by Nora Roberts
"Ethan, if you don't have time for this…" Grace began.
"I've got time to eat an ice cream cone with a pretty girl." So saying, he lifted Aubrey up and let her press her nose to the glass-fronted counter that held the buckets of hand-dipped choices.
Liz took the next order, and spared a wiggling-eyebrow glance toward her husband that spoke volumes. Ethan Quinn and Grace Monroe, it stated clearly. Well, well. What do you think of that?
They took their cones outside, where the breeze was warm off the water, and wandered away from the crowds to find one of the small iron benches the city fathers had campaigned for. Armed with a fistful of napkins, Grace set Aubrey on her lap.
"I remember when you'd come here and know the name of every face you'd see," Grace murmured. "Mother Crawford would be behind the counter, reading a paperback novel." She felt a wet drip from Aubrey's ice cream plop on her leg below the hem of her shorts and wiped it up. "Eat around the edges, honey, before it melts away."
"You'd always get strawberry ice cream, too."
"Hmm?"
"As I recall," Ethan said, surprised that the image was so clear in his mind, "you had a preference for strawberry. And grape Nehi."
"I guess I did." Grace's sunglasses slipped down her nose as she bent to mop up more drips. "Everything was simple if you had yourself a strawberry cone and a grape Nehi."
"Some things stay simple." Because her hands were full, Ethan nudged Grace's glasses back up—and thought he caught a flicker of something in her eyes behind the shaded lenses. "Some don't."
He looked out to the water as he applied himself to his own cone. A better idea, he decided, than watching Grace take those long, slow licks from hers. "We used to come down here on Sundays now and then," he remembered. "All of us piling into the car and riding into town for ice cream or a sub or just to see what was up. Mom and Dad liked to sit under one of the umbrella tables at the diner and drink lemonade."
"I still miss them," she said quietly. "I know you do. That winter I caught pneumonia—I remember my mother and yours. It seemed every time I woke up, one or the other of them was right there. Dr. Quinn was the kindest woman I ever knew. My mama—"
She broke off, shook her head.
"What?"
"I don't want to make you sad."
"You won't. Finish it."
"My mother goes to the cemetery every year in the spring and puts flowers on your mother's grave. I go with her. I didn't realize until the first time we went how much my mother loved her."
"I wondered who put them there. It's nice knowing. What's being said… what some people are saying about my father would have got her Irish up. She'd have scalded more than a few tongues by now."
"That's not your way, Ethan. You have to tend to that business your own way."
"They would both want us to do what's best for Seth. That would come first."
"You are doing what's best for him. Every time I see him he looks lighter. There was such a heaviness over him when he first came here. Professor Quinn was working his way through that, but he had such troubles of his own. You know how troubled he was, Ethan."
"Yeah." And the guilt weighed like a stone, dead center in his heart. "I know."
"Now I have made you sad." She shifted toward him so that their knees bumped. "Whatever troubled him, it was never you. You were one strong, steady light in his life. Anyone could see that."
"If I'd asked more questions…" he began.
"It's not your way," she said again and, forgetting her hand was sticky, touched it to his cheek. "You knew he would talk to you when he was ready, when he could."
"Then it was too late."
"No, it never is." Her fingers skimmed lightly over his cheek. "There's always a chance. I don't think I could get from one day to the next if I didn't believe there's always a chance. Don't worry," she said softly.
He felt something move inside him as he reached up to cover her hand with his. Something shifting and opening. Then Aubrey let out a wild squeal of joy.
"Grandpa!"
Grace's hand jerked, then dropped like a stone. All the warmth that had flowed out of her chilled. Her shoulders went straight and stiff as she turned forward again and watched her father walk toward them.
"There's my dollbaby. Come see Grandpa."
Grace let her daughter go, watched her race and be caught. Her father didn't wince or shy away from the sticky hands or smeared lips. He laughed and hugged and smacked his lips when kissed lavishly.
"Mmm, strawberry. Gimme more." He made munching noises on Aubrey's neck until she screamed with delight. Then he hitched her easily on his hip and crossed the slight distance to his daughter. And no longer smiled. "Grace, Ethan. Taking a Sunday stroll?"
Grace's throat was dry, and her eyes burned. "Ethan offered to buy us some ice cream."
