Mile High Weekend (Opposites Attract Book 1)

by Di Lorenzo, Melinda

  Quinn tried to get back up, but the bouncer smacked a fist into his shoulder, sending him straight down again. With a groan, he rolled over to avoid being hit again, then sprung to his feet, ignoring the shooting pain in his side. He squared off against the bouncer, hands up defensively.

  “What the hell are you doing?” the bigger man demanded.

  What the hell was he doing? One job. One fucking job. Keep Genevieve Silver out of harm’s way. And he was incapable.

  His self-control wasn’t just a pretence. It was a joke.

  He drew back a fist and he dove forward and drove it into the man’s solar plexus. A soft grunt was the only reaction. Quinn tried again, twisting viciously and throwing another punch.

  The bouncer’s palm came up to meet his hand. It closed around it, crushing Quinn’s fingers under his grip.

  Then the other man’s gaze landed on Quinn’s wrist, on the tattooed dagger. He dropped his hold immediately, and Quinn could see the sudden caution there. He seized on it, shoving down the self-loathing he felt at using the gang association for his own benefit. He lifted his arm and shook it at the bouncer.

  “You recognize this?”

  “I do,” the bigger man admitted reluctantly.

  “Think your boss would recognize it, too?”

  “Likely.”

  “Then you both know better than to fuck with me.”

  There was a long, drawn out silence, and Quinn could read the other man perfectly. He’d seen it before in his time undercover. That weighing of odds.

  “Risk it,” Quinn dared.

  The bouncer stepped back. “The exit’s five feet to your left. If you go now…”

  Quinn smiled a dark, practiced smile. One he’d used hundreds of times. A threat under the thin guise of pleasantry.

  “Then what?” he asked. “You won’t try to stop me?”

  He watched the Adam’s apple in the other man’s throat bob up and down. He almost wanted the man to make the wrong choice. To give him an excuse to embrace the identity attached to that tattoo and everything that went along with it.

  “Quinn?” Ginnie’s soft, worried voice drew his attention back to reality.

  His eyes flicked in her direction, and his heart squeezed. She had one hand at her lip and the other pressed to the wall.

  “Can we leave?” she asked.

  Quinn shot the bouncer a look, half questioning, half-mocking. “Can we?”

  The other man gave him a short nod, and it was all Quinn needed. He pushed past the man to grab Ginnie’s hand. Without looking back, he yanked her along, focusing on the flickering red exit sign. When they reached the door, he forced it open with his hip and pulled Ginnie out into the alley behind the club.

  Quinn didn’t give himself time to feel the cold, or to acknowledge the snow falling from the cloudy sky. He grabbed Ginnie and pressed one hand to the nape of her neck and the other into the small of her back. For one moment, he stared into her eyes. Their temporarily midnight shade of green was even deeper than usual, and they were full of hurt.

  “One job,” Quinn muttered.

  “What?”

  In reply, he slammed his mouth into hers. He could taste the rusty flavor of her split lip, and it infuriated him. He kissed her harder. The force of his onslaught drove them backward into the exterior, brick wall of the bar. Quinn’s knuckles smashed against the clay, scraping and burning.

  He didn’t care.

  He slid his hand to her soft, thick hair, and pulled. She yelped, but it didn’t stop him.

  Quinn wasn’t sure he could stop.

  He brought his mouth to her deliciously exposed throat, nipping and sucking, and none of his attention was the least bit gentle.

  He moved to her collarbone. Then her cleavage. Then along the curve of one breast, his teeth paying no mind to the thin fabric covering her. His mouth closed on her nipple, sucking it to a firm, hard point, rolling it with his tongue until she gasped. Then he moved on to the next and did the same. Hot. Fast. Sweet.

  Quinn wanted more.

  He dragged his hands to her waist, then down to her ass, and he lifted her from the ground. He drove his hips forward, thrusting his hard, needy self between her thighs. He rocked back and forth, enjoying the exquisite torture of being against her but not being inside her.

  Inside her.

  Just like that, a part of him had to be. It didn’t even matter which part. He wanted to feel her surrounding him. Needed to.

