Warm Nights in Magnolia Bay

by Babette de Jongh

  Wolf panted agreement.

  “You want to come home with me?” He patted his leg and took a step toward the driveway. “Come on, pal.” Wolf hung back and looked toward the lighted bedroom window.

  “Come on, Wolf.” More than anything, Quinn didn’t want to be alone tonight to contemplate his many mistakes that had ruined his life up until now and eventually culminated in this moment. He’d been shortsighted and selfish, maybe not just recently; maybe he’d been that way all his life. He probably deserved to be alone, but he didn’t want that. Not tonight, and not ever again. He patted his leg, this time adding a little whistle of encouragement. “Come on, buddy. We can have steak for dinner.”

  Wolf took a couple of steps, then looked back again.

  “Fine. Never mind.” Quinn didn’t deserve companionship, not even that of a stinky half-wolf that smelled like a dog.

  Abby’s bedroom light went out, plunging everything, even the air in front of Quinn’s face, into complete darkness. He fumbled for his phone and used the flashlight function to light the way back to the pool house.

  He’d made it some distance down the driveway when he heard the faint sound of Wolf walking behind him, panting and whining softly. Clearly anxious about leaving the farm to follow Quinn, Wolf kept going, even when they left the farm’s open gate and turned the corner onto Quinn’s property. When Quinn opened the sliding door to the pool house and invited Wolf inside, the dog dropped to his haunches on the concrete and looked back at the dark house next door.

  “You don’t have to stay,” Quinn said. “I get it. I’d rather be there, too, but I’m not welcome anymore.”

  Wolf lowered his elbows to the ground and put his head on his paws with a groan. He seemed to understand how it felt to be banished from the lives of people he loved.

  * * *

  Quinn hardly slept that night, and what little sleep he got was riddled with nightmares of driving a pickup downhill with no brakes around hairpin turns—with a load of alligators in the back and Wolf in the passenger seat.

  Exactly what his life felt like right now: out of control with a truckload of problems and only one friend in the world, a smelly wolf dog who didn’t even trust him enough to come inside the house and get a much-needed bath.

  While Quinn twisted in his sheets, he at least had time to twist and turn his Rubik’s Cube of problems around and examine potential solutions from every angle. When the prospect of sleep went from elusive to impossible, he turned on his light and got out his legal pad. He hadn’t made a list in a long while, but now it seemed imperative. He had to sort out his thoughts and consider his options, so he uncapped his pen and made a list.

  1. Sell out now; list the place as-is and be done with it.

  But if he did that, JP would snap it up, so he might as well…

  2. Call JP, negotiate a high price for the estate, take him up on his job offer, and insist on an advance so I can move away from here immediately.

  But if he did that, he’d lose his time with Sean, along with any chance of reconciling with Abby.

  3. Call Reva, apologize profusely, beg her to intercede with Abby, and promise to…

  But he didn’t know what he could promise that would make things right, and besides, he didn’t know Reva’s cell phone number.

  4. Call Mack, get Reva’s number, do #3 above.

  But he still didn’t know what he could promise that would make things right.

  5. Continue to renovate the estate and promise Abby the moon if she’ll forgive me and move in with me and live happily ever after.

  But that wouldn’t work unless her aunt Reva still lived next door. And Abby had said that she never wanted to see him again—unless and until he fixed the problem he’d created. Which left him with…

  6. Find a way to make sure that Reva’s animals can stay at Bayside Barn.

  Frustrated and entirely too frazzled to go back to sleep, Quinn got up, got dressed, and made coffee. The shadow of Wolf’s form lying just outside the glass door was only slightly darker than the darkness beyond. In another hour, the bay would become visible through the darkness, a pale-gray shimmer in the distance. After that, the sky above the trees would turn a soft pearl pink.

