the tickets back to Len, but then I thought, why not? Why not get out of Denver, leave the snow and cold behind? That’s easy enough, I thought. Consider my options.

  “But then the taxi had no heater and I nearly froze. The driver drove like a maniac. I sprained my ankle at the airport and had to limp down the Jetway. When I got to Maui, a little boy ran into me, knocking my contact out. My best friend, whom I was really coming to see, is on the Mainland showing her watercolor originals.” She sighed. “The luau was a disaster, the beach a worse failure, and now there’s been a fire in the hotel kitchen, which happened to be directly below my room.” She looked up. “Does this God of yours have a warped sense of humor?”

  “Yes, God has a sense of humor, but it’s not warped.” He leaned closer and whispered lightly, “Nothing about God is warped. He loves us—without reservations.”

  Tess felt herself swallow hard. The kindness in his voice threatened her resolve to not cry. Carter straightened. “What about family? Mom? Dad? Brothers or sisters? Why not go home for a long overdue vacation?”

  “Never. Mona wouldn’t welcome the intrusion. She’s the last person I want to know about losing my job. I haven’t seen my brother in twenty years. He’s off photographing another war somewhere—I can’t remember the last time we talked.”

  “Mona?”

  “My mother.”

  The way she bit the word out translated to al-Qaida terrorist. Mona bin Laden.

  His tone softened. “What a pair we make. I’m here in paradise because my boss thinks I’m stressed out; you’re here because you are stressed out …”

  “I didn’t say I was stressed out,” she defended.

  Carter smiled knowingly. “Okay. Never mind,” she conceded.

  She glanced down at her soot-blackened robe, the blanket, and shrugged dismally. “I’m going home—the moment the stores open and I can buy something other than this robe and blanket to wear.”

  Carter salted his eggs. “I suppose—” His words halted in midsentence as a man suddenly burst through the restaurant’s front door and barreled toward the table. The Popeye—a spinach-eating looking brute twice Carter’s size and clearly of Polynesian descent—grabbed him by the shirt collar and pulled him out of the booth.

  “What th—?” Carter’s eyes bulged as the oaf dangled him in midair by the nape of his cotton/polyester blend T-shirt. The hulk glared at Carter as if he were about to take him apart piece by piece.

  “The question is, what you think you’re doing, Chump!” The man’s voice sounded like gravel on metal.

  “Let–go–of–me!” Carter wrapped his hands around the man’s tree-branch-like wrist and tried to wrestle free. His air supply diminished.

  Tess slid out of the booth, throwing down her napkin. “You let him go this instant!” she demanded. “Who do you think you are?”

  Carter felt like a fool, dangling by his shirt collar from the hand of this … this leviathan, while Tess confronted the guy like a teacup poodle facing down a pit bull.

  She snapped her finger and pointed at the man with authority. “I’m warning you! Let go of him!”

  Standing in bare feet, she was five foot nothing of blazing wrath in a nightgown and smoky bathrobe.

  The bully let go of Carter’s collar and shoved him against the booth. Carter felt his hip hit with a sickening thud. He straightened against the pain, about to pull himself up between Tess and the giant when Tess spoke again, her voice low but filled with grit, “Just what do you think you’re doing?”

  The man’s cold eyes fixed on her. “This is between him and me, Short-Stuff.”

  She got in his face. “Not when you come in here and disrupt my breakfast, Buster!”

  He started to ease off, shooting Carter a murderous glare. “I don’t know who you are, Lady, but this chump has been seein’ my girl. Nobody cuts into my time.”

  “Wait a minute!” Carter protested but Tess held up one hand to stop him.

  “And who is your girl?” she asked coldly.

  “Irihapeti Tehuia—ask him.” He pointed at Carter.

  “I not only don’t know an Irihapeti Tehuia, I can’t even spell it.” Carter sat back down, raising a hand to his crushed windpipe.

  “Never heard of her,” the ape scoffed. “I got word that you two was seen havin’ a cozy dinner last Friday—”

  “I wasn’t in Hawaii last Friday.” Carter met his furious gaze. “Your information is wrong.”

  “You—”

  “He wasn’t,” she interrupted. “Neither one of us got here until Monday night.”

  “You’d lie for him—”

  “Maybe. But I’m telling the truth right now.” She crossed her arms, her eyes daring him to repeat his claim.

  The brute’s features coiled like a snake. “You’re not Frank Lotus?”

  “I’m not Frank Anybody. Look, fella, I don’t know who you’re looking for,” Carter said, “but it isn’t me. Why don’t you just leave, talk to this woman you’re having trouble with, and try to get the mistake straightened out.” Carter massaged his swollen throat. The dufus had bruised his windpipe!

  Pivoting on his heel, the stranger lumbered out of the café. Tess sank back into the booth and released a sigh of relief.

  “Well, that was interesting,” Carter said.

  They sat for a moment, and then burst out laughing. Carter was glad to see that she
was feeling better, even if it took his broken neck to wipe the gloom off her face.

  “If this situation can get any worse, I’d like to know how,” he admitted.

  “Oh, I’m sure it can.” She wiped her eyes with the corner of a napkin and eyed the mound of congealed eggs on her plate. “Actually, it’s starting to get interesting.”

  9

  “Alana has now been upgraded from a tropical storm to a hurricane. She could make landfall in the Hawaiian Islands within thirty-six hours. But she’s switched course before. Stay tuned for updates as they become available …”

  The bartender reached up and switched off the news. Murmurs about the approaching storm spread among the guests, but Tess was oblivious to the gossip.

  Sitting in the Pioneer Courtyard, surrounded by palms and lush vegetation, she and Carter waited for the hotel management’s instructions on how to weather the storm.

  With all the mishaps she’d had, the thought that she’d be smack dab in the center of a hurricane had never entered her mind.

  She finished off a glass of iced tea and sat back. “You have been very nice about all this.”

  Carter had been more than nice; he’d been courteous and kind and ever optimistic. That was more than she could claim for herself.

  Pioneer Inn management had rounded up the fire-displaced guests and asked them to wait in the courtyard for further instructions. A female employee found a pair of jeans and a shirt for Tess, and she had changed in the ladies’ room. Carter and several other men still wore pajamas. The smell of thick smoke hung onerous in the air, and the guests buzzed with stories of the harrowing escape.

  “You’ve been a good sport, too,” he acknowledged. “What did the doctor say about that ankle?”

  Medical staff was on site to help, so she took the opportunity to have the injury looked at again. By now, a sprained ankle was the least of her worries.

  “He said it’s healing nicely.”

  “You’re still limping.”

  “My ankle is the least of my problems. Where do you think they’ll put us now that the hotel is devastated?” The first floor was a black pit, especially where the kitchen had been. While the upper floors had been saved from the fire’s ravage they had not been spared from the sprinkler system that had left everything a soggy, dripping mess.