  He pulled away and ran a hand along her thigh, slipped it up her skirt and pressed it between them. Then paused as his fingers immediately found her waiting wetness and nothing else.

  Wasn’t she wearing underwear?

  No, he remembered. She couldn’t be. She doesn’t have any.

  Quinn wasn’t going to let the opportunity go to waste. He pushed his fingers into her. Deep. Wet. Pulsing already.

  Oh, God.

  Ginnie pushed against him, her knees tight on his hips, and with her thrusts, his fingers went deeper. Soon, he was moving with her, his erection driving into the back of his hand. He ached to take her.

  No time.

  It was true. He was far too close.

  Fuck it.

  He circled harder, tighter, faster, pleasuring both of them at the same time.

  “Come, baby,” he ordered.

  She had to.

  Because he was going to.

  With a deep, throat-tearing moan, he pressed the top of his palm to her clit, pushed his rock hard self to his knuckles, and as he thrust against her a final, satisfying time, she contracted around his fingers and cried out as he let go too.

  For several moments, Quinn held her there against the wall, her thighs shaking and her chest rising and falling. He didn’t release her until she spoke in a tremor into his ear.

  “Quinn…What w-w-was that? Back there? And th-th-this – ”

  He cut her off. “That was me. This is me. The dark parts. The bad parts.”

  “Bad?”

  “The part of me that uses everything I know to get what I want.”

  “You said there was no black and white. Only grey.”

  “I was wrong, Ginnie. There are parts of me that are black. And broken.” He moved back, letting her legs drop to the ground, his heart like a stone in his chest. “If you can’t handle that…If you don’t want it…”

  “I do.”

  He closed his eyes as her hand came to rest on his wrist and traced the dagger there.

  “I want to know every part of you, Quinn,” she whispered.

  Her words brought his heart to life once again, and in spite of his very recent release, he wanted her once more. Right away. Properly this time.

  Twenty-Nine

  Ginnie let Quinn pull her through the freezing air, barely noticing that the snow had now turned to a drenching rain, not paying the slightest bit of attention to the goose bumps that rose all over her body. She was on fire. The ache between her thighs hadn’t lessened with her release. If anything, it had increased.

  And Quinn didn’t speak. Not when they climbed into the cab, not when they walked into the hotel again, or when they got in the elevator.

  The silence between them was thick. With tension. With need. With anticipation.

  And maybe a little bit of fear? a little voice nudged, and Ginnie acknowledged it grudgingly. A little, yes.

  But she’d wanted to see this side of Quinn. She’d been craving that undercurrent of danger that ran beneath – or was it alongside? – his rough charm and his sex appeal. Maybe she was even the one who brought it out with her little stunt with the lap dance. Had she done it on purpose? She wasn’t sure. But she did know that if she didn’t get to know this side of Quinn, she would never really know him at all. And the thought of that made her throat tighten up.

  She wouldn’t let herself not know him.

  Please let me know him.

  Like he could sense her longing, like he could feel the constriction in her chest, Quinn tighten
ed his grip on her hand and pulled her close. She inhaled his scent as his wide, strong arms encircled her protectively. And Ginnie needed it. Needed him.

  She’d never needed something – or someone – so badly.

  And even if there was nothing else, no other glaringly obvious difference between Quinn and Lawrence, there it was. The intense need. Ginnie had never needed her former husband. Even when she’d been the dutiful, stay-at-home wife, dependant on him financially, she hadn’t thought of herself as needing him. When he’d walked away from their life together, she didn’t experience a loss. She experienced a failure.

  Oh my God, Ginnie thought. Did I even love Lawrence?

  Love? She shouldn’t be thinking about love.

  Her heart thundered so hard in her chest that she was sure Quinn had to be able to hear it.

  So, yes. Fear. But perhaps not the way that little voice of hers believed.

  The elevator doors slid open, his hand slid down her body to clasp hers.

  “Come,” he said, and the word – which echoed his earlier command – made her shiver with desire.

