Page 10 of The Seascape Between Us (The Men of Saltwater Cove #4)

I tensed, dull panic coiling up my throat like some cold, slimy slug-like monster.

I still hadn’t been up to my father’s house, the hotel playing both distraction and excuse.

Besides, the college students would be out of his house in a little more than a week.

I could go through it then. Given Finn’s connection to the men living there, if there was any extensive damage, they wouldn’t be hard to find.

Instead of continuing up the road, Daniel turned into the driveway of a small pink cottage and cut the motor.

He pushed open the car door. “I have to install a blind while I’m here, so I might be awhile.”

“I can help,” I offered, practically hopping out of the truck. “Because I’m charitable .”

Daniel snorted before he could stop himself, but didn’t say anything more.

Instead, he hoisted his toolbox from the back of the truck and one bag of groceries, which I took from him, and then the blind from the hardware store.

I followed Daniel from the driveway up the flagstone path to the cottage’s painted white door.

Daniel knocked loudly, then cracked the door an inch. “Hello? Mr. Sullivan?”

“Oh, Daniel,” a skinny, wrinkled man called from where he sat on his sofa, his walker angled next to him. He might have been tall in his younger years, but now he looked stooped, his thinning white hair swept back from his wrinkled, gaunt features. “Come in, come in.”

At least, that’s what I thought he said. It was hard to hear him over the sharp, staccato barking from the tiny ball of white fur perched on his lap.

“Hush, hush,” Mr. Sullivan said to the dog, who paid him absolutely no attention and continued to bark as if two axe-wielding murderers had just strolled into the house. “Come say hello to Prince, so he’ll stop barking.”

Daniel grinned and set the toolbox and newly purchased blind on the floor by the front window, then crossed to Mr. Sullivan and gave Prince an enthusiastic scratch on the top of his head.

Daniel was clearly a braver man than I. That dog looked like it was ready to take off a finger.

Unlike Daniel, I kept a good three feet between me and Prince, then nodded hello.

However, Prince had no real interest in me. His owner, on the other hand, stared at me with unabashed curiosity while he and Daniel exchanged pleasantries.

“You’re new,” Mr. Sullivan said, giving me the once over while Daniel unpacked the man’s groceries in the tidy little kitchen open to the living room. “I’ve lived in this town nearly sixty years, and I know everyone, but I don’t know you.”

“This is Grey,” Daniel said, and I wondered if he’d intentionally left out my last name. “He’s giving me a hand today.”

“I’m glad to see it,” Mr. Sullivan said, grinning. “We can all use a hand now and then, and Daniel’s needed one for a while.” He let out a throaty chuckle at his own innuendo.

I grinned, but Daniel hurried out to the truck before I could get a look at his face to see if Mr. Sullivan’s less-than-subtle implication had registered, and when he returned, his expression remained stoic.

While Daniel hurriedly took down the tattered blind in the front window, the old man sang Daniel’s praises like the oldest living wingman.

I might have been annoyed having to listen to his glowing review of all things Daniel, except that the man’s praise was clearly making Daniel uncomfortable.

A red flush stained his cheeks, and he dropped his screwdriver twice.

Eventually, Daniel got the old blind down that had clearly been badly chewed by Prince, and he started mounting the new one.

“You look familiar,” the old man said, staring at me shrewdly again.

“I used to vacation here,” I admitted, “when I was young.”

“Is that how you know Daniel here?”

I glanced at Daniel up on the stepladder, his attention fixed on screwing the new blind in place, his expression bland. As if he couldn’t hear me and Mr. Sullivan.

“Something like that,” I muttered. A sick feeling had settled in my stomach, and I desperately searched for something to change the subject, but the old man pressed on.

“Well, you must have come back for something you liked.” Sullivan waggled his thick, wiry brows, a knowing grin curling his mouth.

“No,” Daniel said quickly. “It’s not like that. Grey is investing in the hotel.”

True, even if he’d left out a few facts.

“That’s wonderful,” Sullivan said. “That old hotel has always been an important part of Oceanwind Square. It’s been here nearly as long as me.

When Ramona was running the place and this one’s mother,” he nodded at Daniel, “it had been something to behold. Booked solid months in advance all summer long. Daniel’s done the best he could, of course, given the circumstances. But it’s good he’ll have help now.”

