by Peggy Jaeger
But as a teenager, she’d begun dreaming of a life outside of the town she loved. Moira’s feelings of wanderlust started in sophomore year of high school on a class trip to Montreal. Just leaving the tiny town and its familiarity had caused thoughts and desires to bubble up from deep inside her. She dreamed of the day she would be able to visit all the fabulous, exotic cities the world had to offer. She wanted to climb the white, snow capped Matterhorn, and swim in the warm, tropical seas of Bali. She hadn’t quite made it to those places yet, but the view of the world she’d been afforded for the past few years had been an experience she wouldn’t change.
As all these thoughts flitted through her head on the walk back to the truck, she realized one very real and vital factor that encompassed them all: in every scene of her childhood and adolescence, Quentin had been there, included like family, as family, for as long as she could remember.
“I never thought I’d ever say this, but you’re extremely quiet, M. You okay? Stomach still bothering you?”
Moira looked up into his face and saw the tiny frown of concern that pulled at his lips.
“I was thinking how much I missed being home.”
“You’ve been gone a long time,” he told her, pulling her closer.
“Too long, I realize now. When I saw how tall Steps was the day I came home, I felt like I missed so much. He’s graduating next year and when I left, he wasn’t even in high school. Denny’s done with school next year too. It seems like I lost so much time being away. Time I can’t get back.”
When they’d reached the truck, Quentin opened her door and gave her a hand up, a gesture that still surprised her. When he was settled behind the wheel he asked, “Would it have changed your mind about touring, if you knew you’d feel this way?”
“Probably not. I don’t know for sure. It’s been a rough few months,” she said, sighing and leaning her head back against the seat.
“You ever gonna tell any of us what really happened to make you come home?”
Her eyes lasered on to his. “What are you talking about? I came home because I was sick. And tired.”
Quentin started the engine but before shifting, turned back to her and said, “You have to know, Moira, no one believes that. Something happened. Something you’re not willing to tell anyone.”
A sudden spark of anger flared up from within her, followed by a quick stab of fear. “You don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said, her voice tight. “I got sick. I came home to get better.”
He stared at her for a few beats, his eyes peering so intensely at her through the shadows in the cab Moira swore she could feel what he was thinking.
“I don’t know what bothers me more,” he finally said, sifting into gear and pulling the truck out onto the street. “The fact something did happen and hurt you so much you got sick from it, or the fact you don’t trust me enough to tell me about it. It’s a tossup.”
Tears began to pool in her eyes. She hadn’t cried in days, knowing she was safe and secure again, here, at home. Knowing she could heal physically and emotionally now, surrounded by the people who loved her and knew her best. She wished she had the strength to tell him what had happened, but she was scared what his reaction would be, just as she was scared to tell her twin, the closest person to her. She was just beginning to pull back to some sense of feeling normal again and didn’t want it disrupted with dragging the whole sordid thing up. If she could wish it, Moira would never tell anyone what happened; just go on as if nothing had.
Wishful thinking for sure.
They were silent the rest of the way back to the farm. When Quentin pulled the truck into her drive, he shut off the engine and leaned back, his hands still on the wheel. Neither one of them moved.
“I promised myself I wouldn’t pry,” he told her after a few moments. “It was enough just to have you home.” He turned his body to hers and gently lifted one of her hands in his. “But I saw your face tonight when Pat was grilling you about the tour. You got a little pale when you were talking about it and that’s when your stomach started cramping. I know it’s connected, Moira. I know something bad happened to you while you were gone. I just want to help.”
She looked down at their hands, and marveled at how strong and powerful his looked against hers, and yet his touch was soul soothing and comforting. She wrapped her free hand around them and squeezed. “It’s still a little too raw to talk about,” she admitted, trying to quell the trembling she heard in her voice. “But I promise when I’m ready, I promise,” she squeezed his hands again, “I’ll tell you. But I have to get through it on my own right now. I have to. Please understand.”
“You know we only want to help you, Moira. All of us.”
“I know. I really do. But I need time.”
He glanced down at their joined hands, rubbed one thumb across her knuckles.
“Come on,” he said at last. “I’ll walk you up.”
“Q, it’s me,” she said, pulling back. “I think I can walk myself up to my own front door.”
Without waiting for his reply, she pushed open the door and jumped down from the cab. By the time she crossed to the front of the truck, he was waiting for her.
“Seriously? When did you get so chivalrous?”
“You’ve been away a long time, M,” he told her, taking one of her hands and turning toward the house. “I’ve evolved.”
A laugh bubbled out of her as they walked up the porch steps. The interior of the house was dark, but the porch light was lit. Relieved the mood had lightened between them; she wound one arm through his and squeezed his bicep.
“Thanks for tonight,” she said as they stopped at her front door. “It felt good. Like old times.”
“Friday night movie and Mike’s pizza,” he said, with a nod.
Moira unwound her arm and leaned against the doorframe, gazing up at him.
“You may have seen castles and played for royalty, but it doesn’t get any better than that around here.”
