“No smart ass response? Did I hit a nerve, Cupcake?”
She looked around, everywhere but at him. A niggling warning of unease squirmed in the pit of his belly, but he ignored it. Even the beast stilled. Waiting. Watching.
“I think someone needs to get laid,” he said, laughing cruelly, hating himself more than she ever could. The thought of Quinn in another man’s arms hurt more than a round of buckshot in his gut. He should stop talking. He should shut his fucking mouth and seethe inside his own caustic rage alone, not lash out at her because she was ... Quinn. But he couldn’t help it. He couldn’t think straight around her.
“What’s the matter, Cupcake? Can’t find a man willing to sink himself into that skinny little ass? I’d offer to call a couple of my buddies, but they only want real women, not little girls.”
Quinn turned on the jets, her expression impassive. “You’ve got fifteen minutes,” she said, though her voice sounded thicker than normal.
“You’re not staying?” Acute as ever, Seth narrowed his eyes. “Something wrong, Cupcake?” he crooned silkily. It sounded eerily like a purr.
“Today is Captain Roger’s last day,” she told him. “I promised him I’d say good-bye.”
A sharp pain clawed at the inner walls of Seth’s chest that had nothing to do with his injuries. Mike Rogers had been in the same chopper he had, though he had come out a little better, thanks to Seth. He and Mike had been tight at one point, but the thought of Quinn having her hands on Mike like she did with him made him all kinds of crazy.
“Whatever. Hey, rub up against him like you did me and maybe he’ll do you. He always had a thing for charity cases.”
She turned away, but not before he saw the telltale sheen of moisture in her eyes. It shocked the hell out of him. Quinn didn’t cry. Not ever.
Before he could process it, however, she said, “Thanks for the tip. Maybe I will. Dave, keep an eye on him, will you?”
Seth felt the burn go nuclear.
When she returned at the end of fifteen minutes to turn off the jets and help him out of the therapy pool, Quinn gave no indication that anything had happened. Despite his repeated attempts to reproduce the baffling phenomena, Quinn remained as unaffected as always, except, perhaps, for being quieter than usual.
“Lay off her, will you?” Dave said later when Quinn went to grab some extra towels. He, like several others, couldn’t help but hear Seth’s increasingly loud taunts as Quinn stoically refused to rise to the bait.
When Quinn came back a few minutes later, Seth grinned with all the warmth of a rabid wolverine. “Good news, Cupcake. I think Dave here’s willing to give you a pity fuck, but you’ll probably have to blow him first.”
Things happened in a blur after that. Dave completely lost his cool and landed a solid punch to Seth’s jaw. Quinn cried out and threw herself at Dave, knocking him backward while others rushed over. Someone grabbed Seth’s chair and pulled him backwards, away from where Quinn was desperately trying to keep Dave from getting up and pounding Seth again. Seth wished he would. He wanted the pain, needed it to wipe away the mental images of Quinn with another man.
Dave managed to get to his feet, Quinn clawing at his back. Without thinking, Dave shrugged and flung her much smaller figure off of him.
Time slowed down then. Seth watched in growing horror as Quinn flailed, falling backwards into the shelf of free weights. Unable to stop her momentum, she attempted to twist her body and curl in on herself protectively. Before she could totally bring her knees in to her body and cover her face, she hit the shelf of equipment. Her tiny body bounced once before falling still.
There was a moment of stunned silence before someone screamed. Dave turned around, realizing what he had done and cursed, shouting for help.
Seth’s arms automatically pushed at the wheels of his chair to get to her, but suddenly his chair was turning and he was being hurriedly pushed in the opposite direction. “Quinn!” he shouted, but no one else heard him over the ensuing chaos. A big, bulky therapist named Deiter ignored every vile curse and threat Seth threw at him as they raced down the hallway toward his room. Without pause, he hefted Seth easily into his bed. The next thing Seth knew, he felt the syringe plunged and emptied into his ass. Within seconds, the strong sedative took effect and his world went dark.
