Page 46

Far more than fifteen minutes had passed when Raelyn thought again about setting up a ride for her and Quinn.

She was sitting on one of the benches around the fire and Quinn was standing on the miniature patio off the pub-shed with another drink in hand as he laughed and made conversation with more of Brody’s friends.

She had just finished off her second bottled water when someone joined her on the bench.

“Raevyn Noir?” Emerson extended a wine glass filled with a deep purplish-red wine. It was her favorite wine that her family’s winery sold- it was even named after her, or at least the spelling had been inspired by her name.

Raelyn glanced at the glass. Truthfully, it sounded delicious, but accepting anything from Emerson suddenly felt like accepting candy from a stranger in a white panel-van. Narrowing her eyes at her former fiancé, she asked, “What do you want?”

“Just saw the bottle behind the bar and thought I’d offer you some before it ran out,” Emerson replied, innocently.

No, it was feigned innocence. Raelyn knew by now that this man didn’t do anything selflessly. There was always an agenda, a goal in mind, something in it for him.

“Oh, is that all?” Raelyn asked skeptically. “You’re not hoping to provoke Quinn? Hoping he’ll look over here and see us talking like we’re old friends? ”

“What if he does?” Emerson shrugged. “He doesn’t own you, Rae. He can’t tell you who you can and can’t talk to. You’d think you would be the jealous one. Dude’s been with some solid tens.”

Raelyn rolled her eyes and reluctantly took the glass of wine from his hand. “Why are you here?”

Emerson glanced around. “It’s my best friend’s house. I was invited-”

“No, I mean here. Next to me. What do you want? For real.”

He sighed and faced the large fire now. There were only a few others sitting around the fire, and their seats were far enough back that their conversation remained private.

“I just want to tell you I’m sorry. Again.

I know it probably doesn’t change anything, but I am.

I shouldn’t have...I wish things had gone differently. You deserved better.”

“You’re right,” Raelyn agreed. “It doesn’t change anything, and I do deserve better.”

Emerson scoffed, “Is that why you’re with All-Star? Because he’s so much better than me?”

Well, that humble sincerity dissolved real quick.

“I promise he is.”

“Oh please,” he sneered. “That bullshit about falling for you when he was a kid? That’s a fucking line, Rae.

He’s on vacation with his fucked up arm, comes home, sees the girl he always wanted to bang in high school is available, and is willing to say whatever it takes to get you in bed.

That’s all it is. It’s called a revenge fuck, and when you’ve healed him up, he’s going to fly back to L.A.

and go back to banging twenty-two-year-old models. ”

“Not every guy is you. Not every guy just cares about fucking whoever he can get his hands on. And now that you brought it up, wasn’t that intern of yours also twenty-two? Twenty-one? I think you might just be expressing what you’d be doing in his position. You two are not the same.”

“I never meant for that to happen, Rae,” Emerson groaned, pinching the bridge of his nose. As if he were the one who’d been hurt by his actions. As if he’d been wronged and was over having this conversation .

“Right, you just slipped on some legal documents and fell into her vagina- penis first.” Raelyn took a gulp of her wine.

“It doesn’t matter either way. I’m over it.

I’ve moved on.” She tipped the glass back again, draining it completely, and handed it back to Emerson.

“Thanks for the Noir. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to get my boyfriend and take him home. ”

“Let me know when you find out I was right,” Emerson drawled. “I promise to make you feel so good you’ll forget he ever happened.”

She wasn’t going to dignify that with a response, and instead headed back toward the shed to find Quinn.

She was only a few feet from the huddle of six or seven men when she heard Quinn’s voice. He had an arm around James’s shoulders, and they were leaning into the circle as though sharing secrets.

“...gotta amp up the dirty talk. Seriously, it works,” Quinn was saying as she approached.

“When I do it, I’m just like talking to her like, ‘yeah, this is what I’m about to do to you and you’re gonna be fucking begging for more’.

