Cape Cod Kisses (11 page)

Again she fought those feelings, trying to give Quinn the benefit of the doubt by telling herself that he was juggling a ton of responsibilities. But she knew better, didn’t she?

I’m rationalizing for him.

How hard was it to say,
Excuse me for one moment
, to the person on the phone in order to give the person he was with a quick goodbye, or even an apology for taking so long?

She’d had the most incredible day with Quinn, and there was more heat between them than she'd ever imagined possible—but this was not okay.

She turned on her heel and walked quickly back to her cottage, taking big gulps of the sea air to try to get much-needed oxygen into her lungs. How could she have even
considered
having a fling with Quinn Rockwell, who was one of the wealthiest and most successful men on the East Coast? Was she a glutton for punishment? Hadn’t she known enough men like him to know what to expect?

She mounted the steps to her cottage and spied the champagne bottle on the windowsill, but this time, instead of softening her heart, his gesture that had once seemed so sweet only made the hurt from being ignored cut a little deeper.

Shelley had thought that as an adult she was over the hurt of being disregarded, but she clearly wasn’t. At the very least, Quinn’s behavior was a really good reminder of why she’d planned a solo honeymoon.

I’ll have my own damn bonfire
.

QUINN’S PHONE BEEPED, indicating the battery was dying. He couldn’t afford to drop this call. Not only because there were now four of his business colleagues on the conference line discussing the merger, but because he’d also just learned that a competitor was honing in on Joseph Alger, one of their key executives. They needed to strategize so they didn’t lose him. Agitated and annoyed, Quinn sprinted back to his suite in the resort and plugged in the damn charger, continuing the conversation while tethered to the plug.

By the time Quinn ended the call, they’d hammered out several issues that had been looming around the merger, but there were still more on the horizon.

Unbidden, the thought came at him:
There are always more on the horizon
.

Quinn nearly choked as he finally checked his watch and realized that he’d just spent more than four hours on the phone. How the hell could he have been on the call for that long, when it had seemed like ten minutes?

Damn it. He’d asked Shelley to wait, thinking he’d be on the call for only a few minutes—not for four hours. How could he have done that to her?

He cursed as he looked out through the balcony doors. It was pitch-dark, and he hadn’t noticed that, either. Studying his reflection in the glass, Quinn didn’t like what he saw—a man who had been so consumed with work that he’d been too afraid of losing the focus his business partners demanded by seeing Shelley’s smile and hearing her voice to even pause his conversation for five seconds.

He shifted his gaze to his grandfather’s wing of the resort. The lights in Chandler’s office were still burning bright.
Of course they are
. Because the truth that Quinn could no longer deny was that the more he focused on building his business to the exclusion of all else, the more he became like his grandfather. It had been no fluke that Quinn had seen his grandfather’s pinched, stressed eyes on his own face when he’d looked into the mirror last night.

It wasn’t easy to admit, but Quinn couldn’t ignore this wake-up call. Not when he could too easily see himself in another ten years, alone and so damn focused on his work that no one wanted to be near him.

But the tightening in his chest and the twisting of his stomach over how he’d treated Shelley cut deeper than the thought of becoming unlikable
and
losing his business deal combined ever could.

That guilt was a first, and it hit him like a ton of bricks.

He needed to apologize. Immediately.

Quinn ran out of his suite. He took the stairs two at a time, grabbing a handful of flowers out of a vase in the hallway and bolting out the back door of the resort. The crisp air stung his cheeks as he raced across the patio, down the stone steps to the beach, and sprinted toward her cottage.

As he ran, he couldn’t stop thinking about how Shelley reveled in so many things he took for granted. She was not only the sexiest woman alive, she was also so full of happiness, so free-spirited. And she had lit up parts of him, desires in him, that he thought had disappeared forever.

For the first time in his life, he’d been seriously considering more than a fling. He didn’t want to lose Shelley’s light, that wonderful brightness that had been missing from his life. But at the same time, he couldn’t deny the truth that the carefree, relaxed man he’d been on the beach with her this afternoon wasn’t at all who he really was.

