Beach House No. 9

by Christie Ridgway

  Griffin considered putting on nicer clothes. The Asshole Author Ian Stone had looked as if he was ready for a photo shoot. But then Griffin shrugged. His ragged jeans and soft shirt printed with pineapples and naked wahines might have seen better days, but, hell, so had he. It took a moment to slip into his second-best flip-flops and then he was ambling down the sand toward the restaurant.

  “She’ll be grateful,” Griffin said aloud, addressing a seagull picking at a mound of drying kelp. “It’ll be my small attempt at paying her back.” For the way she made him laugh, for that annoyed little squint of her eyes when he was teasing her, for those ridiculously frilly shoes and fascinatingly plump mouth.

  For the great sex.

  Yeah, he owed her a lot for that.

  It was conch-shell time at Captain Crow’s. From his Party Central days, he recognized most of those crowded on the beach saluting the martini flag. As they all climbed back up the steps to their tables and drinks, he joined them, and was immediately tugged into a free chair.

  A beer was shoved in his hand. A girl in a bikini plopped onto his lap and slid an arm around his neck.

  A month ago, life wouldn’t have been any better than this, but now he could only think of Jane. He slid out from under the pretty girl and surveyed the deck for his pretty girl. Yeah, she wasn’t really his, of course, but she certainly didn’t belong to The Smug Author Ian Stone.

  That’s exactly how he looked too, gazing on Jane as if he knew all her buttons and exactly how to push them. Griffin would bet a billion bucks that the other man didn’t know how Jane took her coffee—one dollop of half-and-half and a stingy sprinkle of real sugar—how she liked her pencils—sharpened to the point of battle-readiness—how sweet she looked in the morning wearing only the perfume of lovemaking and a pillow crease.

  He stalked to their corner table. Without looking at the other man, he addressed Jane. “Hey, I’ve been waiting for you back at No. 9.”

  Her expression was cool. “I thought you’d be busy packing.”

  “And we’re busy having a private conversation,” The Annoying Asshole Author Ian Stone put in.

  Griffin showed him his teeth. He didn’t believe either of them would call it a smile. “Let me make it a much shorter conversation. She said no. Goodbye.”

  “I want to work with her again,” the other man started. “It’s a good offer.”

  “And I’m considering it,” Jane put in.

  Griffin stared at her. “Are you kidding me? This guy’s a smarmy hack who treated you like crap when he had you.”

  “That’s number one New York Times bestselling hack to you,” Stone said in his snobby voice.

  “This isn’t about what you write, okay? This is about Jane.” He narrowed his eyes at her. “Is this because your father gave him some sort of endorsement?”

  She waved that away with a sour look on her face.

  Griffin’s stomach was sour. Sour with the idea of Jane working with this man. He’d once thought she was still in love with Ian Stone, but of course Jane wouldn’t love someone who had the looks of a bowl of oatmeal and the kind of mind that imagined every great love affair meant someone had to end up weeping on the last page. Who would think up shit like that?

  He pointed at the other man, the churning burn in his stomach turning to fire in his blood. “He’s a pessimist, you know that, don’t you, Jane? How can you think of working with someone who is…who is…”

  “Kind of like you?”

  That hurt. He pulled over a chair and slammed into it, turning his back on Ian Stone to focus exclusively on the librarian who was looking at him as if she wished she had a ruler or, better, one of her lethal pencils. “I’m not a pessimist, Jane.”

  “I’m not one either,” That Asshole Author put in.

  Griffin ignored him. “Jane…”

  Her gray eyes were calm, and when she crossed one leg over the other, he couldn’t help but notice the funky shoes, so Jane with their cork wedge and leather-and-rope straps. Over the toes was a matching bow. Ian Stone probably didn’t even realize she had a most unique and arousing taste in footwear.

  “He didn’t appreciate you before. He won’t appreciate you now,” Griffin said.

  “I have to work. And personal history aside, there’s merit to the idea. Another success with him will recoup my reputation.”