  Maybe by the time all that happened, Quinn would’ve come up with a plan. He sat at the kitchen table, sipped his hot black coffee, and underlined the only possible solution he’d come up with:

  6. Find a way to make sure Reva’s animals can stay at Bayside Barn.

  The solution was unfortunately short on details, and no matter how much he thought and doodled and wrote stupid ideas that he ended up crossing out, he couldn’t come up with a viable plan.

  What he needed was a change of scenery, something to occupy his mind and his hands just enough to allow his thoughts to sort themselves out. The sky was beginning to turn pink when he took a fresh cup of coffee and his legal pad—in case inspiration struck—out to the main house.

  Wolf followed until Quinn went inside. It seemed from the way he acted that he’d never been inside a house before. “Come on, Wolf. It’s okay.” Quinn snapped his fingers, he whistled, he slapped his leg; none of it was convincing. “Fine. Suit yourself.” He went inside and left the door open so at least Wolf could see him.

  He was already set up to paint, so he plugged his phone into the Bose speaker, uncapped a five-gallon bucket of paint, and dipped the lightly textured paint roller in. His renovation plan was roughly a top-down model; he had painted all the upstairs rooms and installed new light fixtures throughout. Downstairs, he had installed can lights and painted the ceiling. Now, he was painting the downstairs walls an innocuous warm tan color. The trim and baseboards would be a creamy almost-white, but that would be the last thing he did after refinishing the hardwood floors.

  The flooring project would be the most time-consuming, but the paint made the biggest visible difference. This old house was beginning to look like a home, and with every stroke of the paint roller, Quinn imagined what it might be like to live here with Abby.

  He took a step back to survey the wall he’d just finished and noticed a flash of movement from the corner of his eye.

  Wolf had commando-crawled into the room and now sat like a sphinx, watching Quinn intently. “What?” Quinn asked. “You need an award for coming inside?”

  Wolf put his head on his paws and blinked.

  “I’ll get you something later.”

  Quinn had just turned to dip the roller again when he heard a footstep on the dusty wooden floor.

  “There he is.” Abby came into the room and hovered near the door. “I was worried.” Georgia whined in delight and rushed up to Wolf, happily licking his face.

  Quinn looked around at Abby and tried to keep his face expressionless, even though it hurt like hell to see her being so standoffish. “You’re up early.”

  “Georgia woke me up and insisted that I follow her over here.”

  Quinn wished he knew what to do or say. Abby seemed just as spooky and afraid as Wolf had been about coming in here. If he turned around, or even said anything about the big-ass elephant standing between them, she might bolt and run. So he turned his back to her and kept painting, and came up with something to say that he hoped would be as neutral as the wall paint. “He followed me back to the pool house last night. Slept outside even though I tried to invite him in.”

  “He won’t come inside my house, either.”

  He kept painting, sliding the roller along the walls one neat row at a time. “He’s in here now though,” Quinn said. “Maybe this is a turning point for him.”

  “I hope so.” Abby’s voice, Quinn noticed, was just as carefully expressionless as his.

  “I guess I should’ve sent you a text to let you know he was here.” But she’d been ignoring most of his texts anyway, so even if it had occurred to him, he probably wouldn’t have done it.
“Sorry you were worried.”

  “Not your fault.” Her unsaid words, like everything else, hung in the vast void between them. Meanwhile, Georgia and Wolf were all over each other, practically moaning with delight.

  “Get a room,” Quinn and Abby both said at the same time.

  Quinn paused in his painting, but only for a heartbeat.

  “Snap,” Abby said, her voice sounding weak.

  He emptied the roller, then stood with his back to her, wondering what to do next. “This is ridiculous,” he said under his breath.

  “The walls look good,” she said at the same time, not much louder.

  He turned around and hung the roller on the edge of the bucket. “Abby, I know you don’t want to have anything to do with me, and if that’s your decision, I’ll have to live with it. But no matter what you decide, we need to talk first.”

  She crossed her arms, and her luscious, always-smiling mouth went hard. “I don’t have anything to say to you until you fix the problem you created for my aunt.”

