Wynter's Horizon (11 page)

I held the door open with my foot while slinging my coat on. An icy blast of wind blew through me, taking my breath just as one of the girls at the pool table quipped. “I hope she enjoyed it as much as he did.” My stomach rolled over and, for a moment, I thought I might puke right in the doorway. I rushed outside, scanning the parking lot.

Jason wasn’t there and neither was his car.
Damn him.
It was cold and starting to sleet. I thought about calling Annie, but I’d have to tell her what happened. I checked the time on my phone. The chances of anyone being sober enough at one in the morning were slim. The walk back to campus was maybe a mile, but I had on heeled boots and the ground was already slick. I searched my pockets for money and realized I’d used my last twenty on the shots. A cab was out.

I took a deep breath, trying to steady myself
. That was useless. The tears came, freezing on my cheeks. I leaned on the guardrail by the side of the road No money, no tissues, no gloves. Wonderful.

“I found these,” said a raspy voice with a British accent. I jumped. I hadn’t even heard him come up. He held out my leather gloves.

“Thanks,” I mumbled, trying to keep my head down, hair around my face. I was mortified.

“Can I help?”

I realized it was pointless as I tried to answer; my voice shook with every syllable. “Probably not.” I half laughed. I was beyond help, I knew that.

“Do you at least want this?” He held out a handkerchief. Boy, he really was from another country. Wh
o carried handkerchiefs anymore, much less guys with a sexy five o’clock shadow? I wanted to refuse, but my nose was running as fast as my eyes.

“Okay.” I reached for it and looked up, meeting his gaze, concern evident in his warm brown eyes and his furrowed brow. His nose had a little bend to it. I hadn’t noticed before. I wondered if it’d been broken. He pushed his hair back, and it stood up as he ran his hands through it. I felt the knot in my stomach ease. I smiled and took the handkerchief, wiping my eyes.

And then he gave me that crooked smile and the hardness of his face disappeared. “Can I get you a taxi home?”

I hesitated. It sounded nice—a warm quick cab ride to the dorm, no freezing icy walk—but I had no money and no cash machines in sight. “Umm, well…”

He shook his head as if reading my mind. “Don’t worry about it.” Within seconds, he’d hailed a cab over from in front of Jim’s, talking with the driver and passing him cash.

I jumped up. I couldn’t let him pay. “No. I can walk.”

He looked down at my boots. “Don’t be absurd. It’s freezing out and bloody slick. Just get in the taxi.”

“I can’t take your money.”

“You’re not—” he motioned to the driver, “—he is.”

“Still…”

“What’s wrong?” I paused, not sure how to say it. He shook his head, reading my mind or my face again, it would seem. “Jesus.” It almost sounded like a growl. “I don’t want anything in return.” He held the door open for me. “I’m not coming with you. Just get in and get home and warm, or to your party and drink a pint, or whatever you lasses do.”

I still hesitated, but I could feel the heat from the cab. It was too tempting. I got in, and he closed the door after me.

I rolled the window down. “Thank you…” I paused, not sure how to go on.

He nodded, warm russet eyes gazing at me. “Look, this is none of my business, but he’s some prat to leave you here.” I didn’t know what that word meant, but I had a fairly good idea given how he said it.

I sucked in my breath and, as I always did, made an excuse for Jason’s behavior. “I think he thought I had a car here.”

“Really?” I shook my head this time, unable to get any words past the lump in my throat. No decent guy would have done what Jason did—but a decent
girl
wouldn’t have done what I just did. At least Beck didn’t know what had happened. Jason was right about me. I felt the tears well up again, but thankfully they stayed in my eyes. I glanced down at the handkerchief in my hand. There were initials sewn in the corner, R.B. in fancy cursive.

“R.B.,” I said out loud. “Rhett Butler?”

He grinned. He didn’t look at all like Rhett, but he did have a rakish quality to his smile.

“A fan?”

“It’s a good movie,” I explained.

“Kind of sad.” I nodded in agreement and smiled. He returned it
with a raised eyebrow, and I felt my stomach curl, the warmth of it spreading outward. He held my gaze for a minute, and the awful night disappeared. Finally stepping back, he tapped the back of the cab.

“Have a good night, Wynter, and get home safe.” His voice, with that accent and slightly rough like he’d smoked a pack of cigs, made my breath hitch in my throat. As we pulled away toward campus, I stared out the back window. Standing in the street—hair wet and messed up from the sleet, jacket open, hands in his pockets—he held my gaze until the taxi turned the corner.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Beck—Involved

I watched the taxi pull away with a feeling of regret. I could have talked to her all night. She was a mess, but who cared. So was I. She’d actually defended that snake. I had known he was a wanker months ago.
Why the hell did she like him?
I wanted to hunt him down, but I knew I’d have no self-control if I found him. And that couldn’t turn out well for anyone.

I felt someone at my elbow. “So, how did it go?” I ignored Quinn, and headed for my Jeep.

“I assume you didn’t mention you heard the closet scene?” He grinned like a Cheshire cat, smoothly keeping pace with me. He never dropped a topic. I shook my head, trying to erase it from my memory. We had the unlucky ability to hear the play by play of it against the wall. It left little to the imagination. I grabbed the door to the Jeep, swinging it open as Quinn climbed into the passenger side.

“Do you have a strategy here? Some kind of idea where you’re heading with this?” His brow furrowed. Except for my temper outbursts, I did little without a plan or design. The effects of years of military school. I contemplated not answering, but I knew he would keep going, yammering on until I said something. Besides, he was right.
What was I doing?
I had no idea, but I did know second chances didn’t come around more than once.

I shook my head. “No.” I didn’t know if I wanted her for sex or if I wanted her to find out more, to figure out what the two of us were doing thrust together in that other place. But the only way to do that was to talk to her. And, from the looks of it, she needed some help, too. “I’m just tired of sitting there and watching that bloody guy treat her like yesterday’s coffee.”