She smiled. “It’s the simple things, like Mom always says, that bring you the most happiness.”
“Your mother has always been one of the smartest people I know.” He bent down and kissed her forehead. “See you tomorrow night for your big shindig.”
A small groan escaped from deep inside her. “I wish there was some way I could talk mom and dad out of this party. I just want to relax some more. Ride. Sleep. I’ve been in a crowd of people for years.”
“And yet, you’ve admitted you’ve been lonely.”
She looked up at him, wondering how she could explain the sea of emotions swirling within her.
“Sometimes,” she finally said, “being in a group of people is the loneliest feeling of all.”
“That’s pretty cryptic,” he told her, his mouth pulling into a grin. “And deep.”
“That’s me,” she answered, rolling her eyes.
He rubbed a hand down her arm. “Moira, you know you’re never alone, right? You’ve always got, well, all of us. Your family. Mine. Me. We’re always here for you, no matter what.”
She believed him. It was the reason she’d wanted to come home so badly.
“I know. And I love you all,” she said, going up on tiptoe to kiss his cheek.
She couldn’t read the expression in his eyes as he nodded, and turned to go.
Moira felt an intense overwhelming emptiness engulf her when he left. She started to open the front door but stopped when Quentin abruptly turned back and started up the porch steps again.
“I forgot something,” he told her.
“What?”
When he came up the last step and crossed to her, he said, “this,” and without another word pulled her into his arms.
Her first and last coherent thought was her best friend was going to kiss her goodnight. After a heartbeat, she forgot the best friend part and knew down to her toes friendship had nothing to do with this.
His lips slid across her mouth, soft and gentle, testing, tas
ting. Moira’s mind went blank as she succumbed to the sensation of them, hot and hard, pressing against hers in a kiss like none he’d ever given her before. Slowly, he traced her bottom lip with the tip of his tongue, silently asking her to open for him. When she did, he entered her mouth and began to explore, each movement becoming more demanding, more insistent. Moira fell against him, fisting his jacket lapels to steady herself. When she felt his heartbeat pounding under her hands, she grew lightheaded with need. Quentin framed her face with his fingertips, softly tugging down on her chin, changing the angle of the kiss.
She’d been kissed before, but never, never with such all consuming need and longing. She heard a deep moan and was shocked to realize the sound had escaped from her. One of Quentin’s hands left her face to slide down her back. When he pushed against her backside and molded her body to his, Moira’s stomach jumped. This time, though, it wasn’t with the painful contractions she’d come to expect, but with a heart-stopping craving.
A craving for him.
She unfurled her hands from his jacket and, without thought, wound them upwards, weaving them over his shirt collar and up through his hair. She grabbed onto the ends, pulled his head down closer, and held on fast.
All aspect of time was lost. Nothing mattered but the delicious feel of his strong hands caressing her back and the taste of him as his tongue mated with hers.
This couldn’t be happening. It had to be a dream.
But no dream had ever made her want like this, feel like this. When he skimmed his lips across her jaw and down her throat, stopping to take her lobe into his mouth, Moira knew this wasn’t a dream. That same feeling she’d had when she looked at him in the movie steeped through her again, tickling her stomach muscles. With a jolt, she realized the sensation was desire. Pure and simple.
Quentin pulled back and stared down into her face. With a heavy sigh, he laid his forehead against hers, a small grin tugging at the corners of his lips. “I’ve wanted to kiss you for so long. So damn long.”
“Q—?”
He traced one finger lazily down her jaw and across the lips he’d just caressed, silencing her. “Remember when your cousin Tiffany got married in the backyard here?”
Confused, Moira nodded. She licked her lips, running her tongue across his caressing finger. The hiss that blew from him made her thighs shake.
Quentin rubbed her bottom lip with the pad of his thumb. “When the Reverend told Cole ‘you may now kiss your bride,’ and he swooped her off the ground, spun her around, and kissed her silly? Remember what you said?”
Moira tried to conjure the scene. “I think I said it was the most romantic thing I’d ever seen.”
He nodded. “The exact quote was ‘I hope someone kisses me like that some day.’”
Her grin was quick at the memory. “Pat snorted and said I’d better be satisfied with licks from the horses and Rob Roy because no guy was ever going to kiss me like that.”
“He wasn’t known for tact back then,” he said, rubbing a hand down her back as he held her next to him in the soft lamplight from the porch. The soothing, rhythmic smoothing of his hand made every nerve on Moira’s body stand at attention.
“Later on that day, behind the barn, remember what happened then?”
Because she did, she couldn’t stop the heat from spreading up her face like wildfire. When she merely nodded, he traced a kiss across the area he’d just caressed, and said, “You wanted to know what it felt like to be kissed like that and since I was your best friend, you thought I should be the one to do it, because you—quote—felt safe with me—unquote.”
“What was I? Eleven?” she said, finally finding her voice, and unnerved to hear it whining.
“Thirteen. We both were, and I was more than willing to do it. Almost broke my heart in two when you said afterward, ‘I don’t see what all the fuss is about.’”
