by Jewel E. Ann
“Everyone except my mother. She’s putting the food away then she’ll let herself out.” He sounded tired.
There was an extended period of silence with neither one of us searching for eye contact.
Quinn’s willingness in the past to answer my questions even if it hurt me was commendable, but I wasn’t in the mood to drag information out of him.
“I’m not going to ask you anything. I don’t have it left in me. So if you think you can make it right then now’s the time, otherwise, I’m leaving.”
As much as it hurt, I forced myself to look at him even though he still wasn’t looking at me. He roughly rubbed his hands over his face.”I didn’t lie to you. I was scheduled to go to Spain for the week, but then I got a call from my attorney at the last minute and had to cancel my trip.”
He paused for a moment, maybe trying to piece together his thoughts.
“My father left behind a shit storm of a mess for his family to clean up. He had some business issues that got him into trouble over the past ten years and when he died they fell into our laps or more accurately mine, since I took over most of his business dealings. My attorney needed to question my mother, brother, and sister too, so we changed our plans and they came here for Christmas instead.”
He briefly met my eyes before he looked back down at his feet. The elephant in the room had yet to be addressed and for me it was the deal breaker. I heard the sound of his front door closing and I assumed it was his mom leaving. He must have been waiting for that moment before diving into the subject that could have ultimately sent me running for the hills.
“When plans changed to stay in New York, my sister insisted I invite Olivia to dinner since she wasn’t going back home for Christmas. I met Olivia at a fashion show two years ago and she and Alexis became good friends. It was just dinner, so with all the other drama my family has been going through I didn’t want to deal with the Olivia situation too.”
I waited to see if he was going to elaborate, but he didn’t. Not good enough! I grabbed my suitcase and handbag and headed to the stairs.
“Stop! I’m not finished.”
I dropped my bags but didn’t turn around.
“Olivia and I have never been together for longer than six weeks … at a time. I omitted that detail on our first date because it’s become a defense mechanism for me. Women want to know they will be more than a one night stand and I want them to know it will be a short relationship. Olivia isn’t a gold digger. She has her own money. She likes to be showered with gifts just because she thinks she deserves it, not because she can’t afford them herself.”
I thought he was done, but as I started to move he continued.
“She’s a convenient date and unattached sex. Her modeling career comes first so there is never any pressure to give her a long term commitment, which has made it easy for her to overlook my … indiscretions. My sister’s relationship with her has kept our on-again, off-again relationship going longer than it would have had they not been friends. But you must know, I don’t have to be with her.”
What!
I wanted to storm out of there so fast and never look back, but I knew he would try to stop me. Exhausted, I didn’t have the energy to put up a fight. “I’m going to lie down for a while … alone.”
I left my luggage at the top of the stairs and went into the guest bedroom. Quinn didn’t follow me. He gave me the space I was needing. A few minutes later I heard the front door shut again. I hopped up and took my bags downstairs. Finding some paper and a pen, I left Quinn with the words I couldn’t say, words he didn’t want to hear.
Quinn,
I need time to think and you do too. I believe we may have been the perfect couple, in another life. I can’t keep asking you to give me more than I can give you. I don’t know if I will ever—
The door opened and I jumped, dropping the pen on the ground. Quinn looked down at my bags by the door and then at the piece of paper in front of me.
“What are you doing?” he asked with his eyes fixed on mine.
“Nothing.” I folded the paper and clenched it in my hand.
“What’s that?” His eyes fell to my hand.
I didn’t answer. He walked over to me and grabbed my hand, but I tried to pull it away.
“Stop!” I yelled, but he ignored me and pried the paper out of my hand then unfolded it.
“You’re leaving?”
Silence.
“What was the rest going to say? You don’t know if you’ll ever what?”
Silence.
He slammed his hand holding the paper down on the counter. “Tell me!”