"Well, that's nice."
"You're wearing some of it now," Ethan commented, hoping to ease some of the rippling tension that moved in the air.
Pete glanced down to his shirt, where Aubrey had transferred some of her favored strawberries. "Clothes wash. Don't often see you around the waterfront on a Sunday, Ethan, since you started building that boat."
"Taking an hour before I get started on it today. Hull's finished, deck's nearly."
"Good, that's good." He nodded, meaning it, then shifted his gaze to Grace. "Your mother's in the diner. She'll want to see her granddaughter."
"All right. I—"
"I'll take her over," he interrupted. "You can go on home when you're ready to, and your mother'll bring her on by your place in an hour or two."
She'd have preferred he slap her than speak to her in that polite and distant tone. But she nodded, as Aubrey was already babbling about Grandma.
"Bye! Bye, Mama. Bye, Ethan," Aubrey called over Pete's shoulder and blew noisy kisses.
"I'm sorry, Grace." Knowing it was inadequate, Ethan took her hand and found it stiff and cold.
"It doesn't matter. It can't matter. And he loves Aubrey. Just dotes on her. That's what counts."
"It's not fair to you. Your father's a good man, Grace, but he hasn't been fair to you."
"I let him down." She rose, quickly wiping her hands on the napkins she'd balled up. "And that's that."
"It's nothing more than his pride butting up against yours."
"Maybe. But my pride's important to me." She tossed the napkins into a trash container and told herself that was the end of it. "I've got to get back home, Ethan. There's a million things I should be doing, and if I've got a couple hours free, I'd better do them."
He didn't push, but was surprised how strongly he wanted to. He hated being nudged and nagged to talk about private matters himself. "I'll drive you home."
"No, I'd like to walk. Really like to walk. Thanks for the help." She managed a smile that looked almost natural. "And the ice cream. I'll be by the house tomorrow. Make sure you tell Seth his laundry goes in the hamper, not on the floor."
She walked away, her long legs eating up the ground. She made certain she was well away before she allowed her steps to slow. Before she rubbed a hand over the heart that ached no matter how firmly she ordered it not to.
There were only two men in her life she had ever really loved. It seemed neither of them could want her as she needed them to want her.
Chapter Four
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ethan didn't mind music when he worked. The fact was, his taste in music was both broad and eclectic—another gift of the Quinns. The house had often been filled with it. His mother had played a fine piano with as much enthusiasm for the works of Chopin as for those of Scott Joplin. His father's musical talent had been the violin, and it was that instrument Ethan had gravitated to. He enjoyed the varying moods of it, and its portability.
Still, he found music a waste of sound whenever he was concentrating on a job, as he usually didn't hear it after ten minutes anyway. Silence suited him best during those times, but Seth liked the radio in
the boatyard up, and up loud. So to keep peace, Ethan simply tuned out the head-punching rock and roll.
The hull of the boat had been caulked and filled, a labor-intensive and time-consuming task. Seth had been a lot of help there, Ethan admitted, giving him an extra pair of hands and feet when he needed them. Though Christ knew the boy could complain about the job as much as Phillip did.
Ethan tuned that out as well—to stay sane.
He hoped to finish leveling off the decking before Phillip arrived for the weekend, planing first on one diagonal, then across the next at a right angle.
With any luck, he could get some solid work done that week and the next on the cabin and cockpit.
Seth bitched about being on sanding detail, but he did a decent job of it. Ethan only had to tell him to go back and hit portions of the hull planking again a couple of times. He didn't mind the boy's questions, either. Though he had a million of them once he started.
"What's that piece over there for?"
"The bulkhead for the cockpit."
"Why'd you cut it out already?"
"Because we want to get rid of all the dust before we varnish and seal."
"What's all this other shit?"
Ethan paused in his own work, looking down from his position to where Seth frowned at a stack of precut lumber. "You got the sides and cabin ends, the toerail and drop-boards."
"It seems like an awful lot of pieces for one stupid boat."
"There's going to be a lot more."
"How come this guy doesn't just buy a boat that's already built?"
"Good thing for us he isn't." The client's deep pockets, Ethan mused, were giving Boats by Quinn its foundation. "Because he liked the other boat I built for him—and so he can tell all his big-shot friends he had a boat designed and hand-built for him."
