CHAPTER THREE
Mystic Bay, West Haven, Oregon, May
Moira~
“What do you mean Suffolk Green doesn’t come as a single tube?” Quinn shouted.
Actually Moira’s most disgruntled and fussy customer had not raised his voice, but his dismay still reverberated in her shop like an icy north wind. Still made her entire body quiver. Which was utterly ridiculous. She was Fae. She didn’t do passion. She had thought all her emotional upheaval was behind her now that she was home. But Quinn set her off every time he came into her store. And he seemed to come every few days.
“You can buy the entire range of Milton-Henshaw acrylics to obtain a tube of Suffolk Green, or you can mix your own,” she said patiently, indicating the large shrink-wrapped box Quinn was glaring at. “But you can’t buy it solo. Milton-Henshaw don’t make individual tubes of Suffolk Green.”
Moira was becoming accustomed to her new clientele. Back in Seattle, the buyers of expensive art dressed in designer clothes. Gallery owners did too. In Mystic Bay, artists who shopped for paint and canvases were less fashion forward. The customers of Fairchild’s Art Supply tended to throw on something, anything, to cover their nakedness. Usually garments long past their best-before dates.
And then there was Quinn. She didn’t know if that was his first or his last name. But it was the only one he used. It wasn’t so much his paint-impregnated jeans, or the stained blue smock that had never become acquainted with laundry soap. It wasn’t his black beard, which had morphed in the last four weeks from designer stubble to rat’s nest. Nor was it the unwashed hands with grimy nails rimmed with paint. She could have coped with that.
It was the miasma of stale alcohol that clung to Quinn that infuriated her. She had seen this derelict’s work. He had genuine ability and vision. Strong talent. He was going to steal top prize the Tidewater Art Fair – if he didn’t implode first. Quinn wasn’t so much a train wreck, as a sidelined engine rusting out from lack of maintenance. He had so much potential, but his talent would eventually drown in a bottle.
“I need to match my canvas,” he continued in that same urgent tone. “Why don’t they make Suffolk Green singles?”
“Because it’s a new color they’re trying out,” Moira used her most bland voice. Years ago, her Aunt Robin Fairchild, who ran the Tidewater Inn and possessed decades of customer service experience, had counseled her never to engage with angry patrons. Normally maintaining her calm was effortless, as it was for any fairy, but Quinn had a way of getting under her skin.
“But I need it now,” Quinn continued in that same wrathful voice. It had to be her imagination that blue flames flickered around his shaggy head and issued from his mouth. After only two months on the island, she was losing it.
“Drop Milton-Henshaw an email and tell them how much you depend on it,” she advised courteously. “And in six months or so they may issue it in singles.”
He growled.
She froze. That was not allowed. She firmed her lips and prepared to tell her best customer to take his trade elsewhere. Because alcohol and dirt notwithstanding, Quinn bought all his art supplies from her, and paid cash on the spot every time. And he bought the best. Never quibbled at the premium she was forced to charge because everything had to be brought in from the mainland on the ferry. Never asked for credit. Which in any case she did not extend to starving artists.
But Quinn must have realized that he had gone too far. He smiled at her. A winsome, seductive smile that robbed her of breath and made her nipples tingle. He was doing it on purpose too. She knew he had to be a sensitive of some sort. Aunt Robin did not offer space in the Tidewater Art Colony tonon-sensitives. Yet, try as she might, in the last month Moira had been unable to deduce what Quinn’s talent was. After today, she was guessing hunter.
While she was recovering her power of speech he apologized. “I’m sorry, Ms. Fairchild, I lost my temper.” Another panty-wetting smile. “But I need that Suffolk Green today.”
“I could break this package and let you have that tube. But I would have to charge you –” She paused to calculate how much extra, “Four times the regular price of single tubes.”
“Done,” he was almost purring. “And I’ll take a tube of Blue Twilight from that package as well.” He named a deep purplish-blue that he used to create depth in his shadowy forest scenes.
“If you take three tubes, I’ll lower the premium to three times the price,” she responded quickly. She didn’t want to take advantage of this drink-soaked idiot. If he didn’t watch his money more carefully, he would never last the summer. Which would be a pity, as his paintings were extraordinary.
Another big, satisfied, masculine smile. “Sold,” he said in exactly the tone one of her affluent former clients would have used to seal the purchase of multiple paintings by the same unknown artist. The tone that told her she had seriously underpriced said unknown’s work.
Whatever he was, whoever he was, Quinn was playing her. But a deal was a deal. She shook the hand he was holding out to her. It was big and warm and sent heat racing through her normally cool veins.
Goodness, he was wasting all that charm on her. His greenish-gold eyes ran over what she knew was her flushed face. Something glinted in their feral depths.
By Morgana and Merlin, Quinn must be a hunter. That look confirmed it. Did Robin know? There were lots of predatory shifters on West Haven, but they never took up art. Never. Not enough challenge. No thrill of pursuit. But this hunter was pursuing her. Or he wanted her to think so.
Her hand was still lost in the exhilarating clasp of his huge, dirty mitt. It had to be her imagination that his grip tightened fractionally as if to prevent her escape. She retrieved her hand, surprised to discover she still had her ring.
“What is your third choice?” she asked.
He bent over the box of Milton-Henshaw paints. She sighed. He would pick Crimson Lake or Titanium White or Marine Blue or Cadmium Light. The colors artists used to render the sunsets over the ocean. Reducing the number of readily salable colors.
He frowned slightly. Tapped a metallic between pewter and gold that was never going to sell. “This one, please.” So she wasn’t going to regret this sale. At least not immediately.
She rang the tubes up for him, slipped them into a plastic bag. Heard herself ask, “Would you like a cup of coffee?”
His beard split to display a lot of sharp white teeth. “I’d like that. Here?” He looked around.
Moira had a coffee maker in the back room. And a table with two chairs. Suddenly it seemed like folly to take him there. “I was offering to buy you a cup at the Bean,” she said hastily.
“Sure. Best coffee on the island. Although I would appreciate it if you didn’t tell your aunt I said so.”
The Tidewater Inn boasted the best restaurant on the island. Or in Mystic Bay. Since there was only one town on West Haven, it came to the same thing. The Bean and Bran was Mystic Bay’s best coffee shop and where the locals congregated rain or shine. It would spark gossip for her to be seen there with Quinn, but better gossip than a tête-à-tête alone with a hunter.