A soft hand ran up Matt’s back. Abby was looking between the obviously tense men, a wrinkle between her eyebrows. “The ice cream guy wasn’t there, and it’s time to get ready for Claire’s. Everything all right?”
Chris smiled at her. “Peachy. I probably need to lay off the ice cream anyway.” He rubbed his solid middle like he was stroking a fat roll. “Don’t wait up for me, Dad. It’s all good.”
“Yeah?” Matt asked. He relaxed when Chris nodded.
“Yeah. Y’all better not be late for Claire. She’ll kill ya.” He waved and walked up the beach.
“What was that all about?” Abby asked, gathering up the cooler and folding the blanket as Matt slipped on his shirt. “And don’t say nothing, ’cause I’m not buying it.”
Matt sighed. “Just me being assy again. Seems to be a trend.” He flipped the blanket over his shoulder and took her hand. “Sure you don’t want to run away right now?”
“Very sure.”
Abby declined Matt’s invitation to join him in the shower, claiming that would definitely make them late. She handed him a towel when he opened the shower door, telling him about the way Tyler now avoided Sarah on the street, even when she said a pleasant hello.
Matt snorted, drying his chest and arms before toweling his head roughly. Dropping the towel to his waist, he saw Abby smiling at him in pleasure, appreciative but not coy, and he realized that he’d never been so comfortable in this position, not even during his brief marriage. Thinking back, he didn’t remember ever having a conversation with a woman while he was in the shower without a pre- or post-coital undertone. He liked it. He grinned back and flipped the towel up teasingly before going to work on his legs and feet. Abby laughed and headed to the living room to wait while he dressed.
After another stop at the cottage so Abby could change, they pulled up in front of the Eastmans’ house. “This place is huge.” Abby got out of the Jeep, taking in the brilliant white front of the sprawling manor house, anachronistic in its beach setting.
Matt walked around the car to take her hand. “Just think, this is the summer house. Charles’s family is horrified that he lives here year-round.”
The front door flew open, and Claire strolled out, holding out two drinks and smiling. “C started about a half-hour ago, so his stories should reach the level of unbearable in the time it takes you to drink these and two more.”
Abby smiled as she crested the three steps up to the sweeping, colonnaded porch. She took the proffered drink. “And what’s different if we drink these?”
Claire laughed. “Why, then he’ll just seem charming, dear.” She looped her arm through Abby’s and led her into the house.
Abby zoned in on a painting tucked in a niche in the wall. “Oh my…Claire…”
“Rather good, isn’t it?”
“That’s a Dali that I’ve never seen before! Ever.” She walked over to the painting and almost touched it with trembling fingers. “Has this ever been cataloged?”
Claire took Abby’s arm. “You’ll see many things here that are priceless, Abby, but may I ask you for a favor? Treat them like something you’d have in your home. They’re pretties, nothing more, a normal part of Charles’s life.” She snickered. “He thinks he’s just an average guy. And that’s part of why I love him.”
She opened a pair of French doors and led the way onto a covered patio so vast that it probably had the same square footage as Sarah’s aunt’s entire cottage.
“Abby, watch!” Charles called. He flipped a burger high in the air and laughed when it landed beside the enormous stainless steel grill.
Claire handed Abby another drink. “See? Incorrigible. You’ll need this.” She led Abby and Matt to a set of comfortable chaise lounges near the grill.
The conversation flowed easily over dinner as they devoured an astonishing amount of food, washing it down with glasses of iced tea and Claire’s drink concoctions. By the time Charles had a fire going to his satisfaction, they had eschewed the chairs in favor of sprawling on cushions around the fire pit. Eventually, conversation got around to the show. Matt exchanged a secret smile with Abby, wondering if her mind had jumped to later that night as quickly as his. He was startled when Claire tugged at his sleeve.
“I asked if you took Abby to that old café in Sausalito for lunch before the show. The one with the green tables and chairs? Remember the rhapsodies Kate went into over those tables?”
Abby raised an eyebrow in query, and Matt smiled at her. “Ex-wife. Very ex. Like,” he counted in his head, “eighteen years ex. Wow, almost a lifetime for your boy toy.”
