Chapter 29
T hey checked out of the hotel later with Jude carrying just a little more than he’d arrived with.
Rather than stow away the package Trevor had given him to take home with him, he held it close to his chest, not ready yet to set it aside when it contained all the postcards his father had written since leaving Porthperrin.
Each one that he’d read so far felt charged with static, his fingers prickling as well as his eyes just to know who wrote them.
Letting go of them now felt risky, as though some enchanted connection to his parents might cut off.
Rob, on the other hand, was all business. He sat with his hands at ten-to-two on Betsy’s steering wheel, seatbelt already fastened, a touch impatient and determined to get going. That serious mien only made him sexier. “You ready?”
“Nope.” Jude didn’t fasten his seatbelt.
Instead, he leaned over the gearstick. “Not yet, anyway,” he said pulling Rob into a kiss that Jude was in no hurry to finish given that this parking spot was private and shady.
There was no one around to witness him fumbling one-handed to unfasten Rob’s seatbelt before pulling him as close as he could manage, no one to break the spell cast by twenty-four hours of being Rob’s sole focus.
It wasn’t only the package that Trevor had given him that was packed to the brim with magic, Jude decided.
St Ives was bewitched as well, like this jewel of a hotel.
Getting to have all of this and Rob, who shifted closer, his mouth opening so easily for him, was another spell Jude would do anything right then to prolong.
“Let’s stay,” he whispered against Rob’s mouth.
“No.” Rob pulled back a scant inch, just enough that Jude could see his colour had risen. “Now I’ve had my wicked way with you, you bore me.” He had to be straight-up lying. That rare serious expression cracking confirmed it.
Jude leaned in again, only Rob leaned farther back this time, out of his reach while listing reasons to leave in a way that left Jude’s heart, like the package of postcards in his lap, brimful too.
Rob put Louise first, like usual. “If we stay, your sister will have my guts for garters. She called to say we’ve actually got tables booked tonight for dinner. ”
“We do?”
“We do.”
“Locals?” Jude asked, dubious. Rushing home to cook at a massive discount to make the pub look busy didn’t seem like a good reason to race off, not when the room was paid for until noon, that glorious bed with its soft sheets calling to him like a siren.
A robin landed on Rob’s wing mirror, red chest as puffed up as Rob’s when he said, “Some of my networking must have paid off. The bookings are for two tables of brand-new customers.”
“Paying ones?” Jude narrowed his eyes.
Rob winced and tried to change the subject.
“Buckle up, buttercup,” Rob said as he refastened his seatbelt before coming clean.
“Okay, okay. They’re not exactly paying.
” He gestured for Jude to hurry up as he keyed the ignition, the lovely roar of Betsy’s engine almost muffling his explanation.
“One table’s booked for a local festival committee, and the other is for the farmers’ market collective.
” He started to back out of their parking space, serious again as he frowned, thoughtful.
“There’s no harm in giving them a free meal if that means they’ll consider adding us to their rotation.
I put out some feelers that day we went out to breakfast,” he added.
“Seems like they might be interested in giving Porthperrin a trial.” His incisors dug into a lower lip still reddened by Jude’s kiss, a paler indent remaining when he glanced in his direction.
“Even if it’s only a couple of times in the summer, it could bring in a lot of trade that usually bypasses the village. ”
They left the hotel behind, winding their way back to the main road.
Jude couldn’t help looking over his shoulder as the cove diminished.
He’d come back in a heartbeat.
“That’s what I want,” Rob said quietly, his gaze sliding Jude’s way after stopping the car at a junction.
“What?”
“For people to only leave the Anchor with that look on their faces. You’d do pretty much anything to go back right now, wouldn’t you.”
“I had a good time.” A hard time as well, but worth it for this outcome, even if it left his chest feeling cracked wide open. “Didn’t you?”
“The best,” Rob said simply. “I wouldn’t have missed a single minute.
” He pulled out, slotting Betsy between RVs, caravans, and cars crammed with vacationers’ luggage.
“But I’m not actually made of money, these days.
” His gaze slid sideways again. “I saw how much they charge per night for that suite. Staying for longer is out of my budget.”
“Sure, Mr Fancy-Pants sports car,” Jude grumbled.
“Hey, don’t mistake me for my dad. Cut off, remember?
Besides, someone talked me into investing all my winnings and then some in an amazing hotel you might have heard of.