Chapter Three
“Where’s Quinn?” Seth demanded when an entire week passed and there had been no sign of her. Other than the bare minimum required to communicate, no one spoke to him. No one would tell him where she was, how she was, or when she was coming back. He hadn’t seen Dave, either, but he didn’t give a shit about that, or anything else for that matter. He cared only about Quinn.
If he’d been irascible before, he was downright vicious now.
“Quinn’s supposed to do that,” he seethed, kicking out at Deiter’s strong hands as they pounded into his flesh. “Where the fuck is she?!”
Deiter flipped him over onto his stomach without replying and pressed even harder. Hard enough that Seth O’Rourke was too busy clenching his teeth together to consider any further attempt at conversation.
“WE’LL MISS YOU, QUINN,” Jenna said, one of many who had gathered in the small lounge to offer their farewells. After spending nearly two weeks as a patient, having parts of her face repaired and realigned, she’d done a lot of soul searching. As much as she loved helping others, she simply didn’t belong here.
No matter how hard she tried, she was always just slightly out of step with everyone else. Quinn’s heart, her very soul, beat to a different tempo and always would.
She was through pretending. There was only one place she’d ever felt like she belonged.
She’d already phoned her landlord. Once she left the hospital, she’d go straight home and pack what few belongings she’d managed to accumulate (she was not, by nature, a materialistic person) and hit the road. In a few hours, the rehab center, her co-workers, and Seth O’Rourke would become memories, links in her chain of life experiences. It was time to start working on the next link.
Even former employees weren’t exempt from hospital rules and regulations. Quinn was not spared the humiliation of being escorted out upon her release. Dave pushed her wheelchair toward the elevator that would take her to the lobby and into the next phase of her life. Because he had struck a patient, he had lost his job. Once the director heard the full story, however, and since Seth refused to file a complaint, Dave was given the option of resigning so that the incident was kept out of his permanent record. He already had another job. No one had the heart to refuse him the chance to say goodbye to Quinn, though.
The elevator doors had just opened when they heard a familiar voice. “Hey! Hey! Hold up there!”
Quinn tensed as Dave looked hopelessly at the already overcrowded elevator. She knew as well as he did that there was no way he could wedge her in there with the bulky chair. Instead, he quickly turned and began pushing Quinn in the opposite direction, deliberately ignoring the increasingly loud commands to stop.
Quinn was acutely aware of the stares they were receiving, and if there was one thing that she could not abide, it was being the center of attention. “It’s okay, Dave. Stop for a sec, will you?”
Dave did as she requested, but the concerned expression on his face let her know that he did so reluctantly. He blamed himself for what happened. Though she had assured him time and time again that it wasn’t his fault, that she had been the one to do something stupid by jumping on his back, he still felt responsible, and unfortunately, nothing she said or did was going to change that.
“WHERE THE FUCK HAVE you been?” Seth asked roughly, quickly closing the distance between them. Dave stopped, but kept his body between Seth’s chair and Quinn’s. The sight of her in a wheelchair had nearly stopped Seth’s heart until he remembered hospital policy. Still, two weeks had passed. Had she been here all that time as a patient?
“I’ve been a little... busy,” Quinn said quietly, her head bowed.
“But Deiter will take good care of you, Seth.”
“Fuck that,” Seth growled, drawing up beside her. He wanted to see her face, goddammit. To look into those big gray eyes and know that she was okay. “He’s been beating me like a red-headed stepchild and no one gives a shit. Hey, turn the chair around so I’m not talking to the side of her head.”
For a few moments nothing happened. Then Quinn took a deep breath and nodded. Dave turned the chair.
Nothing could have prepared Seth for what he saw. The entire left side of Quinn’s face, her delicate, beautiful face, was bruised beyond recognition. Her lips, jaw, and cheekbone were still swollen, and there was a bandage over her left eye. Ugly black thread hung loosely in various places where the larger cuts had been stitched.
