2. Quinn
2
QUINN
“ I sn’t that the burning question?” I admit, craning my neck to look up at him.
Sweat clings to the back of my neck, and my heart tilts.
I’ve been avoiding thinking of this moment every day since I moved in here the night Ember’s bar burned down.
Since the sound of sirens scared the men away, and I managed to cut myself free from the cable ties around my wrist and run from the bakery without looking back.
After I gave those men the five thousand dollars they asked me for when they returned a second time, taking my savings as if it meant nothing.
I don’t want to be home.
I don’t want to be in the bakery.
I want to be far from the center of the town.
I want to shrink and be invisible to the men who bring the very fear they want me to pay to prevent.
But I need to keep the bakery running, or I won’t be able to make ends meet.
Butcher is being gracious because of my relationship with Ember.
There’s a prospect or biker permanently on me.
They drive behind me to the bakery, no matter the time of day.
They hang out in the kitchen and patrol the rear and front of the store, looking for signs of trouble.
Then, one of them sits out on the porch overnight.
I take whoever is on watch a couple of pastries and some coffee before I give Bones a last walk outside and then go to bed.
Still, the feeling of unease sits with me constantly.
And while Butcher has told me they’ve taken care of the problem, and Ember reassures me that while she can’t say much, I should believe her father, I can’t.
I paid them. It was a mistake.
But now that they know I’ll give them money, I’m sure they’ll be back.
While I thought a night or two stay, somewhere outside of town, somewhere remote where they wouldn’t think of looking for me, would help, Smoke’s home has become my sanctuary.
It’s the only place I feel like I can breathe.
So, a night or two became…
more.
The property is stunning.
It’s a luxurious log cabin with pointed roofs and vaulted ceilings.
Inside, there is a large chef’s kitchen with more industrial equipment, which makes sense since the property used to belong to Margie.
She sold it to Smoke when her husband passed away, and she moved in above the diner she co-owns with Wraith, her son-in-law.
At least he was, before her daughter, his first wife, was murdered along with their child.
Outside, there is a wraparound porch.
Every evening, before dinner, I sit outside with Bones while I read and gently rock myself on the handmade swing.
The log cabin is surrounded on three sides by tall pines but fronts onto a huge meadow.
Once the sun has gone down for the evening and the air is a little cooler, it’s a perfect spot to sit and watch the stars that illuminate the ink-blue sky.
One thing I know for sure is that, even if I could move, I could never afford something as beautiful as this.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Smoke asks, running his hand over his hair.
He shaves it every year before jump season, but it’s already growing back.
It’s thick and brown with dirty blonde and reddish highlights that a woman would pay a fortune for at a salon.
He’s tan after spending so much time outdoors, making his pale gray eyes even more mysterious and his cheekbones even more chiseled.
He winces as he lowers his thickly veined and tattooed arm.
He has a mix of styles of ink, but there are lots of ocean references, like a lighthouse surrounded by waves with starfish under the water.
Ember told me he’d been injured, and while I want to ask if he’s okay, I don’t.
Bones’s feet scramble on the ground as he rounds the corner and playfully prances around Smoke’s legs.
He was asleep—as usual—when the truck pulled up.
“Bones, sit,” I say, and point to the floor, evading Smoke’s question.
My good boy with big soulful eyes does as he’s told.
With tan floppy ears, a white belly, and a wagging tail, he’s always two steps behind on everything, unless there is a scent that’s worth chasing.
“You brought your dog?” Smoke asks, his expression incredulous.
“Obviously, I did. I mean, he’s sitting right there in front of you.”
“Smart-ass. Does that mean there’s dog hair all over my furniture?”
I wince.
“Maybe a little. Nothing a good vacuum won’t solve.”
“I brought your bags in,” Atom says, stepping inside.
“Hey, Quinn.”
“Hey,” I reply.
“Thanks for dinner last night. Tell Ember I ate the doggy bag she sent home with me for lunch today.”
“No sweat,” he says.
“You want me to put these bags in your room, Smoke?”
“Sure,” Smoke says.
“Maybe leave that canvas one here so I can get the laundry going.”
I take Smoke’s momentary distraction to disappear into the kitchen, but when I see the mess, I know I can’t avoid him forever.
My need to be here transformed from a temporary thing when I brought a couple of cooking gadgets over so I could get a head start on my raspberry and white chocolate chip oat cookies for the following day.
I figured that given Smoke’s home has such a nice kitchen with a big double oven—God bless Margie—I could make some things here and transport them there.
It’s not exactly in line with all the city food preparation compliance things, but I figured they’d never know.
But then, more things started moving over.
Because given Ember’s bar, Whiskey Fever, was set on fire, I started to think about what would happen if they burned down the bakery.
It wouldn’t just be the business I would lose.
It was everything in our family apartment above it.
Melody’s baby album.
My mom’s jewelry.
Birth and death certificates.
Photographs taken before digital photography became a thing.
I’ve already lost the people.
Even though I resent becoming a keeper of things, losing their personal possessions would be more than I could take.
So, things started coming over in boxes.
I often creep up to the apartment during the day to fill one.
It’s become an obsession to the point where I lie awake at night, thinking about things I’ve left behind.
Looking at the tall cooling rack on wheels, I guess that might have been the point when it went too far.
Large metal objects, designed to go into an oven, that aren’t even sentimental, should have stayed exactly where they were.
“What the fuck?” Smoke asks when he walks into the kitchen, his eyes landing on the stack of cases I use to take cakes over to the bakery.
