Chapter 19: The Harbor Talks

Henrik woke before light with her hand already moving on him.

She lay on her side, facing him, with her hair across the pillow and her eyes open and steady.

"Good morning," Alana said.

"Is it?"

"It's going to be."

Her hand was warm and slow.

He had spent twenty hours bracing for the harbor, and now there was nothing in him but the long pull of her fingers.

He reached for her and she caught his wrist and pressed it down on the quilt.

"No. Let me."

"You're running things."

"Since Saturday," she said. "Haven't you noticed?"

He laughed, low, and then the laugh turned into a groan.

She stroked him slowly and watched his face.

He let her look.

He had lived fifty-four years and never once let anyone see him like this.

His fist was knotted in the sheet, and he did not hide it.

She kissed his throat.

She slid her thigh over his hip, and he felt how wet she was before she took him in.

They lay on their sides, chest to chest, and she moved on him in small hard rolls with her forehead against his.

He kept his hand on her stomach.

She had not told him to take it away.

"Come with me," she whispered.

"Where you go."

She came with a soft broken cry against his mouth.

He followed with her name in his throat, and the dawn came grey into the room.

Afterward she lay across his chest.

"Whatever they say today," she said, "I'm not sorry."

"I know."

"I need you to know it before you go down there."

"I know it." He kissed her hair. "I'll tell you something. I'm not either."

The phone calls started at eight.

The first was a regular who had booked the Maren for four days in October and wanted his deposit back.

He did not say why.

The second was a couple from Salem.

The third was the harbormaster's wife.

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