Liz Graham - The Cut Throat

Copyright

T his is a work of fiction. Except for the larger town names, all similarities to actual people, places or events are entirely coincidental.

Copyright 2016 Liz Graham, Author

All Rights Reserved. No parts of this book maybe reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronical or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the author, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review.

For information, please visit the author website or email at Liz@LizGraham.ca

www.LizGraham.ca

ISBN: Ebook 9780973778434

Thanks to editors Joanne and Iona, without whom these books would not have happened. And also to Kathryn, Bev and Christine, who believed in me!

Contents

Landmarks

Chapter 1

R uscan Milanovic was gone. She wasnt sure, but suspected she had misplaced him.

Now in this cottage on the other side of the world, back on her home island in a tiny cove that no one had ever heard of and where she knew nobody, Carmel McAlistair could bury herself in her writing. A dramatic reaction to the pain of loss, no doubt, but it made sense. She would be a hermit now, dedicating herself to a solitary life where she could do no more damage.

It wasnt that she was hiding. No, but he wouldnt find her here, even if he wanted to. Even if he wasnt dead. And nothing was certain, that was the only fact she knew.

Ruscan would have argued the point, of course. He, the Ukranian-born, self-made millionaire whose English was more perfect than her own. Ruscan who couldnt stand to have anything out of place, was now out of place himself. It might have been her doing but some things were better left unthought.

St. Jude Without had found her and become the setting of her latest reincarnation. She liked the way the mountain behind her crouched over the sparse houses, nestling the tiny outpost in its stony embrace and shielding it from the probing fingers of the morning sun. A single road snaked southward around its knee, the gravelled surface the only tenuous connection to the modern world outsideunless, of course, one was prepared to brave the ocean and that rickety wharf.

On this warm late August afternoon, a woman down on the point hung her laundry to catch the fresh sea breeze, and a black dog snuffled the roadside scrub for the days idle gossip. It could be a place of innocence, at first glance. A clean place. Not like the smog-laden skies of Taipei which had swallowed her lover. Who knew someone could vanish in mid-air?

This was the perfect seclusion demanded by her herm-attitude. If that was a word.

Herm-attitude, she said aloud, using the sound of her own voice to block the thoughts revolving round inside her head. She removed the white wine from the fridge. Looking through the out-dated cupboards in the kitchen, the first vessel to hand was a jam jar. Carmel shrugged and proceeded to pour. One good thing about being a hermit was that you could be as eccentric as you liked.

The fridge kicked in with a rattle and a jump, so she hip-checked the door shut, grimacing as she noticed an old mirror in a cheap plastic frame, krazy-glued onto the door many years ago. She pried at an edge with her free pinky, but it wasnt coming off. Her own blue eyes looked back at her from the spotted glass, the wide mouth below serious, the nose long. And another wrinkle starting on her forehead.

Carmel brought both bottle and jam-jar out onto the front veranda overlooking the point of land and the water beyond as she contemplated her new life alone. Although there were many she called friends scattered throughout the world, Carmel had never been one for close relationships. Just the once. And shed lost him. She considered herself an island of sorts.

He had happenedthe love of her liferight when she was ready for him. She left her high-flying friends to be with him in domesticity and it had worked out pretty well. Shed thought. But he had disappeared so suddenly, leaving a hole in her heart as large as Taiwan. Older, wiser and not quite broke, shed headed back to the island shed started from for a new beginning, to see if she could get it right this time.

What is it about islands? she asked a passing seagull, then settled back on the veranda with her drink, watching the ferry chugging across the Tickle to the land mass sheering out of the surrounding sea. Theyre often hard to reach, perhaps isolated, sometimes out in the middle of unprotected seas. Each island has its own mystique.

They say no man is an island, but I think people are, Carmel argued out loud as if Ruscan were there to refute her words. People are like islands in that all of us are isolated within the sea of humanity. Each person has their own mystery, too. She sat back, satisfied that she had won that round, and thinking that would be a good lead into the next article.

Or perhaps she was just spending too much time with herself.

A niggling insecurity deep within suspected that she had done something to chase Ruscan away. Okay, so it hadnt all been roses and sunshine. He liked order, and would get a bit put out with her clutter and disorganization. Theyd had some lovely all-out arguments about politics and food choices and how to load the dishwasher. She giggled aloud at the memory.

No matter the situation, life somehow works out for the optimist. Once Carmel was back on her native soil, this house had fallen into her lap as if by magic. An affordable ocean-side rental but close to the city in her price range? The real estate agent was already laughing as he flicked through the property sheets, the negative answer on his lips, when his attention was arrested by this house. He swore he hadnt seen this listing before, he who knew all the houses available through his office. And who had ever heard of St. Jude Without? Despite its proximity to the city where shed spent her formative years, she hadnt known it existed and even he had to look it up on the map. But there it was, the price was right and she got the key the same afternoon.

Carmel sighed and took a long sip, the afternoon sun warm on her legs as she gazed westward. There was enough money in her savings to live modestly in this small oddly-shaped rented cottage outside the city, in the forgotten cove of St. Jude Without at the end of the long pot-holed road which hugged the cliffs edge of the North Point Road. The house itself was perhaps two hundred years old, situated at a 45 degree angle to the road. Maybe that had inspired Mr. Ryan, her new landlord, to create a round veranda overlooking the road and water, from which practically the whole community was visible.

The house was not attractive and lacked all curb appeal, which could account for its affordability. A squat stone and clapboard structure, it looked like no other house shed ever seen. The interior hadnt been touched since the 1980s, and would have been called retro if its renovator had had a smidgeon of taste. But, alas, he didnt, and neither did his wife. This lady had since passed on to the big bay in the sky and her husband, Mr. Ryan, to the state of Florida, taking advantage of a cheap beachside condo in St. Petes where hed never have to do another renovation or decorating project again.

Still, I dont have to look at it, she reminded herself. But I have a view of the water, woods and wilderness behind me. With this wide expanse before me, I never have to feel claustrophobic again. She lifted her jam jar in a toast.

Slowly, she became aware of being the subject of intense scrutiny. A woman with flowing red hair stood watchfully on the porch of the bungalow across the road, hardly visible at all among the shadows of the lowering sun behind her house. She wore a simple purple Indian cotton dress, the kind in style for hippies over the past fifty years. Once eye contact had been established between the two, the woman made her purposeful bare-foot way towards her.