He swallowed down the bile that rose in his throat, right along with the primal scream that threatened to rip out from his chest. His Quinn. His delicate Quinn. The beast raged and clawed, wanting to kill and maim and dismember on her behalf. It was only the knowledge that it had been all his fault that kept him from doing so.
It took a full minute for him to compose himself enough to speak again. When he did, his voice was little more than a growl. “So. You were just going to go and get yourself released from this hellhole without saying goodbye? Is that it?”
He saw the slight twitch in the right corner of her mouth, along with the wince it evoked. “Yes.”
“You’re a cold, heartless bitch. You don’t think about anybody but yourself, do you? Just wait till you come back. That fucker will have me so messed up you’ll have your hands full.”
The tiny flicker of amusement faded. “I’m not coming back, Seth.”
No! The beast was up again, head butting him, desperate for release. “What, did they fire your ass or something?”
“Or something,” she murmured so quietly he barely heard it. “Goodbye, Seth, and good luck. I have faith in you. You’re going to walk out of here on your own two feet, I just know it.”
An iron fist, complete with razor sharp claws, slammed through his chest, grabbed his heart and squeezed until it damn near exploded.
“Fuck you, Cupcake.”
Chapter Four
Six months of hell, that’s what it was. Six months of grueling rehab with sorry-assed sons of bitches who lived and breathed to make his life as miserable as possible. Six months of enduring the hatred and disgust from the physical therapists who thought he was a rotten, heartless bastard.
And not once, in all that time, did Quinn come to see him.
Not once.
He didn’t miss her. Not at all. He did not wake up every morning with the miniscule hope of seeing those soft gray eyes trying to puzzle him out. Nor did he haul his pathetic ass back into bed at night, disappointed when yet another day passed without one single flash of gray.
He did not think about the clever ways she’d had of putting him through his paces. Of mercifully distracting him through the worst of it while still getting the job done.
And he definitely did not ache to feel those small, strong hands massaging his legs, back, and arms with those oils she used to keep in small, dark brown bottles in her scrubs. The ones that heated his skin and smelled like a forest in winter and allowed him enough relief to be able to sleep at night. No one else used them except her. They probably weren’t even legal.
But he did remember the last time he’d seen her as if it had only just happened. How he had spun his chair away from her as he spat out those last hateful words and caught those big, haunting gray eyes looking at him in such a way that it made his physical pain seem negligible by comparison.
The other therapists talked about her sometimes, usually when they didn’t think he could hear them. Apparently, he wasn’t the only one who thought she possessed a special gift, a healing touch that no one else came close to duplicating. Inevitably he would then feel their resentful stares burning holes in the back of his head, as if her leaving had been all his fault.
Even his inner beast blamed him. It remained curled somewhere deep inside him, refusing to lift its massive head as it sulked and pined for her.
From what he could gather, she hadn’t just left her job; she had blown town entirely. She’d moved away, somewhere up north to live with her aging grandmother or something. It eased him slightly to think that maybe she hadn’t left solely because of him, but because her elderly relative needed her.
Seth was desperate for information—any information—about Quinn, but no one was willingly sharing anything with him. It didn’t matter. Now that he was finally getting out, he would go find out the truth for himself.
“QUINN, LASS, THAT’S the third time ye’ve ground the same pinch of root. ʼTis no good as a paste, mind ye.”
“Sorry,” Quinn apologized, pushing the powdered root from the stone mortar and pestle with her index finger into the small glass jar under Siobhan’s watchful eye. It wasn’t like her granddaughter to be so distracted, but these last few months it was obvious the girl’s mind was elsewhere.
Quinn was a godsend, a sweet child who had been forced to endure more than she ever should have, all because of events entirely beyond her control. Life was rarely fair, but in this particular instance, it seemed about as unjust as it could be.
