When he tossed the magazine on the counter, the cashier smiled. “Does your girlfriend read a lot of romance?”
He crossed his arms so that his tattooed sleeve was on top, snake staring at the woman. “Nope. I’m the romance reader.”
“Oh. Well.” She smiled again, less indulgently this time, and rushed his purchases over the scanner.
Stalking to Sue, he stashed his groceries—and magazine—in her saddlebags. What the hell was wrong with him? He’d been even more unsettled than usual since his mother’s visit the other day.
He’d gone to see his dad, dropping off a check as an excuse to visit. Dad had seemed the same as usual. But on the way out, Quinn mentioned that his mom had stopped by the shop, and that she seemed a little bored.
His dad sighed, running a hand through his thinning hair. “Yeah. Maybe I’ll turn some of these cases over to your brother. Take some time off.”
“Take Mom on one of those cross-country train rides,” Quinn suggested.
His dad looked intrigued, but then shook his head. “She’d come up with a reason not to go.”
“You won’t know unless you ask her.”
“I guess I could take a chance. Nothing to lose, huh?”
Quinn was sad that asking his mom to go on vacation was a risky proposition for his dad. How had their lives gotten so rigid?
He supposed they’d gotten stuck in their own roles, protecting themselves, and were afraid to put something out there now? God, he hoped he’d never get in that kind of a relationship, where he was afraid to tell his woman how he was feeling and let her return the favor.
Quinn froze in the act of throwing his leg over the seat of his bike.
Was that what he’d done? Chickened out? Let his past control his future? Had he missed the opportunity to take a chance with his heart? He told himself that he was doing what was right—walking away so that she didn’t have to decide between him and her life in Georgia— but he hadn’t even given her a choice, had he? Like some big take-charge dickhead, he’d made the decision for her.
Lowering himself to the saddle, he fired up Sue and headed back to the shop. He had to be here for the bike show this coming weekend, but then maybe he could get away for a few days. Take Sue—or Betty, if he hadn’t sold her—on a cross-country trip. Toss his heart out in the Georgia clay, see if there was a chance Kellie might be interested in giving them a second chance.
The mailman was just leaving when Quinn pulled into the lot of his shop. “Brought you a bunch of stuff today.”
“Yay, more bills.”
“There was a hand-addressed package there, too. Maybe it’s a bomb, or some anthrax.”
“That would be a nice change.” Quinn loved that he’d scored the only mailman in Vegas who moonlighted as a Goth comedian.
He went inside and picked up the package—a bubble mailer with a Georgia postmark.
Darryl A. said something to Quinn about some phone messages, but he ignored him. Instead, he took the package into the office, shut the door, and started to read.
Quinn:
I did it. I finished a manuscript. And I sent it to some agents and editors. I don’t know if anything will come of it, but I thought I’d let you know that I didn’t leave everything in Vegas—I brought home the desire to take a chance.
I think about you, and…I hope you’re doing okay. I wish…I hope that if you read my story, and find anything that doesn’t ring true about motorcycles, or Las Vegas in general, you’ll let me know.
XO,
Kellie
Chapter Seventeen
The flight from Atlanta to Vegas took forty-nine hours. At least, that’s what it seemed like in Kellie-on-her-way-to-see-Quinn time. She’d managed to give it two days from the time she’d mailed the manuscript before she called Delta and booked a very, very slow flight.
She should have called him and said that she was on her way. What if she got there and he was cozied up with a new woman? Everything would be super awkward. At least if she’d called, if he was seeing someone new, he would have had time to—what? Stash her away? That was ridiculous.
She could very easily get there and find that he’d gotten together with someone new and was still snuggled up with her, and didn’t care if Kellie was uncomfortable when she stopped by, because, hello! She’d bailed on him. After he’d bailed on her. For bailing on him.
Or something.
She didn’t know anymore.