I jumped and visibly flinched. He looked so mad it scared me. It was a side to Quinn I had never seen, and I wondered how far his anger would take him. I eased past him, praying he wouldn’t reach for me. Quickly grabbing my boots, I nervously fumbled to get them on.
“Fine, Addy, leave. That’s just great. Good riddance … Merry fucking Christmas to you.” He wadded up the paper and threw it aside then went upstairs, not once looking back.
*
It was too late to get a flight out so I got a room for the night and flew back to Milwaukee the next morning. I hadn’t shed a single tear since I’d left Quinn’s. I cleaned my loft, scrubbed the café from top to bottom, walked dogs at the local shelter, and volunteered at the soup kitchen to pass the time until Mac and Evan came back two days before New Year’s. Having texted Mac with the “highlights” of my one day trip to New York, she was very worried about me and thought about returning early, but I had insisted she stay. When they returned home from Chicago we had dinner at their house. As soon as we were done eating, Mac kicked Evan downstairs to watch TV while we discussed my pathetic life.
“He hates me, Mac.”
“I think just the opposite. I think he loves you.” Her face was wrinkled up as if she was afraid of my reaction.
“You’re crazy,” I laughed.
“Hmm, I wonder if he’s ever told Olivia that hurting her ‘rips his fucking heart out,’ or that if she left him he ‘wouldn’t be able to breathe,’ or my personal favorite that he would ‘lay the fucking world at her feet if she just asked’. He’s a finance guy, Addy, not a Hollywood actor. You can’t just make that shit up on a whim unless it’s coming from your heart.”
“Where was his heart when he refused to tell his family about us? Where was his heart when he allowed Olivia to grope him right in front of me? Where was his heart when he said he didn’t have to be with her? I don’t have to eat chocolate, but I sure do want it.”
“Did you ask him?”
“No.”
“Addy?”
“What?”
Mac moved to sit with me on the sofa, and she wrapped one arm around me pulling me closer. “Do you want to be with him?” Her voice was tender and compassionate. Mac loved me and had endured so much to be my friend I felt guilty for not finding happiness in my life because she needed it for me almost as much as I did.
“Yes,” my voice broke, “bu—but … I don—don’t know h—h—how,” I sobbed. Everything that had been building inside me since leaving Quinn’s came out.
“Oh, sweetie, one day at a time. Be with him one day at a time.” She rocked me in her arms.
When I shed my last tear, she handed me a tissue and I blotted my red, swollen eyes.
“I’m not who he thinks I am.”
“You’re exactly who he thinks you are. Your past is horrific, unimaginable, and I wouldn’t wish it on anyone, but don’t let it define you. It was part of your journey, but it’s not your future.”
“I can’t tell him, he deserves to know, but I just can’t.”
“Then don’t. It only affects him if you let it affect you.”
“What if he finds out, like what happened with Brent.”
“Brent doesn’t know everything.”
“He knew Malcolm.”
“Addy, don’t buy trouble. If it comes out, then it comes out. If Quinn cares ab
out you the way I think he does, then it won’t matter.”
“God, I hope you’re right. You’re the best you know?” I gave her one last big hug before leaving.
“I know,” she teased.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“We are not rich by what we possess but by what we can do without.”
~Immanuel Kant
IT WAS AN insane idea, but Mac talked me into flying back to New York for New Year’s Eve and surprising Quinn. It was a bold move on my part. The last time I tried to surprise Quinn it didn’t end so well. I mentally prepared myself for the possibility that he wouldn’t be alone when I arrived. Ready to fight for him, I wasn’t opposed to kicking Olivia or any other hussy to the curb. There was also the possibility that he would kick me to the curb.
My flight arrived mid-afternoon with light snow but luckily no delays. I was eager to catch Quinn before he left for any possible New Year’s Eve parties. I couldn’t imagine him staying home alone on such a night. As luck would have it, the doorman recognized me and let me in the elevator without announcing my arrival. Butterflies fluttered in my stomach as I neared his door. Pausing for a moment, I took a deep breath.