For a second, I wondered what circumstances he meant. I assumed he meant Ramona getting sick and Daniel having to take over so young. He wouldn’t have known what the hell he was doing, and that was probably why the hotel had been bleeding money for years.

The red in Daniel’s cheeks deepened, and I couldn’t tell if he was embarrassed or annoyed, maybe both.

With the blind having been securely installed, Daniel climbed down the stepladder and folded it up.

“All done,” he said. “This will be easier, and no cords for Prince to chew. You just lift the blind like this.” He demonstrated by gripping the bottom frame and pushing the blind up, then pulling it back down again.

“Wonderful, Daniel, thank you,” Mr. Sullivan said. “You’ve always been a good kid. What do I owe you?”

“Nothing. I had an extra lying around the hotel that I didn’t need,” he lied.

“Well, we should get going. We have a few more stops to make.”

We said our goodbyes, and once back at the truck, Daniel loaded the ladder and his toolbox into the back. I hesitated a moment before climbing into the passenger seat. “You didn’t tell him my last name.”

Daniel shrugged. “Sullivan is almost ninety. He knew your father and Sean. If he knew you were Oliver’s son, he’d want to talk to you about your father. I wasn’t sure if you’d want that.”

I’d forgotten how thoughtful Daniel could be, how careful he was with the feelings of others. It only made how things ended between us more confusing. A sudden wave of sadness rolled through me.

Maybe the way things ended between us was more on me than on Daniel.

After all, we’d never really had the big "are-we-exclusive" or "where-is-this-relationship-going" talk. I’d been head over heels for him, and I assumed he felt the same. When I mentioned staying in The Square and transferring to Bayside University, he seemed genuinely excited about the idea. Maybe he was—but maybe it never occurred to me that he wouldn’t be okay with seeing other people. We were both so fucking young.

After climbing back into the truck, Daniel continued making the rest of his deliveries, even taking us past my father’s old house. Sweat bloomed on my back as we drove by, my heart rate kicking up.

A little less than a year ago, I’d met Finn outside this house.

Even then, I hadn’t been able to bring myself to go inside.

It shouldn’t bother me as much as it did.

For nearly fifteen years, my father and I barely spoke, and what was already a strained relationship had turned non-existent.

So why, then, did just the prospect of going inside that house turn my insides cold?

Daniel made his last delivery, turned the car around and started back the way we’d come. Unfortunately, making another pass by my father’s house.

“I heard you found him,” I said, keeping my attention on the house outside the window. I felt rather than saw Daniel glance my way.

“Yes, I did.”

“How did that come about?” I knew what my father thought about Daniel, so I had no idea why he would have been in my father’s house to have found his body crumpled on the floor in the hallway by the front door.

“I delivered to him, too,” Daniel said. “After Sean passed away, your father didn’t go out much.”

“Was he some kind of shut-in?” Somehow, I couldn’t picture it.

Oliver Mackenzie had been a man who’d prided himself on getting involved.

He’d been instrumental in developing Oceanwind Square as an LGBTQIA+ community.

He’d been a civics professor at the university, a town councillor for Saltwater Cove and an activist. That man didn’t sound anything like someone who stayed inside and had his groceries delivered.

“Kind of,” Daniel said slowly, choosing his words carefully.

“So many people knew him here, in The Square. Hell, even people who didn’t know him felt like they did with everything he was involved in.

I think it was hard for him after Sean died.

People wanted to tell him how sorry they were, ask him how he was doing.

He didn’t want to talk about any of that with anyone, so he stayed home.

Then I think it was just easier for him to be alone than to be with people. ”

I hated the guilt Daniel’s words lit inside me. Why should I feel guilty? I didn’t push my father away he pushed me away. Every time I’d reached out, he turned away, so I stopped reaching out.

I wasn’t Charlie Brown . I wasn’t going to keep kicking at a football that kept getting pulled away.

My father had pushed me away, and so I gave him what he wanted. I shouldn’t feel guilty because he’d died alone in his stupid house overlooking the community he loved more than his son. So why did I?

Maybe it was just the thought of him, alone and dead on the floor from an aneurysm. How long would he have gone undiscovered had Daniel not been bringing him his groceries? God, that was a depressing thought.

