Authors: Stacy Gail
“What?” Mia could barely get the word out, she was so flabbergasted.
Jase nodded decisively. “Yeah, you don’t have any business with him anymore, kiddo, you hear me? You just put Seattle right out of your head. That’s
done
.”
Her jaw went from unhinged to clenched while a slow tidal wave of anger began to flow. “Quinn told you about that?”
“Of course he did. It’s not like it was a big secret, right? In families like ours, everyone knows what everyone else is up to. You’ll get used to it.”
Elise’s eyes widened as she watched Mia’s face. “Um… uh-oh. Honey—”
“Not to mention I needed to know what kind of person you were. After all, Quinn’s a smart guy, but his track record with women is shit, you know? But he put all my fears to rest when he told me your story, and how you did your damnedest to support that waste of space you thought you got engaged to—”
“I
did
get engaged to him.”
“Yeah, but now you’re not. Or was Quinn wrong when he told us that the shithead made the most epic douche move ever by announcing online that he’d gotten engaged to another woman?”
I’ll kill him. I’ll kill him so incredibly dead, then give him CPR to bring him back so I can kill him again…
Out of the corner of her eye she saw a familiar figure heading their way. She turned to stare pure death at Quinn, who raised his brows at the hostility, but otherwise kept coming.
“Well, well, well. Look who’s here,” she growled. “Dead man walking.”
“Oh dear,” Elise muttered while her husband grinned like a maniac.
Quinn’s brows stayed raised as he joined them. “Who lit your fuse?”
“
You
did, you jerk.”
“What’d I do?”
“Here’s a hint. The personal shit going on in my life is just that—
personal
. If your brain can’t grasp that concept, let’s make it simple and put it in terms of making a deal. The next time you get the itch to broadcast my personal shit like you think it should be up on a billboard to amuse the masses, I get to see how quickly I can tear your head off with my bare hands and use it as a bowling—
Quinn
!” She screeched out his name in shock and fury as he bent, stuck his shoulder into her middle and hauled her up unceremoniously in a fireman’s lift.
Without so much as a word of farewell to his parents he carried her off, with Jase’s roars of laughter ringing through the cavernous lobby.
When Quinn entered the offices behind the front desk, all conversation came to an abrupt halt. He looked to Emma, Otto and Thomas, who had come to a collective standstill when he’d entered with a furious Mia beating on his ass like she thought it was a damn set of bongos.
“Out.” He jerked his head toward the door.
They did a quick vanishing act, with Emma whispering a quick, “Morning, Mia,” before closing the door behind her and shutting out the world.
“Okay.” Carefully he dumped Mia back onto her feet, then took a wary step back just in case the smacking of his ass progressed to the smacking of other parts of him. “Go ahead. Whatever it is that’s got you so riled up, let it all out.”
“
Whatever it is
?” Her hair was a riot of curls around a face that was bright pink from either anger or being held upside down, he couldn’t tell which. “Are you
serious
?”
Ah. So it was anger. “Yeah.”
“Do you really expect me to believe that a smart man like you has no clue why I’m so pissed off?”
“There’s a trick question if I’ve ever heard one.” And by damn, he had to admire the hell out of her for it. Even in the midst of a full-blown snit, Mia was still scary-clever. “If I say I have no idea what you’re talking about, I look like an idiot. But if I say yeah, I am a smart guy who’s figured it out, then I’m walking bang into a trap that’s going to string me up by my balls.”
“Then let me make it clear for you—
don’t tell people about my personal shit
.” She shouted it out at what had to be the top of her lungs, her eyes squinting closed in the effort. “They say women are hopeless gossips, but holy crap, you’ve got us all beat by a mile.”
“I didn’t tell my family anything that I consider personal information about you. For instance, they’ll never hear it from me that you open your eyes real wide right before you come, or that you talk about cats in your sleep, or that your skin tastes like honey.
That’s
personal, and that’s the kind of shit only I get the privilege of knowing.”
She stared at him as if she didn’t know whether to thank him or slug him into next week. “I’m talking about details of my
life
, damn it. My very personal, very fucked-up life that you chose to share with your parents for reasons known only to you.”
“Oh. That.” Then he shrugged. “What’s wrong with that?”
Her face went from pink to red. “Those details weren’t yours to share, Quinn. No one has the right to know about Jackson, or why I was traveling to Seattle, or anything else about me, because those things are
private
.”
