Page 20 of Homeport

Annie finished drawing a beer, slid the mug gracefully down the length of the cherry wood bar toward the waiting customer. Briskly, she wiped her narrow hands on her bar apron.

At five-six and a hundred thirty well-toned pounds, Annie McLean gave the impression of no-nonsense competence.

A select few—including a two-timing cheat of an ex-husband—knew there was a delicate-winged blue butterfly on her butt.

Her wheat-colored hair was worn short and spiky to frame a face more interesting than pretty. Her chin was pointed, her nose listed slightly to the left and was splattered with freckles. Her voice was pure Down East and tended to flatten vowels.

She could, and had, tossed grown men out of her bar with her own work-roughened hands.

Annie’s Place was hers because she’d made it hers. She’d sunk every penny of her savings from her days of cocktail waitressing into the bar—every penny her slick-talking ex hadn’t run off with—and had begged and borrowed the rest. She’d worked day and night transforming what had been little more than a cellar into a comfortable neighborhood bar.

She ran a clean place, knew her regulars, their families, their troubles. She knew when to draw another draft, when to switch to coffee, and when to demand car keys and call cabs.

She looked at Andrew and shook her head. He’d drink himself blind if she let him.

“Andrew, go home. Make yourself a meal.”

“I’m not hungry.” He smiled, knowing how to put his dimples to work. “It’s cold and rainy out, Annie. I just want a little something to warm the blood.”

“Fine.” She turned to the coffee station and filled a mug from the pot. “This is hot and fresh.”

“Christ. I can go right down the street and get a goddamn drink without the hassle.”

She merely lifted her eyebrows. “Drink your coffee and stop whining.” With this, she began to work her way down the bar.

The rain was keeping most of her customers home. But those who had braved the storm were glued to their seats, sipping beer, watching the sports channel on TV, huddled in conversations.

There was a pretty fire burning in the little stone hearth and someone had plugged in quarters and Ella Fitzgerald on the juke.

It was her kind of night. Warm, friendly, easy. This was the reason she’d been willing to risk every dime, to work her hands raw and lie awake in bed worrying night after night. Not many had believed she could succeed, a twenty-six-year-old woman whose only business experience had come from serving mugs of beer and counting tips.

Seven years later, and Annie’s Place was a Jones Point standard.

Andrew had believed, she remembered with a tug of guilt as she saw him stomp out of the bar. He’d lent her money when the banks wouldn’t. He’d come by with sandwiches when she’d been painting walls and staining wood. He’d listened to her dreams when others had ignored them.

He figured he owed her, she thought now. And he was a decent man who paid his debts.

But he couldn’t erase the night sixteen years before when, lost in love with him, she’d given him her innocence, taken his. He couldn’t make her forget that in doing so they’d created a life, one that had flickered only briefly.

He couldn’t make her forget the look on his face when, with joy leaping under terror, she’d told him she was pregnant. His face had gone blank, his body stiff as he sat on the rock on the long stretch of beach and stared out to sea.

And his voice had been flat, cool, impersonal when he offered to marry her.

Paying a debt, she thought now. Nothing more, nothing less. And by offering to do what most would consider the honorable thing, he’d broken her heart.

Losing the baby only two weeks later was fate, she supposed. It had spared both of them overwhelming decisions. But she’d loved what had been growing inside her, just as she’d loved Andrew.

Once she accepted the baby was gone, she’d stopped loving. That, she knew, had been as much a relief to Andrew as it had been to her.

The hum of friendship, she thought, was a lot easier to dance to than the pluck of heartstrings.

Damn women were the bane of his existence, Andrew decided as he unlocked his car and climbed behind the wheel. Always telling you what to do, how to do it, and most of all how you were doing it wrong.

He was glad he was done with them.

He was better off burying himself in work at the Institute by day and blurring the edges with whiskey at night. Nobody got hurt that way. Especially him.

Now he was much too sober, and the night ahead was much too long.

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