But there was a stark divide between their life experiences and hers.
She wanted Quin to see her. To honor her values and opinions. Otherwise, all they had was sex.
When she returned to the dinner table, all three men stood until she was seated. Their innate courtesy was as flawless as it was instinctive. Perhaps their father hadn’t been the best parent, but he had raised his sons to be gentlemen. That much was clear.
When her phone dinged quietly, she slipped it from her clutch and read the text, sighing inwardly. Her face must have given her away.
Quin touched her hand. “Problem?”
She didn’t really want to elaborate, but all three men were looking at her with varying levels of interest and concern. “My sister is trying to get her own apartment. She’s been sleeping on the sofa at a friend’s place. She has the rent covered, but she doesn’t have any credit. I need to help her with utility deposits and a pet fee.”
Quin made a weird sound beneath his breath and frowned. “Need?”
She glared at him. “This is none of your business, Quin.”
Zachary seemed shocked, perhaps because he was now the only one ignorant of Quin and Katie’s former relationship. “We all have to make those decisions at one time or another,” he said. “When I turned twenty-five and inherited a large sum of money my grandparents left me, a lot of my old college buddies started crawling out of the woodwork. It’s hard to say no.”
Katie shook her head. “My sister isn’t like that. She doesn’t take advantage of me. But I’ve been luckier in life. I’m able to help, so I do.”
Quin’s jaw was tight. “I don’t think you’ve been luckier in life. You’ve worked your ass off. In college you had three part-time jobs just to get through. That was your choice. You’ve worked your way up at SRO. All that is you, Katie. Your sister came from the same family.”
In the uncomfortable silence that followed Quin’s outburst, Farrell stepped into the breach. He gave his brother a warning stare. “That’s a lot of information about a woman on such short acquaintance. Maybe we should talk about something else.”
Zachary still looked mystified, as if he had missed part of the conversation. He had. Everyone else at the table knew Katie was far more than a temporary assistant during Quin’s recovery.
Fortunately, their meals arrived. In the hustle and bustle of making sure everyone was served, the awkward conversation fell by the wayside.
By the time dinner was finished, it was getting late.
“We should head for the theater,” Quin said.
As they all stood, Zachary donned his jacket and picked up his credit card receipt. “You two need to keep an eye on the long-range weather outlook. The forecasters are thinking this latest hurricane may make its way up the coast eventually. Be careful.”
“I hope they’re wrong,” Farrell said. “If we get too much damage, it will slow down the building project at my place. I want the new lab to be my sole work site until we figure out what’s going on.”
When they left the restaurant, the four adults parted ways. Another hired car was waiting for Katie and Quin. She didn’t know what to say to him once they were alone. But she knew how she wanted the evening to end. Had their unexpected quarrel ruined the mood?
Suddenly, he reached across the seat and took her hand. “I’m sorry, Katie. I was out of line. What you do in your private life is none of my concern. Will you forgive me?”
He was genuinely sorry. She could see it in his eyes. A cynical person might think he was mending fences in order to coax her into sex tonight. Katie didn’t believe that. Quin was not manipulative. Forceful and persuasive, but not manipulative. “I forgive you,” she said.
His small smile was sheepish. “I’m not the easiest man to get along with,” he confessed. “I wondered why you broke up with me, but it could have been any one of a dozen reasons.”
She shifted on the seat. His forthright description of himself demanded equal honesty, but it would serve no useful purpose. “I think we can forget the past, Quin. We’re not going back there. I’d prefer to live in the moment. It’s safer that way.”
“If that’s what you want.” The slight crease between his eyebrows told her he wasn’t pleased with her answer.
The car slid into a momentarily empty space at the curb. The theater was half a block down the street. Quin and the driver exchanged quick words about a later pickup.
As Quin helped Katie out of the car, he explained, perhaps anticipating her question. “It’s almost impossible to get a cab when the theaters let out. I don’t want to waste any time getting back to the hotel.”
It was a loaded statement. Her stomach flipped and her cheeks burned as his hand gripped hers.
Quin laughed. “You look like a scared rabbit. It’s your choice, Kat. It always was.”
His words stayed with her all through the fabulous musical. Though the story and the rap lyrics and the music were mesmerizing, she was hyperaware of the man at her side. Zachary’s seats were box tickets, only eight chairs in the small balcony overlooking the stage. The two beside Quin and Katie were no-shows, so they had the second row to themselves.
As soon as the lights went down, Quin slid his arm around her. His fingers caressed her bare shoulder. He was warm and large and wonderfully male at her side. She wanted somehow to preserve this moment, this entire evening, but it was sand slipping though her fingers. A snowflake disappearing in a warm breath.
When the curtain fell for the final time, the enthusiastic crowd clapped and shouted. The sheer talent of the show’s creator was awe-inspiring.
Out on the sidewalk, the heat remained, even after dark. Quin pulled her close, protecting her from the jostling crowd. “Coffee? Dessert?” he asked, his expression warm and happy.
“No, thank you,” she said. “Let’s go home.”
It was a slip of the tongue. The Carlyle wasn’t their home. But for tonight, it promised privacy and endless possibilities.
