Page 4 of Love Always

She nodded. “Yeah and then down a peninsula.”

“Well,” I said, standing and beginning to button my shirt from the bottom up. “We need to get you sober before you climb behind the wheel of a car.”

“Do you want to go down to the lobby and get coffee there? Or stay here?”

“Stay here,” she said softly. “I wasn’t going to drive anyway like this.” She sniffed. “I was going to call my sister.”

“Do you want to do that instead?”

She gave a shuddering sigh and pulled off the backpack again. “No.” She dropped it on the bed. “Let’s have coffee here.”

“We’ll get you a cup of coffee. And we don’t have to talk. We don’t have to do anything. We can just sit here together, if that’s okay.”

She nodded and gulped a little, pressing the heels of her hands into her eyes. When she pulled them away, her voice was steady. “Thank you so much. This is what I used to do in high school. I had some really bad news today and part of me went right back there. I was trying to send myself back into some spiral of self-destruction. I’m not really usually such a mess.” She paused. “I’m just so glad we didn’t do this.”

I have to admit watching her curl into the chair, grasping the mug of black coffee I handed her, left me with mixed feelings about that one.

I walked back over to the coffee station. I needed to sober up as well. I used to drink a lot. Not anymore. It was a carousel of K-Cups. “I hate these things. So much waste.”

“Exactly,” she said, clearly glad to have the focus off of us, off of her.

We talked about nothing after that. Small stuff. Cheesy popcorn or buttered with yeast? Omelets or scrambled eggs? Were spicy, Brussels sprout tacos, legit?

“No,” was my one-word answer. “And don’t argue with a Mexican about these things.”

That’s when she laughed and put her hand over her mouth and I finally witnessed what I’d thought I’d seen on the pier. I poured her a second cup. She sat in the chair with legs drawn up sipping coffee and telling me about growing up on the coast. Her dad had been a vet. My father was a horse trainer. Laurel was one of five kids. I was one of two. She grew up watching the sea and collecting sea glass. I grew up watching sandstorms and catching lizards.

An hour later when she left, her hair back in the elastic, her face washed and her voice steady, I thought I’d never see her again.

I should have known better though.

I walked her to the lobby door. When she rose on tiptoes to kiss me on the cheek, my heart stuttered in my chest. More than any antics on the bed, this one kiss, chaste and sweet, made me take a step back as my prick stiffened. Her touch was real, her kiss authentic and it made all the difference in how my body reacted.

“Thank you,” she said. “For everything.”

And then she was gone.

΅

So, flash forward to this morning when my life grew more complicated. Finn Colton wanted me to drive up to his inn at a place called Echo Bay and see the “NP” or “North-of-Portland” office as he calls it. I also had to track down my old friend, my buddy, Bryce Tucker. He works for Finn too. One issue: he’s been off the map for the last three years and didn’t know I was coming.

After an awkward afternoon finding Bryce, dealing with his guilt bullshit, meeting a woman named Chloe under slightly bizarre conditions, I ended up on the back porch of the Echo Bay Inn. After being handed an assignment for later that evening, I turned down a beer, a move which probably scored points with my new boss but really, it was because of the night before. I was also meeting the people who made up my boss’s life. As it turned out, I needed to be as clear-headed as possible.

They were like one tight, extended family. I hung out with Finn and his girlfriend, Claire Russo, a veterinarian whose practice was right next door. I discovered Chloe was her sister and then another sister, Devon, showed up with a little boy named Cory who immediately opened up a plastic bag of Lego and spilt them on the porch. The name “Travis” floated by, a younger brother and another vet in the making I gathered after a few minutes of listening. He was coming a bit later.

It turned out the Russos grew up at “The Inn,” as they called it. Their father’s clinic was next door and their mom ran the front of the house and housekeeping for the twenty-two room, three-story building. It used to be a home for quarrymen at the turn of the century, but Finn had updated the grounds. Now it was fifteen bedrooms with just a few shared baths. “A work in progress,” he said, raising his beer bottle to the porch ceiling.

Then, as I’m sitting there, gazing out at the sea, suddenly content and at peace to be near a coastline again, to see the water knowing I didn’t have to navigate it, the screen door opened onto the back porch.

Framed in the doorway, her mouth slightly open, her arms tight with the effort of controlling a tray of what looked like bread, cheese, and a bowl of olives, stood Laurel.

“Momma,” Cory said to her without lifting his head, “I not hungry.” A Lego flew over the railing.

It took a second to register. For both of us. She adjusted her face and instinctually I did the same. I swore my heart would give me away though. It pounded so hard I’m sure the collar to my shirt quivered.

“Cory,” she said without raising her voice, “Cory. You need to go get that piece.”

He glanced up but did not look at her.