Page 23 of What Love Can Do
A few steps into the room, Lilly made no pretenses. She looked like a woman with a secret burning a hole into her brain. Her worried gaze landed on his mother’s leather-bound journal on his nightstand then back at him. She got straight to the point. “Why did you say you were in town again?”
This was her first thought after the amazing sex they’d had last night?
“My mother passed away almost two weeks ago. She hailed from Green Valley, though my brothers and I, we never knew that until recently. I only have that…” He pointed to the journal, marked about halfway with Post-It Notes. “It was my mother’s from when she lived here.”
“May I see it?” she asked, moving towards it.
“No.” His voice was firm, resolute, and she stopped in her tracks. From the scolded look in her baby blues, he immediately regretted talking to her that way. “I mean, it’s personal. Only me and my brothers have looked through it, though I’m the only one who reads it over and over.”
“Why? What are you looking for?”
“Clues, hints of who she was before she came to Ireland.”
“Why? What difference will it make?”
Quinn sighed, sitting on the edge of the bed. He wasn’t sure what was up with this interrogation, but it seemed important to her. “I don’t know that it will. But like I told you last night, I’m at a point in my life where I may or may not leave Dublin, Lil. That’s not an easy decision. I need to know what was so special about Forestville that she couldn’t even talk about it after she left. I want to know who was the woman who became my mam.” He had said too much. Yes, he had shared very special, very intimate times with Lilly last night, but that was no reason to go getting so personal. “Why do you ask?” He turned a fixed gaze on her. He desperately wanted to slide his hand over and link fingers with hers, tell her that he’d had fun last night, but she didn’t seem in the right frame of mind.
“Would you read me a bit from the journal then?” She crossed her arms over her chest.
Quinn tilted his head. “You know, I have to say, I’m a bit baffled right now. I thought we’d have things to say to each other about last night, about that awesome finale to a wonderful evening.” His eyes searched hers for any clue that the shared connection was still there. It seemed gone. Whatever happened between last night and now, it had wiped the light from her eyes. “Or don’t you remember?”
The words reached her heart, seemed to awaken her, if only for a moment. The furrow on her forehead flattened. “Of course I do. It was an amazing night.”
“So then, what’s the problem?”
She bit her lip and looked away, paced the room, stood at the window to stare outside at the driving rain. “Where’s your brother?”
“He hasn’t been here. I was going to start calling him, though I’m sure he’s fine.”
She sighed, softened a bit. “Just a page or two, Quinn? From your mother’s journal. Please?”
Something in her eyes. Maybe she’d looked into things. After all, this was a small town, and people talked, and he had called his grandfather prior to coming to tell him he would be here. Word, technically, could have gotten around about him and Con. She probably wanted to know where she stood with him.
He sighed, reaching for the journal, flipping to the last page he’d read from:
“Dear Diary, it was raining again tonight, but I went to Mulligan’s Tavern anyway. I went, because it’s new, and I heard they’d be having live music and because Gracie told me she would let me drive the scooter she’d won in a sweepstakes around town if I went with her. She was scared of Irish boys, but not me. Yes, they’re far out crazy with their whoopin’ and hollerin’ and they can make a girl feel self-conscious with their obvious stares, but they’re sweet and funny and they’ll charm the pants off of you.
I would know, because I met one. In town today, visiting just for a week. His name is Grant (second one), and he said he’d be at Mulligan’s if I wanted to talk to him some more. That’s the real reason I didn’t want to go at first, Diary. I didn’t want to get in trouble. But it looks like I already am. More later.”
Quinn looked up.
Lilly stood by the window, listening intently, mesmerized, gnawing at her fingers. “Is that it?”
“Well, no, there’s a whole journal, but you said read a little bit, and now I’ve gone and done that. Why do you look that way, like the river is rising and flooding the whole of Green Valley? All nervous, as though something’s wrong?”
She shrugged, twirled her hand around. “Gracie is Avery’s cousin,” she said, thinking things through, as though he wasn’t even in the room.
Who was Avery?
“Does it say anything in there about another guy? Besides your father, that is?”
“No, not this part. In another entry, she mentions a guy named Ken, but honestly, she doesn’t talk about him a whole lot. She only says ‘him’ or ‘the first one’ and ‘the second one,’ almost like she was talking in code, worried someone would read her journal. Probably her dad. My grandfather,” Quinn added. “Isn’t the most compassionate guy, apparently.”
Lilly stared at him, fingertips to her lips. “I’ve heard that about him.”
“You know him?” Quinn asked.
“Not personally, no. I mean, I’ve seen him around town at barbecues and church, but I’ve never had the pleasure of speaking with Mr. Phillips.”