Deep breath … I am peaceful, I am strong.
I knocked on the door. No answer. Then I tried the key that I hadn’t given back before I left. The door unlocked and his security system beeped. Hurrying to type in the code, my hands were shaking. Finally, after my second attempt the light switched to green. The silence haunted me. He wasn’t home. The wind started to deflate from my lungs. I wanted to surprise him, but plan B was to text or call if he wasn’t home. Not ready for plan B, I freshened up in the bathroom and lounged on his couch staring out the window. I messed with my phone checking Facebook, emails, and a missed call from Mac. I even read some of a book I had downloaded onto my phone. Before I knew it, it was after five o’clock. I was feeling less certain that I would see Quinn and emotions threatened my eyes but I fought them back. It wasn’t how I’d planned it. I didn’t want to do this over the phone. I had to look in his eyes. My courage had been compromised and my confidence was fading. I wasn’t sure I could handle seeing him come through the door in the early morning hours draped in another woman. But having nothing to lose by that point, I texted him.
Where are you?
I waited, ten minutes, twenty minutes, a half hour. My heart sank. I knew he would’ve had his phone with him, but the realization hit me that he just didn’t want to talk to me. I’d flown to New York and gotten my answer. He was done with me. A silent goodbye.
My next step was the daunting task of finding a hotel room on the most crowded night of the year in New York City. I pulled on my boots and just as I was buttoning my jacket my phone chimed.
I’m sitting outside my door.
What?
I opened the door and sure enough there he was sitting on the ground against the wall. He was wearing faded blue jeans and a white thermal shirt with a white ball cap. I hardly recognized him, he looked so young. It felt like someone just breathed life into me again.
“What are you doing?” I hesitantly asked.
“Waiting.”
“Waiting for what?”
“Waiting to see if the beautiful angel I saw walk into the lobby earlier was really here or just my imagination. I was afraid to open the door and have her not be there.”
I squatted in front of him, placing my hands on his that hung over his bent knees.
“Well, I don’t know if that beautiful angel is here … but I am.”
He spread his knees and I knelt between his legs, this time I cradled his face in my hands and leaned my forehead against his. “I have another proposition for you.”
“Anything.” He lifted my hips and extended his legs out flat then set me back down so I was straddling him. His arms wrapped around my waist and mine around his neck.
“You don’t even know what I’m going so say yet.”
“Doesn’t matter. If you’re here, then my answer is yes.”
My emotions boiled over. Quinn made me feel wanted, needed, desired, and even if he hadn’t said the words yet, maybe even loved. “Maybe we could discuss this inside?” I suggested.
“First things first.” He turned his hat around with the bill to his back and closed the small gap between us. He kissed my top lip, then my bottom lip, before I pulled his head into me, deepening our kiss, our tongues reuniting and exploring familiar territory again.
“God, I missed you,” he mumbled against my lips.
“Mmm,” was my response, not wanting to leave his lips.
After several minutes of making out like teenagers in the hallway, he gracefully stood up, holding me in my signature monkey position, and walked us into his condo, his mouth never leaving mine. He collapsed on the couch as his free hands worked the buttons of my coat until he could shrug it off me. I felt his hardness beneath me as his mouth became more urgent moving down my neck.
“Quinn, we should … talk … first.” I didn’t sound believable but he stopped anyway.
His breathing was ragged. “Make it quick.” He smirked as he wiggled under me adjusting himself.
I had rehearsed my speech a thousand times over the previous twenty-four hours and it was uncharacteristic, virtually impossible, for me to forget something, but being there with Quinn my mind went blank. I had to search for new words and hoped I would piece them together well enough to make sense.
“Do you think we can be together without our pasts?”
“You mean Olivia?” he asked cautiously.
“Yes, no … I mean … jeez, I thought this would be easier. It sounded so good in my head.”
