“Are you okay? I saw you head into the vineyard and…” She trailed off with a shrug. “I know I don’t exactly deserve your secrets, but if you want to talk, I’m here.”
He did, but dumping his shit on her wasn’t fair. “Nah, I’m good.” He turned back in the direction he’d come from. Missing his sister’s wedding because he was throwing a bitch fit wasn’t an option, which meant they both had to head back now. “How are things with you? I haven’t seen you since…” He realized what he’d been about to say and stopped cold.
“Since the car accident that killed my brother and put me in the hospital for ages? I know.” She laid a hand on his forearm. “It’s okay. It was a long time ago. I mean, I still miss John.”
“I do, too.” He didn’t normally carry around the guilt that Daniel did, but standing here in front of John’s little sister made it hard to remember why. They should have kept better tabs on Hope. Tried harder. Something. “I know it’s been said before, but I’m—”
“Don’t.” She shook her head. “Don’t apologize to me again. I’m walking, which is better than they’d hoped for after the crash. Like I said, it was a long time ago.” She hesitated. “How… How is Daniel?”
He couldn’t tell her the truth—that Daniel was a mess. It would just hurt her, and if she’d actually managed to move on with her life after what happened thirteen years ago, she deserved better than to be brought down by the fact that her ex—and her brother’s best friend—didn’t walk away from that night and that car crash whole any more than she did. The only difference was that Daniel’s scars weren’t physical. “He’s doing okay.”
Hope frowned. “You just lied to me.”
Fuck. He’d forgotten she had a knack for reading people. Luckily, they reached the end of the row before he had to answer. He looked around, but Aubry was nowhere to be seen. “Let’s get in there before Jenny starts panicking that she’s missing half the wedding party.”
Hope’s sigh was nearly inaudible. “Yeah, let’s do that.” They walked across the lawn and into the lobby, retracing the path he’d taken following Aubry out.
Quinn didn’t respond, too focused on searching the crowd for her. Nothing. Maybe she went back to the room to lick her wounds. Yeah, that had to be it. He eyed the elevator, silently debating whether he had enough time to get up and back before someone came looking for him.
Brad appeared, deciding that for him. “There you guys are. We’re about to start corralling people into the chapel. Hope, Jenny is looking for you.”
Hope gave him one last significant look and then disappeared through a gap in people. He had a feeling he wouldn’t be seeing the last of her anytime soon. He had bigger things to worry about. Like his sister’s wedding.
Like the fact that he had no fucking idea where Aubry was.
The entire ceremony passed in a blur. He knew he should focus on what was going on at the altar, but he kept searching the crowd for a distinctive head of red hair and coming up with nothing. And why wouldn’t he? The only reason she’d come to the wedding was because he’d convinced her to. If she wasn’t with him, she wouldn’t be here. Knowing that didn’t stop him from looking for her, though.
The problem was he had no idea what he would say when he did find her. Nothing had changed, not really. They still had too many issues to be able to iron things out. She was still too determined to sabotage things. He was still too stubborn for either of their own goods.
It seemed like he blinked and it was time for the reception. Quinn took the opportunity to make his excuses about forgetting something in his room and heading upstairs. He doubted he’d fooled anyone, but it didn’t matter because he was going to figure this shit out. Somehow.
He’d spent so much time building up what he was going to say—or trying to—that it took him a full ten seconds to register that their room was empty. More than empty. When he looked closer, he realized her suitcase and laptop bag were gone.
Quinn rushed downstairs to the front desk. A kid who didn’t look old enough to drink was manning it. “Did a redhead come through here? About this tall”—he held his hand up—“and probably kind of pissed.” Because of him.
The kid shifted, eyeing him like he was going to Hulk out or something. “Yeah, she was pretty upset.”
Tell me something I don’t know. “She left?”
“Called a cab to the airport thirty minutes ago.”
The airport. Quinn rocked back on his heels, trying to process the fact that she would rather get into what she thought was a flying deathtrap than stay here another moment with him.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
Chapter Seventeen
Aubry was the very definition of a hot mess by the time she made it back to Devil’s Falls. She left the rental car parked on the street and trudged through the back door of Cups and Kittens, needing nothing more than to be surrounded by the safety of her four walls and maybe to hide for a few years until her aching chest stopped reminding her how stupid it was for her to let herself get her heart broken by Quinn Baldwyn.
You didn’t even like him a week ago, and you can get back to that point…eventually.
Except she wasn’t sure she could fully erase the feeling of his hands on her skin and his voice in her ear, drawing out her dirtiest fantasies and bringing them to life.
How the hell did someone even bounce back from that sort of thing?
She didn’t think it was possible.
She closed the door behind her and ran smack dab into a person. Aubry jumped back with a shriek, her bags flying, and almost tripped over her own feet. “What the hell?”
“Aubry?”
Goddamnit. She shoved her hair back. “What are you doing here, Daniel?”
Jules’s cousin looked as shitty as she felt, dark circles beneath his equally dark eyes and like he might have lost weight recently. Since Aubry couldn’t remember the last time he’d actually come into town, she wasn’t sure how recently it was, but the fact that he was here instead of at the Rodriguez ranch spoke volumes. Or it would as soon as she figured out what he wanted. “Did Quinn send you? Because he can fuck right off and go jump into bed with Hope for all I care.” She was half surprised her pants didn’t burst into spontaneous flame at that lie.
Daniel frowned. “What are you talking about? Hope?” He went pale beneath his tan skin. “Hope was there?”
Aubry was too wrapped up in her pain to pause, a runaway train with no hope of stopping. “I’m talking about Quinn. He’s absurdly tall and, while pleasing to the eye, is equally infuriating and just plain man-stupid. And—”
“And obviously something went terribly wrong while you two were at the wedding.”
She couldn’t talk to him about this. Not only was he Quinn’s best friend but… Daniel might not be
in on her long list of people she despised—which basically amounted to the entire world outside her tiny circle—but he wasn’t one of her people. That meant she was more likely to curl up in a ball and waste away than to spill her guts to him. “It’s nothing.”
His mouth tightened. “I know nothing when I see it, and that’s not what’s written all over your face.”
For fuck’s sake. “Aren’t you supposed to be the quiet and brooding one who keeps to himself? Keep to yourself, Rodriguez.”
But he stepped in front of her. “Jules has her hands full with Adam right now, not that either of them would admit as much, and you don’t have friends other than Jules.”
“Wow, thanks. You’re making me feel so much better.” But, strangely enough, the sarcasm was making her feel better. A little.
Daniel rolled his eyes. “My point is that you don’t have a single damn person to talk to and you look like you need to talk.”
“I thought I looked like shit.”
“Those two things are not mutually exclusive.” He picked up her suitcase and set it down next to the stairs leading up to the apartment she used to share with Jules. “Now, sit your contrary ass down. I’ll be right back.”
“Holy shit, Rodriguez, I think you’ve strung together more words in the last five minutes than I’ve heard you speak in the last five years.”
He snorted. “And you’re already feeling more like yourself. Sit.”
She sat. Really, it wasn’t like she had anywhere else to be, and her self-flagellation could wait a few minutes. He was right—she couldn’t call Jules now any more than she could have called Jules earlier. This mess was one entirely of her own making, and dumping it on her best friend when she was otherwise occupied with things that were actually important would be a dick move.
Daniel reappeared a few minutes later with two mugs of coffee in hand, trailing Mr. Winkles and Ninja Kitteh behind him. The latter immediately jumped into Aubry’s lap and made himself at home. She ran her hand down the cat’s back and accepted the cup of coffee. “I don’t think I want to talk about it.”