by G. K. Brady
She texted Quinn and got up to take a shower, overjoyed that she had the energy to get her herself shampooed and washed. When she stepped out of the bathroom, Quinn was lounging on the other side of her bed, hands laced behind his head as though he belonged there. A vague recollection of him doing that the last few days hovered like a mist.
“What are you doing here?” she blurted.
“Your text said you heard a noise, and I thought I’d take a look outside.”
“I think my imagination caused it.”
He shrugged. “I didn’t see anything. But it’s pretty windy out there.”
She took him in, all long and stretched out on the bed in jeans, bare feet, and a Henley that molded to mouthwatering muscle. “Have you been sleeping next to me?”
He looked startled but quickly recovered. “Sometimes when we’re watching a show together, I doze.”
“What have we been watching?”
“All kinds of shit. We’ve watched everything from science to biographies to ancient pyramids. Is there anything you’re not interested in?”
“Not really.”
“Do you remember watching past hockey games and talking about the plays?”
“Vaguely.”
“You know your stuff.”
“So do you.”
He laughed. “As I should. Hungry? Thirsty? Is there anything I can do to make you more comfortable?”
God, he was sweet. She lowered herself on the bed and sighed into the mattress before lowering her lids. “I’m good. I feel about fifty pounds lighter after my shower.”
“You smell really, really good.”
Pleased, she rolled her head toward him. “Yeah?”
“Oh yeah.”
“Good, but I think the shower wore me out. My eyes burn too much to read or watch TV. Would you read to me?”
He cleared his throat. “Uh … read what?”
She leaned over, swiped her e-reader from the nightstand, and switched it on. “Here.”
“It isn’t the romance crap, is it?”
“Is the big, bad hockey player chicken?” Her toes started to tingle just thinking about that deep voice of his reading some of that “romance crap.”
“Of course not,” he scoffed. She could have sworn he blushed.
“Maybe you can score the characters on their … prowess. You know, like at the Olympics?”
A chuckle rumbled through him, and she grinned.
He started to read. He got through one sentence before he fell into hysterical laughter. “I can’t do this!”
“Embarrassed?”
“Yes! Happy now?”
“No. You’ve only read one fucking sentence.”
“Okay. Are there some non-sex parts I can start with? You know, like foreplay, so I can build up to the more graphic shit? You sort of threw me into the deep end here, Sunshine. We already have hard-as-wood cocks going into wet folds. And why the hell aren’t they using protection?”
A laugh spurted from her. “It’s the eighteenth century, you nut.”
“They had STDs back then.”
“Of course they did, but they didn’t have Trojans … or Durex … or …”
He cleared his throat. “Okay. Let me try this again.” He man-giggled through half of the scene, until he finally dissolved in guffaws. “Oh my fucking God! This is … this is … porn!” he wheezed.
“You’re taking all the romance out of this, you know.”
“That’s what she said!”
“C’mon, Sparks. I know you can do this. And if you can’t, I’m kicking you out of my bed.”
“That’s also what she said!”
She turned her head to the side and cracked open an eyelid. “You’ve been kicked out of bed before?”
He nodded. “God, yeah.”
“Don’t take this the wrong way—like letting it go to your already oversized head—but I’m having a hard time picturing it.”
“Like I said, toots, I don’t do things halfway. When I piss off a woman, I really piss her off.”
Now it was her turn to chuckle. “Now that makes sense.”
He laid the e-reader between them. “How about I read from the latest issue of Structure?”
“You read my magazine?” Her tone broadcast her surprise.
“Cover to cover. Fascinating stuff. I’d forgotten how much I like it.”
“I haven’t even read my magazine,” she groused.
“So this is perfect. There’s this great article about anchored wall systems.”
“Meh.”
“Okay. There’s a different issue on evaluating historic stone bridges.”
She blinked a few times. “How many of my magazines have you read?”
“I’ve read them all. I hope that’s okay.”
