I close my eyes and shiver as he gently nudges aside my nightgown and kisses my shoulder. His unshaven face is rough against my skin and I sigh as my head lolls back. The nightgown slips off my other shoulder and moonlight spills across my breasts. I am shaking and utterly exposed to his gaze, yet I don’t feel afraid. His mouth meets mine and his kiss tastes of salt and rum. I gasp in a breath and smell damp wool and seawater. The scent of a man who has lived too long on a ship, a man who is hungry for the taste of a woman.

As hungry as I am for the taste of a man.

“I know what you desire,” he says.

What I desire is him. I need him to make me forget everything but what it feels like to be embraced by a man. I topple onto my back and at once he is on top of me, his weight pinning me to the mattress. He grasps both my wrists and traps them over my head. I cannot resist him. I don’t want to resist him.

“I know what you need.”

I suck in a startled breath as his hand closes around my breast. This is not a gentle embrace but a claiming, and I flinch as if he has just burned his brand into my skin.

“And I know what you deserve.”

My eyes fly open. I stare up at no one, at nothing. Wildly I look around the room, see the shapes of furniture, the glow of moonlight on the floor. And I see Hannibal’s eyes, green and ever watchful, staring at me.

“Jeremiah?” I whisper. No one answers.

* * *

—

The whine of an electric saw awakens me and I open my eyes to dazzling sunlight. The sheets are twisted around my legs, and beneath my thighs, the linen is damp. Even now, I am still wet and aching for him.

Was he really here?

    Heavy footsteps creak upstairs in the turret and a hammer pounds. Billy and Ned are back at work, and here I lie in the room just beneath them, my legs splayed apart, my skin flushed with desire. Suddenly I feel exposed and embarrassed. I climb out of bed and pull on the same clothes I wore yesterday. They’re still lying on the floor; I don’t even remember taking them off. Hannibal is already pawing at the closed door and he gives an impatient meow, demanding to be let out. As soon as I open the door, he darts out and heads downstairs to the kitchen. To breakfast, of course.

I don’t follow him, but make my way up to the turret room, where I’m startled to see a large hole in the wall. Billy and Ned have broken through the plaster, and they stand peering into the newly exposed cavity.

“What on earth is back there?” I ask.

Ned turns and frowns at my unkempt hair. “Oh, gosh. I hope we didn’t wake you up.”

“Um, yeah. You did.” I rub my eyes. “What time is it?”

“Nine-thirty. We knocked on the front door but I guess you didn’t hear us. We figured you went out for a walk or something.”

“What happened to you?” asks Billy, pointing at my arm.

I glance down at the claw marks. “Oh, that’s nothing. Hannibal scratched me the other day.”

“I mean your other arm.”

“What?” I stare down at a bruise encircling my forearm like an ugly blue bracelet. I don’t remember how I got it, just as I don’t remember how I bruised my knee the other night. I think of the captain and how he had pinned my arms to the bed. I remember the weight of his body, the taste of his mouth. But that was merely a dream, and dreams do not leave bruises. Did I stumble in the dark on my way to the bathroom? Or did it happen yesterday afternoon on the beach? Numb with wine, if I’d banged my arm against a rock, I might not have felt any pain.

My throat is so dry I can barely answer Billy’s question. “Maybe I got it in the kitchen. Sometimes I get so busy cooking, I don’t even notice when I hurt myself.” Anxious to escape, I turn to leave. “I really need coffee. I’ll get the pot going, if you want some.”

    “First come take a look at what we found behind this wall,” says Ned. He pulls off another chunk of drywall, opening up a wider view of the cavity behind it.

I peer through the opening and see the glint of a brass sconce and walls painted a mint green. “It’s a little alcove. How strange.”

“The floor back there’s still in good shape. And take a look at that crown molding. It’s original to the house. This space is like a time capsule, preserved all these years.”

“Why on earth would anyone wall off an alcove?”

“Arthur and I talked about it, and neither of us has any idea. We’re thinking it was done before his aunt’s time.”

“Maybe it was a bootlegger’s space, to hide liquor,” Billy suggests. “Or to hide a treasure.”

“There’s no door anywhere in or out, so how would you get to it?” Ned shakes his head. “No, this space was closed off, like a tomb. Like someone was trying to erase the fact it was ever here.”