  Moving slowly, he reached for a painter’s rag and started methodically cleaning his hands. “I understand that’s how you feel. However, even though I sat awake most of the night trying to figure out how to do that, I’m coming up empty. For your aunt’s sake, if not for mine or yours, I need your help.”

  Chapter 24

  Much as Abby hated to admit it, Quinn was right. They did need to talk. “So talk,” she invited. Not very graciously, she had to admit.

  “Let’s go where we can sit.” He gestured toward the pool house, and she led the way, keeping as much space between them as possible. On the patio, he slipped past her and opened the sliding door, then stood aside to let her go in first. So polite. So stilted.

  So sad.

  Abby’s eyes stung with tears she wouldn’t allow to fall. She’d cried enough already. How could he have betrayed her the way he did? She’d been closed off, locked up, her wounded heart armored against any further pain. And he’d slowly and methodically dismantled all her efforts at self-protection. Even making her open her heart to his son, whom Quinn could snatch away from her on a whim.

  She sat in the center of the small couch, leaving no doubt that Quinn wasn’t invited to sit next to her.

  Thank God she hadn’t let Sean get too close.

  And at that thought, she heard her indrawn breath stutter. Because she had let Sean get too close. She cared what happened to him, and she cared whether she ever got to see him again. Quinn held not only one, but two giant slices of her heart.

  “You want water?” Quinn asked from the kitchen. His voice sounded almost—but not quite—normal.

  “Yes, please.” It would give her something to do, some small shield to hold between herself and Quinn. Between herself and her own feelings, which seemed to be expanding inside her and trying to break out.

  Instead of handing the water glass to her, he set it down on the table in front of her. He could tell that she didn’t want to touch him.

  He’d left the door open for the dogs, but they didn’t come in. They lounged by the pool, being obscene with each other. All that unconditional love made her want to… Well, she didn’t know what it made her want to do. Forgive him? No. Smack him? Maybe. She couldn’t decide.

  He sat across from her in the matching chair. “So. You wanted to talk.” She agreed it was necessary, but she wasn’t about to make it easy for him. “You go first.”

  “I fucked up.” He leaned forward, his forearms propped on his thighs, his fingers linked in front of him. “I complained to my real estate agent about those loud, annoying field trips when I first moved in here, before I’d even met you.”

  “You complained.” She leaned back and crossed her arms. “And your Realtor just decided to take it upon himself to make your problem neighbor disappear.”

  “Herself.”

  Abby waved that stupid detail away with a flick of her fingers.

  “And no,” he continued, his expression earnest. “She didn’t just decide to take it upon herself. I told her to do whatever it took to make the problem go away, and I promised her a signing bonus once she helped me sell this place.”

  Abby crossed her legs and swung one foot, struggling to contain her anger. “And then what? You called your ex-boss—”

  “Business partner,” he interrupted. “But I—”

  “Whatever.” She flicked her fingers again and swung her foot harder. “You called JP and cooked up—”

  “I didn’t—”

  She scowled at him and he shut up. “And y’all cooked up a scheme to get rid of Bayside Barn, a scheme you backed out of after you convinced me to have sex with you?”

  “Well, in my defense, you didn’t take much…” His voice trailed away, probably when he noticed the angry smoke coming out of her ears. He cleared his throat. “I didn’t call him; he called me. And we didn’t scheme or cook up anything. I told him I would think about what he said and get back to him, just to get him off the phone.”

  “And you knew all this was about to happen, and you knew that you caused it, but you didn’t say anything to me. You lured me in with your helpful-nice-guy act and let me make a fool of myself over you. You lured me in, and all the while, you were lying to me.”

  “No.” His voice sounded gentle and sad. “It wasn’t like that.” He spread his hands, an unspoken plea for her to listen. “I swear, I didn’t put the two things together in my mind. I had blown off steam to my real estate agent, and when I didn’t hear back from her, I figured she had ignored me. I had no idea she had spilled everything to JP.”