Seth changed his sandpaper and applied himself again. He didn't mind the work, really. And he liked the smells of wood and varnish and that linseed oil, too. But he just didn't get it. "It's taking forever to put it together."
"Been at it less than three months. Lots of people spend a year—even longer—to build a wooden boat."
Seth's jaw dropped. "A year! Jesus, Ethan."
The loud, and very normal whine, made Ethan's mouth twitch. "Relax, this isn't going to take us that long. Once Cam gets back and can put in full days on it, we'll move along. And once school's out, you can pick up a lot of the grunt work."
"School is out."
"Hmm?"
"Today was it." Now Seth grinned, wide and bright. "Freedom. It's a done deal."
"Today?" Pausing in his work, Ethan frowned. "I thought you had a couple days yet."
"Nope."
He'd lost track of things somewhere, Ethan supposed. And it wasn't Seth's style—not yet, anyway—to volunteer information. "Did you get a report card?"
"Yeah—I passed."
"Let's see how." Ethan set his tools down, brushed his hands on his jeans. "Where is it?"
Seth shrugged his shoulders and kept sanding. "It's in my backpack over there. No big deal."
"Let's see it," Ethan repeated.
Seth did what Ethan considered his usual dance. Rolling his eyes, shrugging his shoulders, adding a long-suffering sigh. Oddly enough, he didn't end with an oath, as he was prone to. He walked over to where he'd dumped his backpack and riffled through it.
Ethan leaned down over the port side to take the paper Seth held up. Noting the mutinous expression on Seth's face, he expected the news would be grim. His stomach did a quick clench and roll. The required lecture, Ethan thought with an inner sigh, was going to be damned uncomfortable for both of them.
Ethan studied the thin, computer-generated sheet, pushing back his cap to scratch his head. "All A's?"
Seth jerked a shoulder again, stuffed his hands in his pockets. "Yeah, so?"
"I've never seen a report card with all A's before. Even Phillip used to have some B's, and maybe a C tossed in."
Embarrassment, and the fear of being called Egghead or something equally hideous rose swiftly. "It's no big deal." He held up a hand for the report card, but Ethan shook his head.
"The hell it's not." But he saw Seth's scowl and thought he understood it. It was always hard to be different from the pack. "You got a good brain and you ought to be proud of it."
"It's just there. It's not like knowing how to pilot a boat or anything."
"You got a good brain and you use it, you'll figure out how to do most anything." Ethan folded the paper carefully and tucked it in his pocket. Damn if he wasn't going to show it off some. "Seems to me we ought to go get a pizza or something."
Puzzled, Seth narrowed his eyes. "You packed those lame sandwiches for dinner."
"Not good enough now. The first time a Quinn gets straight A's ought to rate at least a pizza." He saw Seth's mouth open and shut, watched the staggered delight leap into his eyes before he lowered them.
"Sure, that'd be cool."
"Can you hold off another hour?"
"No problem."
Seth grabbed his sandpaper and began to work furiously. And blindly. His eyes were dazzled, his heart in his throat. It happened whenever one of them referred to him as a Quinn. He knew his name was DeLauter still. He had to put it at the top of every stupid paper he did for school, didn't he? But hearing Ethan call him a Quinn made that little beam of hope that Ray had first ignited in him months before shine just a little brighter.
He was going to stay. He was going to be one of them. He was never going back into hell again.
It made it worth being called down to Moorefield's office that day. The vice principal had reeled him in an hour before freedom. It had made his stomach jitter, as it always did. But she'd sat him down and told him she was proud of his progress.
Man, how mortifying.
Okay, so maybe he hadn't punched anybody in the face in the last couple months. And he'd been handing in his stupid homework assignments every dumb day because somebody was always nagging him about them. Phillip was the worst nag in that particular area. It was like the guy was a homework cop or something, Seth thought now. And yeah, he'd been raising his hand in class now and then, just for the hell of it.
But to have Moorefield single him out that way had been so… bleech, he decided. He'd almost wished she'd hauled his butt in to give him another dose of In-School Suspension.
But if a bunch of dopey A's made a guy like Ethan happy, it was okay.
