Instead of doing what Inez would have preferred — simply spilling what he knew, the man shook his head. “I’m not scared of you, and I’m not saying shit.”
Across the room, Kendall laughed, a deep, throaty, rich sound that made heat settle between Inez’s legs. “Trust me, brother. You should be scared.”
Smiling, Inez turned back to the prisoner as she pulled a knife from the holster at her belt. She lifted it, hesitated just long enough to make him give her the sardonic grin of someone who really thought they shouldn’t be scared.
Hmph.
With precision, Inez brought broke the knife down, straight through the bones in his knee, flicking it to separate the muscles. The man screamed, until Inez covered his mouth and nose with her hand and squeezed tight.
“You should have listened to the man. He’s right. You should absolutely be scared.”
eleven.
Shit.
Quentin dropped his head into his hands, groaning as he closed his eyes. Several days had gone by since the failed attempt to snatch Tomiko, and still… no sign of her. On one hand, it was good. No more near death experiences, no more destruction. But on the other hand...
What the fuck are you up to, crazy ass girl?
Inez's interrogation of Tomiko's henchman at the apartment had led them to a small townhouse near Naomi's, which currently sat empty while they figured everything out. They could see Tomiko had indeed been there, from the fire accelerants, weapons, ammo, and blueprints from the buildings where they lived and worked. Naomi came to the quick conclusion that since she couldn't get to them — Naomi, Quentin, or now Renata — the next best thing was going after the gym. In any case, by the time they found the townhouse, she was gone, and hadn't been back.
They had nothing.
Raising his head, Quentin sat back and propped his hands behind his head, staring at his computer screen. Tomiko occupied one side, Terry King occupied the other. Two targets that he couldn't seem to get any closer to than where he was.
Shit!
Frustration had driven Renata up to her room, without her laptop, nearly an hour before. The stress of it all seemed to be weighing on her heavier now, especially since the video call with Wolfe the day before, where Taylor had excitedly shown her new clothes, a computer, school supplies, all preparations for her to start school hundreds of miles away, “since mommy was so behind on her work.”
And the bastard had offered — insisted — on setting her up in a new apartment, which she refused to even go look at. Who knew what kind of surveillance he would put on her, what kind of favors he would feel like she owed, if she accepted such a thing provided by him? The call ended with him feigning offense at Renata's refusal of his gesture, and as soon as the line was closed, she broke down in tears.
Nothing would have given Quentin more satisfaction than putting a fist through Wolfe's face, but that wouldn't have been helpful at this stage, unrealistic or not.
Get Taylor back. Then, Wolfe was fair game.
Recognizing that his focus was shot for the day, Quentin pushed himself out of his seat, shut down his computer, then headed upstairs. As he passed the door to Renata's room, the faint thump of music caught his attention. He glanced down at his watch for the time. It was past late at night, but music playing meant she was probably awake... probably up worrying.
He knocked lightly on the door, and when she didn't answer, knocked a little louder to be heard over the music. When he still got no response, he turned the knob and eased the door open. The lights were off, but she'd lit what appeared to be at least a dozen candles to illuminate the room.
Quentin's first glance was toward the bed, and when he found that to be empty, he pushed the door a little a further to seek her out in the room, expecting to see her at the desk.
Instead, she was standing in front of a canvas propped on an easel against the wall. A counter-height table had replaced the desk, and it was covered with tubes of oil paint she’d requested of Kendall and Marcus a few days before. She had the window open, and a fan going to pull any fumes out of the room and into the night air. She had a paintbrush in her left hand, moving deftly across the canvas to create highlights and shadows for what, as far as he could tell, was a striking image of two people, just their torso area, a man and a woman, pressed together.
Quentin grinned.
Oh that's how she's feeling right now, huh?
Neo soul playing, lights low, candles lit, her chosen creative outlet on hand... She was vibing. And he...was interrupting.
“You don't have to leave,” she said, just as he was turning to leave her to her project. When he looked back, she was turning to face him, and the sight stopped him cold.
