Zee

Shadows fall on the beach, and a cool wind whips around us, making Quinn shiver in my arms. Even the sand has cooled.

I pull her close, and mumble against her temple, “We should go, it’s getting cold.”

“I don’t want to leave,” she says drowsily.

“You have goosebumps.” I rub my palm over her arms.

“Don’t care.” She snuggles deeper into me. “I like it here. Could stay forever.”

The scary thing is, I could too.

I give myself a moment longer, pulling the blanket tighter around her shoulders.

“Do you enjoy what you do?” she asks, trailing her fingers along the ink on my chest. “The band, I mean. Being on stage.”

“It’s a job.” I hate thinking about that life, especially when I’m with her. It seems dark and polluted compared to the world she lives in. The world I’ve always skated the edges of.

“You’re good though,” she says. “On the guitar.”

I chuckle against the top of her head. “Wouldn’t have gotten where I am if I weren’t.”

She lifts her head and rolls her eyes at me. “Cocky much?”

“Some things I’m allowed to be. That’s one of them.”

She rests her chin on my chest, lips pulling down. “So you’ll go back to it, when you leave?”

I don’t want to think about leaving either.

“There’s another tour coming up,” I admit. “Haven’t decided if I’ll sign yet.”

“Don’t you have to go?”

“My name won’t break the band.” In fact, I’m the third bass guitarist AutoCorrect’s gone through in the last ten years.

“What will you do, if you don’t tour with them?”

“Haven’t thought that far ahead.”

It’s the truth. I have no idea what I’m going to do. Not until I talk to Kade. Until I know the truth.

“You can always stay here,” she says softly.

“Quinn—”

“I know.” She breathes out a frustrated breath, then pulls away from me and starts gathering her clothes. “I’m not asking. Just saying it’s a possibility.”

Is it? I’m not sure. The more I think about the whole situation, the more I realize that telling her the truth, coming clean to Kade is probably more selfish than keeping it from them.

If I stay here, I could still be part of the kid’s life. Does it really matter who her real father is if she’s loved and taken care of?

I honestly don’t know.

“What about you?”

“I’d like to travel more.” She shrugs, handing me my shirt, then stands and brushes the sand off her legs. “But I’ll always come back here. It’s my home. And I don’t want to leave Lola. Kade’s done a great job with her, but he’s got his hands full with the bar, and trying to make ends meet.”

Guilt strangles me. How much of that is my fault? Most of it.

Whatever happens, even if the kid isn’t mine, I’m going to make sure to relieve some of his financial burdens. I know he won’t take money from me, but there’s ways around that. Hell, I still own half the damn bar, I could have a construction crew there tomorrow to start renovations. Fix the place up so it doesn’t look like some dive bar in the middle of nowhere — which it technically is. But, still not the point.

“You’re happy, working in a bar for the rest of your life, and taking care of someone else’s kid?” I know the second the words are out of my mouth that I shouldn’t have said them.

Asshole, my brain shouts, and I see the same accusation in Quinn's eyes.

“Being a waitress doesn’t make me any less of a person.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

Chewing on the inside of her lip, she looks out on the lake. “I know my life probably seems menial compared to yours, but honestly, all I really want is...” She shakes her head and gives me a small forced smile. “There’s nothing wrong with wanting the simple things.”

“Coming from the woman who owns two hundred pairs of shoes.” I wrap my arms around her waist and pull her against me.

She smacks my chest and laughs. “Those boxes weren’t all shoes, some had purses in them. And I’ll have you know I had every intention of selling the ones I can and donating the rest.”

I shake my head at her. Only Quinn would spend thousands of dollars on ridiculously expensive designer shoes, just to give them away.

“So if shoes don’t make you happy anymore, what does?”

“Oh, shoes still make me happy.” She chuckles. “Just not as much as they used to.”

“You didn’t answer my question.” I brush her hair behind one ear. “What do you want in life.”

“You’ll think it’s silly.”

“Probably.” I grin.

“Well, I’m not telling you now.” She shakes her head, laughing.

“Tell me.”

She sighs. “Like I said, I’d like to travel. See the world a bit. But really I just want...” Her lips tug down slightly before she continues. “I know how lucky I am to have a great family. Parents who love me and still, after all this time, love each other. And even my brothers, as annoying as they can be, I’m glad I have them. So, I guess, that’s what I want.”

“More of your crazy ass brothers?” I laugh.

“No.” She glances away when she says softly, “To have a family of my own, a whole brood of kids, getting in my hair and making me crazy. Because in the end, nothing else really matters.”

My chest constricts, and I swallow hard over the lump that’s formed in my throat, because I could see everything she said clearly in my mind. See my ring on her finger. See her belly swollen with child — my child.

Fuck. The thought sends fear straight to my gut. Not because I don’t want it. But because I do.

I feel her tense. “You can relax, I wasn't saying I wanted it with you.”

Her words sting, even though I hear the lie in them.

“It’s getting cold. We should go,” she says, pulling out of my arms, then reaching down to pick up the blanket and shake it out.

That damn voice is back, screaming at me to say something, to not let her walk away thinking that she means anything less to me than I do to her.

But I do. Instead of stopping her, I drag my hand through my hair and watch her start up the hill.

Coward, that voice inside my head mocks. Maybe it’s right. Because if love exists at all, I know it’s here, in this place — with Quinn.