A place called the New Anchor? I heard it’s got the best new chef in the country, and”—he tapped the walnut of the dashboard for luck—“it might not get completely eviscerated by Guy Parsons.” The thick, dark sweep of Rob’s eyelashes shouldn’t have been so appealing as he fluttered them Jude’s way.
“You thought that hotel in St Ives was something? The New Anchor’s going to knock your socks off. ”
Jude would have appreciated Rob’s confidence if it wasn’t for a few facts: they’d yet to take any money, and Guy Parsons’ review might still hamstring them.
He held Trevor’s postcards close to his chest as they crawled back, none of the traffic taking the Porthperrin turn-off, all heading for vacation spots that had much more to offer.
“Hey,” Rob demanded a few minutes later. “Are you listening to me, fish face?”
Jude tuned back in as Rob negotiated the last tight bend before returning to Porthperrin’s empty car park. “Yeah?”
“I said, there’s one more reason why we needed to get back in a hurry.
” Now, with his car safely parked, and this car park private for very different reasons to the one they last kissed in, it was Rob’s turn to unfasten both their seat belts and lean into Jude’s space.
His kiss was sweet and slow and drugging. “Will you do something for me?”
Something?
After finding Trevor for him and Lou, he’d have done anything Rob wanted.
“Well, two things, actually.”
The first request was sobering. Rob slid his hand from Jude’s shoulder to press the postcards more firmly against Jude’s chest. “Can you warn Marc that Lou’s going to need him when she reads these?”
“Can’t you?”
“Yes, I can,” Rob said. “But I’m not going to. You are. And you’re going to act happy about it.”
Jude couldn’t help the sigh that slipped out. He wasn’t unhappy exactly; being around Marc was awkward, that was all, tangled with Jude’s response to his dad’s avoidance, none of which was Marc’s fault in the slightest.
“Jude,” Rob said, patient. “Did you notice anything about the paintings in Marc’s studio when we were there?”
Jude shook his head. He’d been too intent on begging Lou’s forgiveness to pay much attention.
Then he nodded slowly. “They weren’t seascapes, like in the gallery, were they?
” Or like on the walls of each room at the pub.
“The colours were different,” all soft shades of gold and rose. “Were they sunsets?”
“They were all of Louise.”
“What?”
“He paints seascapes for money, but he paints her because he’s in love with her.
” How Rob could blend humour with a warning, Jude still couldn’t fathom, but he did it as he added, “Some of them are abstract, but in some of them he paints her like a French girl, so don’t ever look at them too closely,” and then let out a chuckle.
“So, if he seems protective, remember who stayed in Porthperrin when their family went back to France, and who Lou ran straight to when she needed someone to trust.”
“Yeah, okay. I’ll go see him.” Jude dug deep into that tender new place in his chest. “I’ll clear the air if I can. Explain why I was such a dick around him,” and stop any wedge from forming between Jude and his sister, if he was lucky. “What’s the second thing you wanted?”
Rob answered with a question. “Did you really help your dad build both of the bunks in the boat shed?”
Jude nodded, the memory of sawing the wood suddenly so fresh he could almost smell the sawdust. “Yeah, when Lou and I outgrew the first ones Dad built. We both helped, only I had to build hers and she had to build mine. It took us ages.” God, his dad had been so patient, only helping them fix their mistakes rather than take over.
Missing him at that moment had Jude clutching his package even closer. “I guess that’s why we’ve always got on when some siblings can’t stand each other. He made us think of each other, and then gave us the tools to do it.”
Rob’s tone was so soft. He said, “Good because I want you to take them apart all over again,” like another chore was good news. He continued with, “And then build one we can stretch out in,” and Jude cheered up in a hurry.
Much later that evening, after a successful service that should have made him happy, Jude’s mood wasn’t exactly lower, but his feelings were mixed as Louise sat down to read the postcards.
Watching her holding back tears was just as hard as he’d anticipated, but her turning her face into Marc’s shoulder, postcards spread out on the desk before her, only made him pull back, silent.
Then he stopped at the office doorway, knowing now that his withdrawal response was a learned one, a legacy he didn’t have to continue when his dad had written as plain as day that he’d do things differently, in hindsight.
Jude came back and faced Marc. “I’m sorry about when you first came to Porthperrin.” Rob’s nod encouraged him to add detail. “Dad always withdrew from gay people.”