I turn to face him. “I need your help.”
“No kidding. I said you could stay for a few nights. Why the fuck did you move all this shit in?” He gestures to the boxes and…
stuff.
“It was an accident, of sorts. Unintentional. I didn’t mean to.”
“No, I’m not helping you.” His answer is the bluntness I deserve.
“I don’t want to be here, either,” I admit.
“Then why are you?”
He reaches for a glass from the cupboard but immediately retracts his arm and winces.
When his T-shirt lifted, I could see there are also dressings on his torso.
I debate all the ways I could explain this.
I hate that I’m going to have to be vulnerable if I want to stay.
“Because they came at night, Smoke. In the dark. And they set fire to Ember’s bar, at night. If Atom hadn’t been passing through in the early hours of the morning, she would have died in that fire. I don’t want to burn alive.”
Smoke blanches, and, as if on autopilot, touches his dressing.
“Oh my God. I’m so sorry. That was an awful thing to say. I didn’t mean like you…I mean, your friends. I… Shit. I can’t get this out right. I’m?—”
“I get it.” Smoke raises one hand, then winces.
It’s manipulative to lean into what has just happened to him, but it’s not like I don’t want to be in the bakery, it’s that I don’t want to be anywhere other than here.
Where I’ve found a modicum of peace.
“The way I see it, you have two choices. I leave, take my chances, but if something happens to me, it’ll always be on your conscience.”
“You assume I care.” Smoke shrugs.
“And it sounds like something I can live with, given you’re an adult and not my responsibility. What’s my second choice?”
“Your second choice is that you let me stay and I’ll help you.”
Smoke folds his arms across his chest. It’s unfair that he’s so distractingly muscled.
He smirks; it’s mean and lazy.
“What the hell would I need your help for?”
“It’s an exchange. I get the benefit of your house being out in the middle of nowhere, and your protection. And you get the benefit of having some help on hand while you recover.” I look back to the hallway where Atom left the canvas bag.
“I can do that laundry for you. Hang it to dry outside. Fold it and put it away for you if you tell me where it all goes. I can vacuum and get rid of the dog hair and cook and clean for you.”
Smoke’s smirk slides from his face.
He looks around the kitchen like it’s a military assault course filled with hideous obstacles.
“Are you hungry?” I ask.
“There’s food in the fridge, and I could pull you something together before I head into the bakery. I felt I should be here when you got back to…” I gesture around the kitchen.
“Face the music?”
“No. To welcome you home.”
Smoke stares at me, and I feel myself melting beneath his gaze.
“Fine. Yes. Face the music,” I say.
“Stop fidgeting,” Smoke says, and I shove my hands into the pockets of my dress.
My cheeks heat with the embarrassment of obeying so easily.
In some romance books I read, they say that with one look, the hero can make the heroine do anything.
Suddenly, I understand why.
Except I don’t want to do anything with Smoke.
“Stop making me nervous.”
“If you weren’t still here with all your worldly belongings, you’d have nothing to be nervous about.”
“I really am sorry about the fire references,” I blurt.
Smoke sighs. “Fine. Here’s the deal. I’d appreciate help with the household chores while you’re here. Your dog has to stay off the sofa. And you need to stay out of my way.”
“Does that include common spaces in the evening?”
Smoke raises one eyebrow.
“There are plenty of spots to sit in this house, so make any of the ones I’m not in yours.”
“Done. I’m not sure Bones is going to listen to the new stay-off-the-sofa rule, though.”
“It’s not a new rule. It’s always been the rule. Again, you arrived and over-stayed your welcome. Had I known a dog was coming with you, I would have told you. So, train him until he gets it. No is a powerful word. Keep trying to negotiate with me and I’ll use it.”
“Fine. Agreed.” I step around the kitchen counter.
“I can give you three things with what’s in the fridge: a chicken and bacon BLT, an omelet, or I have homemade tomato soup and could make you a grilled cheese.”
I hope he remembers, like I do, the time he came to pick Melody up for a date and she was late getting ready.
It had taken an age to convince our parents that she should be allowed to go, even though she was eighteen and technically could do what she wanted.
She was supposed to make me dinner before she left, but they were going to the movie theater in the next town, and Melody wanted to look perfect and was taking forever in the bathroom.
Smoke had said at least three times that she looked fine and that they were going to be late.
While we waited, Smoke offered to make me something to eat.
“My range is pretty limited, kid. But I do a mean grilled cheese sandwich.”
He cobbled it together with one of those small cans of condensed tomato soup.
And I sat at the kitchen island and devoured it like it was the most incredible thing I’d ever tasted.
I’m not even sure what was so special about it now.
And I’ve tried plenty of times to recreate it.
Maybe it was the man who cooked it.
Because once upon a time, we had the makings of being friends.
Back when he produced my favorite candy from his cut when no one was looking.
When he seemed like a good guy with a sharp sense of humor, who tolerated his girlfriend’s much younger sister.
He might have been my first childlike crush, before he became my first enemy.
I used to think Smoke killed her.
But over time, and in discussion with the police about the facts of the case as I got older, I know that isn’t true.
But I’ve always wondered if he knew more than he ever admitted.
“Fed up with rubbery and slippery eggs after being in the hospital. I’ll take the soup and cheese.” And with that, he turns and walks out of the screen door onto the back porch, leaving me as relieved as I am confused.
But one thing is true.
Between us are eight years in age, thirteen inches in height, and my sister’s disappearance.
And yet, this is the safest I’ve felt since the day of the break in.