  “Well, why didn’t you tell me he wanted to buy all the land around us? Didn’t you think my aunt had a right to know that?”

  “JP’s always full of grandiose plans. I didn’t think anything would come of it.”

  “Humph.” She swung her foot, percolating on what he’d said. She could see how Quinn might have been too self-involved to have noticed what was going on all around him, or to care how it might impact her aunt. “Okay. I’ve heard you out.” She stood. “I’m going now.”

  He jumped up and put a hand on her arm, a gentle, don’t-go touch. “Can we please try again?”

  She shrugged away, and his hand dropped to his side. “You have a big problem to solve before I’ll think about that. You can keep me posted on your progress, and I’ll help out if I can. And Sean is always welcome at the farm. You can tell him you’re too busy to stop what you’re doing, and I won’t say anything about the current situation. That’s the best I can do for you right now.”

  He put his hands in his pockets. His eyes were serious and sad. “I understand.”

  She walked out through the open door, and he followed. Georgia put her front paws on Quinn’s leg and smiled her snarly grin, wagging her tail. It seemed to Abby that Georgia was asking him to come back to the farm with them. He petted her head, a reluctant no.

  Abby turned her back and crossed the pool patio. After a second, she heard Georgia’s nails on the concrete as she trotted to catch up.

  “Can Wolf stay here with me?” Quinn called out.

  “Sure,” she called back over her shoulder. “He’s not my dog anyway. Never has been.”

  * * *

  Quinn tried to go back to painting—and he did; he painted another wall and the stairwell—but he had a hard time settling in. His heartbeat seemed to reverberate under his skin, making him feel jumpy and disconnected. Antsy. Like he needed to be doing something else. “Screw it.” He put the lid back on the paint bucket and took the roller and brush outside to rinse with the hose. He had to get out of here and do something different. Get on his motorcycle and let the wind blow through him with a fresh perspective.

  Anyway, it was past lunchtime, and his stomach was growling at him.

  He ended up at a bayside pub he had ridden past but never had time
to stop at. From the outside, the place looked festive but relaxing, with rows of multicolored triangular flags fluttering from the edges of a vine-covered arbor in the morning breeze. Lights that hung from the arbor’s beams were turned off now, but the sun sparkled off the bulbs. As he got off his motorcycle, a wind chime he couldn’t see made a happy, high-pitched clanking sound.

  It took a second for his eyes to adjust to the dim interior. The hostess looked up from her station near the entrance. “Table for one?” She cocked her head, her ponytail swinging. “Or would you rather sit at the bar?”

  He glanced at the long bar that faced a wall of windows overlooking the water. A few people sat with their backs to him, but the bar wasn’t crowded by any means. “I’ll sit at the bar.”

  She led him to a seat and handed him a menu. While he surveyed the menu, he felt a steady gaze on him and looked to his right.

  “Hey, Quinn,” Mack said. “How’s it going?”

  “Abby dumped me.” He closed his menu. “How you doing?”

  “My wife kicked me out.”

  Quinn gasped. “Dude. I’m sorry to hear that.”

  Mack shrugged. “I guess it’s just as well. Neither of us was very happy.”

  “Still, man. That’s raw. I’m so sorry. If you need a place to stay, I’ve got room.”

  “Thanks, but I’m okay.”

  “Where you staying?”

  “The vet’s office. Good thing we kept a full bath and bedroom at the back of the building when we renovated. Figured they’d come in handy if I had to stay overnight to monitor a critical case.” He took a swig of his drink. “Didn’t figure I’d have to move in.”

  The bartender came up with a notepad in hand, his pen poised to write. Quinn ordered a loaded burger and fries, then looked over at Mack. “You want another drink?”

  Mack nodded, his face glum. “Sure. Straight-up bourbon.”