You should see Rae when I whisper shit like that,” Quinn gave out a groan. “Fuck, does her body respond.”

Raelyn stopped in her tracks and stared at his back, trying to ignore how great his t-shirt looked stretching over those muscles. What the fuck did I just walk into?

Another one of the guys chimed in, “Damn...I haven’t mastered that yet,” he admitted. “I feel like I think too much.”

James added, “Everything just sounds dumb in my head.”

Quinn waved his hand dismissively. “Just take charge. ‘Babygirl, I’m gonna flip you over and take you for a ride.’ I used that on Rae a few times and, I’m talking, instant waterfall.”

Rae felt her face go red as she dropped her jaw and stared from a short distance. She had been getting ready to speak up but wasn’t sure she wanted to draw attention to herself after that, so she waited and listened for the right moment .

“Full disclosure,” Ethan, Brody’s younger brother piped in. “The first time I met Raelyn…” he paused and gave a low whistle. “Let’s just say you are one lucky man.”

“That ass though,” one of the men added.

How old are these assholes? Are we in a fucking high school locker room?

Quinn let out a mischievous and boastful sounding laugh, “Oh, I know. That view when I hit it from behind- fuck- it about does me in just seeing-”

“Seeing what, exactly?” Raelyn forced herself to cut in.

She really didn’t want to hear the rest of that sentence.

She didn’t want this entire group of men to hear the rest of that sentence.

She stood with both hands on her hips, head tilted to the side, and an eyebrow raised in a challenging glare.

Raelyn thought he’d at least be humble enough to recognize he’d been busted and that talking about her like that was not okay.

Not to a bunch of people he barely knew!

However, when he was fully turned around, he was displaying his cocky, charm-the-pants-off-you grin.

“Oh, hey baby. We were just admiring your...assets.”

He winked.

This motherfucking, cocky son of a bitch actually winked.

Raelyn glowered at him for several silent seconds. His expression refused to falter.

“I’m sorry, do I look charmed to you right now? Is this shit supposed to be cute or something?” Raelyn stood her ground, staring him down. She wanted him to collapse to his knees and beg for forgiveness.

Apparently Quinn had no such intentions.

“It’s really a compliment, if you think about it,” he said, shrugging one shoulder.

Her jaw dropped once again, and she let out a hollow laugh. She rolled her neck as if she were getting ready to fight a bitch, then crossed her arms over her chest to control that urge.

“Oh, she’s mad…” Someone in the group muttered .

"It's a compliment?" Raelyn kept her voice quiet and controlled. It seemed everyone except Quinn recognized her tone as threatening.

"Rae, come on," Quinn said, letting his head fall back as though exasperated.

You're fucking kidding me, right?

"Come on?" Raelyn repeated, incredulous. "Are you serious right now? If I remember correctly, this is exactly the kind of thing you beat the shit out of countless guys for in high school."

"I'll take a swing at him if it'll make you feel better," Emerson's deep drawl came from behind her.

“Fucking try it, Trust-Fund Ken,” Quinn snapped, taking a step closer and puffing up.

“Quinn! You are not getting in a fight with your arm the way it is,” Raelyn hissed.

“I don’t need both arms to fight him,” said Quinn.

Who the hell is this right now? This is not my Quinn…

Rae placed a hand on his chest and lowered her voice. “Just ignore him. What the hell are you doing? Bragging about our sex life?”

“Yeah, I’m sure he’s got way more interesting stories to tell than the time he finger-fucked a girl at a baseball field,” Emerson interjected.

Raelyn froze. Hadn’t Quinn told her he hadn’t gone into detail about that night? Hadn’t he implied that he’d only told the story about how he’d finally got the girl he’d always wanted?

She took a couple steps back. "You actually told him that? About the baseball field?" Raelyn was livid. "What the fuck , Quinn? Am I really just some…" she searched for words other than Emerson's, but found none, "some revenge fuck because we didn't hook up in high school?"