He stopped running and paced as he tried to untangle his web of emotions.

Shelley sure as hell didn’t deserve a guy who got stuck on business calls and was juggling so many demands that he ignored her. Should he set her free to find a man who wasn’t destined to become like Chandler?

That thought stopped him cold. Because now that he’d met Shelley, he simply couldn’t imagine not holding her again, not seeing her bright smile or hearing her sweet laughter. He refused to think about waking up tomorrow morning knowing today was all they’d have.

Over the past ten years, Quinn had worked doubly—triply—hard to prove himself. He hadn’t wanted anyone to think he’d gotten to where he was with his business just because he was a Rockwell. And somewhere along the way, those twenty-hour days, seven days a week, had become a habit. More than that, his workload and endless hours in meetings and at his computer had become his entire life—all he knew and all he could see for himself into the future. Quinn had been only as good as his next deal, only as good as his ranking on the Fortune 100 list. Romance was nowhere on his list of priorities, not even a blip on his screen.

Until last night, when he’d found Shelley at the cove and then spent today clamming with her.

Suddenly, for the first time in a very long time, Quinn could see a different future. One he could have only if he took a long hard look in the mirror, admitted that he didn’t like what he was seeing anymore, and then put the work in to change his life. For the better this time.

He’d screwed up, but he was going to fix it, damn it
.
More than just fix it—he wasn’t going to let himself turn into Chandler and end up losing everyone who mattered in his life.

Right here, right now, Quinn Rockwell was going to change.

He knew he hadn’t been the man Shelley deserved, and that he’d been a selfish jerk for putting work ahead of her. But there beneath the moonlight, with the chilly air stinging his face and his heart so full of Shelley he felt as if she filled his entire being, he knew that the man he’d been was nowhere near the man he was capable of being—the man he
wanted
to be.

The man he would become for Shelley.

Every step marked with determination, he strode down the beach toward her cottage. The telltale scent of burning wood hung in the air, bringing him back to their conversation before the phone call.

The bonfire.

The ache ground in deeper, fueling his resolve to never, ever let her down again.

Shelley wouldn’t have spent the night pining after any man. A woman who took a solo honeymoon would have no trouble having a solo bonfire—and he was bound and determined that she’d never want to have a solo
anything
again.

He would become the man who caused her eyes to light up, not fill with regret. If there was any way she’d give him another chance, he’d make sure to get it right this time.

Somehow, some way, he’d make everything in his life fit together. It might take a hell of a lot of work, but he already knew in his heart that Shelley was worth whatever it took to have her by his side.

But when her cottage came into view, reality sliced him wide-open. The bonfire had been extinguished, and the lights were out in her cottage, too.

He was too late.

He stared at the fire pit feeling as if his hope had been extinguished by a few buckets of seawater. But he knew that wasn’t the case. There was no one to blame but himself. He’d killed his chances with Shelley the minute he’d turned his back on her to focus on the phone call.

Quinn looked down at the flowers in his hand, a poor substitution for the apology he needed to say to her face-to-face, so that he could look into her eyes as he told her he was sorry and would never make a mistake like that again.

He walked quietly up the steps to the front porch of her cottage and laid them on the welcome mat, knowing he’d just lost the best thing that had ever happened to him.

QUINN WENT BY Shelley’s cottage again first thing the next morning, but her curtains were still drawn and he didn’t want to make things even worse by waking her up. The remnants of her bonfire reminded him of how strong she was and magnified the fact that Shelley didn’t
need
any man.

A long night with little sleep and a lot of heavy thinking had only reinforced his decision—if by some miracle she was willing to give him a second chance, he’d do whatever it took to make it up to her.

