Free A Rocky Path by Lauralynn Elliott Page A

protect me.”
    “And I appreciate him for it. But I’m a
little curious about him. Where does he live?”
    “He lives somewhere down the shore. He likes
to sit on the rocks and draw,” Emily said.
    “Why doesn’t he draw down by his own
house?”
    “I think he just likes the scenery better
here.”
    Sam grinned. “I bet he does.”
    Emily smiled at him. “Very funny.”
    “Seriously, just how much do you know about
this guy?”
    “All I need to know. He’s my friend and he
rescued me from possible rape.”
    Sam looked and her and raised his eyebrows.
“Do you really think Jamie is capable of something like that?”
    “Sam, you didn’t see what he was like. I’ve
never been so scared in my life. Jamie is a nice guy and I care a
lot about him, but when he’s drunk, he turns into something much
different than the man we know.”
    Sam looked thoughtful for a minute. “I wonder
why, after all this time, he decided to start drinking
tonight.”
    “I think I know a little about that. It may
be because I rejected him. He thinks I led him on and I guess maybe
I did. I didn’t mean to, Sam, I really thought maybe I could learn
to care about Jamie, but the feelings just weren’t there.”
    “And what about this Patrick fellow? Do you
have feelings for him?”
    Emily looked down at her hands. “I guess I
do. I don’t think he feels the same way, though.”
    “Then why did he rescue you tonight? If he
didn’t care about you, why did he get angry enough to throw Jamie
hard enough to give him a concussion?”
    “I don’t know. I guess he saw a female in
distress…”
    Sam cut her off. “And why did he just happen
to be here at the right time?”
    Emily thought about that a minute. Was
Patrick watching her? That thought sent a little thrill through
her.
    Just then the phone rang. It was Rebecca.
Jamie had a mild concussion and they were keeping him overnight at
the hospital. He would be able to come home the next evening. Emily
decided that would give her enough time to go see him tomorrow.
They needed to clear the air.
     
    * * *
     
    That night Emily couldn’t sleep, once again.
She roamed the house, restless and nervous. She finally went
downstairs to look at more of the paintings she had found. She was
delighted with the different scenes that she found. There were a
lot of different views of the ocean and of the rocky shore. Some
were painted with the sun just coming up over the water. Some were
on a sunny day with white fluffy clouds in the sky. And others were
painted at dusk, when the shadows were getting long and everything
was so beautiful it took her breath away. She knew what that scene
looked like, and it was painted perfectly. Who was this artist? Was
he or she part of the mystery? She thought the painter had to be a
man because only a man’s eye would see the blond woman the way that
picture was painted. The woman was beautiful. But it was more than
that. It seemed that the painter must have known her intimately.
She twisted the silver ring on her finger. She still couldn’t
believe that this ring belonged to the woman in the picture!
    She was getting to the end of the paintings.
There was one left. When she took the covering off of that one, she
gasped and turned pale at the sight. There on the canvas was
Patrick! Well, of course it couldn’t be Patrick, but this man was
identical to him, even down to the shoulder length hair and the
sapphire eyes. In the right hand corner of the painting was the
title….’Self Portrait’.
    He was dressed in a black coat and vest, with
a white shirt underneath. There was a white silk cravat around his
neck.
    Patrick had lied to her! He had said that he
was no relation to the McCullochs that had lived here for two
centuries. It had to be a lie! He was the very image of this man in
the painting. Patrick had to be a descendant of the McCulloch
family that had once lived here. Why would he lie to her? Did he
have some kind of ulterior motive? Did he want the