His lips twitched at the corners when he said it, and Moira felt the warmth of her blush intensify.
“Q—”
“Hush.” He kissed her forehead. “Ever since that day, all I’ve wanted is a second chance. Now,” he pulled her body closer, wrapped both arms around her small waist, his hand resting just above the dent in her spine. “We’re both a little older, a little more mature. Some of us are much more experienced—”
“And conceited.”
“Experienced,” he said, the laugh in his voice quiet and seductive, “and things can be so much better.”
Moira stared up into his eyes, warm and moist, shimmering under the subtle porch light. “Where is this coming from? You’ve never said anything like this, never acted like this, before. Ever.”
He took a breath and tucked her head against his shoulder, rubbing her back with both of his hands. His chest was made of granite, hard and solid and Moira felt so secure in his embrace. So comforted and so safe. If he never let go of her, she knew she wouldn’t mind in the least.
He didn’t speak for a few moments. Then, he pulled back, gazed down into her face and Moira didn’t need verbal answers to her questions. The look of blatant need and craving was so strongly etched in his eyes as he peered right through her, and for a moment, all she could do was stare, motionless. It was the same expression she’d seen on his face the night of her welcome home dinner. Then, she hadn’t known what to make of it. She couldn’t put a name to what she was seeing etched in his chiseled features.
Now, she knew.
He brought his lips to hers again in the gentlest of touches. “I want you, Moira. More than I’ve ever wanted anyone or anything, in my entire life. I’ve always wanted you, from the time I knew what it meant.” He chuckled and added, “probably even before then. I haven’t gone a day in too long to count when I didn’t think of you and want you with me. There have been so many times the past few years when I’ve wanted to take an extended leave from the practice and go fly to wherever you were performing, just to see you. Obligations, though necessary, can be a bitch, and the time never allowed it. When Pat told me you were coming home, I thought, good. Finally. Home court advantage.” His lazy grin spread with the words.
“I never knew,” she said, tears springing up. “You never gave me any indication. All these years, you’ve never hinted at this. In any way. Why not?”
He shook his head. “I know. I didn’t know how you’d feel about it. We’ve been friends forever. I don’t have a childhood memory that doesn’t include you. We’re everything friends should be. But this is a different feeling, Moira, from friendship. So different.”
His voice broke on the last word as he claimed her mouth again, deepening the kiss instantly, and knocking her back emotionally.
“I won’t push you,” he said into her hair, kissing her temple. “You need to get used to the idea, I know. I don’t want anything to change between us.”
“How can it not?” she asked, the tears spilling over. “It changes everything, Quentin. You know it does.”
His thumb swiped softly at the drop of moisture cascading down her cheek. “It doesn’t have to. We’re still us. We’re still the same. I won’t ever lose you as a friend, Moira. I can’t. You’re as much a part of my life as I am of yours. Our friendship will never change. It hasn’t in all these years you’ve been gone.”
Moira was certain he believed it. She wanted to as well, but the events of the past few months, the events she’d kept a secret from everyone but Clarissa Rogers, made her doubt it. There was no one she trusted or loved more as a friend than Quentin, though.
“Q, when I look at you, when I think of you,” she said, wrapping her hand around one of his arms and squeezing, “it’s always with love. You know that.”
He smiled and laid a hand over the one on his arm. “Of course I do. So? What’s the problem?”
The only way to explain it to him would be to tell him what had happened while she was away, and she still wasn’t ready. She didn’t feel strong enough yet to confide in anyone in her family. And Quentin was family. He’d alwa
ys been.
He reached out a finger and gently smoothed the line crossing her brow. “Look, nothing’s really changed. Like I said, I’ll give you time to get used to the idea, but I’m not going to stop what we’ve started here tonight. There’s never a time I don’t want to touch you, hold you or kiss you. I can temper it in front of people.” His grin was quick, and to Moira’s eyes, deadly. “I’ve been doing it since I was a kid when I’m around you. But when we’re together, especially alone like this,” he leaned in closer and pulled her back to lay against his chest, molding her body along his, “I’m not holding back anymore. I’m gonna make you want me as much as I do you. Bet on it.” His lips took hers again and Moira felt every ounce of the passion and unbridled desire inside him unleash. She had no doubt of his longing.
Or her own.
The sound of an approaching car made him pull back. Moira’s gaze turned to the driveway. “It’s Steps,” she said, reluctantly pulling out of Quentin’s arms.
“I’d better go. Think about what I said.” He swiped a finger down her cheek.
“Like I’m going to be able to think about anything else,” she mumbled, blowing out a breath.
With a huge self-satisfied grin, he bent and whispered into her ear, “You already think I look like a god, M. Just think about that.”
“Conceited goon,” she whispered back.
“Hey,” Quentin greeted Moira’s youngest brother as he jogged up the porch steps.
“Hey,” Alastair said back, glancing from his sister to his brother’s best friend. “What’s up?”
“Just leaving.” He turned to Moira and said, “See you tomorrow night.”
She was barely able to eek out a “‘Night,” before he left them.