  The one that Griffin had failed to improve. He put the heels of his hands to his suddenly throbbing temples. “I still say this is about your father. You’re thinking if you do this, Daddy’ll be happy. His seal of approval on the job makes you think you’ll have his approval for yourself.”

  “Stop,” she said. “Stop talking.”

  He wouldn’t. She’d flapped her mouth at him plenty of times, hadn’t she? “But your father’s opinion is not worth the hot air it rides on, Jane. He should know how special, how special and lovable you are. Success is not a necessity to make that happen. And neither is working with Dumb-ass.” His thumb jerked toward Stone.

  The other man’s chair scraped back. “Who are you calling Dumb-ass?” he asked, leaping to his feet.

  “You.” Griffin flicked him a careless glance. “Christ, man, you have to know that already. You’re the one who stepped out on Jane. You’re the one who lost her and then went out of your way to hurt her in the aftermath. Just another idiot who doesn’t know a real treasure when he has one.”

  He must have touched a nerve, because The Asshole Author Ian Stone wrapped his fingers around the back of Griffin’s collar and tried to yank him from his seat. Of course, he was too short and Griffin too solid to budge. Still, it added another layer of pissed-offness to what was turning into a really shitty day. Grabbing the other man’s wrist, he jerked his hand free of his shirt.

  The old fabric ripped. “I love this shirt,” he said from between his teeth. Then he shoved out of his seat.

  “Griffin,” Jane said. “Calm down.”

  “As soon as I beat the crap out of this guy.” It suddenly seemed like a great idea. A real problem-solver. He turned to confront the man and gave the classic gimme gesture.

  Face going red, the author charged him like a bull.

  Griffin shoved him aside, then went after him with his right. Ian Stone got a good crack at his jaw before getting punched in the face. The pretty boy stumbled back, falling into a chair.

  Someone whooped, “Bar fight!” and his Party Central buddies gathered round. All that free booze he’d offered up in the past bought him a lot of goodwill. They started up a chant: “Griffin! Griffin! Griffin!”

  The Asshole Author Ian Stone shook his head. Then he placed his palms on the arms of the chair, getting ready for another go. When he stood, Griffin allowed him to start a second charge. Then he swept his leg, sending the clown flat on his ass. He’d learned the move from a twenty-year-old native of Kansas City on a freezing day when practicing fight moves seemed a finer way to keep warm than huddling by the diesel-powered heaters.

  The kid had later lost an eye to a Taliban bullet.

  And remembering, Griffin wanted to hit someone all over again. “Get up,” he said to Ian Stone, feeling his temper redoubling, shooting fire into his blood and hardening his fists into blocks of cement. “Get the hell up.”

  A hand touched his elbow, and he spun toward the new threat, his right arm lifting, ready to swing. At Jane. He froze, his arm cocked to attack.

  The world went still. Sound and light and everything dropped away but his fist, set to strike her face. Jane’s beautiful face. He couldn’t breathe.

  How could this happen? He’d almost hurt her, his Jane, with the soft hair and tender mouth and clear-as-mirrors eyes.

  In them he saw the bastard that was himself.

  Lurching back, he bounced off a table. The rebound brought him near to her again, and she flinched. At the sight, he thought he might throw up. “I’m sorry,” he said, his voice hoarse and ugly. “I would never hurt you.”

  But of course he had.

&nb
sp; The crowd around them was silent now, and two bikini girls scuttled out of his way when he made to leave. Leaping off the top step, he landed in the sand and wished he could get a hundred miles away a hundred times faster. He wished he wouldn’t be taking himself when he got to wherever he was going.

  Jane caught up with him before he’d made it back to the beach house. She must have run, because she was breathless and her cheeks were red. “Griffin, stop. Wait.”

  Shoving his hands into his pockets, he halted without looking at her. He couldn’t look at her. “What is it?”

  “It’s what I wanted to talk about before Ian showed up.”

  His stomach roiled again. “I don’t want to hear it, Jane.”

  “Well, too damn bad. Not ten minutes ago you were telling me how lovable I am. I just wanted to return the favor.”

  “Ha.” It was a bitter laugh. “I almost punched you.”

  “Almost.”