“Of course it’s okay.” She closed her eyes and snuggled into her pillow. “I like the sound of the bridges, but don’t read it to me. Just tell me about it.”
He did, his voice lulling her into a warm, floaty place. When he grew quiet, she opened her eyes and peeked at him. He was staring at her.
She frowned. “What are you looking at?”
“You.” He tapped the end of her nose. “I like your nose. And the bling.”
When she crossed her eyes to look at it, he laughed. “You have long eyelashes,” he said in a reverent tone that fired something in her tummy. “Did you know they flutter when you dream?”
Oh wow! That’s either super creepy or really, really sweet. Judging by the tender look on his face and the soft tone of his voice, she was going with the latter.
She swallowed around a sudden lump in her throat. “No. I don’t usually record myself when I’m sleeping.”
As if he hadn’t heard her quip, he reached out and swept her hair back. “And your hair … It’s so silky it constantly falls across your face.” She closed her eyes, relishing the feel of his fingers as he tucked strands behind her ears. It was such a gentle, intimate gesture that she was both moved and completely stunned. Two warring emotions welled inside her.
He snatched his hand back, the sudden movement popping her eyes open.
He shrank away—as much as a man his size could. “Sorry … Hey, can I get you some soup?” His abrupt businesslike tone was completely incongruous with the lover’s sensuous voice he’d used when he’d touched her. Sick as she still was, she found herself yearning for the lover to return—and equally appalled that she craved it.
The next day, Sarah sauntered into the kitchen, and Archer hopped up to greet her. Two heads swiveled in concert; two pairs of eyes riveted on her. She raised her hand in a self-conscious little wave. “Hey, Liz. ’Morning, Sparky. How is everybody?”
“What are you doing out of bed?” Quinn barked.
She went for a nonchalant shrug that ended up resembling a shoulder jerk. “Don’t blow a fuse, Sparky. I’m feeling better and decided I was tired of being lazy. How’s your shoulder?”
He gave her a blank stare.
“The one that was in a sling?” she added helpfully.
Recognition dawned in his cocoa eyes. “Fine.”
Liz broke out in a broad grin. “Welcome back to the land of the living, doll. You’ve been missed.”
Sarah stole a glance at Quinn, who surveyed her over the rim of his coffee cup as he took a sip. His dark brows were knotted together. Not so sure Sparky missed me. He looks like he wants to choke me out. What happened to that really sweet guy? She smoothed her T-shirt that read, “Zombies Eat Brains … Don’t Worry, You’re Safe.” The shirt had been too tight to wear before, but apparently she’d dropped some weight because it fit snugly over her long-sleeved tee.
When she lifted her head, she caught Quinn reading the slogan—and looking rather embarrassed about it, judging from his bright burgundy cheekbones. “Nice T-shirt,” he rasped.
“Thanks.”
He cleared his throat. “So. We’re glad you’re feeling better, but until you’re symptom-free for two weeks, you hav
e to stay in—”
“I figured as mu—”
“And you have to socially distance from Mom.” He tilted his head toward Liz.
Her heart sank. “How am I supposed to do my job?”
“You’re not. She and I have this.”
Dread bloomed in Sarah’s chest. “Oh. So I guess you won’t be needing me anymore?”
Liz and Quinn glanced at each other, then both spluttered at once. They were so emphatic Sarah couldn’t understand either one, but it gave her a lift. Quinn took the lead. “No. I mean yes, absolutely, we—Mom needs you. I’m the temporary replacement, and I’m pretty sure she’ll be glad to have you back.” Liz nodded. He broke out in a deep-dimpled smile that instantly put Sarah at ease. Honestly, she’d missed that smile. God, what a sap! “Another One Bites the Dust” blared in her brain. One more woman blinded by Quinn Hadley’s brilliant smile.
“And,” Liz added, “you’re still on the payroll.” She slid her eyes to Quinn, who turned slowly, deliberately, and gave her a frown that might have looked real if not for one corner of his mouth twitching. Liz shot back a twinkly smile.