Abby rolled her eyes and asked, “Artist?”
“Kate could talk about paintings for hours. She just never got around to creating one.”
Claire laughed. “That poor girl. Follows Matt out here from Philly, thinking she was ready to live like a Bohemian student. It lasted, what—eighteen months?—before she was back on a plane to Philadelphia. She was always a banker at heart. Do you ever hear from her, Matt?”
He shook his head. “She was doing something for my mother’s company and stationed in Paris the last time I heard anything, but that was probably ten years ago.”
“As I remember, she claimed she was coming back out until she met that guy, right? Long-distance romance.” Claire snorted disdainfully, then looked at Abby in the sudden silence.
“We were kids.” Matt swallowed the last of his drink. “And it was kind of a relief when she left. Not much of a romance.” He glared at Claire, and she had the good grace to look abashed.
Charles cleared his throat in the awkward silence and then asked how Claire was doing on the sales. She gave him a grateful smile.
“Well, I’ve had one back out. Baker’s pocket-monkey-yes-man. To be honest, Matt, you are very lucky that Peery has pull in that crowd. It could have gone either way.”
Matt grunted. “Did I make enough at the show to tell Baker to kiss my ass, give him his completed statues, and move on?”
Claire glared at him. “Weren’t you listening just now? Sure, you made a nice bit of cash, but Baker has influence. Call this your cushion…escape fund…whatever. He holds the big money. Finish this, and, with the Peerys’ help…well, you’ll be set up for a good, long time. Like maybe forever.” She got to her feet and extended her hand to Abby. “Let’s go get the ice cream. Mary made it just this morning, to C’s exact specifications.”
Abby looked at Matt hesitantly and then took Claire’s hand. The women headed toward the house, talking quietly.
After a few minutes of silence between the men, Charles spoke. “Pissed her off again.”
“Yep.”
“Why do you do these things?”
Matt sat up. “It’s a curse, I’m beginning to suspect. I’ve been cursed with assyness.”
“True enough,” Charles agreed. Another moment passed before it was his turn to sigh. “Do you think you can go in there and tell her to put it out, since you started all this? Ashtray breath is…” He shuddered. “I have no desire to argue with my hot wife tonight, so it’s up to you.”
Matt laughed, heaving himself to his feet and walking through the open doorway. He wandered toward the kitchen, touching a couple of his sculptures fondly and smiling at a few of Charles’s unfortunate mistakes, which were tucked into hidden niches. As he neared the kitchen doorway, he heard the telltale whir of the exhaust fan and knew Claire was using it to suck her cigarette smoke away before it could permeate the room. Hearing his own name, he paused, feeling like a creeper but unable to resist listening.
“…Worried about dealing with another of the walking wounded, boobing about how his family has screwed him up and left him unable to commit?” Claire laughed. “Nope. Not Matt at all. His dad’s a lovely guy. Moved to France a couple of years ago, following the surf, but I think he might be in Australia now. His mom—he’s told you about her, right?”
“A banker of some sort?”
Matt heard Claire hum her approval as
she took a deep drag. “She’s a nice lady, too. Came down here on vacay, fell for the hot surfer, and was amazed that the feeling was mutual. She tried, I think, but they were too different. Moved back to Philly when Matt was two or three, but she brought him out here for every vacation until he was old enough to travel alone. He came to Cali for college and stayed. No big drama. They both love Matt to distraction.”
Hearing his family dynamics described so succinctly left Matt feeling conflicted. Every word Claire said was true…but was it right? It seemed to him that a lifetime of niceness, of avoiding drama, might not have been such a good thing after all, because it was leaving him paralyzed when it came deciding what to do about Abby. Not to mention in figuring out what part a surf jockey could play in her life.
He shifted to step out of the shadow, but he stopped when Claire continued. “You haven’t asked, but Kate isn’t an issue either. Like I said, she was here and gone quickly—I don’t think he found her very interesting, and she had no idea how to reach him. The split was mutual, and they were pleasant while they stayed in touch.” Matt heard her bracelet jingle tellingly against crystal. “There. Done. I swear, that man of yours is giving me lung cancer by millimeters.” She paused, and Matt heard her set the ashtray down. “Now, are you going to tell me what’s wrong with you two? Something’s not right.”
