Before I can remind Tate that Daisy isn’t his dog, he flashes his dimples at the waitress and says, “It’s a date.”
As Jessica saunters off, I roll my eyes. “Are you seriously using my puppy to get laid?”
“Of course. I told you, puppies are chick magnets.” He shoves a strand of hair off his forehead. “Just let me borrow her for a few hours, dude. You know I’m good with dogs. I’ve got three at home.”
“Fine. But I’m not hanging around town on your account. Drop her off at my place later. Her dinnertime’s at five. Don’t be late, asshole.”
Tate grins. “Yes, Dad.”
“You think if I had Daisy with me when I go to see Ren, I’d have a better shot at winning her back?” Wyatt asks thoughtfully.
“Definitely,” Tate says.
Wyatt’s head swivels toward me. “Can I borrow her tomorrow?”
My friends are idiots.
Then again, so am I. Because when my phone buzzes and Mac’s name flashes on the screen, I don’t do the smart thing and ignore the call.
I answer it.
CHAPTER TWENTY
MACKENZIE
The summer after I graduated high school, I traveled alone in Europe. A present from my parents. I had just walked back to the Colosseum from Vatican City when, in a sort of burst of manic impulsiveness, I marched right past my hotel to the train station. I didn’t know where I was headed. I simply bought a first-class ticket on the next train, which happened to be going to Florence. From there, Bologna. Milan. Then, through Switzerland, France, and Spain. Two days after leaving Italy, I called my hotel to have them send my luggage to Barcelona.
To this day, I don’t know what possessed me. A sudden, urgent need to break free, to get lost. To disrupt the order of my life and prove to myself I was alive and in control of my own destiny. Which is to say I don’t remember deciding to call Cooper, only that one day after Preston shot down my hotel fantasy, two weeks since I’d kissed Cooper and told him never to contact me again, and fifteen minutes after we hang up, he’s standing beside me on the boardwalk staring at the dilapidated exterior of The Beacon Hotel.
“You just … bought it?” Bemused, Cooper rakes a hand through his dark hair.
I’m momentarily distracted by his tanned forearm, his defined biceps. He’s wearing a black T-shirt. Jeans that hang low on his hips. It feels like I’m seeing him for the first time all over again. I hadn’t forgotten what the sight of him does to me, but it’s more potent now that my tolerance has waned. My heart beats faster than usual, my palms are damper, my mouth drier.
“Well, there’s paperwork and due diligence. But if that goes well …”
I’m more nervous now than when I made the offer to Lydia. Than when I showed Preston. For some reason, I need Cooper to be happy for me, and I didn’t realize how much until this moment.
“Can we look around?”
He gives nothing away. Not boredom or disapproval. Not excitement either. We barely said hello and didn’t mention a word about our kisses or our fight. Just Hey, so, um, I’m buying a hotel. What do you think? I have no idea why he even showed up to meet me here.
“Sure,” I say. “The inspector said the ground level is stable. We shouldn’t go upstairs, though.”
Together we tour the property, stepping over storm-tossed furniture and moldy carpets. Some interior rooms are in nearly perfect condition, while beach-view rooms are little more than empty carcasses exposed to the elements, where the walls have collapsed and storm surges long ago sucked everything out to sea. The kitchen looks like it could be up and running tomorrow. The ballroom, more like a setting of a ghost ship horror movie. Outside, the front of the hotel facing the street belies the damage inside, still perfectly intact except for missing roof shingles and overgrown foliage.
“What are your plans for it?” he asks as we peek behind the front desk. An old-fashioned guest book, with the words The Beacon Hotel embossed on its cover with gold lettering, is still tucked on a shelf with the wall of room keys. Some scattered, others still on their hooks.
“The previous owner had one demand: Don’t tear it down and put up an ugly high-rise.”
“I came here all the time as a kid. Evan and I would use the pool, hang out in the beach cabanas until we were chased out. Steph worked here a few summers during high school. I remember all the old hardwood, the brass fixtures.”
“I want to entirely restore it,” I tell him. “Salvage as much as possible. Source vintage antiques for the rest of it.”
He lets out a low whistle. “It’d be expensive. We’re talking about cherry furniture that’ll have to be custom replicated. Handmade light fixtures. There are stone floor tiles and countertops in here they don’t even make anymore except in small batches.”