Heroes Are My Weakness: A Novel

WHEN ANNIE ENTERED THE COTTAGE that night covered with soot, she was greeted with the sight of Leo straddling the back of her couch like a cowboy riding a horse. Dilly sat in a chair, the empty wine bottle from two nights ago in her lap. Crumpet was sprawled on the floor in front of an open copy of the pornographic art photo book, while Peter had crept up behind her to look under her skirt.

Theo came out of the kitchen, a dish towel in his hands. She looked from the puppets to him. He shrugged. “They were bored.”

“You were bored. You didn’t want to write, and this was your way of procrastinating. Didn’t I tell you to leave my puppets alone?”

“Did you? I don’t remember.”

“I could argue with you about that, but I have to take a bath. For some reason, I seem to be covered in fireplace ash.”

He smiled. An honest-to-God smile that didn’t quite fit on his brooding face. She stalked toward the bedroom. “You’d better be gone when I come out.”

“Are you sure you want me to leave?” she heard him say. “I picked up a couple of lobsters in town today.”

Damn it! She was ravenous, but that didn’t mean she was going to sell herself out for food. Not for ordinary food, anyway. But lobster . . . ? She slammed her bedroom door, which made her feel like a twit.

I don’t see why you’d feel that way, Crumpet said petulantly. I slam doors all the time.

Annie stripped off her dirty jeans. Exactly my point.

She took a bath, washed the soot out of her hair, and dressed in a clean pair of jeans and one of Mariah’s black turtleneck sweaters. She tried to tame her wet hair by putting it up in a ponytail, knowing as she did that her curls would soon pop out like demented mattress springs. She eyed her meager supply of makeup but refused to apply even lip gloss.

The kitchen smelled like a four-star restaurant, and Theo was peering into the cabinet over the sink. “What happened to the wine that was here?”

She pushed up the sleeves of her sweater. “It’s boxed up and waiting for my next trip to the post office.” The value of the whole batch was around four hundred dollars, not a legacy, but still welcome. “I’m selling it. Turns out, I’m too poor to drink hundreds of dollars’ worth of wine myself. Or offer it to an unwanted houseguest.”

“I’ll buy a bottle from you. Better yet, I’ll trade it for the food you stole from me.”

“I didn’t steal anything. I told you. I’ll replace it all when the supply boat comes in next week.” She made a hasty amendment. “Except for what you ate.”

“I don’t want it replaced. I want your wine.”

Scamp butted in. Give him your body instead.

Damn it, Scamp. Shut up. Annie gazed toward the pots on the stove. “Even the least expensive bottle is worth more than the food I borrowed.”

“You’re forgetting tonight’s lobster.”

“On Peregrine, hamburger is more expensive than lobster. But nice try.”

“Fine. I’ll buy a bottle from you.”

“Great. Let me get my price list.”

He muttered something under his breath as she made her way to the bedroom.

“How much do you want to pay?” she called out.

“Surprise me,” he said from the kitchen. “And you can’t have any. I’m drinking the whole thing myself.”

She pulled the box from the rear of the closet. “Then I’ll have to add a corking fee. It’ll be cheaper to share.”

She heard something that was either a cough or a rough laugh.

Theo had made mashed potatoes to go with the lobster—creamy, garlicky mashed potatoes—indisputable evidence that his offer to fix dinner was premeditated, since there hadn’t been any potatoes in the cottage that morning. What was his motivation for hanging around here? It definitely wasn’t altruistic.

She set the table, grabbed a sweatshirt against the draft coming in through the bay window, and helped carry the dishes in from the kitchen. “Did you really sweep out all those fireplaces?” he asked as they started to eat.

“I did.”

Something happened at the corner of his mouth as he filled her wineglass and lifted his own in a toast. “To good women everywhere.”

She wasn’t getting into an argument with him—not while she had a rosy red lobster and ramekin of warm butter in front of her, so she pretended she was alone.

They ate in silence. Only after she’d finished her last bite—a particularly sweet morsel from the tail—and dabbed at the smear of butter on her chin did she break it. “You made a deal with the devil, didn’t you? You traded your soul for the ability to cook.”

He dropped an empty claw into the shell bowl. “Plus being able to see through women’s clothes.”

Those imperial blue eyes had been designed for cynicism, and the sparks in the irises took her aback. She wadded up her napkin. “Too bad about that. There isn’t much around here that’s worth seeing.”

He ran his thumb across the edge of his wineglass, his eyes on her. “I wouldn’t say that.”

A jolt of sexual electricity zipped through her body. Her skin burned, and for a moment, it was as if she was fifteen all over again. It was the wine. She pushed her plate back from the edge of the table. “That’s right. The prettiest woman on the island is right under your roof. I forgot about Jaycie.”

He looked momentarily confused—a monumental fake-out on his part. She tightened her ponytail. “Don’t practice your sexual mojo on her, Theo. She’s lost her husband, she has a mute child, and—thanks to you—she has no job security.”

“I was never going to fire her. You knew that.”

She hadn’t known it at all, and she didn’t trust him. But then something occurred to her. “You won’t fire her as long as you can make me jump through hoops. Is that it?”

“I can’t believe you really swept out those fireplaces.” The slight lift of one indolent eyebrow said she’d been played for a sucker. “If she stayed in town instead of living at the house, she could come out a couple of times a week,” he said. “I can still do that, you know.”

“Where in town? A room in somebody’s house? That’s worse than what she has now.”

“It shouldn’t be a problem as long as I can work here.” He drained his wineglass. “And Jaycie’s kid will talk when she’s ready.”

“The great child psychologist has spoken.”

“Who better to recognize a troubled kid than me?”

She played at wide-eyed innocence. “But Livia isn’t a psychopath.”

You think just because I’m a bad guy, I don’t have feelings?

She’d definitely had too much wine because the voice belonged to Leo.

“I had some problems that summer. I acted out.”

His lack of emotion infuriated her, and she jumped up from the table. “You tried to kill me. If Jaycie hadn’t been walking on the beach that night, I would have drowned.”

“Do you think I don’t know that?” he said with an unsettling intensity.

She hated her own uncertainty about him. She should feel more threatened when they were together, but the only threat she felt came from confusion. Still, was that so different from being fifteen? She hadn’t wanted to believe she was in danger then, either. Not until she’d almost drowned.

“Tell me about Regan,” she said.

He balled his napkin and stood. “There’s no point.”

If he had been anybody else, compassion would have made her stop. But she needed to understand. “Regan was a good sailor,” she said. “Why would she take the boat out when she knew it was getting ready to storm? Why would she do that?”

He strode across the room and grabbed his jacket. “I don’t talk about Regan. Ever.”

Seconds later, he was out the door.


SHE FINISHED OFF THE LAST of the wine before she went to bed and awoke with a giant thirst and an even bigger headache. She didn’t want to go to Harp House today. Hadn’t Theo said he wouldn’t fire Jaycie? But she didn’t trust him. And even if he had meant it, Jaycie still needed help. Annie couldn’t abandon her.

As she left the cottage, she vowed not to let Theo make her jump through hoops with any more jobs like cleaning fireplaces. There was only room for one puppet master on Peregrine Island, and that was herself.

Something whizzed by her head. With a gasp, she fell to the ground.

She lay there breathing hard, the dirt cold and rough beneath her cheek, the world spinning around her. She squeezed her eyes shut. Felt her heart pounding.

Someone had just tried to shoot her. Someone who might, even now, be coming after her with a gun.