“Not anymore. Mia,” he went on when she let out an alarming sound torn between a whistling teakettle and a glass-shattering shriek. “Calm down, okay? Geez, you’re acting like it’s the end of the world that my family’s interested in getting to know who you are.”
“That’s not what I’m upset about.” She dragged her hands through her hair in a way that gave him the distinct impression she wanted to pull it out. “There are
boundaries
, Quinn. Specific frigging boundaries that you just blew through like they weren’t even there. How would you feel if our roles were reversed and I told my aunt every last little detail that I know about you and Lorette?”
“That’s cool with me. Feel free.”
“
Ugh
.” She began to pace in front of him, again raking her hands through her hair. “I can’t believe that I have to explain that there are such things as subjects that you don’t talk about with other people, and that you should respect the sensitive nature of those subjects as well as the privacy of the person those subjects deal with. So let’s just make this simple. My life—especially the parts that deal with Jackson—are strictly off-limits to
everyone
, okay?”
“No, that’s not okay,” he said, beginning to frown. “Especially making the qualification that the subject of your ex is off-limits. I don’t like that at all.”
She didn’t stop her pacing as she threw him a scorching glance. “Why should that matter to you?”
“It matters, because it tells me it’s still a sore spot for you.”
“Exactly!”
“Lorette cutting me out of her life is no longer a sore spot for me, Mia,” he said, and that seemed to have enough weight behind it to make her come to a halt and stare at him. “I’m not carrying around that baggage anymore. I can now see it for what it was—a shitty time in my life where I had to learn a few hard lessons and grow the hell up so I could move on and find something better. The second I woke up to the fact that I’d let it all go, Lorette and everything that had to do with her stopped mattering to me. So I want to know, when are you going to let your baggage go? Because as long as you hold onto it, that asshole still matters to you.”
From crackling with furious energy, she was suddenly so still it was like she’d frozen over. “Jackson was a part of my life for a long time.”
“I get that. Lorette had me for even longer.”
“You’ve had two years to put all that behind you. I’ve had a few days.”
“Wrong. You’ve had seven months, so don’t give me any of that
few days
shit.”
She hissed like an angry cat. “That’s not shit. It’s the truth.”
“No, the truth is that in your heart, you knew it was over long before that asshole announced he was marrying some other woman.”
“I knew for
certain
it was over only a few days—”
“Red, if that was actually the case, you never would have tumbled into my bed immediately after that jackhole confirmed you guys were done. And you know how I know that? Because you’re loyal. God, you’re loyal to a fucking fault, holding on until the very last, even when you know there’s no reason to hold on anymore. You said it yourself—you needed him to let go first, because you don’t give up on people. But you’ve got to give up on him now, baby. You’ve got to.”
“Boom, I
have
.”
“Then why is he still a sore point for you?”
“Because I was stupid,” she gritted out as if the words cut her up as she pushed them out. “For seven months I was a total, blind idiot, and everyone knew it but me. Hell,
you
knew it, and you’ve never even met Jackson.”
The sudden glitter of tears in her eyes alarmed him enough to capture her chin in his hand and force her gaze to his. “Is that the only reason you’d cry over this piece of shit, Mia? Because your pride got dinged?”
Confusion clouded her face. “I’m not crying, and what other reason would there be?”
“Do you still love him?”
“
No
.” The response was out so immediately he couldn’t help but believe her, and her faintly appalled expression was just the icing on the cake. “I could never love him now.”
“Good, baby.” Suddenly breathing seemed a hell of a lot easier, and he relaxed enough to caress her cheek, amazed as always at the softness beneath his fingertips. “You know you deserve the best.”
“I don’t know about that, but I don’t deserve the likes of Jackson Hackler.”
“
I
know what you deserve. You deserve to know that you’re the only thought in a man’s head. You deserve to be his top priority, and to believe without a doubt that you’re the only woman in the world who matters. So as of now, you don’t waste another tear on a man who never gave you what you deserve.
I’m
the one you should be thinking about, because I’m the man who’s going to give you everything you deserve.”
Her face softened as if by magic. “God, you’re amazing.”
Good, he was finally getting through to her. “Yeah, I am.”
She laughed and stepped closer to him. “How do you do that?”
“Do what?”
“Get me so furious I could kill you one minute, then wish we were someplace private so I could rip your clothes off the next.”