He rolled his eyes dramatically and refocused on Sarah. “What she said.”
“No, I couldn’t! I’m not doing anything except sucking up your food and—”
“Sunshine, you’ve barely sucked anything.” Something flashed in his eyes, and his cheekbones flushed a deeper shade, if that were possible.
Uncomfortable—for so many reasons—Sarah shifted her weight. “I have a hard time accepting, um, other people’s kindness”—and letting them pay me for doing squat—“but I want to thank you both … so much for looking out for me.”
“Don’t look at me.” Liz jabbed her pointer finger at Quinn. “Sparky here is the one who took care of you—and me. And he might’ve been more protective of you than Archer.”
Archer’s ears perked up at the mention of his name, and he trotted back to Liz and parked his fuzzy butt beside her.
Sarah was overcome with a weird shyness, and she cast her gaze to the countertop. “Well, thank you.”
“I guess now’s the time for me to announce my apology to the world,” Quinn rumbled.
Sarah raised her head. “Apology for what?”
“For making light of the virus. I had no idea … You were so sick. And Mom could have come down with it. Thank God she didn’t.”
Behind his back, Liz mouthed, “He was very worried.”
“Anyway, I’m glad you’re back. You’ll have to take it easy because I’ve been reading about people who think they’re better but it doubles back on them, and voila, they’re sick again.”
Sarah snickered. “Showing off your command of the French language again?”
He stared at her for a few beats, then broke out in a grin. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I missed your witty repartee, Sunshine.”
“I think I missed fencing with you too, Sparky.”
Judging by the heat blazing up her neck and over her face, she was pretty sure she’d just gone an even darker shade than Quinn’s cheekbones. Meanwhile, Liz’s eyes bounced between them, and her smile widened with what could only be described as mischief.
Chapter 21
You Can Do That Virtually Too?
One week later, Sarah hummed along at nearly back-to-normal speed. Quinn still wouldn’t let her do anything beyond lifting a fork to feed herself, and he was positively militant about enforcing it, a polar opposite to his easier-going side. She found it sorta sexy in an alpha I’m-the-boss-of-you kind of way. Not usually a masculine style she cozied up to, but he had a way of getting behind her defenses. Probably those damn dimples.
Late afternoon one day, they were seated at opposite ends of the couch. She was on her laptop, and he’d commandeered the all-COVID-all-the-time TV from Liz while she soaked in the hot tub. Thank God! Sarah had had enough of COVID-19 to last a lifetime.
Quinn was currently engrossed in an episode of Engineering Disasters. “So what do you think, Sunshine? Did the engineer call out the wrong rebar?”
Sarah squinted at the screen. “Sorry. I tuned out the show.” She glanced between him and her computer screen several times. “How big are you?”
His head whipped toward her. “What, now?”
“How big are you?” she repeated.
A slow, sexy smile spread over his face. “Why don’t you slide on over here and find out?”
“Oh, for fuck’s—I’m talking about your height and weight. I already know about your …” Oh shit. Did I really almost just say that? By the look on his face, he was finding what she had to say way more interesting than the twisted metal carnage on TV.
“My what?”
She stared at her laptop, wondering if she could be absorbed into it. “Nothing.”
He shifted so that he faced her, and he leaned in, his voice low and melty and hypnotic. “What were you about to say?”
Eyes still glued to her computer, she blurted, “I heard some of your groupies talking about your … a certain part of your anatomy in the bathroom the night of the team dinner.”
In her peripheral vision, his spine went ramrod straight. “What?”
She flapped a dismissive hand at him. “Don’t worry. It was complimentary. Your ego would have inflated at least another two dress-shirt sizes.”
“What did these supposed groupies look like?”
She turned and met his gaze. “Like the ones you usually go for. Blond, heavy in the boob department, slut—er, slinky. I think one of them was a repeat lube-and-tune customer.”
He gave her a look that broadcast he was processing the information—in overload mode. “What, uh, exactly did they say?” he coughed.