From the back, the oversized tee shirt she wore dipped low, low enough that she was well covered. But in the front, it rode high, high enough that juicy, dark brown sugar colored thighs were on full display, and... goddamn was that a peek of sapphire-blue boy short panties? He brought his eyes up to her face, a little smile crossing his mouth at the sight of a streak of paint across her cheek.
He was still wondering how the hell she could look so sexy in a sling when she put the paintbrush down and took a step toward him.
“Q... what's up?”
“Huh?”
Renata smiled, shaking her head a little as she took yet another step. “What's. Up?” she repeated, tipping her head to the side. ”You came into my room.... You must have wanted something?”
He pushed his hands into his pockets. “Um… yeah. I just wanted to check on you… you were pretty upset earlier, so…”
She nodded. “Yeah. It’s… a lot happening, you know? And then finding out that Wolfe is buying Taylor school supplies, like he’s not even planning to let her come back, even if we can pull off this thing with King any earlier…. I already know what he’s gonna say, that’s it not fair to pull her out of school in the middle of the semester, and I… does it make me crazy that I thought about that too? Knowing what he did to me, when I was just a little older than she is now, how he’s tortured me over the years, I actually considered if I should have her stay to finish out the semester. What kind of parent does that make me?”
“One who got put into a shitty situation, but also wants the best for her child. Wolfe is being daddy of the year right now. He’s not harming Taylor, he’s providin’ for her, being kind to her… all the things that good parents do. So… I don’t think it’s abnormal that, because you see her being well taken care of, you wonder if you’re fallin’ short. He’s setting you up, Ren. Wants you to feel guilty, like you’re the bad guy. Taylor is a teenager. She doesn’t see Wolfe for what he is, she sees him as her elusive, magical father, who comes bearing gifts. It turns you into the villain, for taking her away from her new friends, disrupting her school year, etc, when it’s time to get her back. Now… I’m not a parent, but… I’m pretty sure you do things all the time that Taylor may not necessarily like, or understand… but it’s still what’s best for her. Don’t let the fact that Wolfe is on the other side change what you’ve been doin’ for years.”
Twirling a braid around her finger, Renata shrugged. “I guess. But really, if I wasn’t moving so slow with this King Pharma thing, this wouldn’t even be a problem. If I could use both hands, this wouldn’t even be a problem right now.”
“That’s not true and you know it.” Quentin took a step closer, closing the distance between them as he reached for her hand. “This isn’t a quick job. We have to finesse it, if we want it done right. It’s not enough to just put a scandal into the news, we have to make sure the backstory checks out, alter records from clinical trials, all kinds of stuff that we can’t do quickly, some things that we have to wait on paperwork to go through, so we establish a proper trail. We’re working as fast as we can.”
Renata shook her head. “I’m not. Even with the voice recognition, I’m just… slow. And then… this crazy bitch Tomiko trying to kill me, and burning down apartments, and we don’t know where
the hell she is, or what she’s capable of. What if she goes after Taylor because of me? I’m failing right now. Failing my daughter, failing the team, fail—”
“Stop,” Quentin urged quietly, bringing her fingers up to his mouth to kiss her hand. “You’re not failing anybody… you’re doing what you can.”
“You’re just saying that to make me feel better.”
“I’m saying it because I mean it.”
He kissed her fingers again, then moved so that he was behind her, and wrapped his arms around her waist, pulling her close. “Talk to me about something else,” he murmured against her ear, before planting a kiss there. “Tell me about what you’re doing right now. Tell me about your painting.”
For a long moment, she didn’t answer or move, and almost seemed to not even be breathing, until Quentin kissed the spot behind her ear again. Then, she sucked in a breath, which she exhaled in a stream before she finally began to speak.
“This is the other thing I can’t get off my mind,” she said, settling back against Quentin’s chest. “So… I set this mood, with the music, and the candles, and … painted what I was feeling.”