And that was why she’d decided to get on the damned plane and fly out here. She had to take the gamble that he’d be available. And in town. And willing to see her.
“Flight attendants, prepare the cabin for landing,” said the pilot, or Mr. Sulu, or whoever was in charge of that stuff.
Suddenly, Kellie needed another hour or two before she got to the ground.
What was she doing? She had no idea.
But fifteen minutes later, the wheels of the plane hit the runway and the announcement was made that passengers could fire up their electronic devices.
Kellie’s finger hovered over the airplane mode button. Should she call now? Let him know that she just happened to be in town and was going to drop by?
She would check her email while she decided. Maybe by then that desert monsoon she’d wished for would finally be happening and the decision would be taken out of her hands.
But when her account loaded, her worries about visiting Quinn were sidetracked.
It took her another forty minutes to get a rental car—which she desperately needed, because she had to get somewhere quiet to make a phone call.
It took a few minutes extra for the rental agency to change her paperwork, because by the time she’d gotten there, she’d reread the email six—okay, ten—times and decided on a Mustang GT instead of the economy Fusion.
Once she was in the car, in the parking lot, with the windows up and the air-conditioning cranked, it took four tries to get the numbers right. The call finally went through.
“JGA Warren and Associates.”
“Hello, this is Kellie Dalton. I’m calling for Cathy Perkins.”
Her hands were so sweaty she almost dropped the phone when Brae’s agent came on the line.
“Kellie! I’m so glad you called. Hopefully you will be, too, after we talk.”
Half an hour later, she managed to pull out of the parking lot, but then had to stop again, because she’d forgotten to enter the address of Quinn’s Customs into the GPS.
It only took her three tries to get that right. But she finally got on the road, and she was pulling into the surprisingly tidy parking lot twenty minutes later. Not nearly long enough to figure out what she wanted to say.
…
“Hey, boss, there’s someone here to see you.” Darryl B. stood grinning in the door of Quinn’s office.
“I’m kinda busy right now, is it important?” He looked back down at the pile of papers in his lap. He had about twenty more pages to go, and really needed to find out how this story ended.
“Might be important. Guess that’s up to you.” Kellie’s voice was hesitant, but as smooth and lovely as he remembered.
“Shit!” He stood and the remaining pages of the manuscript slid to the floor with a plop. “I mean, hi.”
Her soft brown hair was short, all choppy and windblown, but her big eyes were just as green—maybe greener. And the porcelain skin of her face and neck led down to curves that begged for his hands…
Her hands fluttered. “Sorry to stop by unannounced. But I was in the neighborhood?”
“Were you?” His response sounded terser than he intended because his jaw was so tight and his heart was pounding. She wouldn’t have come all this way to break his heart, would she?
“I’m sorry, I—” She stepped back a pace, the hopeful look on her face fading.
Oh hell. “I’m glad you’re here,” he said, moving toward her. Jesus. He felt like a sixth grader.
She looked at his hands, so he did, too. He clutched the remai
ning pages of her book like they held the winning Powerball numbers.
“Yeah. I, uh, got your book. Today.” There you go, let her know you dived right in like it was a Coke and you were in desperate straits wandering the desert.
Licking her lips, she asked, “So. Have you found anything I got really wrong?”
What should he say? That the hero shouldn’t have let the heroine go all the way home before going after her? That he should have made sure she knew he was insecure and let her decide for herself if he was good enough for her?
He cleared his throat. “The hero has eight-pack abs, at least. Not a wimpy six-pack.”
One side of her mouth curved up, and he really, really wanted to kiss her there. “Eh. Maybe, but I was trying to be realistic. Most motorcycle mechanics probably don’t have quite the physique you do.” She turned and stared pointedly into the shop, where Darryl A.’s gut was on the verge of stretching his 3X T-shirt past its limit.
She sobered and looked at him again. “Anything else?”
“I don’t know,” he told her, turning to put the pages on his desk so he could wipe his palms on his jeans. “I haven’t gotten all the way through. I don’t know how it ends.”
