“He shouldn’t have lied to me about the paintings.”
“No, he shouldn’t have, but I know why he did.”
“I really thought I was good, you know? Now I might never lift a brush again.”
“Did you ever think he was trying to give you confidence because he knew how much you wanted to believe in your work? Maybe it wasn’t just about subsidizing your income. Maybe it was more about giving you an opportunity to prove to yourself that you’re a painter whose work is valued.”
“But that’s just it, my work isn’t valued.”
“Of course, it is Annalise. Don’t you value your work? Don’t you believe in it every time you pick up a brush?”
“I did.”
“Then that’s what matters. If the whole world gives you a mountain of accolades but you don’t believe in what you’re doing, it doesn’t mean anything.” And if the whole town tells you what a wonderful wife and mother you are, how you bake the best bumble berry pies and garner the most money at St. Michael’s Silent Auction with your watercolor paintings, but you don’t believe in what you’re doing, it doesn’t mean anything.
“I guess you’re right.”
“Your brother loves you. The last thing he’d ever do is hurt you.”
“He needs to let me live my own life and stop trying to control everything.”
“Give him time.”
“I guess.”
“And start depending more on that fiancé of yours. I see the way you call Quinn for advice and I’ll bet you told him about the sale before you told Michael, didn’t you?” When Annie blushed, Evie shook her head slowly. “No man wants to be an afterthought.”
“But Michael’s never available.”
“Because he doesn’t have to be.”
“He’s so busy.”
“Then maybe he isn’t the right man for you.”
“But I love him.”
“Then tell him, and work with him.”
“I’ll try.”
“Don’t just try, Annalise. Do. If Quinn sees you easing off, he might not like it at first, but he’ll adjust. And if you’re still suffering from those panic attacks, do something about it.”
Annie fiddled with her spoon. “I didn’t want you to know about that.”
“Why not? I’m responsible for them, aren’t I? I don’t want to carry that around the rest of my life, so please, make an appointment and see someone about it.”
“Actually, Michael made an appointment for me yesterday. The doctor’s one of his colleagues. I’m going to talk to him.”
“Good. You know, I’ll stay a while, but at some point, I am going to leave.”
“Why?” Her eyes filled with tears and desperation. “I mean, I was kind of hoping you’d stay in Philly.”
Despite the sad hopefulness in her daughter’s words, Evie couldn’t lie. “I won’t be staying.”
“Will you visit, even just sometimes? Please?”
Evie hesitated only a second before replying, “I would like that very much.”
“Thank you. I love you, Mom.” Annie threw her arms around Evie in a half-woman, half-child embrace.
“I love you, too, Annalise.”
Annie pulled away and sniffed. “I think I’ll call Quinn and then I’ll go see Michael at the hospital.”
Evie raised an eyebrow. “Did I just waste my breath for the last ten minutes?”
“What? Oh!” Annie smacked her forehead and laughed. “I’ll go see Michael first, and then I’ll call Quinn.”
After she’d left, Evie grabbed the mailbox key and headed for the first floor. She pulled a stack of mail from the box and rifled through it as she worked her way back to the apartment. Four utility bills, three flyers, two medical journals, three magazines and a legal size envelope addressed to Rita Sinclaire. Evie grabbed the wall for support, fighting dizziness and a burst of nausea. She sipped three breaths of air and inched back to the apartment. Once inside, she threw the deadbolt and leaned against the door. Calm, must remain calm. She sipped more air and ripped open the envelope. Four typed words stared back at her. YOUR TIME IS UP.
***
Quinn found Evie in the kitchen rolling out dough. She’d been here three days, since the letter from Pete Muldaney arrived. She wore jeans and a black t-shirt, her short hair mussed, feet bare. The heart-shaped necklace dangled from her neck, swinging with each push of the rolling pin. “What are you making?” He slung his suit jacket over a chair and eyed the bowl of sugared apples on the counter.
“Apple pie.”
He popped a piece of apple in his mouth. “I haven’t had homemade apple pie in”—he tried to remember the last time he’d had it—”a long time.”
“I remembered it was one of your favorites.”
Rupe’s favorite, too. “Where’s Danielle?”
“Sleeping.” She placed the dough in the glass pie plate and began crimping the ends. “She said she didn’t feel well this morning and thought she’d try to rest.”
“Good.” He hated to admit it, but he liked coming home to Danielle and he liked her in his bed at night. He’d slept better these past five nights than he had in years. “Maybe I’ll just go check on her.”
“Quinn?” Her fingers stilled and she met his gaze. “I know it’s none of my business, but you do care for her as more than just, well a way to pass time?”
He centered his attention on the heaping bowl of sugar-cinnamon apples. “She’s not just a way to pass time.”
“I didn’t think so. I’m certainly the last to offer advice, but I think there are some things you two need to discuss.”
“Is there something I should know?”
“Not necessarily. It’s just that couples need to get everything out in the open in the beginning, before there’s too much misunderstanding and they can’t go back.”
“Are you speaking from experience?”
She re-worked an edge of pie crust and took so long to answer, he thought she might not. When she did speak, there was a distant sorrow in her voice that made him wish he hadn’t asked. “Your father and I had so many expectations and dreams of what we wanted out of life, but they weren’t necessarily the same.”
