by Anne Harper
“To keep the mud off your car seats.”
Quinn shook his head after she disappeared inside.
“I don’t think she realizes how much mud I have on me. I’m pretty sure I could pass as Swamp Thing.” He didn’t have to look down at his clothes to know they were covered. He could feel the wet weight of them across his body. “I need to just get out of these things.”
Nell had her high heel in one hand and a contemplative look across her face. She was nothing but sage as she suggested something that made him pause mid-step.
“Honestly, I think we should just take them off or else we’re going to ruin your car.”
“Come again?”
Nell stopped next to the car and crossed her arms over her chest. The side of her body had been taken by the mud. Somehow, though, it didn’t diminish how good she looked in her dress.
“I mean, since we have the towels, it might be better if we just strip and wrap ourselves up before riding around,” she clarified. “Do you have a plastic bag in your car for our clothes?”
He actually did.
“A garbage bag in the glove compartment. Ever since my kid threw up orange soda in the car when he was five, it’s been a habit to keep one handy.”
Nell made a face that looked pained.
“Did it go through his nose?”
Quinn felt his eyebrow rise.
“What?”
“The orange soda.” She made that face again. “I threw up orange juice when I was a kid because Mateo thought it would be funny to put ketchup in it when I wasn’t looking. He wanted to see if I’d notice. I did. And when I got sick, it went through my nose. I know it’s not the same as orange soda, but still. Orange-anything through the nose is a scarring thing.”
Quinn chuckled.
“Thankfully, no orange soda through the nose. It only came out of the mouth. But, believe me, that was enough to do damage. I’ll never ride without a bag in my car now, even a rental.”
“Well then, that’s perfect! You grab that and strip while I go get my shoe.”
The word “weird” just didn’t cut it for the night anymore.
Quinn used the car for cover and watched over the hood as a mud-covered woman pulled a high heel out of the ground. While he stripped down to his boxers. No big deal. Just another day in Arbor Bay.
At least Mrs. Langdon had left on the floodlight.
“There was no way this was staying here,” Nell said with grit when she was back. Quinn wrapped the towel around his waist and passed the bag over. “These puppies survived the most awkward company holiday party I have ever gone to when I was dating Greg. There’s no way I’m letting them die out in the yard because of a pig named Wiggly.”
As if to further prove her point, she placed each shoe into the plastic bag with care.
“You know, I’ve been meaning to ask about that,” Quinn said. He angled his body away so he was staring into the woods and not at a stripping Nell. “Greg, I mean. Well, how you’re doing, not really about him. That’s the first I’ve heard you talk about the breakup since the restaurant.”
Nell made a noise. Quinn kept his eyes firmly away.
“There’s not much to really be said about him or the breakup. I mean, I’m not thrilled about how it happened and when it happened, but I’m okay.” She made that noise again. A grunt of effort with a pinch of annoyance. “And, according to Liere, it’s a really good thing that it happened. Apparently Greg didn’t look at me when I was across the room from him.”
That got him to glance over. All he could see was a cloud of hair.
“He didn’t look at you,” he deadpanned.
That hair bounced.
“Yep. Liere says if they don’t look at you when you’re not looking, then it’s not love. Go figure.”
Quinn went back to staring at the woods in a flash.
“That’s an interesting stance to take.”
“Right? A bunch of bull if you ask me. Just like this damn dress.” Nell made an even louder noise of frustration. There was defeat in her voice. “Getting this thing on wasn’t an act of God, but getting it off is a different story. I think some mud is making the zipper stick.” Quinn heard her bare feet against the ground before he smelled her perfume behind him. “Could you give it a go?”
“Give it a go?”
He turned and was met with her back. The zipper on her dress was caught below her shoulder blades. Above it, nothing but smooth, bare skin.
Which meant she wasn’t wearing a bra.
Ah, there he was again thinking about Nell Bennett’s bra. With how much thought he’d given the woman’s undergarments in the last week, Quinn could hardly believe he’d gone his entire life until now without thinking about it.
Nell sighed.
“Unzip me if you can. Try not to make it weird.”
“Weirder than chasing a pig at a stranger’s house?” He closed the space between them and focused on the zipper. “I don’t think I could make this any weirder than it’s already been.”
She snorted.
Then they both went quiet.
This wasn’t Quinn’s first time at tangoing with a dress’s zipper. One of Deborah’s superpowers during their marriage had been buying outfits that had needed a signed permission slip from God to escape from. Quinn never understood how she got into them, but he sure had taken the mantel of Liberator to get her out.
Yet, when he used one hand to hold the fabric while the other one worked with the zipper, it in no way felt the same.
Nell’s skin was soft and warm and neither fact surprised him.
What did? How he felt about it.