Quinn had never needed anyone to make him feel complete. Now, not only did he
want
Shelley in his life, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that he needed her there, too. And maybe, if he were really lucky, she would realize
she
needed
him
, too. Not just because they didn't have a prayer of controlling their attraction to one another, but also because after seeing how much she enjoyed clamming yesterday, he knew she’d enjoy the rest of the unique things the island had to offer: midnight sails, walks in the woods, fishing, the lighthouse—all the things he hadn’t even thought of in forever, and only a few of the things he’d let himself give up in order to achieve his success.

After going for a hard and fast run to try to burn through some of his frustration, Quinn showered and dressed, then headed back out to go by Shelley’s again, nearly plowing into Trent in the hallway.

“Did you get my message?” Trent wore a pair of trousers and a dress shirt again, which meant he must be planning on going back to New York today.

“No. I didn’t check my phone after my run.”

“We have a meeting with Grandfather in less than ten minutes. The sooner we get this over with, the sooner we can all get back to our lives.”

Quinn shot a look at the door at the end of the hallway, which led outside.
Damn it.
There was no way he’d make it down to Shelley’s again and be back in time.

“What’s wrong?” Trent asked.

Quinn didn’t like lying to his siblings. So instead of saying,
Nothing,
he opted not to answer the question. “Let’s go.”

SHELLEY WAS DETERMINED to have a good time on the rest of her trip despite having her feelings hurt by Quinn last night.

Deciding to greet the morning with a walk along the beach, she slipped on a pair of cute flip-flops and pulled the front door of her cottage open. The woody, ashen scent of her solo bonfire lingered in the air. Renewed disappointment settled around her, threatening her intent to have a great day despite the fact that this was supposed to be a solo honeymoon anyway. At least until she looked down and realized she’d almost stepped on a handful of pretty flowers lying on the welcome mat.

She crouched beside them, trapping her lower lip between her teeth.

Quinn
.

Picking up the bouquet, she saw that the flowers had wilted a little around the edges and their stems were bone dry. Her heart beat a little harder knowing he must have come by last night after she’d gone to bed, after all.

She stared at the flowers for a long moment before deciding to put them in a vase and set it in the bay window beside the champagne bottle with the candle in it as she tried to push past the conflicting emotions stirring inside her.

When she finally headed out for her walk to explore the area in the opposite direction of the resort, she was still mulling everything over.

All night long she’d told herself to nix the idea of Quinn Rockwell. So what if he kissed like a dream? So what if she couldn't stop imagining what his kisses—and his big, strong hands—would feel like roving over her naked skin? She'd tried to convince herself that she'd eventually get over the need that continued to torture her. But now this bouquet had her wondering yet again—was the lighthearted, fun-loving guy she’d spent the afternoon with really
all
about business? Or did he just need a little reminding about how much beauty and adventure there was outside of the boardroom to reclaim that part of himself? And a lesson in manners, too?

And even if he did, was she up for taking that kind of a risk on him...especially if he really did only want a fling?

Shelley heaved out a huge breath, feeling like she was getting way ahead of herself. After all, while the flowers were lovely, they weren’t an apology. And while finding them waiting for her this morning did help assuage a little of her hurt, the way Quinn had behaved last night still stung. Stung a lot, actually.

She passed a couple on the beach in front of the resort and then a family with two small children busy filling buckets with sand. Walking down the sandy beach made her think of her aunt and the mornings they’d spent searching for sea glass. What would her aunt Marla make of Quinn? Shelley wondered.

Just then a
For Rent
sign at the top of the dunes caught her attention. She shielded her eyes from the sun, and the cute cottage at the top of the hill called to her. She’d received a text from Sierra, and they’d made plans to meet later that afternoon to discuss the possibility of bringing a specialty café to the island.

Shelley had been toying with ideas ever since. There was nothing tying her to Maryland. She loved her house on the creek, but wouldn’t she enjoy living on the island even more? She could even keep the creek house as a getaway if she wanted to. Plus, Taryn lived in Philadelphia, so either way she had to travel to see her closest friend, and wouldn’t Taryn
love
visiting her here?