“Meaning he wanted a home and family and you didn’t.” No matter how many years had passed, he could still see the empty place setting at the kitchen table.
“I loved all of you.” Her eyes grew bright. “But I couldn’t keep pretending I was someone I wasn’t.”
Quinn thought of his father sitting in the Barcolounger in the dark. Waiting. “Couldn’t you have tried?”
She swiped at her eyes with the back of her hands. “Your father deserved more than I could give him. All of you did. If I had stayed, I would have ended up empty and resentful, and you would have seen it and hated me for it. At least, when I left you knew you were loved.” She cleared her throat. “You were never supposed to find the notebooks.”
“But I did.” And I haven’t been the same since.
She sighed. “That I regret most of all. I would have destroyed them had I known I wasn’t coming back, but I didn’t know. If you believe nothing else, please believe when I left for the grocery store that day, I intended to come home. There was no grand plan to escape. I did that at night with the oils and the writing. I planned to continue cooking and cleaning and baking, living the same life I’d led since I married your father. I never intended to carry it any further than that.”
“It doesn’t matter. It’s done and I don’t want to talk about it.” He turned his back on her, opened the fridge and pulled out a beer.
“But don’t you see, Quinn, we have to or you’re never going to be able to let yourself care about anyone.”
“You’ve been talking to Annie, haven’t you?” He flipped the beer tab and took a long drink.
“She’s mentioned some things.”
“Just because I’m not looking for someone to play house with doesn’t mean I’m not happy. I like my life just the way it is.”
/>
“And Danielle? How does she fit into your plans? I don’t think she’s going to let you turn her into one of your play things.”
“I don’t intend to.”
“Oh?”
He was not going to stand here and listen to a relationship lecture from his mother. “I’ve got work to do. I’ll be in my study. Let Danielle know where I am when she wakes up.” He needed distance right now, from all of them. Quinn grabbed his beer and headed for the study, cursing his mother for interfering when she had no right to say anything.
He’d lined his study with wide-spined law volumes, motivational how to’s, and the works of Hemingway, Fitzgerald, and Dreiser. This room provided a safe haven from a world that made too many demands and right now it guarded him from a mother who had no right at all. He flipped on a CD, grabbed An American Tragedy and settled in his chair. In minutes, he was caught up in the story, thankful that fiction could still create a more warped existence than reality.
Chapter 18
“So, am I going to have to pry the truth out of Danielle or are you going to tell me what’s going on between you two?” Annie leaned over the table and said, “Come on, please tell me.”
When she scrunched up her nose and used that tone of voice, she reminded Quinn of when she was ten and wanted him to do something for her. Usually something he didn’t want to do. Like now. She sipped her root beer and waited. He’d invited her to lunch at Bessy’s Flying Pig because she loved pulled pork but never ate it since Michael was allergic to it. Now he half wished he hadn’t been such a thoughtful brother.
“Quinn? I’m your sister, you should tell me.”
“Maybe that’s exactly why I shouldn’t tell you.”
“Oh, for Pete’s sake, Danielle’s the first real woman you’ve dated. Even Michael says so.”
“Who said we were dating?” Were they dating? Or just sleeping together?
She rolled her eyes. “I’m not stupid you know. I see the way you two look at each other. Besides, I have it on good authority that you haven’t been out with any of your usual standbys since Danielle came into the picture.”
“Who told you that?”
She slid him a sly smile. “Someone who knows.”
“Annie—”
“Okay, okay. Arianna told me.”
“She doesn’t know everything.” Damn close though.
“So, how serious is it? Mom won’t spill the beans, and I’ve been working Sylvia but she’s too damn loyal, and Danielle turns beet red and starts stammering when I get within two hundred yards of the issue. The only one who gave me decent Intel was Arianna and I had to practically pull it out of her.”
“You should have worked for the CIA,” he said, dodging the subject.
She raised an eyebrow and said, “In my line of work, you learn the right questions to ask and never give up because it could save a life.”
That made Quinn grin. “My personal information isn’t saving lives. I’d say you’re gleaning this more for personal use, wouldn’t you?”
“I’d call it protecting my investments.”
“How so?” Wrong question. She took this tiny sliver of opportunity and pounced on her soapbox before he realized what he’d done.
“I knew you’d find a real woman one of these days, I mean one with heart and soul, not just silicone.” Her eyes lit up as she expounded on the virtues of his new girlfriend and the anti-virtues as she called them, of the previous women in his life. “I won’t even call them girlfriends because you and I know they were just toys.” She lowered her voice and whispered, “Sex toys.”
Quinn tugged on his tie and glanced around the restaurant. Was his little sister really going to lecture him on sex and women?
“But I think they were all necessary,” she went on, “so when the right one stepped into your life, she’d stick out like a cherry on a hot fudge sundae.”
A cherry on a hot fudge sundae? “Thanks for the insight.”
“You’re very welcome. I’m getting quite good at matching people up. Ask Sylvia. She said the stars are aligned in your favor.”