“Really? I don’t want to repeat it. It’s embarrassing.”
“I find it difficult to believe you could be embarrassed by anything, Sunshine. But this is important. Did you catch any names?”
The tone of his voice set a few alarm bells ringing. “Why? Did you lose her number?”
He threw himself back against the couch and dragged his hand through his hair and over his face. “You are so frustrating sometimes!”
“Me? I thought you missed my witty repartee. And jeez, I had no clue you were so desperate for a blow-by-blow—literally—about your dick. Maybe you should shoot video of yourself and watch it. That way—”
“Jesus Fucking Christ on a cracker, don’t even go there,” he snapped. The back of his head rested against the couch, and his eyes were closed, giving him a relaxed appearance. But the rest of him totally contradicted his calm affect. His hands were laced across his stomach, and his thumbs circled one another like accelerating propellers. One leg was bouncing to some ridiculously fast and out-of-sync rhythm. “You have no clue how not funny that is, toots.”
Whoa! This sounded serious. Gage had had some unpleasant experiences with “overzealous” fans, and while he’d never shared the deets of what had happened, he’d often taken Sarah to events as his plus-one for protection—before he met Lily, of course. “Hey, Sparks, what’s going on?”
“First tell me what they said. Please.”
She put the computer aside and wiggled in her seat. “Well, it went something like, ‘He’s soooo cute. I get why you screwed him in his truck,’” she said in a high-pitched voice. When she looked over at him, Quinn’s eyes were shuttered, and he had a pained expression on his face. He made a rolling motion with his hand, indicating she should go on. Talk about uncomfortable! “Um, there was more discussion about your dimples and hair and how funny you were. Then the one … Her name was—” Sarah snapped her fingers. “What’s the name of that fish in Finding Nemo?”
He groaned. Not a good kind of groan. “Dory.”
“That’s it! Dory. Well, Dory squeezed her tits and told her friend how much you liked them.”
Another long, low groan. “I can’t believe women talk about that shit.” Another hand drag over his face. “Fuck me.”
“Wasn’t that
the whole idea?”
He rolled his head toward her and opened his eyes. “Would you just …?” he gritted out before looking away again.
“Okay. But consider yourself warned. There’s more, and it doesn’t get any less graphic.” She paused a beat and continued cheerfully. “But you might actually enjoy this part. I think most guys would like hearing how, uh, well-endowed a woman thinks they are.”
“Sunshine!” he yelled. “What. Did. She. Say?”
A few weeks ago, her sadistic side would have enjoyed toying with Quinn Hadley the way a cat toyed with its prey, but that was before she’d gotten a glimpse of the other Quinn Hadley—the one who was fun to talk to and who cared about his mom. The one who’d sat with Sarah and nursed her through her sickness without complaint. The one who took Archer for walks. The one who was giving his swear jar money away.
So despite her misgivings about him, it was with no joy and a whole lot of cringing that she sped through her narrative. “She said you were so big she choked when she went down on you and that she wasn’t putting out in the backseat anymore and that you needed to either take her to your house or a nice hotel with room service because she wasn’t a slut.”
Deafening silence hung in the air between them.
At last, he let out an extended, strangled breath. “Shit. Fuck. Goddamn.”
“Yep. Those would be the top three I’d go with too.”
He turned his head back to her and smiled. Not his full-on, dimpled smile, but one that was achingly lovely because it seemed so special and genuine and … private. “Thank you,” he said. “I know that wasn’t easy—even for a sassy potty mouth like you—and I’m sorry you had to hear it and repeat it.”
“Is she giving you a bad time?”
He shook his head. “Not really. I bumped into her the other day when Arch and I were out for a walk, and it was awkward as hell. But that’s what I get for being an idiot and hanging with her in the first place.”
Hanging? Yeah, that’s one way to put it. The thought of Quinn and the buxom blond made Sarah a little queasy. “Do you want to hook up with her again?”