Quinn forgot about his goal, the zipper, and Mrs. Langdon somewhere in her house. He forgot about the reasons why he was even there or why he’d moved to Arbor Bay in the first place. He forgot about Heart in Hand, Mrs. McMurray, and most importantly for him, he forgot that the woman he’d fantasized about no less than eight hours or so ago was off-limits if he wanted to keep Heart in Hand from being sold. If he wanted to make the most stable life for himself and his son.
All Quinn could focus on for that moment was the naked skin beneath his hand and the woman who fate kept putting in his path.
The same woman he missed kissing, even though their lips touching had been a one-time thing. It didn’t stop him from wanting it.
From wanting her.
But you can’t. Not without repercussions that could possibly hurt more people than just you.
Quinn’s mind finally took pity on his body and reminded him why he was there. Slowly he moved the zipper through the mud in its way and exposed even more of her.
Nell didn’t say a word as the zipper ended just below the small of her back.
He liked being with her. That was as simple as it was true. But his body?
Well, it definitely wanted more.
Quinn meant to move his hand away, but instead he only moved his thumb resting against her shoulder blade. One small exploration for Personal Life Quinn, one giant no-no for Professional Quinn.
He cleared his throat.
“All done.” Quinn pulled his hands back. Playful teasing mode switched to please don’t make a tent out of this towel mode in a second flat.
Nell turned around, holding a now-slack dress to cover her chest. A small smile lifted the corner of her lips. A streak of mud had found its way to her jaw, yet it somehow made the picture of her all the more enticing.
“Thank you.” Her voice was soft, just like her.
Just like her lips had been.
Whatever lipstick she’d put on was still hanging in there. Dark red, alluring, and perfect.
Those lips he was admiring parted.
Then he met Nell’s gaze, but only after hers moved up his body at a deliberately slow pace.
The humidity
the rain had left in the air suddenly felt charged. Like he could reach out and feel the bad decisions he was on the brink of making.
No one spoke for a moment.
What the hell am I doing?
“It was no problem,” he finally said in a rush. He gave her a smile that he’d used at Heart in Hand when talking to Tally and Jones. A cordial thing. One you didn’t read into for another meaning. “I’ll start up the car and give you some privacy.”
Nell opened her mouth more, maybe to say something, but Quinn was already reaching for the driver’s side handle.
Because the only sensible thing he could do at the moment was to stop looking at Antonella Bennett before he did something he’d regret.
No matter how much he liked it.
Chapter Twelve
Monday morning, Quinn came in five minutes late, had four coffees in a caddy, and told Nell with a thrumming voice that vibrated her private bits that he needed to see her in his office.
A full day had come and gone since their last interaction, and still Nell hadn’t had enough time to figure out how she felt about it all. One moment they were hanging out, being friendly, and then the next, something shifted. They always started at a lukewarm nice and then slid into hot or fell into cold. No matter which way they went, it always seemed to be Quinn who set them off.
No one, and she only really meant her, had missed the total linger Quinn had pulled after unzipping her dress. That thumb of his sliding against her bare skin like the best doggone wax on, wax off she never saw coming. It had ignited a heat that had started below her waistline and was followed swiftly by let’s get ready to rumble feelings.
There was no denying that Quinn himself definitely hadn’t missed the move. It hadn’t been an accident, at least not based on the lack of his poker face when she turned around. He hadn’t even been looking at her, at least not at her eyes. Instead, her body had gotten a double dose of adrenaline when she realized his gaze was flirting with her lips. Not for just a glance but a long, hard few seconds. The obviousness of it had only inspired Nell to return the favor.
While upping the ante.
She scanned his bare upper half like he was a damn barcode.
Nell couldn’t ever picture Quinn being into CrossFit or having a gym membership, but the man surely was doing something with a capital S.
The inexplicable urge to rub his abs—the man had honest to goodness abs—down with honey had zipped through her body and perked her nipples right on up. If she hadn’t already been holding her limp dress around her, he would have been blinded by her sudden headlights flaring to life. Instead there was nothing but the literal floodlight around them while Nell also catalogued the detail of dark hair that led its march down his chest and stomach and then farther south beneath the towel. Nell couldn’t see that Quinn quadrant but she made sure to memorize everything else.
She was done with men. Right?
And wasn’t there bigger fish they needed to be frying?
That’s when Quinn had decided to shift the overall vibe again. He’d gone ice cold and rigid, his words became clipped, and then he had reverted back to being the man who had turned down a Polaroid picture of them and nearly run for the door after they’d shared a kiss.
So Nell had struggled but had respected, picked up, and continued on with what he was putting down. They’d spent the car ride to her house talking about Wiggly, Mr. Elliot, and if Jones’s cousin would in fact send word back to Mrs. McMurray about their interest in Dweller’s Cove on Monday.
There hadn’t been a peep between them on Sunday. Nell had to give herself several pep talks that that was that.
Then, Sunday night, it happened.
Beneath her sheets and within the confines of her subconscious, Nell had a sex dream about her boss.