“It’s a romance,” she told him. “The hero and heroine work it out and live happily ever after.” The side of her thumb made it all the way to her lips before he grabbed her hand and pulled her toward him.
“How do they work it out? He can’t sell his shop and start again on the other side of the country until he’s paid off a lot of debt. He could…” Jesus, was he going to say this? For Kellie, he would. “He could keep the bike thing as a hobby, and take the bar exam.”
She yanked her arm away from him then and pushed his chest so that he had to take a step back to keep his balance. “The hell he can! There is no way he can stop being a motorcycle artist. They can see each other and be a couple and be in love and make it work and have their jobs—the jobs they want. He is not giving up his dream. No fucking way!”
Quinn held up his hands and started to laugh, which seemed to make her even madder, but she quickly wound down, put her hands on her hips, and glared at him.
“You said the F-word.”
“I fucking did fucking say the fucking F-word. And I’ll fucking say it fucking any time I want.”
“Wow.” He admired the way her bosom heaved for a moment. “So, Ms. Happy Ending. How does it all work out? Does the heroine inherit an airline and decide to take her bookstore back and forth across the country with her?”
“Close.”
He threw his hands up. “Come on, what gives?”
“Well, Toby quit acting professionally for now, Brae’s pregnant, they moved to Georgia, I convinced them to buy the building where my shop is, and they’re my new landlords. They’re opening an actor’s and writer’s studio in the other half of the building. And I decided that as long as I have a landlord who’s not going to sell the building out from under my business, I could promote Rocky and spend some more time writing.”
She grinned then, and gave a little hop-step happy dance. “And, I submitted that”—she pointed at the manuscript—“and got a call on my way here. I’ve got an offer for it and a request to make it into a three-book series.”
“Holy shit, babe! I knew you could do it.”
Quinn picked her up then, twirled her around the tiny office, and kissed her hard. Then he kissed her softly. And then he kissed her just right. For a long, long time.
“So. Where do you plan to set up shop for this fancy writing career?”
“Well, I’m not sure. I think I could probably do it from anywhere. It would be nice to work somewhere that I wouldn’t have trouble doing research. You know, especially for the sexy parts.”
“How ’bout that. You know, I’d be more than happy to offer you help with any research.”
“Really? That’s awesome. Especially because my second book’s about a kinky sex club.”
A shiver ran down Quinn’s spine. “Really? Well. As long as I can get leather pants in my own size and not borrow Toby’s, I supposed I could act out some scenes with you.”
Her smile broadened. “You won’t need the leather pants, just a studded collar. The heroine is the dominant in the relationship.”
“Oh, fuck.”
Epilogue
“Are you ready?” Quinn stood outside of the bathroom checking his watch for the nineteenth time, and then straightening his tie and rebuttoning his suit coat. The awards ceremony wasn’t a strictly formal event, but he felt compelled to complement whatever conservative dress Kellie would have pulled from her bookstore-lady wardrobe. “We’ve got to get going, babe.”
He leaned toward the mirror in the hallway, finger-combing his newly shorn hair. Yes, he’d even remembered to get a haircut for this.
“Okay. Here I come.” The door finally began to crack open.
The woman who stepped out was not even close to being mistaken for a bookstore lady. At least, not a children’s bookstore lady.
“Oh, no.” Kellie’s black leather motorcycle boots came to an abrupt, dismayed halt a foot from Quinn’s shiny wing tips.
“Oh, yes.” Quinn’s mouth watered as he took her in, from the top of her teased hair, over the tiny leather vest that barely supported her generous bosom, along the impossibly skintight pants, to the tip of those sexily clunky boots.
She glared at his tie and tugged at her vest. “I thought this was a biker convention.”
He grinned. “Yeah.” Moving forward so that his toes bumped hers, he put his arms around her, pulling her against him.
