Robert sends us meal after meal of meticulously prepared foods. Even the appetizers are a goddamn masterpiece. I wouldn’t expect anything less—he’s been with our family for a long time, since well before the divorce. I remember my mother sitting poolside, lifting each bite to her lips and then leaning her head back against the plush padding of her lounge chair, closing her eyes while she savored every mouthful.
That’s the image that comes to mind when Quinn does the very same thing in her lounge chair by the pool, reflections from the surface of the water dancing across her face, illuminating her exquisite beauty despite the shadows from the oversized sun hat she’s wearing. She laughed when she found it in the closet, but yet she refuses to sit by the pool without it, the canopy be damned.
Quinn stretches out on a lounge chair again midmorning on Sunday. The furniture has been replaced at least twice since my parents divorced, but the memory is still so powerful that I can see it right in front of my eyes. A stab of regret spears my heart realizing that Quinn will never get to meet my mother.
Or my brother.
My brother loved this place when we were growing up. The sun always made my head swim after an hour or so, sending me back to my room to read in the relative darkness, but he didn’t give a shit—he’d stay out by the pool until the sun set, doing cannonball after cannonball, sending waves of water over the sides of the pool. My father liked to stand at the grill, turning over burger patties and hot dogs—always cooking more than any of us could eat—and transferring them to a ceramic tray with a silver cover.
I was never out there long enough for him, but my brother—he was just wild enough to earn my father’s affection. A memory surfaces from the depths. A headache blooming behind my eyes, the summer sun too intense, and my father calling after me, “You’re just like your mother. Too quiet to make any real mark on the world.”
Though his tone was mocking and he said the words with a smile, he laughed along with my brother at my retreating back.
I shake it off and fill my eyes, and my mind, with the sight of Quinn, radiant in a slick black bikini, her head tilted back against the cushions of the chair, her perfect body stretched out in total relaxation. I can just see the edges of her face underneath the sun hat. Her eyes are closed to shield them against the pool’s reflection.
“It’s a relief,” she says, as if we’ve been talking this entire time instead of silently enjoying the last morning of the weekend.
“What’s a relief?”
“Being free from Derek.”
We’ve been trading life details the entire weekend, but this is the first time she’s mentioned him since that night at the apartment. My heart breaks a little that that piece of shit is on her mind, but I can see how the wound would still be fresh.
Secretly, I’m thrilled that she’s choosing to open up to me like this. If we can be totally real with each other, then…
I nod, though she still hasn’t opened her eyes. “He seems like he was an asshole.”
“Somewhere, he still is an asshole. I just wish I hadn’t wasted five years of my life on him.”
“Five years?”
“The first couple were pretty good. If they hadn’t been, I wouldn’t have let him move into my house.”
“You didn’t mention that before.”
“That he was living in my house?”
“Yeah.”
“It’s a little embarrassing to find out that your fiancé has had a woman on the side for an entire year while he’s living in your own house. Oh, and that the woman in question is your best friend on top of it.”
“You don’t have to be embarrassed,” I say, reaching out to rest a hand on her smooth thigh. She gives a soft sigh of satisfaction. “He was a prick who didn’t know what he had.”
Quinn opens her eyes then and smiles into mine. “Do you know what you have?”
“I have a decent idea.” I grin back, my voice husky.
“You know what the worst part was?” she says, lifting her head to kiss the side of my neck, her tongue darting out in a suggestion that we should consider heading back to the bedroom.
“What?”
“The fact that he lied about it for so long.” Quinn’s gaze turns steely for just a moment. “I’m fucking over liars.” My stomach flops over in a sickening thud.
Then her expression clears, and she’s looking at me with a wicked glint in her eyes. “There’s something I want to do. We have a little more time before we need to leave, right?”
I’m out of the chair in an instant, offering my hand to her.
“More than enough.”
Chapter 33
Quinn
City noise—horns honking, taxi drivers shouting at one another, motorcycles with no mufflers—seems almost oppressive after the luxurious silence at Christian’s cottage in the Hamptons.
Cottage. Even thinking about the Pierce Cottage being called that—by anyone, even Christian—still makes me laugh.