Quentin cast his eyes upward to look at the painting again. A golden-brown man and deeper brown woman, neither clothed, faces hidden, pressed together in an obviously intimate embrace. It wasn’t lewd, or erotic, but the sensual nature of it practically oozed off the canvas, making Quentin wonder just how much she was “feeling” this.
“Is this me and you?” he asked, tipping his head over her shoulder to see her face.
She cast her gaze upward to meet his eyes, then wet her lips with her tongue. “This is weird, isn’t it? I’m being… weird, and inappropriate… right? I’m not supposed to be feeling like this, thinking of me and you like this, when I should be concerned about Taylor.”
“I think you’re being too hard on yourself. It’s okay for you to relax sometimes, cher. What, exactly, is piling yourself with worry and guilt going to accomplish?”
She shook her head. “Nothing.”
“Exactly. Nothin’. So why do it? You’re a grown woman, Ren. Nothing wrong with not wanting to think about all the messed up shit happenin’ around you. It’s called taking care of yourself.” Quentin reached up, sweeping Renata’s braids over her shoulder so that he could press a kiss against the exposed back of her neck. Her soft whimper made him pull her closer, trailing more kisses up to her ear. “You’ve gotta be good to yourself sometimes too, cher.”
He placed a final kiss against her cheek, then released her from his embrace. “I’m gonna leave, so you can chill out to your music, paint, enjoy yourself without feeling bad about it, okay?”
“Wait a minute,” Renata said, catching his hand as he turned for the door. “This isn’t what I want to do.” She paused for a second, chewing nervously at her bottom lip before she returned her gaze to his. “This is…. the substitute.”
Quentin reached up to brush her hair back from her face. “So what do you want to do?”
“I want you to stay.” She released his hand to point at the canvas. “I don’t wanna paint that. I wanna do that. With you.”
— & —
Renata’s words hung in the air for a moment before she reached for him, grabbing a handful of his shirt and yanking it upwards, trying — and failing — to pull it up further than his chest with one hand. And then… she panicked. Just a little.
I don’t know what the hell I’m doing.
She didn’t have any experience initiating sex. Or… having sex really, but… she didn’t think that really mattered. She’d watched movies, and read books… she knew what the experience should be like.
Kinda.
Quentin grinned, then grabbed a handful of her shirt, using it to drag her closer. He pressed his lips against hers in a soft kiss. “Ren… you sure this is what you wanna do?” he asked, his lips brushing hers.
“Yes.”
Their eyes met, and Renata saw the hesitation in his. Her heart dropped a little, remembering the conversation with Naomi and Inez. Was he… concerned about taking advantage of her? Was that the reason behind his reluctance?
“Q,” she said, cupping his chin in her hand. “You just got finished encouraging me to practice some self-care. This — you and me — is what I want. Don’t deny me that.”
For a moment, neither said anything, but then Quentin moved his hands to her waist to pull her closer. Renata pushed herself up on her toes, meeting him halfway. Their kiss started off slow, sweet, the soft press of lips as they tried to gauge each other. At first, Renata could still feel a bit of hesitation from Quentin, but she draped her arm over his shoulder, pressing her hand to the back of his head to keep him close.
That little movement seemed to be the confirmation he needed that she really wanted to take it further. He ran his tongue along the seam of her lips, requesting entry, and she granted it hungrily. Slipping his tongue into her mouth, Quentin tasted and teased, deepening the kiss to a point that she became lightheaded, high off him, wanting so badly for him to touch other places that they throbbed.
He lowered his hands, and Renata shivered as his strong fingers gripped handfuls of her butt, kneading and caressing until finally, he picked her up and carried her to the table, where he shoved aside the painting supplies that covered the surface before sitting her down.
Quentin pulled his shirt over his head, tossing it to floor. Renata’s eyes traveled hungrily over his newly revealed, ink-covered golden skin, admiring the ridges and planes of his chest and abs illuminated by the candlelight.