  “And last night…” Oh, shit. Just where he didn’t want this conversation to go. He pressed his temples between his palms and sent her a glance. “You give too much.”

  “I might never see you again. You’re going someplace dangerous, and who knows what might happen there?” Tears clogged her voice. “So I think I have to tell you—”

  “Don’t be silly and emotional, Jane,” he said, desperate to stop her.

  Her hurt expression made clear the verbal punch had done its work.

  He started walking again.

  Still, she kept talking. “I won’t apologize for falling in love with you.”

  Griffin jerked at the words. She’d said them, damn her, and they seemed to strip away a layer of his skin. How could she do this to him? He’d never set out to hurt her, and now there was no way to escape it.

  “I won’t be sorry for being silly and emotional because now I realize the alternative,” Jane continued, pitching her voice louder. “And that’s being cold and alone like my father.”

  Another beat went by; he distanced himself a few more feet. But then she spoke again. “Cold and alone like you.”

  He kept moving.

  “It’s no strings attached, Griffin, I just wanted you to know. I get that you don’t love me—”

  “You don’t get it at all!” He whirled to face her. “I don’t want to love you. I don’t want to ever love anybody.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  GRIFFIN DIDN’T KNOW what to do with himself, so he drove to visit Rex during the hospital’s evening visiting hours. Anything to occupy himself since he couldn’t find his iPod, and nothing on television—not even 24/7 news—was working as a tranquilizer. He ran into his sister near the bank of elevators on her way to see the old man too. “David took the kids out for pizza to give me a break,” Tess said.

  Even in the shittiest mood of all time, he could attempt some social niceties. “How are the minions?”

  “Great. Happy to be home with a happy mom and dad.”

  “Listen, you gotta do something about Duncan and Oliver.” He might not get another chance to tell her before he left the States. “That Cheeto thing just creeps me out.”

  “David’s working on it,” Tess said. “Why don’t you come home with me after our visit and give him some opinions on how to best do that? I made a cake for dessert.”

  Griffin stepped back. “No.” He’d just gotten the tribe of them out of his life. “I don’t feel much like cake.”

  “That’s the thousandth time you’ve refused to do a family thing with us since you returned from Afghanistan. If I hadn’t come to the cove, would we have seen you at all this summer?”

  He ignored the question. “A thousand is an overstatement. And I just don’t have a big interest in cake.”

  Unexpected tears glittered in his sister’s eyes. He groaned. “What is it now, Tessie? What’s wrong?”

  She held the back of her hand to her nose. “I heard what you said in Rebecca’s class. That the civilian world is dull after coming back from war.”

  He shrugged, not following her thought.

  “You think we’re dull. Is that why you won’t come over for dessert? Is that why Gage never visits? The two of you are too busy on your never-ending quest for the next adrenaline high?”

  Why hadn’t he stayed home and pushed pins beneath his fingernails? His sister looked ready to bawl.

  “I can’t speak for Gage,” he said. “It’s just…I’m sorry.” He shrugged again.

  Tess stepped forward. He held out his arms, exhorting himself to give her a comforting hug. Instead she whacked him on the shoulder with her purse. “Ow!” he said. She carried one of those bags big enough to hold a circus. Including the elephant. She lifted it again, and he put up his hands. “What’s gotten into you?”

  “You’re so dumb, that’s what!” She put her fists on her hips. “How do you think you find meaning in our mundane world? You come to your family—you find your purpose with them.”

  “What purpose is that?” he asked, half bemused and half bewildered by her diatribe.

  She made a wild gesture that had her purse swinging. “Teach your nephews how to catch a ball—David’s got the bicycle down, but he hates baseball. Get to work glaring at your niece’s first dates. Tickle Baby Russ’s belly.”

  “Tess—”

  “And then find a woman who you can value and love every day.”

  “Tess—”

  “Which bring me to Jane,” his sister said.

  His expression must have made some sort of statement.

  His sister groaned. “Griffin. Tell me you haven’t ruined what you had with her.”

  “We didn’t have anything.” Just the greatest sex, the best laughs, the kind of connection he’d never found with another woman. The elevator arrived with a ping. “Get off my back, Tess.”