Ethan was absolutely cool in Seth's estimation. He worked outside all day, and his hands had scars and really thick calluses. Seth figured you could practically pound nails into Ethan's hands without him even feeling it, they were so hard and tough. He owned two boats—that he'd built himself—and he knew everything about the Bay and sailing. And didn't make a big deal about it.
A couple of months back Seth had watched High Noon on TV, even though it had been in lame black and white and there hadn't even been any blood or explosions. He'd thought then that Ethan was just like that Gary Cooper guy. He didn't say a lot, so you mostly listened when he did. And he just did what needed to be done without a lot of show.
Ethan would have faced down the bad guys, too. Because it was right. Seth had mulled it over for a while and had decided that's what a hero was. Somebody who just did what was right.
ethan would have been stunned and mortally embarrassed, if he'd been able to read Seth's thoughts. But the boy was an expert at keeping them to himself. On that level, he and Ethan were as close as twins.
It might have crossed Ethan's mind that Village Pizza was only a short block from Shiney's Pub, where Grace would be starting her shift, but he didn't mention it.
Couldn't take the boy into a bar anyway, Ethan mused as they headed into the bright lights and noise of the local restaurant. And Seth was bound to complain, loudly, if Ethan asked him to wait in the car for just a couple minutes while he poked his head in. Likely Grace would complain, too, if she caught on that he was checking on her.
It
was best to let it go and concentrate on the matters at hand. He tucked his hands into his back pockets and studied the menu posted on the wall behind the counter. "What do you want on it?"
"You can forget the mushrooms. They're gross."
"We're of a mind there," Ethan murmured.
"Pepperoni and hot sausage." Seth sneered, but he spoiled it by bouncing a little in his sneakers. "If you can handle it."
"I can take it if you can. Hey, Justin," he said with a smile of greeting for the boy behind the counter. "We'll take a large, pepperoni and hot sausage, and a couple of jumbo Pepsis."
"You got it. Here or to go?"
Ethan scanned the dozen tables and booths offered and noted that he wasn't the only one who'd thought to celebrate the last day of school with pizza. "Go nab that last booth back there, Seth. We'll take it here, Justin."
"Have a seat. We'll bring the drinks out."
Seth had dumped his backpack on the bench and was tapping his hands on the table in time to the blast of Hootie and the Blowfish from the juke. "I'm going to go kick some video ass," he told Ethan. When Ethan reached back for his wallet. Seth shook his head. "I got money."
"Not tonight you don't," Ethan said mildly and pulled out some bills. "It's your party. Get some change."
"Cool." Seth snagged the bills and raced off to get quarters.
As Ethan slid into the booth, he wondered why so many people thought a couple hours in a noisy room was high entertainment. A huddle of kids was already trying to kick some video ass at the trio of machines along the back wall; the juke had switched to Clint Black—and that country boy was wailing. The toddler in the booth behind him was having a full-blown tantrum, and a group of teenage girls were giggling at a decibel level that would have made Simon's ears bleed.
What a way to spend a pretty summer night.
Then he saw Liz Crawford and Junior with their two little girls at a nearby booth. One of the girls—that must be Stacy, Ethan thought—was talking quickly, making wide gestures, while the rest of the family howled with laughter.
They made a unit, he mused, their own little island in the midst of the jittery lights and noise. He supposed that's what family was, an island. Knowing you could go there made all the difference.
Still the tug of envy surprised him, made him shift uncomfortably on the hard seat of the booth and scowl into space. He'd made his mind up about having a family years before, and he didn't care for this sharp pull of longing.
"Why, Ethan, you look fierce."
He glanced up as the drinks were set on the table in front of him, straight into the flirtatious eyes of Linda Brewster.
She was a looker, no question about it. The tight black jeans and scoop-necked black T-shirt hugged her well-developed body like a coat of fresh paint on a classic Chevy. After her divorce was final—one week ago Monday—she'd treated herself to a manicure and a new hairdo. Her coral-tipped nails skimmed through her newly bobbed, streaky blond hair as she smiled down at Ethan.
She'd had her eye on him for a time now—after all, she had separated from that useless Tom Brewster more than a year before and a woman had to look to the future. Ethan Quinn would be hot in bed, she decided. She had instincts about