The car was waiting for them one street over. At another moment, Katie might have enjoyed riding the subway. That was a big-city rite of passage she had never experienced. But for now, she was content to be whisked away.
The hotel was quiet when they returned. In the elevator, Quin barely spoke. When they reached their floor and stepped out, Katie took his hand. “Give me half an hour,” she said. “Then come to my room.”
His eyes flared with shock, quickly followed by heat. “You’re sure?” The two words were gruff and gravelly.
She slid her hand behind his neck and pulled his head down for a kiss. “Not really. But I won’t change my mind, I promise.”
Eight
Quin felt like a condemned man faced with a reprieve. After his stupid stunt at dinner, he thought he’d ruined any chance of the two of them winding up together tonight.
His Katie had a kind heart. Either that, or she was as eager to re-create the magic as he was. He stripped off his tux, showered and changed into light knit pants and a T-shirt. Respectable enough for roaming the halls.
His prep took exactly eleven minutes. Which left him nineteen minutes to get antsy. He was second-guessing himself all over the place. Would Katie regret tonight? He didn’t want that. Not at all.
But who was he kidding? No way in hell was he walking away from this chance to be with the woman who turned him inside out. He ached for her. In all the months since the accident that derailed his life, sexual needs had taken a back seat to pain and therapy and cumulative weeks in the hospital.
Now his libido had roared to life.
At twenty-nine and a half minutes, he grabbed up his keycard, deliberately left his phone behind and exited his room. The hallway was empty. At this point, he didn’t care. He would have walked stark naked through the lobby for the chance to have sex with Katie again.
They’d had plenty of problems duri
ng their relationship, but sexual compatibility hadn’t been one of them. When they were in bed together, the world stopped. Nothing mattered but the two of them connecting, skin to skin, shivering breath to ragged heartbeat.
He knocked softly at her door. Insanely long seconds passed before she opened it.
When he saw her, his mouth dried and his already semi-erect sex went on high alert. Either Katie had a thing for sexy sleepwear, or she had come prepared for this weekend with him. He hoped like hell it was the second.
She had showered as he had. Earlier tonight, her elegant hairstyle had bared her neck—sexy in a different way. Now, her silky blond hair, still damp in places, brushed her shoulders.
“You are so damn hot,” he muttered. Her mostly sheer black nightgown did little to conceal her budded nipples or anything farther south. He ran a hand down her arm. “I want you, Kat. I know I should be cool about this, but I have to be honest. I haven’t been with a woman since the accident. I may disappoint you this first time.”
Eyes wide, she took his hand and pulled him inside, closing the door with a gentle shove. “I won’t be disappointed, I swear.”
He sifted his fingers through her hair, steadied her head in his hands and found her mouth with unerring desperation. “I’ve missed this,” he groaned.
His instinct was to take what he wanted, what they both wanted. But second chances were delicate and prone to collapse. Katie needed more from him than selfish lust. He saw that now. In hindsight, he could identify all the ways he had failed her. This time would be different.
He wasn’t the same man.
Her lips were soft and eager. She leaned into him, signaling her readiness. With one arm, he dragged her close, molding their bodies from chest to knee. He could feel every inch of her warm, soft skin.
He was embarrassingly out of control. “I wanted to do this right,” he panted.
Katie’s laugh was low and knowing. The sound scraped his nerve endings and made the hunger worse. She nipped the shell of his ear with sharp teeth. “I believe you. Let’s see what you’ve got, big guy.”
He tugged her wrist, dragging her toward the lavish hotel bed, pausing only to throw back the covers and pillows and bolsters. He shoved them aside and laid Katie in the exact center of the bed. Her hair fanned out in a messy arc over the pillow. Her cheeks were flushed, her gaze soft.
With clenched fists, he forced himself to appreciate the picture she made. His chest heaved. He tried to control his driving need. He wasn’t an animal. Still, something primitive stirred within him. Something possessive and determined and demanding.
The sleep pants that rode low on his hips had a single pocket. He had stuffed it with several condoms. Tossing the protection on the bedside table, he lifted his arms and ripped his T-shirt over his head. The stunned way she watched him was gratifying.
He hadn’t planned a strip show. But when he dragged his pants down his legs and kicked them aside, Katie’s eyes rounded.
Quin took his aching flesh in one hand and fisted it, barely able to touch himself. “Is this what you want, Kat?” The skin was tight, almost painful.
“No.” Her brown eyes heated. “I want more. I want it all.”
Her words were like a physical blow. He flinched away from them, even as her bold pronouncement ratcheted his hunger upward. His breath sawed in and out of his lungs like a dying man’s.
What more could he give her? He had laid his hunger and his fortune at her feet once before, and it hadn’t been enough. What else was there?
Ignoring the nuances of her disturbingly ambiguous declaration, he joined her on the mattress. It barely dipped beneath his weight. A bed at the Carlyle wasn’t a bad place to restart a sexual relationship that had lain dormant for two years.
He stroked her breast through her nightgown, pinching lightly. The curved mound fit his palm perfectly.
