Page 6 of As You Crave It

She nodded. “I was living in New York. But I got a new job down here, and I moved back a month ago.”

“And you never called?” he asked with a small smile.

“I wanted to look you up, I thought about it...” She trailed off before she could tell him the number of times that she’d dialed the distillery’s phone number, hoping to reach him, before hanging up after one ring.

“Don’t worry about it. I might not have called me, either.”

They were caught in another beat of awkward silence.

“So where is your new job? Do you like it there?” he asked.

Celia really didn’t want to talk about work. It had only been a month since she’d started at Seacoast Prestige, but Jared Foster had been working her day and night. She gave a shudder when she thought of her boss, and the work he’d rather she be doing for him all day and night. He was a slimy, disgusting misogynist, and she’d known it would be difficult working for him. Again. But it would all be worth it when she made him pay for what he’d done to her in New York. It wasn’t going to be easy, putting herself in his presence, but... “Oh, you know, it’s work,” she told him lightly, belying how she actually felt about working for the monster. “I’m a computer programmer for a local company.” The less she said about it, the better, so she shook her head. “But that’s enough about me. How about you?” she asked him.

“I’ve been well,” he told her. “We’re so busy with the distillery. It’s our best year yet.”

“Yeah, I can’t go anywhere without seeing Rexford rum.”

There were several more beats of awkward silence. It was weird, having such a stilted conversation with him. It was to be expected, of course. They couldn’t possibly just restart their friendship, but she’d hoped they would have been able to put it all behind them. No such luck. She knew he felt it, too. Frustrated, she turned in her seat to face him. “What’s going on here? Do we have to make out to break the tension or something?” Wouldn’t be the first time. It hadn’t exactly ended well then, had it?

She’d meant it as a joke and figured he would take it that way. Instead his eyes locked with hers, his mouth set in a serious line. “You want to?”

The breath shot out of her chest. She might have thought he was a jerk, but did she ever want to make out with him. She wouldn’t let it happen again, though. After everything that had gone down in her life in the past few years, what had happened in New York, what had happened with Quin the last time she’d seen him, she just couldn’t take any more pain. Celia had to protect herself. Protect her heart. “That’s ground we’ve already covered, I think.”

He shrugged casually, but his face was still serious. “Then why’d you bring it up?”

“I don’t know. Maybe I wanted us to communicate like before, using more than a few words at a time. But it feels like there’s a wall between us that was created the last time we saw each other. Can we just have a normal conversation?”

“I’d like that.” His lips turned up in the mischievous grin that she remembered. “I’ve got an idea,” he told her, standing, and he held out his hand. “Come on.”

Without hesitation, she put her hand in his.

Quin led her back inside and through the club to a busy horseshoe-shaped bar. There was a crowd surrounding the bar, several people deep, and she wondered how long they would have to wait for a drink. She should have known, however, that Quin Rexford wouldn’t have to wait for anything. He released Celia’s hand and strolled behind the bar, careful not to get in the way of the busy bar staff, not that they seemed to mind that he was there. He reached under the bar, threw down several bills on the top and smiled at the bartenders.

When he emerged from behind the bar, Quin was holding a wine bottle low against his thigh. He hid it under his jacket, so security wouldn’t see, and held it in place with his arm. He grinned and put a finger to his lips, and then took her hand again and led her out of the club.

“Where are we going?” With her palm pressed solidly against his, Celia walked onto the sidewalk with Quin. Even though the sun had gone down many hours ago, the night was still quite warm and almost damp with humidity. She took in a heavy breath of the salty air, and she knew she was back home. She glanced up at Quin. Just like old times. But it was nothing like old times. They’d been best friends, but something had shifted between them since then. Time and distance, among other things, had divided them.

“Somewhere we used to go a lot back in the day with a bottle of wine and time on our hands.”

She smiled at the memories. “The beach.”

“You know it.”

They continued walking. Thankfully, the sandy beach was within sight. She didn’t believe that her feet would make it much farther. She looked down at her gorgeous, but ridiculously high, stilettos. Four-inch spiky heels with pointy toes that held the arch of her feet at a near-impossible angle. “You know, I’m really relieved you’re taking me to the beach because that means I can take these shoes off eventually. I knew these were a mistake two seconds after I put them on.”

Quin stopped walking and handed her the bottle of wine. He bent at his waist. “Get on,” he told her.

“Get on what?” she asked.

“My back,” he said simply. “Those shoes suck, and your feet hurt.”

She couldn’t argue with that. “Fine,” she said, and jumped on. “But I won’t let you talk about my shoes like that.” He grasped her thighs and walked in the direction of the beach. It was where they’d always gone when they were younger. They would sit and talk, listening to the water crash against the sand. Things were simple then, before their relationship had been complicated. They had been young and optimistic, and they’d had their entire lives ahead of them.

She clutched the wine bottle in one hand, her arm crooked around his neck. With her other hand, she held the bottom of her short skirt, in an attempt to preserve her modesty.

It was a short walk to the beach and when Quin reached the sand, he lowered her to her feet. They both kicked off their shoes, and she sank her feet into the sand, wiggling her cramped toes in the cool granules. Walking toward the water, they picked an arbitrary spot close to the tide line, where he shook off his jacket and flattened it on the sand so she could sit.

“I don’t think we’re supposed to be here,” she told him. “Thought this place closed at ten.”

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