Daniel pulled into the hotel parking lot, and I did my best to shove thoughts of my father to the far corners of my mind. Once he shut off the engine, we both climbed out, and he came around to my side of the truck.

“You wanted to talk about the hotel?” he said with as much enthusiasm as an inmate marched down death row.

“I did, but not here in the parking lot,” I said.

But not in his office, either. I knew it pissed him off when I sat at his desk and used his computer, and while a pissed-off Daniel was kind of funny, getting under his skin wasn’t going to work to convince him to stop avoiding me and get involved with the plan for the hotel.

“Come back to my room,” I said. “We can go over things there.”

Together, we made our way through the hotel to the second-floor walkway outside my room. The sun had dipped behind the horizon, streaking the sky with gold, purple and turquoise, the colors reflecting in the dark water.

I unlocked my room, and he followed me inside.

“Have a seat.” I nodded to the table and chairs next to the front window while I switched on the lamp next to the bed. Daniel slowly lowered himself into one of the chairs, still looking like he was expecting to be tortured.

“Here’s the thing,” I started, after sitting down opposite him. “I’ve noticed I haven’t seen much of you over the last three days, and I’m concerned you’re avoiding me.”

“Avoiding is probably a strong word,” he said, his expression giving nothing away.

“Whatever you’re doing, there’s a lot to do to get this hotel into shape before the Grand Re-opening. I can’t have you sulking in the shadows. You need to get involved.”

“ Sulking ? I’m not sulking. I’m running my hotel. You were very clear about what you needed from me for your big Grand Re-opening.” The eye roll was a little much. Irritation stiffened my spine.

“You currently have no guests. What are you running, exactly?”

Something flashed in Daniel’s light eyes, and he shifted in his seat, leaning closer. “Maybe, if you knew anything about running a hotel, you would also know what was required on every day—guests or no guests.”

“And if you were such an expert, I wouldn’t be here.”

“Fuck this.” Daniel stood as if to leave.

He did not think I had spent the better part of two hours watching him deliver groceries to seniors for him to get up and walk out now.

I stood with him. “Where the hell are you going? We need to talk about the plans for the Grand Re-opening, the renovations and everything that needs to be done over the next six weeks… Five and a half now, actually.”

“You told me how you wanted me involved. I believe it had something to do with getting you coffee.”

“Obviously, I wasn’t serious.” Daniel could be such a child sometimes. “You can’t just ignore what’s happening for three days because you’re pissed off. Especially when we have to go over the rather considerable list of things this hotel needs—”

“You have got to be kidding me. I’ve been working at this hotel since I was a teenager.

I don’t need you to tell me what this hotel needs.

” His mouth twisted with furious disdain.

“You spent one summer here almost twenty years ago, but now you’re an expert?

Anything you know about this hotel, I told you. ”

“You may have a point,” I conceded, my voice deceptively quiet, frustration having long given way to anger. “Which is all the more reason you should involve yourself more in this hotel now.”

“I have never not been involved in this hotel—”

“I wasn’t done.” I cut him off and took a step toward him. He stepped back. “I may not be an expert on hotels… yet , but I am an expert in running a successful business. Something you can’t say the same.”

“You’re a dick.” He started to turn toward the door, but I blocked him. His eyes narrowed.

“And you’re a stubborn ass!”

Daniel stood a good four inches taller than me, his broad body wider across the shoulders like a wall of solid muscle.

Still, when I stepped into his space, closing the small gap between us until my chest was nearly flush with his, he stepped back.

And I kept pushing forward until I backed him against the wall.

“What are you doing?” His voice dropped, low and raspy, barely more than a whisper.

Honestly, I didn’t know what the hell I was doing.

Maybe I thought I could shut him up and stop the argument.

Maybe I’d hoped to convince him to see my point.

But the truth was, what I did next was about more than any of those things.

For three days, Daniel had been so close, and for three days, all I kept thinking about was what it would be like to touch him again, taste him, until I almost ached with need.

Don’t do this , some distant voice whispered in the back of my head. One last trace of rational thought. I should stop, walk away, let him walk away.

My heart jackhammered in my chest, and I pushed closer, pressed my body against his solid frame, and then caught his mouth in a furious, hungry kiss.