The Bookstore on the Beach - Brenda Novak Page 0,59
making small talk throughout dinner and meticulously adding that day in the tree house to the subjects that were off-limits, there didn’t seem to be much more to say on the drive home. To Autumn, it seemed as though they’d said all the inconsequential things they could think of to say, and now they were left with all the things they wouldn’t or couldn’t say.
And left with the attraction, of course, threatening to pull them together whether she wanted it or not.
“You tired?” he asked as they finally reached the outskirts of town.
Autumn wasn’t remotely tired. She was completely wired and struggling against a natural inclination to drop her defenses and accept him as a real friend. He’d been nothing but nice. He’d never been anything else, even if he did choose another woman. But she was afraid their relationship would quickly escalate into something more if she did. She was too vulnerable right now—too lonely, too hungry for love, and sex was sometimes a good substitute. Even now she could feel the warmth of Quinn’s body, which was weird since he sat a foot or more away. She’d been with plenty of other people in a car and had never noticed such a phenomenon before.
What was it about him?
She wished she knew—and she wished she could kill it. But that seemed impossible. “Not too bad,” she said. “What about you?”
“I was up at dawn this morning, but I’m okay.”
“What got you up so early?”
“I run at six. I like it when the beach is deserted and I can watch the sun come up all by myself. It feels like I’m standing on the edge of the world.”
“It’s beautiful to be out at that time of day.”
“It is. With what’s going on with my mother, having to witness my father’s worry and grief and helping with the restaurant—even though I never wanted to work there again—running gives me an escape.”
“It’s what’s carrying you through this difficult time.”
“I guess you could say that.”
“My daughter and I like to do yoga on the beach in the mornings,” she volunteered. “But we’re probably there after you’re gone.”
“What time do you go?”
“Not until eight-thirty. That’s early to Taylor,” she added with a grin.
He chuckled. “Of course. She’s a teenager. I’ve usually had breakfast and am jumping in the shower by then.”
Autumn had tried to pay for half of dinner, but Quinn had refused to let her. He’d said he owed her for all the work she was doing on the fundraiser, that even though he couldn’t pay hundreds of thousands of dollars in medical bills for his mother, he could manage to buy her a meal—and she’d let him because she could tell it was important to him not to come off like a charity case.
But now she regretted giving in. That he’d asked her out, driven and paid, made it so much harder to pretend that this hadn’t been a date.
She checked her phone to see if Mr. Olynyk had sent her anything. This time of night was usually when they communicated. She hadn’t heard from him since she’d agreed to continue his services for another month, but their contact had been dwindling as time marched on, and she didn’t see an email from him tonight, either.
Maybe Nick wasn’t coming back. She had to accept that. As Caden had said in the car, if he was coming back, he would’ve done it by now.
“Is that your mother or your kids, wondering where you are?” he asked when he noticed her looking at her phone.
“No.”
“Will they be waiting up for you?”
She put her phone back in her purse. “Caden will probably be awake. But he won’t be waiting for me. He’ll be playing video games. And Taylor will be watching Netflix on her laptop in her room. My mother will be in bed, though. It’s after eleven, and, like you, she’s an early riser.”
“How many bedrooms does that cottage have?”
She could tell he was surprised they could all fit. It didn’t look very big, and it wasn’t. “Only two. My mom has her room, Taylor takes my old room and Caden sleeps on the couch.”
“Where do you sleep?”
“There’s an apartment above the garage. I stay there.”
“So you won’t have to go into the house tonight.”
“No.”
He turned down the music playing on the radio. “You sound relieved.”
“I am. If I go into the house, they’ll ask me where I’ve been, and I’m not quite sure what I’m going to say.”