Katie’s strangled moan urged him on. Her eyelids fluttered shut. He thought she was going to say something, but if her throat was as tight as his, the ability to speak had eroded rapidly.
Moving his hand to the other breast, he rested his head on her shoulder. She was warm, so warm. Her fingers sifted through his hair, massaging his scalp. This time he twisted the nipple with a firm grip. The raspberry nub was hard now. Puckered. Taut.
He couldn’t resist. Shifting positions slightly, he bit down on her tender flesh, just enough to let her know he meant business. Katie’s keening moan made the hair on the back of his neck stand up.
When she turned her cheek into his chest, his heart clenched. The gesture of trust affected him more strongly than he would ever admit. He knew that he had failed her somehow in the past. Hurt her.
Whatever it was that had dragged them apart didn’t have to happen this time. He could fix it.
The bottom of Katie’s gown had twisted around her legs. He tugged it loose and gathered it to her waist. Now his view was unimpeded. Her pink, moist sex was a thing of beauty. Katie was clean-shaven between her legs, but a tiny, heart-shaped fluff of pale hair covered her mons.
He started to shake as if fevered. His need for her scrambled his brain. When he stroked her center, Katie shook her head wildly. “I’m ready,” she said, the words demanding. He might have smiled if he hadn’t been out of his mind with lust.
Instead, he grabbed a condom, ripped it open and rolled it carefully over his aching erection. “Katie...” He wanted to say something tender and romantic. Words failed him.
She held out her arms, her eyes heavy-lidded. “I want you, Quin.”
Straightforward. Impossible to misinterpret.
He spread her thighs and mounted her, sliding deep with one steady push. Katie whimpered. Her sex clenched around his, eager, ready.
The need to come was almost impossible to hold at bay. Embarrassingly so. In his head, he tried to list the slope gradients of his five favorite ski runs. It didn’t work. He ground his pelvis against hers. Was she even close? They had barely started.
Again, he rubbed the base of his sex where it would make the most difference, trying to hit just the right spot.
Katie grabbed his shoulders, her fingernails scoring his hot skin. “I’m so close. Harder, Quin,” she begged.
The desperation in her pleas galvanized him. He withdrew almost completely and slammed his body into hers. The connection was messy and raw and inelegant. Any finesse he had once possessed was gone.
All he could see was her beautiful face. All he could feel was a rush of pleasure so intense, it burned to the point of pain.
Katie cried out and wrapped her legs around his waist, lifting into him and taking all he had to give. His own orgasm snapped like the sharp flick of a broken rubber band. He caught his breath and muffled his shout in her shoulder. His world ground to a halt.
It had never been like this. In the past, they had dented his bedroom wall a time or two with the headboard. One night they even broke Katie’s bed. It was one of his fondest memories.
But the sex was different now.
Was it the two years of being apart, or had they each changed?
He rolled away from her, trying not to let her see how strung out he felt. His eyes stung.
Without thinking it through, he linked her fingers with his. Her touch was a lifeline in his spinning universe. “Katie?”
“Hmmm?”
“Did you see other men after we broke up?”
It wasn’t a fair question. It wasn’t his business. But the possessive need to stake a claim made him oblivious to the land mine he had planted.
“Yes.”
His heart slugged once in his chest, as if someone had whacked him in the ribs with a baseball bat and cracked bone. Of course she had. The men in Portland weren’t blind.
She raised up on one elbow, staring at him, her expression curiously blank. “Did you sleep with other women?”
“About what?”
He sat up and raked his hands through his hair. “I was angry that you didn’t give me a chance to undo whatever stupid thing I had done to make you walk out on us.”
All the color drained from her face. Her expression was bleak, tormented. “It wasn’t that simple, Quin.”
“Nothing ever is...”
“We’re better off being friends. Trust me.”
“I think you’re wrong.”
She left him and went to the bathroom. When she returned, she had donned one of the plush hotel robes. Her jaw stuck out at a familiar angle. “I won’t rehash the past, Quin.” Her eyes were dark with misery. “We don’t have a future. If you want this...” She waved a hand at the bed. “I’ll be with you for three more weeks.”
Fury flared in his gut. “So take it or leave it?”
She nodded slowly, her lips pressed tightly together. “Yes.”
“Okay, then.” He shut his mind to the feelings that bombarded him. He was a man who didn’t trust feelings. Hell, he couldn’t even trust his own body anymore. “In that case, come back to bed. I’m not through with you.”
* * *
He must think I’m a bitch.
Katie’s stomach curled. For the briefest of moments, she flashed back to that terrible day with Quin’s father. He had made her feel she was less than nothing. If she’d had any inkling that Quin wanted more than sex, she might have fought for the chance to find out.
His father’s cold, dispassionate summation of the truth had shattered her confidence and underscored every one of her doubts about her relationship with Quin.
Even back then, she had realized that Quin could never know what had happened. Now that his father was gone, the truth was even more dangerous. Quin had suffered so much. She couldn’t add to his pain. But she also couldn’t expect anything different from a relationship this time around. Not with the secret she carried.
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