“And this bothers you?” Bewilderment was evident in his voice.

“Yes. She seems way too nice for him. What did a guy like that do to deserve her?” I thought of her eyes and lopsided smile.

“Didn’t anyone tell you that life’s not fair?”

I ignored him and played with the buttons for the radio, recalling the sound of her voice. “She smells good, too,” I added.

Quinn nodded reluctantly in agreement. “Yeah, like baby powder, vanilla, and sometimes cinnamon.”

“I know,” I sighed. I could still smell her scent from holding her gloves in my hands.

He leaned his head back against the seat. “No good can come of this.”

I frowned at the highway ahead. I wondered if I should tell him the truth. I just wasn’t sure I was ready for that conversation.

“You’re the one who said live a little,” I replied defensively.

“I said live a little, not go to the asylum and let the patients out,” he retorted quickly. “And, to be honest, I’m not so sure about her sanity after what happened in that closet. I’m all for outside the box sex but he’s an obvious ass and what do you think Jim feels about his missing counter?”

“Jim has bigger problems than a broken bar,” I answered dismissively. “He has patrons shagging in his closets.”

“I bet he’s more upset about the bar,” Quinn surmised. I wondered about that. Jim was a level-headed bloke. I couldn’t imagine him liking his bar used as a Motel 6.

I thought about my own actions regretfully. It wasn’t often I lost control in public. I was lucky I had been able to rein it in. “I should probably just stay away,” I offered.

“You should,” he agreed.

I didn’t bother answering. She intrigued me, and I wanted to know more. It was that simple. I had spent the last few years living by a code that I had created, sure that this was the answer, that with these rules I would be safe and so would the rest of society. All I achieved was getting electric shock treatment by a lunatic fanatic, a fairly good case of PTSD, and fired from the one job, the one life I knew. And, though I didn’t plan on throwing out those rules, I was going to bend them a bit.

Turning the music up, I watched the sleet bounce off the seats. I could see Quinn trying to light a cigarette and looking at me sideways with exasperation.

“What’s wrong with you? Just because you like the cold doesn’t mean I have to get wet.”

I laughed, enjoying the moment, picturing Wynter’s face as the taxi pulled away.

***

“Hey, when did you actually buy food?” Quinn asked, peering into the fridge. I waited for the next part, shaking my coat out and watching the tiny droplets of sleet scatter across the floor.

“And where the fuck is all the beer?”

“I moved it to the other fridge.” I paused on my way out to the deck. “Grab me one, too.” We were like an old married couple, ironic given how we had hated each other fifteen years ago. Time and circumstances certainly changed things.

Quinn met me outside, beers in hand. “What the hell are we doing back here so early? What are we going to do now?”

I had been so engrossed in thinking about Wynter, I hadn’t even been aware of driving straight home. It was only two a.m. The whole night stretched before us
; for me that was torture.

Quinn took a drag of his cigarette, lounging back against the porch railing, watching me. He had a guarded expression.

“What?”

He lifted an eyebrow and half shrugged.

“What?” I prompted again.

“She’s not Lilly, you know.” He said it quietly but pointedly. I turned and gazed for a long time out over the preserve, listening to the waves crashing. I could argue with him or get mad, but he wasn’t far off. And, until I told him
about my weird memories, I couldn’t expect him to have a different response.

“I kind of figured that one out since Lilly was a red-head and she’s a blond,” I said for lack of anything better.

He sighed. “You know what I mean. You can’t save her any more than you could Lilly, and, in case you’ve forgotten, that didn’t end so well.”

“I don’t want to save her.” I just want to find out why she’s in my mind and what happened.

“Really? Cause that’s what it seems like from here.”

I bet it did.

“I mean, you think this girl likes you, but she just had sex with some guy in a bar, and she thinks the guy she slept with likes her. And he just left her there. I personally think you’re both nuts.”

“She’s not crazy,” I said defensively. If she was crazy so was I, which wasn’t the best argument given the recent goings on in my head. Fuck, I was going to have to tell him the truth soon.

“Are you sure you’re qualified to make that judgment?” He had a point, but I didn’t address it.

“There’s something going on, but she’s not crazy.”

“Okay. Just be careful.”

“I know.” I stared into the darkness. I felt a small thrill of possibility, something I hadn’t felt in years.

Chapter Twenty-Three

Wynter—Brunch

My phone rang. As I rolled over to grab it, I peered at the light streaming in the window through the shade. My head felt heavy. I lifted my phone to my ear and realized my stomach wasn’t right, either. It flip-flopped, and I swallowed, thankful there was nothing in it. “Hello?”

“What happened to you last night?” Julia’s annoyed voice reverberated, emphasizing the pain shooting through my head. My mind stumbled backward over the night, and I groaned inwardly.

“It’s ten-thirty. You want to go to brunch?” Julia asked.

“I’ll be ready in thirty minutes.” I got up and immediately wished I hadn’t. Nausea rolled over me in waves. Drinking on an empty stomach—one that was perpetually empty—was not a good combination. I concentrated on taking shallow breaths and gathered my stuff for a shower, dreading the inevitable post mortem at brunch.

The water felt good as the smell of shampoo washed away the stench of smoke and stale beer. I thought of Beck while I dried off and got dressed. His eyes were the best, or maybe it was his voice. Thinking of him standing there in the sleet left me with a tingling feeling and a little smile—and almost made me forget the storage closet.

Someone knocked.

“Yeah?” Julia materialized with Annie behind her. I immediately felt guilty. Annie raised an eyebrow. “What?” I asked, my voice shaking with laughter brought on by nerves. I knew they wouldn’t approve of my actions last night, not that I did.