Siobhan wished there was something she could do for her granddaughter. She hadn’t even been aware of the girl’s existence until Quinn was already in her late teens, a mere shadow in the midst of Siobhan’s hulking son and grandsons. They’d been only too glad to be rid of her, and Siobhan had been glad to have her. Siobhan had never been accepted by her son’s wife because of her special abilities. Marie was a devout Catholic and viewed Siobhan’s healing skills as nothing short of blasphemous witchcraft. Fergus Brennan had been forced to make a choice between his family and the woman he loved, and he chose Marie.
Siobhan didn’t blame him. A man was meant to leave the nest and make his own way in the world. That was the way of things, and truth be told, he never would have been happy in Erehwon. He was her son, yes, but he had chosen to lock away that part of him that would have thrived here. But perhaps if they had retained some contact, she might have known about her special granddaughter and been able to intervene sooner.
“Ye have the Gift, Quinn,” she’d said, feeling the truth of it after spending only a few minutes in her presence. Quinn had inherited the healing touch, an ancient skill passed down from woman to woman since the time of the Druids. Siobhan had feared that in having only a son, the gift had been lost forever, and had been ecstatic to see it alive and so strong in her granddaughter.
Disillusioned by modern medicine, there were many who called upon Siobhan to provide care not available in hospitals and doctor’s offices. Since Quinn had come to live with her, demand had never been higher. The girl was a natural. People were instinctively drawn to her quiet, soothing nature. At first, Siobhan feared all the attention – especially that of the young bucks – would go to Quinn’s head after being ignored for all those years, but so far, she had remained blissfully unaffected.
Siobhan sat down at the ancient, scarred wooden table and put her tiny hand over Quinn’s with a sigh. “What’s his name then?”
Quinn had the good grace not to look her grandmother in the eye. “Who?”
Inwardly, Siobhan sighed. She was tired of pussyfooting around. With a hard winter not far off they would need to harvest and prepare as much as they could now. Quinn’s arrival had been nothing less than a blessing, but it would take both of them to get the village through till spring.
“The one ye pine fer, o’ course.”
“I’m not pining for anyone, Gran,” Quinn countered.
“Bullshite. I ken a lass in love when I see one. And yer farther gone than most. Ye have it bad, Quinn lass.”
QUINN NEVER EVEN CONSIDERED the possibility that her grandmother wouldn’t know exactly what her problem was. She’d known from the moment Quinn arrived at her door six months earlier with a trunk full of boxes fille
d with the meager possessions she’d managed to accumulate. Quinn was grateful that Siobhan had left the matter as long as she had, giving her every opportunity to work through it on her own. As of this morning, however, it seemed her grace period was up.
“I think all these herbs are addling your senses. Maybe we should take a row in the lake this afternoon to clear your head.”
“Och! Such disrespect,” Siobhan lamented, but there was no mistaking the twinkle in her eye.
Quinn smirked.
“Still, it sounds lovely. I believe I could do with a turn on the lake. Mayhap we can do so after we make our visits today.”
Siobhan watched Quinn as they carefully labeled the morning’s work and packed the various herbs, salves, and extracted oils into hand-woven baskets to take into town. The leftovers were carried down into the cold cellar they used for storage. The unfinished underground room stayed a constant, dry fifty-seven degrees Fahrenheit all year round, ideal for storing dried herbs and roots over the long winter months.
“Is it Malcolm MacDougal’s son, Rory?” Siobhan inquired later as they sat in the sturdy little rowboat, drifting beneath the clear blue sky and cotton-candy clouds. “I’ve seen the way the boy keeps stealing glances at ye when yer not looking. I daresay, the lad’s huge, and ye do ken what they say about a well-hung Scotsman.”
Despite not wanting to encourage her grandmother, Quinn couldn’t help the giggle that bubbled up. “No, Gran, do tell. What do they say about a well-hung Scotsman?”
“Why, he can cross a girl’s eyes with his stamina and skill, o’ course.”
Quinn giggled again, then looked at Siobhan with mock thoughtfulness. “Do you think he really is, you know, endowed? I mean, he wears his jeans awfully snug, and you would think if there really was something there it would be noticeable...”
Rehabbing the Beast Page 2