“If that woman paid half as much attention to her typing as she did to that damn horoscope, I’d have bumped her up three pay grades by now.”
“She means well.”
“Yeah, well it’s annoying.”
“You know, you’re all bark and no bite.” Her smile deepened. “You grouch about Sylvia but didn’t you send her to Tahiti last year with her mother?”
Quinn shrugged. “I don’t remember.” Her cousin went, too.
“And Sylvia told me you paid the plant man’s hospital bill when he fell and broke his leg.”
“Now I know that woman’s talking too much.”
Annie reached across the table and clasped his hand. “You’re a good person. I don’t know why you go to such lengths to hide it. What are you so afraid of?”
“What are you talking about?”
Her dark eyes crinkled at the corners and she suddenly looked much older than twenty-eight. “I think you should marry her.”
“What?”
“Marry Danielle. You make the perfect couple.”
“You’ve been looking at too many Bride magazines. Why don’t you just concentrate on Michael right now?”
She eyed him over her root beer and assured him, “He gets first rate attention these days and I’m keeping him quite happy, thank you very much.”
“You mean since I got booted down the ladder?”
“You’ll always be at the top of my list.” She spoke with such earnestness he wished he’d kept his mouth shut. “We’ve been through things most kids couldn’t imagine.”
“Annie, don’t think about the past.”
“I wouldn’t have made it if it hadn’t been for you.”
“You’re tougher than you think, kiddo.”
“Thanks.” She sipped her root beer. “No attacks for three weeks.”
“The medicine’s working then.”
She nodded. “Uh-huh, and I like the doctor, too. Michael said he’s one of the best.”
“Good. So just concentrate on your wedding and have fun with it, okay?”
She rolled her eyes. “You know absolutely nothing about weddings, do you? Nobody has fun planning them. The gowns are overpriced and fit so snugly the bride can barely breathe, and forget about getting a meal that day.” She shook her head and said, “All that food and she’s stuck chomping on celery sticks and carrot wedges.”
“Sounds like a blast.”
“Hardly. Michael wants to elope, did I tell you that?”
“Smart man.”
She frowned. “We missed out on so much tradition growing up; I’m not missing out on this, too. Besides,” her voice softened, “you have to walk me down the aisle.”
He thought about what she’d said later that evening as Danielle lay tucked against him, her breath soft and warm on his skin. Annie deserved to be happy and if prancing around in white fluff for a day did the trick, then he’d be right beside her. Danielle shifted and murmured in her sleep. Quinn tightened his hold on her. The sex had been great again tonight, like it was every night. How could it be that good every time? He kept waiting for his desire to wane, even a little, but it didn’t. Maybe it was the condoms or the lack thereof. Since that first time when he’d been so desperate to be inside her that he forgot to use one, something he’d never done before, she told him she was on the pill and Maldonando had been her only lover.
Maybe knowing he was only her second lover was what turned him on so much. Hell, he didn’t know, but when he was near her all he could think of was tasting her until she moaned and burying himself so deep inside that delicious body his mark would remain there forever.
His feelings were a jumble of emotion he couldn’t understand and truthfully, didn’t want to. Maybe he should call Mandy or Victoria and see if sex with them was as good as with Danielle. But even as the idea tickled his brain, he knew he wouldn’t do it. He buried his face in
her hair and breathed in her scent. This was exactly where he wanted to be, right here, right now, with this woman.
***
Arianna glanced up as the bells jingled the entrance of the tall, dark man in the European cut suit. She’d always thought Quinn was the most handsome man she’d ever met, but this one robbed her of logic and dear Lord, he actually made her breathless. “Welcome to The Silver Strand,” she managed when she remembered to draw in air. “May I help you?”
“I’d like to think so.”
His voice spilled over her like fine brandy on a chilly night. She tried not to stare but something in his dark eyes held her. She cleared her throat. Twice. “What can I do for you?”
He smiled and ran a hand through his black hair, which was longish and slicked back, like an Italian model. Perfect teeth. Perfect nose. Perfect cleft chin. Arianna continued to stare. Perfect.
“Well?”
“Excuse me?”
“I’m looking for an opal necklace for my sister.”
Talk of jewelry jolted her back to earth. “They’re in this case, right here.” She gestured to a side case which housed opal necklaces, bracelets, and earrings. “May I suggest the black opal? It’s truly magnificent.”
His eyes scanned her lips and he murmured, “Yes, I imagine it is.”
A flash of heat burned through her and she chided herself for behaving so ridiculously. Didn’t men talk this way to her all the time? And didn’t she blow them off with nothing more than a look? This man was different. Women didn’t ignore him.
“Would you like a necklace?” She pointed to a delicate black opal on a white gold chain. “Or perhaps a bracelet? This one is very unique with its double chain linked to the stones.” She gestured to a section below the bracelet and added, “We have earrings as well.”
“Hmmm.” He moved closer and his cologne tickled her senses. Lime and ginger. His very nearness unsettled her, or maybe it was his height. She stood 5’11” but this man towered over her.
“May I show you something?” she asked.
His dark gaze met hers. “Please do.”
“What would you like to see?”
A slow smile spread over full lips. “Everything.”
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