Matt could hear the thread of sadness underneath Abby’s voice as she delivered Sarah’s news. “Silly to ask this stuff now, right? I’m leaving in less than a week. It’s just been on my mind…” Her voice trailed off.
“I’m sure something will work out. I know it.” Claire’s voice was muffled, and Matt peeked in to see the two women embracing.
He cleared his throat and walked into the kitchen. “Ready to go?” he asked Abby. “I think we’ll pass on the ice cream tonight.”
“I think Charles must have eaten it all anyway. Bastard,” Claire said fondly. She shrieked when Charles’s stealthy tiptoe across the kitchen ended with a wet kiss on the back of her neck. Matt and Abby laughed at his huge grin when his wife slapped at his shoulder.
Claire walked with Matt to his side of the car. “I know you were outside the door, creeper. Do something, or you’ll regret it for the rest of your life,” she murmured in his ear before returning to wrap her arm around Charles’s waist and wave goodbye.
Abby curled up on Matt’s sofa, not questioning his decision to bypass her cottage. She rested her hands on the arm of the sofa and laid her head on her hands, watching Matt build a small fire. “What a day,” she said when he returned to her with a blanket.
Matt sat beside her and covered them both. “Aside from the obvious, have you had fun?” He settled back, letting Abby adjust her head in the hollow of his shoulder.
“It’s been beyond wonderful,” Abby whispered, tightening her arm around Matt’s middle. They watched the flames for a while in silence, each lost in their own thoughts.
Matt felt his heart clutch and then speed up when Abby started to sit upright. “I guess you should take me home. I’m bound to be rotten company for what’s left of tonight.”
He held on to her arm. “Then we’ll be rotten company together. I don’t want to take you home.”
“I don’t want to call a cab again, Matt. The drivers are going to start talking.”
“I don’t want you to call a cab either. Stay here.”
Abby stopped trying to sit up. She stared at Matt in mock shock. “An invitation to invade the Batcave again, or whatever the hell Chris called it? First woman ever?” Matt smiled. “Ever?” Abby demanded playfully, and he nodded. “Then I accept.” She snuggled against him again and smiled. “If I went back to the cottage I’d probably start packing anyway.” Her smile faded.
Matt hurt when he thought of Abby throwing the last suitcase into Sarah’s little car and driving away. “No. Stay,” he whispered into her hair.
“I said I would, goofus.”
Matt shifted her around until their heads were both resting against the back of the couch, facing one another. He brushed her hair over her ear. “No, Abby. Stay. Here. With me. Don’t leave with Sarah. Finish your vacation and give me time to work something out.”
“Matt…” Abby’s voice was shaky.
“Don’t say no.” He trailed a line of kisses from her mouth to her ear, where he whispered, “I’m not ready for you to go. Stay with me.”
Abby pushed on his shoulders. “This is crazy. You’re willing disturb your peace here for a relationship that’s been going for less than a month?”
“This has been the best summer of my life, and I stopped saying that about twenty years ago. I don’t want it to end yet.” He swallowed hard, ready to keep arguing until morning if he had to.
Abby hesitated. Doubt warred with hope in her eyes. Then she smiled. “Yes.”
Matt rose from the couch, drawing Abby with him, and they started moving toward his bedroom. “This is right; you know it,” he said.
Abby chuckled wryly. “I’m not sure it’s sensible, but it’s what I want.” She stopped him in the hall. “I don’t operate on ‘I want,’ ever, but this time I don’t care if I’m being stupid. I need one thing from you, though.” She cupped his face. “I need you to promise me that you’ll say something right away if you’re sorry for asking, even if it’s tomorrow, or a week from now. Promise me, Matt.”
“I promise.” He hesitated briefly before he leaned in to kiss her, moving slowly and gently. He groaned, hands tightening on Abby’s hips as his gentle explorations became more intense, but he let Abby decide when to move closer.