It had been tasteful, if she did say so herself, despite it taking place in the back of his rental. Her high heels had been sitting in the floorboard and the song “Crash into Me” by Dave Matthews had been their soundtrack. Since Nell had already seen the goods, the star of the show was Quinn’s bare chest.
Yet the alarm had woken her up and stopped the dream before it had gotten really good.
You know, the alarm she had set so she could get up for work.
Where Quinn would be.
Acting as her grumpy boss with thumbs of magic.
The touch at Mrs. Langdon’s, the dream, and the apparent arousal the man could activate in her in a second flat had made Nell’s decision to calm down when it came to lust for the man hard to follow. Add in that she’d had a good time just being in his company before all of that?
Well, it had left her sighing at her desk when the man of the hour came in to work.
Never mind when his deep, authoritative voice swung low and said a nice hi, hey, and hello to her downstairs lady bits. It was all Nell could do to keep the flashes from their dream romp away as she followed him to his office.
Calmeth down, child. Men complicate everything and that’s why we’re saying no! Even when you kind of want to jump their bones!
If Nell hadn’t been so distracted, she would have hung her head low at the quality of pep talks she was giving herself lately.
“So I’ve come to a decision,” Quinn started off. The coffees in the caddy he was holding were now down to two. He must have given the other two to Tally and Jones while she was blacked out in lust land.
Nell crossed her legs and smoothed out the nonexistent wrinkle in her slacks.
“You have?”
He nodded.
“I’ve decided that you’re right.”
Lust land or not, that got Nell’s attention. She smirked.
“I agree but, for confirmation’s sake, can you be more specific?”
Quinn took one of the coffees and handed it over. A smile stretched his lips wide.
“On my first day here, you told me that being a loner, more or less, isn’t the way to go, especially not in a small town. Saturday showed me that you might be right.” He took his coffee and leaned back in his seat. “So I’ve decided to make friends, starting with you, Tally, and Jones.”
Nell motioned to her drink.
“So you’re trying to win us over with good coffee. Not a bad plan, I’ll give you that.”
“I also wanted to ask what everyone is doing for lunch. I’d like to join if that’s okay.”
Nell considered the man for a second.
Something was different about him, but she couldn’t put her finger on what exactly.
His face was freshly shaven, his hair was gel-controlled, and he’d gone with a more business casual outfit of black jeans and a dark red flannel button-up. There was also the hint of cologne—old school Curve, maybe—floating through the air.
Was Quinn trying to pull her leg about wanting to be friends?
Had he also dressed up a little for the occasion?
“We’re actually going to Live Oak,” she said, sidestepping asking either of her questions. “There’s a pop-up food truck festival going on until Wednesday there.”
“Isn’t Live Oak a boat ramp right on the bay?”
“It is but there’s a dock and a park attached. It’s really beautiful. Not to mention a great place to network.”
Quinn’s furrowed brow smoothed out and he smiled.
“Perfect! Then it’s a date.”
Nell wasn’t against the idea of a more sociable Quinn, but a thought stuck inside her head. She could have let it go, she could have just smiled and agreed, but sometimes you just had to ask the question that was bothering you.
“Did you decide on this change because of what Donavon said?”
That smile of his lessened. He nodded.
“That’s part of it,” he admitted. “I want to help get Dweller’s Cove. Or, at least, not hurt our chances of getting it.”
“And if we get Dweller’s Cove and Donavon asks you which one of us should become the new owner, would you tell him it should be you?”
The question came out clunky, but Nell knew as soon as she was done asking it that she’d needed to do it. Like, lust, and chasing pigs aside, if Donavon kept his word, then Heart in Hand’s future came down to her and Quinn.
And she wasn’t sure exactly what it was that Quinn wanted.
Thankfully, he didn’t mince his words, though he didn’t outright answer her original question.
“I’ve already thought it over and if he gives me the option to buy, I will.” He straightened in his chair. “And I expect you would do the same.”
It wasn’t a question, so Nell didn’t answer.
But they both knew she would.
“All right then,” she said after a moment. “See you at lunch.”
…
Nell came back into his office with a problem on her tongue and an apology in her expression. For a moment, Quinn thought it was because of their earlier conversation, but there was a more pressing kind of panic to her movements as she spoke.
“Hey, I’m probably going to have to miss lunch,” she said as way of greeting. “Tally and Jones are still going to Live Oak, though.”
Quinn set aside his phone and the text he was grumpily having to type out to his ex about future school schedules for Owen. Nell hadn’t said much, but her tone was also betraying some urgency.
“What’s going on?”
She smoothed out the bottom of her blouse. It was bay-water blue and matched her earrings. Quinn wouldn’t have noticed them had her hair not been flipped up into a bun. As it was, their blue caught his eye and then he was looking at the long line of her neck.
Get it together, Quinn. You pitched being friends, not staring at her until you get a semi.
Nell let out a long, low breath.
“You know the Greywater Cabin? Two-story, super country chic house with dock access.”