He was terrified that he would have to race through that vicious rain and vomit into the pitching sea. In defense, he once more lay down across the seat, fighting to breathe slowly and evenly. He began to count the minutes until he reached solid land again.

And must have fallen asleep.

He dreamed of snakes sliding under his skin, the slither of them ice cold. Of a woman with blue eyes and long gold hair who cried out—all pain and pleas—as he brought a cane down, again and again, to batter her.

She’s quiet now. Quiet now. Spawn of Satan.

Of a bolt of blue lightning that shot like an arrow out of the sky and into his heart. He dreamed of terror and vengeance and hate.

He dreamed of a lovely woman in a white dress who wept as she curled on a marble floor. Of a wood, dark under a new moon, where he stood holding a knife to a smooth white throat. And this time, when it sliced clean and her blood covered him, the world erupted. The sky split and the sea opened its mouth wide, to swallow all who had stood against him.

He awoke with screams strangling in his throat, slapping at himself as if to kill whatever was crawling inside him. For an instant he stared horrified in the rearview mirror. And eyes that weren’t his, eyes pale as water, stared back.

Then the ferry let out its blasting note to herald the docking on Three Sisters. The eyes that stared back at him as he dragged out his handkerchief to wipe his damp face were red-rimmed, haunted, and his own.

Just caught a little bug, he assured himself. He’d been working too hard, traveling too much. Crossing time zones too often. He would take a day or two to rest, to let his system catch up. Bolstered by the idea, he snapped on his seat belt, started his car. And drove off the ferry ramp and onto Three Sisters Island.

The storm turned into a gale. On the second day of it, Mac surfaced from his work and took a good look around. He’d had another shipment of books sent in, and replacement parts for some of his equipment. Right now he had pieces of a sensor spread all over the little kitchen table. A monitor that was acting up stood on the counter with its guts spilling out.

The kitchen still smelled of the eggs he’d burned that morning—which, he had to admit, he’d had no business making when his mind was elsewhere.

He’d broken a glass, too. And had a nice slice in his heel, since he’d gotten distracted before he swept it all up.

He’d turned the entire cottage into a lab, which wasn’t so bad. But without a lab assistant cleaning things up behind him, he’d also turned it into a disaster.

He really didn’t mind working in a disaster area, but it certainly wouldn’t do as a permanent living arrangement.

If the cottage was too small to accommodate him and his work on more than the short term, it was certainly too small to accommodate a . . .

Ripley, he thought quickly. He wasn’t quite ready to use the term “wife,” even in his thoughts. Not that he didn’t want to marry her, because he did. And not because he doubted she would marry him. He would just wait her out in that area until she caved. He’d match his patience against her stubbornness any day of the week.

But first things first.

When a man wanted to settle down permanently, he had to find a place to settle. However much affection he had for the cottage, it wouldn’t fill the bill. And he doubted seriously if Mia would sell it. He rose, and managed not only to tread on a screw but to step on it at the exact point of his recent cut. He spent a little time on some inventive cursing and hobbled out to find the shoes he’d thought he’d already put on.

He found a pair in the bedroom doorway, where they had obviously planted themselves, cagily waiting for him to trip over them.

And holding them, took a look at the bedroom. Winced.

He didn’t usually live like a slob. Okay, he admitted, he didn’t usually intend to live like a slob. It just happened.

Forgetting the shoes, he pushed up his sleeves. He would shovel out the bedroom and use the manual labor to clear his mind. He needed to think about a house.

It needed to be a pretty good size so his equipment didn’t get in everybody’s way. He would need an office, too.

Not entirely sure when he might have changed his sheets last, he decided to err on the side of caution and stripped them off.

It would be good if there was space to set up weights and exercise equipment. Ripley would want some space of her own, too, he imagined, and started gathering up socks, shirts, underwear. Somewhere she could get away from him when he started to drive her crazy.

His mother called hers an escape hatch, he remembered, and reminded himself to phone home. He carted the laundry to the tiny room off the kitchen, missed stepping on the same screw by a hair, and stuffed everything that would fit into the washing machine. He added soap, then deciding he should write down some of the basic house requirements, wandered out to find a pad and forgot to turn on the washing machine.

Three bedrooms minimum, he thought. Four would be better.

Someplace close to the water. Not that anywhere on the island was far from it, but Ripley was used to living right on the beach so . . .

“Booke, you idiot! It’s staring you right in the face. You knew the first time you saw it.”

He dashed to the phone and dialed long distance information. “New York City,” he told the operator. “I need the number for Logan Enterprises.”

An hour later, to celebrate what he considered the first step in becoming a homeowner, he braved the elements. Thaddeus Logan hadn’t jumped at the offer, but he hadn’t dismissed it out of hand, either. It hadn’t hurt that Logan was acquainted with Mac’s father. Connections within connections, Mac thought as he hissed in his breath and decided to walk to Café Book rather than risk the iced-over roads in his Rover.

He had a good feeling about it, and he was certain Logan would negotiate. Which reminded Mac—he should call his father for advice in that area. The one thing he was sure of was if you wanted something too much, and the other party knew it, you were asking to get skinned. He needed to do some research on real estate values in the area, and he patted his pockets absently, hoping for a handy piece of paper to make a note to himself.

Not that the money mattered all that much, but the principle did. And he imagined that if he let himself get taken, Ripley would get torqued about it. That would start the whole process off on a bad note. Tomorrow, Mac promised himself, he would take a drive and get another good look at what was going to be theirs.