" Revenge fuck?" Quinn's brows pulled together.

Closing the gap between them, he reached out to take Raelyn's hand, but she pulled away before he could make contact.

"You're not seriously going to believe what that asshole said, Rae.

" He glowered over Raelyn's shoulder at Emerson. "What the fuck did you tell her?"

“The truth,” Emerson shrugged. “At least as far as I could see it. ”

“Rae, he doesn’t know what the fuck he’s talking about,” Quinn said, still glaring over Raelyn’s shoulder.

“I will say though, All-Star, you’re definitely right about that view,” said Emerson, smirking between her and Quinn. “Remember riding me reverse-cowgirl on the floor because you just couldn’t wait for it?”

Quinn lunged forward, but Raelyn placed two firm hands on his even more firm chest to keep him back. "Quinn, don't. It's not worth it."

Wrapping an arm around Raelyn's waist, Quinn squeezed her against him as he continued to stare Emerson down. "You can fuck right off. She's mine, and you fucking lost," Quinn said through gritted teeth.

Raelyn pushed away and untangled herself from Quinn's arms. "I'm not some object to win," she snapped. "And just because he's a sociopath doesn't mean I'm not still mad at you. I expect that shit from him, Quinn. Not you."

"Well, Princess , maybe you should. I've only been letting you down since we were sixteen!"

Behind her, she heard Emerson laugh. “Oh God, this is so much better than I imagined.”

Raelyn whipped around, her voice laced with venom, “Will you shut up? This has nothing to do with you!” Turning back to Quinn, she asked, “What do you mean? When we were sixteen?”

“Everyone knew I was into you, Rae. Everyone knew I was crazy about you, but you just refused to see it. Why? So you could date rich assholes like Liam? Like this guy?” He gestured toward Emerson.

“You’re not exactly in a position anymore to be complaining about rich people, Quinn,” Raelyn replied.

“Exactly,” Quinn snorted derisively. “Why now? Why should I think you’re interested in me now?”

Whoa- what?

Raelyn stepped back as though dodging a physical blow to her stomach. “I’m sorry- what exactly are you implying? ”

"Do the math, Rae," Quinn growled. "All these guys you've been surrounding yourself with since we were kids. Jesus , I can't believe I didn't see it."

It didn't matter that she had been drinking since noon and had consumed more alcohol in twelve hours than the past twelve months.

She was suddenly completely sober. That terrifying thought she'd had during Quinn's first physical therapy session had drifted so far out of her mind, but here it was slapping her across the face.

Just the other day when she was talking to Amira on her way to work she had admitted that she sometimes completely forgot that Quinn had a mega-million dollar salary, and that she still thought of him as her best friend from the proverbial wrong side of the tracks.

Maybe she would've preferred him that way.

Maybe that's why she hadn't been able to see this obnoxious, cocky, hot-shot version of him.

She swallowed around the lump in her throat once again, urging it to go away.

She did not want to cry in front of all these people.

She especially didn't want to cry in front of fucking Emerson and give him the satisfaction that he'd done exactly what he'd intended.

Feeling her lip tremble and the tears start to fill in, she looked away from Quinn.

He was her oldest friend. How the hell could he believe that?

Her heart was in physical pain, but she couldn't let herself cry here. She had to get home.

Anger. Anger is easier.

Raelyn closed her eyes and channeled her inner rage.

Finding it, she let out a humorless laugh.

The kind that lets a man know that a woman is both angry and maybe a little crazy.

“Quinn, I don't need your money. I don't know if you remember, but I've got a small fortune of my own, and one day I'll be getting an inheritance that makes your salary look like pocket change.”

She met his gaze and noticed his whole mood changed drastically, sobering and realizing too late the weight of his own words. His golden eyes flared with panic. “Rae- no, I- ”

She turned around, knowing she wouldn’t be able to keep the tears at bay much longer. “I’ll find my own ride home,” she muttered, and made her way back up the lawn to the house alone.