“You’re all…all…engineering executive or something. I have to go change.”
“No. You don’t.”
“I look ridiculous,” she told him, shoving at his chest.
“You look delicious,” he countered, emphasizing his point by grabbing a handful of ass in each hand, rocking his pelvis into hers, and biting the skin along the side of her neck, following it with a lick. She tasted, as always, of sunshine and freedom.
His body thrummed in anticipation of what might come next.
“Ohhhhh.” She sighed, softening against him, running her hands over his chest, finding his nipples and running her thumbs over them. His already partially hard cock rose a little farther.
Did they have time to— No. They didn’t.
His body whined in protest as he set her gently away from him and stepped back. “You look perfect,” he told her.
“But you’re all…fancy,” she protested, pushing him to get to the closet.
He grabbed her arm and stopped her. “No. You, sit. If you change, we’ll miss Betty’s debut.” He yanked at his tie and kicked one of his motorcycle boots from under the bed. Where was the other one?
“No! You can’t change,” she told him. “Let’s just go.”
“Really?” This was the same girl who had agonized about how well her hair was blow-dried and which sweater thingy to wear before going to meet his mother. Was she really willing to step out in an ever-so-delightfully trashy biker-chick outfit while he wore a conservative suit?
Apparently she was, because they were on the back of Sue and heading down Las Vegas Boulevard in no time.
As Quinn rolled them into the parking area of the MGM Grand, he felt his tension mount, and this time it wasn’t the nice kind, courtesy of the woman behind him on the leather seat of his bike. This one was pure nervous energy, in the form of a knot in the center of his chest.
…
Kellie’s hand was nearly squished in Quinn’s massive paw as she double-timed it like an army recruit to keep up with his longer stride and not have her arm yanked out of its socket.
“Babe, can you slow down just a skosh?” she panted.
He stopped and turned to look at her as though he’d just realized she was with him. “Oh. Sorry.” But then he turned and started moving again, albeit at a marginally lower pace. At least she wasn’t completely out of breath when they found the
ir seats at a table near the front of the massive auditorium.
Quinn pulled her chair out for her and then seated himself, folding his long legs next to hers under the table.
She leaned toward him, anxious to absorb heat from his body. How did those showgirls survive in places like this? It was positively polar.
Quinn was jittery, though, moving around in his seat, looking here and there about the room. “You sure you don’t want me to take your coat back and hang it up?” he asked, trying to pull the thing off of her by the collar.
“Quinn!” she finally snapped at him, fighting to keep her arms in the almost-warm leather. “Would you relax? Please?”
Her hand on his arm seemed to calm him slightly, but he still practically vibrated under her touch. Her big, strong Zeus was a nervous wreck about this evening, even though he looked like he’d stepped right off of the pages of Esquire magazine. And Kellie understood. He’d worked so hard for this night, using every ounce of energy that he had—and nearly wearing out the Darryls in the process—to finish Betty and get her delivered to the show on time.
And now it was time. The night that the awards for best bikes would be given out.
The lights in the room began to dim.
“I hope they present the new artist category first,” he murmured in her ear, sending those delicious shivers along her spine. Shivers that had nothing to do with how cold it was in this room—as a matter of fact, Kellie was feeling just a little bit warmer, all of a sudden. “If they hurry up and get it over with, I can be happy for whoever wins and stop stressing about it.”
She turned her head to look into his dark eyes. Those eyes that she’d been gazing into on a regular basis forever, if she had her way. “Why do you think it won’t be you?” she asked.
“I dunno, I just want it to be over with.”
And really, there was no need for him to be anxious. He’d been asked for his business card so many times this week that Kellie had run to the printer to rush-order a few hundred more. Darryl A. told her this morning that their appointment calendar was filling up faster than they could handle, and he asked Quinn to place an ad to hire another Darryl as soon as possible.
Accidentally in Love With the Biker (What Happens in Vegas) Page 14