“We Kingfishers are a talented lot. And as for privacy…” With his body suddenly flushed with warmth and his dick beginning to feel heavy with a deep and insistent throb, he grabbed her hand and dragged her into his inner office, locking the door behind them.
Mia would have taken in the uncluttered space furnished with a desk, chair, a serious-looking computer with the biggest monitor she’d ever seen and a couple of slingback black leather chairs, but she was otherwise occupied. Quinn was coming at her with an unmistakable hunger gleaming in his eyes, and her heart was beating so fast she thought it might jump right out of her throat. “You can’t be serious,” she managed. But even she could hear the breathlessness in her voice while her skin began to tingle, and she could feel the rasp of fabric against her suddenly sensitized nipples. “Quinn, think.”
“I am.”
Oh, yeah. She’d just bet he was thinking, and she didn’t have to be a mind reader to know exactly what he was thinking about. “We cannot have sex in this office. It’s… it’s unprofessional.”
His low laugh was downright predatory as he reached for her, his hands immediately homing in on the top of the comfy yoga pants she wore. “Hell, yeah, having sex in the office is unprofessional. Maybe I should fire us.”
“I don’t work here.”
“Then maybe I should hire you. I’ve got a definite position for you in mind.” He shoved her pants and undies past her hips, making her gasp. He took advantage and brought his mouth down on hers, his tongue invading in a way that was pure sex. Whatever lingering inhibitions she might have had melted under the sheer wave of lust that his touch always unleashed. She knew it wasn’t smart or socially correct to have sex in a place of work, and she’d never even dreamed of doing something so risky.
But being smart and socially correct didn’t matter. What mattered was that every time Quinn touched her, she went up in flames, and those flames burned away everything but him.
When she was in his arms, he was her universe.
Her mouth mated feverishly with his, and his almost inaudible groan vibrated through her to pool way down deep in her belly. That beautiful resonance spread outward, dampening that place between her thighs and quickening her breath with feverish excitement. It was crazy, getting this wet from just a kiss.
But this was Quinn. When it came to turning her on, he was a freaking genius.
Her hands gripped his shoulders for balance when he cupped her ass and boldly pulled her up to rub against the thrust of his sex so urgently her feet almost left the ground. The feel of his arousal, knowing how much he wanted her, made her head spin as dizzily as it had from wine the night before.
“I always thought sex was bad for a headache,” she murmured against his lips, her voice husky with need. “But I think you’ve cured my hangover.”
“I’m the cure for everything that ails you, baby.” He rolled his hips into hers, the veil of clothing keeping them separated, and suddenly she wanted to scream with the frustration of not being able to feel his naked body under her hands.
“Quinn.” She wasn’t aware of whispering his name into his mouth as she worked the buttons of his heavy work shirt. It was a relief to slide one hand inside the material to roam over his smooth, furnace-hot skin stretched tautly over muscle and bone. But even as she gently raked her fingernails over a pec and beaded nipple to make him jump and groan and press more insistently against her, it wasn’t enough.
But she knew what would be.
With her other hand, she dealt with his belt in what she thought was a masterful feat of dexterity, but he apparently he didn’t agree with her. He tugged the button at his waist open and yanked the zipper down then, impatient, took her hand and shoved it past his underwear to close around the steel-hard rod of his shaft.
“
Yes
. Oh, sweet baby.” A shudder rippled through him, and it had to be a trick of her imagination that she thought he sounded downright reverent. “There’s nothing better than your hand on my cock.”
“Nothing better?” Thrilled out of her mind with his response, she stroked him while her sex ached with wet heat. “I thought you liked nothing better than to put this amazing part of you—” she gave his stiffened flesh a gentle squeeze that made him moan and buck against her “—inside me.”
“Mia, fuck, you make me crazy, I can’t…”
She never found out what Quinn thought he couldn’t do. In a handful of heartbeats he had her out of her yoga pants and panties, and balanced on the edge of the desk. Then he was busy throwing his wallet aside after rolling protection in place, his scorching hot gaze never leaving her. She scooted back on the desk, uncaring that something clattered to the floor, and spread her thighs wide.
“Fuck me,” she whispered, her body on fire. “Make me whole.”
“We make each other whole.” His strong voice was ragged as he gripped her thigh with one hand while the other stroked the slickness of her cleft. Then he was there, thrusting into her and filling her all the way. Pleasure bit into her senses, her soul, and sank into every part of her being. She felt her body absorb him, surrounding his invading flesh, and it was so beautiful it brought tears to her eyes.