  And she couldn’t move her feet fast enough as they hurried from the elevator to their room. She forced herself to not jump in front of Quinn to drag him along faster. When they got to their door, he fumbled with the key and dropped it, and Ginnie almost leaped to grab it. She had to squeeze her hands at her sides to stop from doing it.

  Hurry, hurry.

  Quinn bent to grab the key, and finally jabbed it into the door with a loud click, and the solidity of the sound, the firm, undeniable fit of the shaft in the keyhole…It made Ginnie gasp. Loudly enough to draw a curious look from Quinn.

  Oh, God.

  She shook her head. “Just…Please,” was all she could manage to say.

  He eased the door open – why the hell was everything taking so long? – and pulled Ginnie into the room, then closed it behind them and turned to face her.

  For an agonizingly long moment, they stood there in the pitch black, toe-to-toe.

  Ginnie tipped her face up, waiting for him to take a hold of her. But except for his shallow breaths, Quinn was silent again. And as her eyes adjusted to the dark, she saw that his face had a guarded, cautious look to it. It wasn’t the cocky mask she’d seen him use before when trying to cover some emotion; it was something else entirely.

  “Am I your fantasy?” he asked softly.

  Ginnie blinked in surprise. “What?”

  “The bad boy. The one who throws rocks at your window, climbs up the trellis and sneaks in. Is that me?”

  It was Ginnie’s turn to be cautious. “Why?”

  “I can be him. But if that’s all I am, I want to know. Now.”

  That staccato beat of her heart started up again as she made her admission. “No. That’s not what I want you to be.”

  Quinn met her eyes. “I need to ask you something else, and it might piss you off.”

  She took a breath. “Okay.”

  “If he – if Lawrence – came back to you, if he said getting the annulment was a mistake, would you consider going back to him?”

  For a second, Ginnie was pissed off. Too mad to even speak.

  How dare he – she cut herself off, mid-thought. Oh.

  He wasn’t making an accusation or an assumption. He wanted to know if he was going to get hurt. This big, indestructible-looking man was insecure. Because of her. Ginnie might’ve laughed if it hadn’t been so damned achingly sweet.

  “Lawrence was the fantasy,” she said slowly. “And there’s no chance in hell I’d take him back. When he kissed me, I wanted to bite off his damned tongue.”

  Quinn stiffened, then chuckled, finally looking a little more relaxed. “There’s a sentence I never thought I’d hear, let alone find sexy.”

  Ginnie reached up to stroke his slightly stubbled cheek. “In a million years, I wouldn’t trade this weekend with you for a lifetime with Lawrence.”

  He put his hand on top of hers and leaned into the caress. “And at the end of the weekend?”

  “Whatever you want, Quinn. I’ll do it. I won’t ask for what you can’t give.”

  “All I want is you, baby.”

  She swallowed, terrified of bursting the balloon of elation in her heart. “Me too.”

  He bent his head and kissed her. Far too gently. Then pulled away.

  “That’s it,” he told her, his voice husky.

  “That’s it?”

  He nodded, his nose brushing hers sweetly. “I want you to take the lead.”

  A blush crept up Ginnie’s face. “Me?”

  “You wanted to seduce me,” he reminded her with little smile. “It worked. I’m under your spell.”

  “Oh.”

  She couldn’t think of anything else to say, so she took a tiny step away and gave him a shy onceover. And as she examined him, her shyness dissipated into the dark.

  The lead. Where should she start?

  Clothes.

  Yeah, those would have to go.

  But first…

  Ginnie stood on her tiptoes and ran all ten of her digits through Quinn’s still-damp faux-hawk. It was surprisingly soft. Even the short sides were like silk. It felt so good against her skin that she did it again, this time more slowly. And just as slowly, Quinn’s lids dropped closed, his dark lashes nearly brushing his face.

  I want to touch those, too, Ginnie thought.

  So she did. She dragged her thumbs down his forehead, over his eyelids, along his cheekbones, and down to his mouth. She hesitated. But only for a second. One hand slipped to the back of his neck while the other tripped lightly over his firm lips, circling the warm bit of metal there in a sensual dance. Her knees grew weak, and Ginnie wasn’t sure if it was from her exploration of Quinn’s features or if it was from holding herself up.