  They stepped into the empty metal box. “I thought there was some magic at the cove,” Tess said. “Seeing you and Jane, I had high hopes, and with Gage exchanging letters with Skye, for a moment I even thought…”

  He stared at his sister. “Gage and Skye?”

  Tess waved a hand. “Forget it. Now I wouldn’t wish you and your twin on any woman.”

  Magic at the cove, Griffin mused, as the elevator chugged upward. What a crock. And to think he’d sold Colonel Parker on the idea. Colonel Parker, who wouldn’t be bringing his darling daughter to No. 9 after all. He thought of Vance Smith, the combat medic who always kept his cool. Could that last during the month at the cove he’d promised to a fatherless girl? Still recuperating from his own wounds, he’d be at the beach house in mere days.

  Which got him thinking about the email he’d received that very morning. Vance himself, touching base. Griffin was still confused by it. The man seemed to be operating under the impression that the colonel’s daughter, Layla, was a child, when Griffin knew for a fact she was in her mid-twenties—all grown up. Must be me who misunderstood Vance, he decided. Still, he sent the other man a silent message. Good luck, buddy.

  When Griffin and his sister found the coot’s room, Tess was still muttering about her twin brothers’ lack of intelligence, common sense and general good manners. “That’s rich, coming from you,” he told her. “We never ate food with our feet.”

  She ignored him to greet the elderly reporter with a kiss on the cheek, and Griffin could tell she was trying to be cheerful for the invalid’s sake. Rex looked pretty damn lively for someone ancient enough to be a first cousin to God, and Griffin told him so.

  “They’re letting me go home tomorrow,” the elderly man said. “After fourteen tests and being prodded and poked more than a rodeo clown, they say it was likely dehydration.”

  “Well, drink some more water, you irascible antique!” But the news solidified a hazy idea Griffin had. “Listen, Rex…I’m going overseas and could use somebody to look after Private. Are you up to it?”

  “Me? And that flea-bitten, mannerless, mangy canine that either pees on my bushes or tries to dig them up?”

  Gr
iffin lifted a shoulder. “If you’re not interested—”

  “I didn’t say I wasn’t interested. Someone has to take charge of that dog. I’ll bet I can teach him a little courtesy.”

  “You manage that, you should tackle Duncan and Oliver next.”

  He realized his sister was giving him a dirty look. “Hey,” he said, defending himself, “the curmudgeon scared the shit out of me when I was their age. It could work.”

  “It’s not about my boys,” she said. “It’s about this new plan of yours to go overseas. This is about Gage’s offer, I presume? You’re taking him up on it after all, and that’s why you had the falling-out with Jane.”

  “We haven’t had a falling-out.” There’d almost been a knockout, and the thought of it still sickened him—and only confirmed how necessary it was for him to get away from her.

  Suddenly that memory was front and center. Even the chatter between Tess and Monroe couldn’t prevent what was recurring in blazing Technicolor in his head. In one quick breath, it stopped being something he recalled and became something he was reliving.

  He’s on the deck at Captain Crow’s. Rage is a ball of fire in his belly. Ian Stone is a smug prick who thinks he’s going to get Jane back into his life and back into his bed. Griffin doesn’t want to allow him to have another chance to chip away at her confidence. Jane might seem to stand ten feet tall, but a lot of that is wedge heel and ribbon bows. She should be with a man who cherishes her, who will nurture her can-do attitude and spoil her on the days when she’s feeling blue.

  Ian Stone is not that man. And as Griffin waits for the jerk to get back up and come at him, his fists clench tighter.

  Then there’s that quick touch. He spins, his arm cocking back.

  Jane’s sweet face. Her little jerk of fear. The thudding crash his heart makes when it falls to the pit of his belly.

  He came back to the present and realized that Tess was gone and he was alone in the hospital room with his neighbor. Surprised, he looked around him. “I…”

  “She had to get back home to her husband and family. You answered when she said goodbye, but I didn’t think you were all here.” Rex waited a beat, then asked a casual question. “Flashback?”