“I put you up here, instead of the bed, so we don’t forget and put too much weight or anything on your arm. Is that cool?” he asked, positioning himself between her legs.
What arm?
In that moment, Renata couldn’t have chosen her arm out of a lineup, but she nodded, because she wanted to feel his lips again. He lowered his mouth to her neck, nibbling, sucking, kissing his way down to her collarbone as his hands slipped under her shirt. The first touch of his fingers on her breasts made her gasp, and made her nipples peak into hard beads against his skin.
Quentin drew back, to carefully remove her arm from the sling, then even more carefully pulled her shirt over her head and tossed it aside. He lowered his mouth to kiss her again, and she moaned as he drew her lip between his teeth, sucked it, then pushed his tongue back into her mouth to deepen the kiss.
Pressed into his hard, muscled chest, Renata’s breasts ached for his attention. A moment later, she got her wish as he pulled away from her mouth to trail kisses down her neck. His lips traveled, across her collarbone, then down to her nipples; first one side, then the other. With him between her legs, she could feel the power of his erection pressed against her, making her hot, and dizzy, and light-headed, and it was… wonderful.
She’d been kissed before, touched before, but… it never felt like this.
“Cher,” Quentin murmured, raising himself up to speak into her ear. His hand swept gently over her breasts, down her stomach, stopping to touch the apex of her thighs, through her panties. “Can I touch you here? Is that okay?”
He seemed so… concerned, so focused on making it a good experience for her that tears pricked Renata’s eyes as she bit her lip. “Please,” she whispered, nodding her permission as he pressed his lips to hers again. A moment later, he slipped a hand into her panties, spreading her folds as his thumb danced over her clit. Her brain, it just… wouldn’t fire right, not with Quentin touching her like that. Her vision blurred, thoughts went fuzzy as pressure built in her core, and his mouth was on one of her nipples again, gently teasing it with his teeth, rolling it with his tongue, and she had to squeeze her eyes shut to handle the intensity of pleasure it caused.
She opened her eyes at the sound of the chair that previously went with the desk being rolled into place in front of her. At first, she was confused, but then Quentin sat down between her legs and pulled her panties down her legs and dropped them to the floor. He d
raped her thighs over his shoulder, and then up at her with a sexy smirk.
He didn’t give her a chance to say anything before he covered her with his mouth, pulling a whimper of pleasure from her throat. Pulling her closer to the edge of the table, he buried his face between her legs, licking, and kissing, and sucking, and nipping, and driving her right to the brink of ecstasy as he devoured her.
Renata gripped the edge of the table with one hand, trying to keep herself upright when he pushed a finger inside her. His finger and tongue moved in unison, building a type of pressure that was… different, hotter, stronger, more… powerful than any orgasm she’d ever given herself. And still she felt uninhibited, and free, and sexy, as Quentin worked his mouth on her most intimate places, making sounds of pleasure as he consumed her, like she had sugar between her thighs.
She threw her head back, biting her lip to keep herself from screaming out loud as that coil of pressure tightened too far, then burst as she climaxed. Pleasure hit her in waves as Quentin continued, planting open-mouthed kisses on her sensitive flesh until her breathing finally calmed. He kissed his way up her stomach, over her breasts, then finally back up to her mouth, where he kissed her deep, massaging her tongue with his before he pulled back.
“That was beautiful, chérie,” he said, gazing into her eyes for a long moment before he drew her into another kiss. “Watching you come like that… and you taste so good.” After that, he gave her that look again, filled with such adoration that it made heat rush to her cheeks.
“You called me… chérie, instead of cher… is there a difference?”
Quentin grinned as his hand drifted down between her legs again. “Yeah,” he said softly, just before he pressed his lips to hers again. “Cher is something I call female friends. Chérie is something I call you. Only you. Do you understand?”
Nodding, Renata let out a gasp as he pushed a finger into her again. His mouth covered hers, swallowing her moan of pleasure with a kiss as he slipped in a second finger and began stroking her.
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