Page 46 of What Love Can Do
But he didn’t know what to say. This was ending and ending badly.
The bubble had popped, the parade had been rained on. It was only a matter of time. God, she was beautiful, even standing there with tears in her eyes, and how he would have loved to cultivate a relationship with her had the timing been right, but alas—it wasn’t meant to be. Just another heartbreak in his life.
Time to move on again.
He finished packing his and his brother’s bags, did a quick sweep of the room to make sure he wasn’t leaving anything in the closet or under the sheets, and then took a solid, long glance at the room that had been his home for two weeks. Pausing at the door to plant a last kiss on Lilly’s forehead, he rushed out of Russian River House before he caught sight of her perfect doll face again and changed his mind.
Eighteen
Her heart couldn’t have ached more if he’d broken it with both his strong hands.
No “Goodbye, Lilly.” No “Thank you for the times we shared.” Nothing. Just a kiss on her head like a period at the end of a long, beautiful, if confusing, sentence. There was nothing she could say to stop him from leaving.
She could hear Quinn telling Con that everything had been packed. “So, let’s go.” The front door of the B&B closed, and her chest imploded with a million questions and regrets, as she stood staring at the empty room that had held the O’Neill brothers and all their things just a moment before. Now, it was just a cold space where her heart had been.
Wait…
He hadn’t taken everything. In his haste, he’d left something brown and leather and very, extremely important sticking out underneath his pillow—Maggie Phillips’ journal. Quickly, she rushed in and scooped it into her shaking hands, wondering if she should run out after him, but he’d already taken off, peeled out of the B&B parking lot, fleeing like a priest from his personal demons.
She wrapped the loose leather string around the journal and held it close to her heart. Chances were, he would notice soon enough that it was missing, and then he’d have to come back to her to get it, but only after suffering a bit. Yes, it was an evil thing to think, but he was the one who left in a rush, refused to listen or talk things through.
Closing the bedroom door, she headed upstairs to her room with the journal, closed her door behind her, and sat on her king-sized empty bed, book in hand. The urge to glance through its telltale pages was overwhelming. There might be insight there about her father, why Maggie left for Ireland, things that would help Lilly understand a tormented woman’s train of thought.
Lillian knew once her eyes fell on the written words within, her brain would soak them up, simmer them a while, then serve them up in some form, one way or another—whether she agreed with Maggie’s decisions or not. She could, of course, adopt a head full of morals all of a sudden and not read it at all—but then again, Quinn had clearly told her that he trusted her completely and that she could read the journal whenever she wanted.
She wanted to understand Quinn better. Right now, she needed to feel close to him. He was hurt and angry right now, but she knew he’d been right to place his trust in her.
Lilly went to her room’s fridge, pulled out a bottle of chardonnay, and poured herself a chilled glass. Then, slipping into her sweater, she escaped to the outdoor terrace with the journal, sat on her lounge chair, the very one she and Quinn had made love on almost two weeks ago and breathed in the scent of jasmine and gardenia. Striking a match, she lit one of her outdoor lanterns on the side table, hung quietly for a few moments, listening to the silence of the valley, and began to read.
Hours later, Lilly went to see her mother. She knew exactly where to find her. Most of the time, they were both tethered to the bed-and-breakfast but when she was troubled, Penny Parker gravitated toward Parker House and the vineyard where her husband had worked alongside his family. As Lilly headed over there, the sky’s patchwork of purple and yellow clouds set against the autumn orange background brought sad memories. Dad had died on a day just like this. His ALS had hit an all-time low, and the hospice finally made “the call” to deliver the bad news.
That had been heartbreaking enough. Add to that the last couple hours reading Maggie’s journal and the slap when Quinn walked out of her life, and it was enough to make Lilly want to curl up into a ball and burst into tears. But there was no time for that. She had to find her mom to make things right.
She spotted her mother’s emaciated form within the endless rows, talking with a worker, touching the cabernet grapes with loving tenderness. Lillian shuffled up to where she stood and panted an end-of-walk sigh. “Hey.”
Her mother whirled, wiping her hand on the towel she’d strung from a loop on her jeans. “There you are.”
“Can we talk?”
Mom nodded. “Let’s go back to the veranda.” She turned and walked slowly toward the main house, dragging her feet. She was definitely getting slower these days, which worried Lilly.
“I’m sorry for the way I left the kitchen earlier,” Lilly said. After Avery’s rude comments, she had slapped down her towel, torn off her apron, and stormed out, finishing dressing as she’d walked out of the kitchen. “But I want you to understand where I was coming from—”
“But?” Mom interrupted. “Lillian, when you apologize, apologize. There are no ‘buts.’”
Lilly scoffed. “At least I’m apologizing, even though I didn’t do anything wrong. I mean, aside from being half-naked in the kitchen, that is. I didn’t know you were coming back so soon.”
Mom raised an eyebrow in her direction. “You did more than that. You know what you did.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Lilly asked, vying for her mother’s eye contact and not getting it. “What do you have against Quinn? I know in your mind, he’s the spawn of the devil, but he’s not. First of all, he’s not a clone of Maggie Phillips, and second—”
“What would you know of Maggie Phillips? You weren’t even around yet, Lillian.”
“I didn’t need to be around. I can read. I read Maggie’s journal about those days before she left for Ireland and the few years that followed. She wasn’t an ogre, Mom. I know you won’t understand, but she wasn’t. She cared, and she had to hurt some people to follow her heart—”
Her mother stopped and faced her. “Stop telling me that you think you know what I feel. ‘I know you feel this…I know you think that.’ You don’t know what I think.” The wagging finger was up and doing what it did. “You aren’t me, so please…keep this about you.”
Mom continued walking, and Lilly fumed. “You know, Mom, you keep interrupting me, which just goes to show that you don’t even respect what I’m saying.”