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Not able to watch this atrocity anymore, I nudged him out of the way and sat across from her. “What happened?” I asked, my tone gentler than I’d thought possible given the circumstances.
Claire clutched her glass of water and stared at it. “I got seasick.” She hung her head. “God, I’m so embarrassed.”
That made sense. During the summer she’d lived here, on the days the rest of us took out wave runners, she’d always been content to watch from the beach. What didn’t make sense was why she’d been found at the dock all by herself. I knew she wouldn’t take a craft out on the water. Some asshole had left her there.
“Don’t be,” Wes said. “You’re not the first, and you won’t be the last. At least you had the sense to puke in the water.”
“And the bushes,” she mumbled.
Yikes. How many times has she puked?I’d thought seasickness ended once the person was off the sea.
“Who took you out?” I demanded. I imagined a crazy scenario in which a masked assailant forced her onto the boat, because why else would she go?
“Mr. Abernathy.”
Wes chuckled. “Don’t feel bad about being sick. That man drives his boat like a lunatic.”
I glared at him, and he put his hands up and backed away slowly. I returned my attention to Claire. “And he left you at the dock? In this condition?”Respect my elders, my ass.I was going to have words with that man.
She shook her head. “No, he waited with me until my ride came. Before I could get in the Uber, I threw up again, and the guy just took off. I guess he didn’t want to risk me getting sick in his car.”
My anger changed its target. “Who was the driver?” He’d better hope I didn’t know him, or he was going to hear from me too. What was wrong with the men on the islands? Present company excluded, of course.
“I don’t know.”
“Check the app on your phone.”
It was probably an unreasonable request, considering she still had a green tinge to her complexion, but I wasn’t thinking straight. I was pissed off to be sharing my islands with a group of assholes who would treat one of our guests this way. Sure, I wanted Claire gone, but while she was here, she deserved to be treated with decency.
“I can’t. I lost my phone in the ocean. I used Mr. Abernathy’s phone to order the car.”
So he’d not only left her at the dock, but he’d also left her knowing she had no phone.Classy move, Abernathy. “He should have waited until you were safely on your way.”
“It’s not his fault. I didn’t let on how bad I was feeling.” She offered a weak smile. “I’m a pretty good actress when I need to be.”
“Why the hell were you on his boat, anyway?”
She didn’t answer, but her silence told me what I’d already suspected. Mr. Abernathy held a seat on the local business commission, and no doubt, Claire had gone to plead Markham’s case. It was just like the ornery old man to insist on talking business during a fishing trip. While I was pissed, I couldn’t help but admire her tenacity. Too bad she would have endured both motion sickness and losing her phone for no reason. My feeling sorry for her didn’t change my position—that resort wasn’t happening if I had anything to say about it.
This was all the more reason I needed to step up my game—to get her out of town for her own good. Not only was she risking her well-being, but she was also wasting her time, and the Claire I had known would have hated that.
She swallowed the last of her water. “I think I’m feeling better now. If I can borrow your phone, I can call my sister to come pick me up.”
I frowned. “Why didn’t you call her in the first place?”
“I did. She didn’t answer.” Claire sounded a little annoyed, and I didn’t know if it was because I was giving her the third degree or because Stephanie hadn’t picked up. Probably both. I guessed that meant she really was feeling better.
Good.It was easier to remember she was the enemy when she didn’t look so pathetic. I took my phone out of my pocket and waited while she made the call.
After about thirty seconds, she cursed. “Sorry. If you don’t mind signing out of your Uber app, I can—”
I stood, my keys already in hand. “I’ll drive you.” I wasn’t trusting another Uber driver to do the right thing after her previous experience. Besides that, she’d been so shaky she hadn’t been able to walk into the bar on her own. I doubted Uber services extended to personally escorting her to her front door.
“You don’t have to do that. I’ve already caused enough trouble tonight.”
I scowled. “Refusing my offer is only causing more trouble, because I’ll have to go through the trouble of convincing you to do the sensible thing and take the ride.”
Inwardly, I cringed. I’d given both Hudson and Wes a hard time for joking at her expense, but my hostile attitude wasn’t any better. But what did she expect? She showed up at my business all damsel in distress, and I wanted to smooth her hair away from her face and feed her ginger ale and saltines. It pissed me off. She had no right to make me feel this way. If she hadn’t been so obviously ill, I’d have thought she was being manipulative.