  It doesn’t matter.

  She was ready to move on.

  She dropped back to her heals, putting her eyes on level with the top button on Quinn’s shirt.

  Ginnie brought her hands up. They shook a little as she fought with the button, and it took her three tries to get it undone. Embarrassed, she glanced up at Quinn’s face. His eyes were still closed, and just the ghost of a patient smile touched his lips.

  All right.

  She was determined to be more efficient with the next few buttons, but as she unfastened the second, then the third and fourth, she realized Quinn’s skin was almost icy, and a new idea came to mind.

  Ginnie dropped her hand to his and pulled him across the room to the bathroom, glad to see that the bathtub was as big as she remembered.

  Quinn’s eyes opened when she flicked on the soft light over the sink, and he shot her a curious look.

  “You wanted a bath yesterday,” she said, trying to sound firm instead of questioning.

  “It wasn’t the main thing on my mind,” he replied.

  “I know.” Ginnie used the excuse of twisting on the taps to cover her blush.

  But she couldn’t keep her attention away from him for long. As the room filled with steam, and the tub filled with water, she turned his way again, and her breath caught. He was so damned sexy, leaned against the counter the way he was, with his shirt half-open and his muscles and ink on display. She couldn’t decide what she wanted more – to stare at him like that for a while longer, or to help him take the rest of his clothes off.

  There’s a third option.

  Ginnie smiled. And slowly, deliberately, she reached behind her own back and tugged on the tiny tie there. It came loose with surprising ease – so much ease that without even a nudge, the shimmery top slipped off and floated to the floor.

  She watched Quinn’s eyes follow the shirt, then rise up to her chest. For a moment, she was self-conscious, but when his gaze finally met hers again, it was hungry.

  Her smile grew.

  She kicked off her heels and shimmied out of her barely-there skirt, and Quinn swallowed.

  Ginnie turned toward the tub, flipped off the taps, th
en stepped into the scalding water, and faced him again.

  “Come here,” she ordered softly.

  And even though he’d told her she was in charge, his quick obedience startled her. One second he was beside the sink, the next he was standing so close that she could smell his intoxicatingly masculine scent. It was her turn to gulp.

  “Take off your shirt,” she managed to say.

  Without moving his gaze from her face, he undid the last couple of buttons.

  “And your pants,” Ginnie added breathlessly, afraid if she didn’t say it right away, she’d chicken out.

  Blood rushed through her body, sending waves of heat through every part of her. Momentarily light-headed, she dropped her gaze and closed her eyes. And when she opened them just a few seconds later, Quinn’s clothes were in a pile on the ground.

  She knew was he was completely bare, and she’d seen him that way before. But last time it was unintentional. Embarrassing. Now…she could take her time, perusing his body at leisure.

  Her gaze slid up, inch by inch, moving with the beat of her heart.

  Solid feet.

  Well-muscled calves with just the right amount of dark hair.

  Knees, held a foot apart, one lightly scarred, the other unmarred.

  His thighs.

  Oh, God, his thighs.

  Strong and thick with muscle, there was no hiding the power in those thighs. They made Ginnie tremble. They made her nipples grow taut and her breath catch. They made her wet – so slick with want that she was sure she was giving the bathwater a run for its money.

  And between those thighs…

  Oh, sweet lord.

  He was the embodiment of male perfection.

  Huge and hard, full-mast and waiting.

  Ginnie wanted to put so many parts of her body on him. She wanted to stroke him, taste him, ride him. She’d never felt a desire so strong.

  Patient. Please let me be patient.

  Because she wanted to savor him, too.

  She forced her eyes to move on.

  Was that a six-pack? It had to be more than a six pack.

  Her hands itched to run over those abs, to slide up and caress his chest.

  As Ginnie’s gaze followed the path in her mind, she gasped. The beginnings of a mottled bruise covered his un-tattooed shoulder, and she knew immediately it was from the blow he’d taken from the bouncer. Guilt hit her.