“I’m not with Olivia, and I told you that nothing you tell me about your past will change the way I feel about you.” He held me closely in a comforting embrace. I rested my head on his shoulder, my nose to his neck, and I breathed him in.
“I know … I do … it’s not that. I’m not trying to hide anything from you. My past is tragic and sharing it with you would be like reliving it. I can’t do it, not now, maybe never.”
He kissed the top of my head and stroked my hair. “Baby, if you can let go of your past, then I don’t need to know about it. But I hope someday I can look into your beautiful eyes and see past all your pain.”
Pressing my lips to his strong jaw, I combed my fingers through the hair at the nape of his neck. “Me too.”
“Baby?”
“Hmm?” I mumbled as my lips and tongue tasted every inch of his neck.
“You should move to New York.”
Whoa!
I sat up straight to look at him. “I can’t move to New York.”
“Why not? You told my family you were thinking of moving here.” He smirked.
“I’m glad you find the humor in that. What’s in New York that I can’t have in Milwaukee or even Chicago?” I threw back without thinking.
“Me.” He grinned and so did I because his beautiful smile was so contagious. “You could open up another Sage Leaf Café here in Manhattan. Hell, you could open a chain of them.”
“I didn’t open my café to make money. I opened it because I wanted to share what I love with others. One café is personal, a chain of them is not. It’s not that I’m opposed to having more cafés like mine open up. It would be a good thing to have healthy food options more readily available. But Mac handles the ‘business’ part of our business, and I don’t see her rushing to expand anytime soon.”
“Then let me help you expand. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but inside this ruggedly handsome head of mine is a brilliant mind for business. You wouldn’t have to deal with banks or worry about start-up capital because I would give you all the financial backing you would need.”
“I don’t need your money—”
“Need? Or do you just not want my help or my money. Your feminist attitude is admirable, I get it, but—”
“Wait! I don’t have a feminist attitude. This may be hard for you to wrap your
money-driven brain around, but I don’t want or need your money. If I wanted to start a chain of cafés I would, and maybe someday I will. If or when that day comes, I have plenty of financial backing. However, right now I’m just trying to live in the moment and squeeze every bit of happiness I can out of it. I lost my purpose a long time ago, or at least I thought I did. But maybe it’s not about the right time or moment to find a new purpose. Maybe it’s about finding purpose in every moment.”
He squeezed my legs as I sat astride him. The look on his face was complete adoration. “You fucking amaze me, you know that, right?”
“That’s why you lov—”
Quinn raised his eyebrows as I fumbled for a recovery. He’d poured his heart out to me on more than one occasion, but in all his words of admiration, passion, and desperation, never once did he use the word love.
“Um … that’s not what, or what I meant—” I was drowning but he gallantly rescued me by putting us back on the road we’d been on before I detoured into no man’s land.
“So then come to New York and get a teaching job at the culinary institute, or use your degree, or get a janitor’s job at Juilliard and do the ‘Goodwill Hunting’ thing by leaving anonymous masterpiece compositions on the chalk boards.”
I punched him in the gut, laughing at his ridiculous ideas. “You’re a dork, you know, that right?”
He didn’t even flinch when I hit him. “Your IQ is probably 180 or higher and ‘dork’ is the best you’ve got?”
I gave him a slow kiss. “What can I say, I’m an idiot, stupid, dumb, thick, deficient, simple-minded, dopey, witless, stolid, moronic, brainless, and cretinous when I’m around you.”
“Okay, Merriam-Webster.” He dipped his tongue in my mouth and cupped my breasts, and I knew we were done talking.
His erection came back to full attention. I reached between us and rubbed him over his jeans. Pulling away, he swiftly removed his shirt in one easy motion. I reciprocated then he paused, taking in my new, black, lace, demi cup bra. His tongue lazily wet his bottom lip then his teeth pulled it into his mouth. The lustful look in his eyes had me squirming on his lap. I reached both arms around to unhook my bra but he grabbed my arms and stopped me.