When she did, it was with infinite slowness, tormenting him first with her distance, then her body heat, and then the lightest brush of her breasts against his chest. “Tell me we won’t be sorry, Matt,” she murmured against his cheek, feathering kisses along his jaw. “I’ll believe you.”
Matt heard the vulnerability in her voice and gently disengaged her hands from his shirt, stepping back enough that he could see her eyes. “I think it’s going to hurt like hell when you have to go. I still want you to stay.”
Abby sighed out a shaky breath. “Thank you.”
A few minutes later, in his room, the moonlight coming through the open window limned Abby’s skin with silver as her skirt floated to the floor. Matt sat on the foot of the bed, eyes traveling from face to shoulders to hips to feet as Abby waited, seemingly unworried this time about her flaws. She had proof in clay of what he saw when he looked at her, and he was glad she was no longer nervous under his gaze.
“Will you come here?” he requested.
Abby walked over and stood in front of him.
With one hand, he reached out and touched her stomach with the tips of his fingers. Abby shivered, and Matt smiled. He trailed the same fingertips down her side, barely brushing the outer curve of her breast before ghosting over her sensitive ribcage, continuing over her hip, and down her thigh. After the third time, Abby gasped, and Matt looked up from following his hand with his gaze. “Is this okay?”
Abby laughed shakily. “Very okay. Really, really okay.”
Matt smiled and urged her onto the bed to lie next to him. “Then I’ll do it right,” he murmured, starting his explorations in earnest.
Chapter Sixteen
SARAH LEANED BACK on her hands on Abby’s bed, watching her friend pack the last few things from her dresser. “Are you sure about this, babes?” she asked again and shifted her weight to one hand to hold up the other in a wait motion. “I know, I’m driving you crazy, but…Abby, you just don’t do stuff like this. You dated Eric for two years, and moving in together never even flew onto your radar, and you’ve known Matt for what, like…two months? I mean…” She stopped, her mouth opening and closing in several aborted attempts at speech. She gave up and scratched her head vigorously in frustration.
Abby looked around for any loose items she might have missed. “Will you relax? You’ve gone on vacation with a guy, right? Right. I seem to remember two weeks in B
arbados with…what the hell was his name? Jared? What’s the difference?”
Sarah flopped back on the bed with a groan. “I thought we agreed to never mention that vile name again. He’s an animal, not a guy.” Abby laughed, and Sarah rolled to her side and propped herself on her elbow with a serious look. She began ticking off points on her fingers. “And there are differences. First, it was half as long as this will be. B, I worked with him for almost a year before taking the highway to hell. Number three, I do—did—stupid shit like that all the time. Last…” Sarah stopped ticking off points and chewed her lip.
“Last?”
“I didn’t really care about Jared at all,” Sarah blurted out. “I liked his body, he made me laugh, and I saw a chance at an almost-free Caribbean vacation.” She flopped back again. “I hate being honest with myself. It’s exhausting. I’d rather live in ‘Sarah is a Perfect Princess’ land.” She sighed. “Anyway, that is so obviously not the case here. I’m totally self-absorbed, and even I can see that you’re in lo—”
“Sarah,” Abby warned.
“Yeah, I know, we’re not talking about it. And you don’t even believe in it anymore…but, Ab, won’t this make it harder when you come home? You are coming home, right?”
Abby sank down on the bed and laid her head on Sarah’s stomach. “A few weeks ago you were all gung ho about me dropping everything and moving here.”
Sarah grimaced. “That’s when I thought you would never in a million years do it. It sounds romantic until I think about you never coming home. Then shit gets real.”
Abby sighed. “Of course I’m coming home. I have a job and an apartment and a life in Boston.” None of that sounded appealing to her at the moment. “And, yes, staying will make it harder when I have to leave. But I don’t care. I…I have to do this.” Abby looked at her friend pleadingly, hoping that she was making sense.
Sarah’s face softened, and she stroked Abby’s hair back from her forehead. “I know,” she said. They were quiet for a moment, each lost in her thoughts.
The Art of Appreciation Page 21