I can’t help shivering as I peer into a room that has been frozen in time for at least a generation. What scandalous history could have led someone to close up this space and plaster over any trace of its existence? What secret were they trying to conceal?

“Arthur wants us to open it up, paint the walls to match the rest of the turret,” says Ned. “And we’ll need to sand and varnish the floor, so that’ll take us another week or two. We’ve been working on this house for months, and I’m starting to think we’ll never get finished.”

“Crazy old house,” says Billy and he picks up a sledgehammer. “I wonder what else it’s hiding.”

* * *

—

Billy and Ned sit at my kitchen table, both wearing grins as I set down two steaming bowls, fragrant with the scent of beef and bay leaves.

    “Smelled this cooking all morning,” says Billy, whose bottomless appetite never fails to amaze me. Eagerly he picks up a spoon. “We wondered what you were whipping up down here.”

“Lobscouse,” I answer.

“Looks like beef stew to me.” He shovels a spoonful into his mouth and sighs, his eyes closed in utter contentment. “Whatever it is, I think I’ve died and gone to heaven.”

“It’s known as sailor’s beef stew,” I explain as both men tuck into their lunch. “The recipe originated with the Vikings, but they used fish. As the recipe traveled with sailors around the world, the fish was replaced with beef instead.”

“Yay, beef,” Billy mumbles.

“And beer,” I add. “There’s lots and lots of beer in this dish.”

Billy raises a fist. “Yay, beer!”

“Come on, Billy, you can’t just inhale it. You have to tell me what you think about it.”

“I’d eat it again.” Of course he would. When it comes to food, Billy is the least discriminating person I have ever met. He’d eat roasted shoe leather if I placed it in front of him.

But Ned takes his time as he spoons chunks of potato and beef into his mouth and he thinks as he chews. “I’m guessing this is a lot tastier than what those old-time sailors ate,” he concludes. “This definitely needs to go in the book, Ava.”

“I think so, too. I’m glad to have the Ned Haskell seal of approval.”

“What’re you cooking for us next week?” Billy asks.

Ned gives him a punch on the shoulder. “She’s not cooking for us. This is research for her book.”

A book for which I’ve already compiled dozens of worthy recipes, from a generations-old French Canadian recipe for tourtière pork pie, luscious and dripping with silky fat, to a saddle of venison with juniper berries, to an endless array of dishes involving salt cod. Now I can test them all on real Mainers, men with appetites.

    Billy gobbles down his stew first and heads back upstairs to work, but Ned lingers at the table, savoring the final spoonfuls.

“Gonna be real sorry to finish up in your turret,” he says.

“And I’ll be sorry to lose my taste testers.”

“I’m sure you’ll have no end of eager volunteers, Ava.”

My cellphone rings and I see the name of my editor pop up on the screen. I have been avoiding his calls but there’s no way to put him off forever. If I don’t pick up now, he’ll just keep calling.

“Hello, Simon,” I answer.

“So you haven’t been eaten by a bear after all.”

“I’m sorry I haven’t called back. I’ll send you a few more chapters tomorrow.”

“Scott thinks we should drive up there and drag you home.”

“I don’t want to be dragged home. I want to keep writing. I just needed to get away.”

“Get away from what?”

I pause, not knowing what to say. I glance at Ned, who discreetly rises from the table and carries his empty bowl to the sink.

“I’ve got a lot on my mind, that’s all,” I say.

“Oh? What’s his name?”

“Now you are really barking up the wrong tree. I’ll call you next week.” I hang up and look at Ned, who is meticulously washing the dishes. At fifty-eight years old, he still has the lean, athletic build of a man who works with his muscles, but there’s more to him than mere brawn; there’s a depth to his silence. This is a man who watches and listens, who takes in far more than others might realize. I wonder what he thinks of me. If he considers it odd that I have isolated myself in this lonely house with a badly behaved cat as my only companion.

“You don’t have to do the dishes,” I tell him.

“It’s okay. Don’t like to leave a mess.” He rinses his bowl and picks up a dishcloth. “I’m particular that way.”

“You said you’ve been working on this house for months?”

    “Going on six months now.”

“And you knew the tenant who lived here before me? I think her name is Charlotte.”

“Nice lady. She teaches elementary school in Boston. Seemed to like it up here well enough, so I was surprised when she packed up and left town.”