Hunted (Love like Yours Series Book 3)

by Nicole S. Goodin

  “And then on top of that, he woke up, like properly woke up, and spoke for the first time… to you?”

  I hung my head down. “Yip… that’s the one.”

  “That’s pretty funny really.” She snickered through the phone. “What did he say?”

  “He thought he was dreaming.” I left out his reasons for thinking that.

  “He’s going to ask about you, you know that right?”

  “I know.” I groaned. “I don’t know what to do.”

  “For god sakes Quinn, pick up the damn phone and end things with Colt. You’ve made too many excuses and now you’ve dug yourself a hole that I’m not sure how you’re going to get out of.”

  “Tell me what you really think.” I muttered sarcastically.

  “Ring him Q. Meet up with him and tell him you’re done. And if you want my advice?”

  Yes… no… yes.

  I sighed. “I do.”

  “Tell him about Harrison. He’s going to find out anyway.”

  Fuck it all. She was always right.

  I had to do it now. Harrison was awake and it seemed like he was going to be fine. There was nothing left to hide behind.

  I finished up with El and dialed through to Colt.

  He answered after only two rings.

  “Quinn, hey, I was just about to call you.”

  “Hey, look, can we meet up and talk?”

  “Definitely.” I could hear the smile in his voice.

  I’m such a bitch…

  “I actually was just about to ring you to ask a favor.”

  I sighed. This was already not going to plan. “Um… what is it?”

  “Harrison is getting out of the hospital and my car has just broken down… I was kind of hoping you could drive me to get him?”

  Oh hell.

  “I’m not sure that’s such a good idea Colt.” I replied quickly.

  Worst. Idea. Ever.

  “I don’t even know him.”

  And I think I’m obsessed with him.

  “Please Q, he’s dying to get out of there and you’re my only option.”

  I rubbed my temples and held back a groan.

  How do I keep getting myself into these situations?

  I knew this was a bad idea. Half of me was demanding I just get it over with, it had to happen sometime. The other half – probably the smarter half, was telling me to run.

  I deliberated internally.

  “Quinn?”

  It’ll be fine.

  “Okay. Text me where you are and I’ll leave in ten.” I tried to convince myself that I’d tell him about visiting Harrison on our way to the hospital.

  “Thanks beautiful.”

  I cringed. This was going to be one hell of an afternoon.

  ***

  I pulled up to the curb behind Colt’s car and sat on the horn for a moment so he would know I was here. I was dreading this. I had a ball of nerves in the pit of my stomach that wouldn’t budge.

  That was the thing with secrets. They always found a way to come out, usually, right when you needed them to stay quiet the most.

  Like, for example when you’re on your way with the guy you dated, to pick up his brother, who you’re obsessed with, but who doesn’t know who you are or why you were in his hospital room…

  Fuck.

  I rested my head on the steering wheel and breathed in and out deeply.

  How the hell did I get into such a mess?

  “Hey Quinn.”

  I jumped and hit my head on the roof of the car.

  “Fuck Colt, you scared the shit out of me.”

  “Sorry.” He grimaced. “Are you okay babe?”

  He reached for my head and I instinctively pulled away – he casually pulled back his hand and pretended not to notice my reaction.

  “I’m fine.” I gave him a weak smile.

  I pulled out from the curb and into traffic. We sat in an awkward silence, the only noise from the keys in his pocket as his knee jiggled up and down nervously.

  “Just tell me Quinn.”

  Crap.

  I glanced at him out of the corner of my eye. “Tell you what?” I replied quietly, taking the chicken shit response.

  “Tell me what the hell is going on here?” He furrowed his brow. “You don’t call, you don’t want me to touch you… you’re acting weird. If you don’t want to spend time with me anymore, I just want to know.”

  “I’m sorry.” I whispered.

  He groaned in frustration. “So you don’t want to see me anymore?”

  I shook my head and kept my eyes on the road. I felt so guilty, I couldn’t even look at him. I knew he was looking at me.

  Stop being a pussy…

  “I’m sorry Colt. I just can’t be with you anymore. It’s nothing you did… I just want more –”

  “I can give you more.” He interrupted, hope in his voice.

  Oh god.

  “You can’t.”

  We stopped at a light and I turned to look at him.

  “I can Q. I want more too.”

  I closed my eyes for a moment.

  “I know you do.”

  “Then if we both want the same thing…?”

  I was going to have to break his heart good and proper.

  I looked into his eyes. “I don’t want those things with you.”

  He huffed out a breath. The expression he wore broke my heart. He looked… defeated.

  “I’m sorry.” I whispered again.

  He didn’t reply, just went back to jiggling his knee up and down, more forcefully this time.

  I drove us to the hospital in a suffocating silence.

  I turned the key off and fidgeted awkwardly in my seat. “Colt… I tried to make it clear you know. I didn’t intend to lead you on, and I’m sorry if I did.”

  “You didn’t.”

  I glanced over at him in surprise. He was staring at me again.

  “You told me how it was, and I chose not to listen. I kept coming back, even when I knew you didn’t want me to. So I’m sorry.”

  Is this really happening?

  “I should have been stronger.”

  “It’s my fault.” He stated. He snapped out of his trance and unbuckled his seat belt. “I did it to myself.” He said as he opened the door. “I broke my own heart.” He mumbled it so quietly I was sure I wasn’t meant to hear.

  I jumped from the car and followed after him. “I should go Colt.”

  I’d already hurt him enough, and I still hadn’t even told him about Harrison yet.

  He turned back “It’s okay. I’ll be fine. We can be friends right?” He nodded as though he was trying to convince himself, not me. “Friends do favors for each other don’t they?”

  I nodded. I’d heard this from him before and I hoped like hell that he wouldn’t be trying to be anything more than a friend to me.

  “Okay.” I squeaked, knowing I had no choice but to follow him into the building.

  We rode the elevator in silence, the awkward waiting room music the only sound. It wasn’t until we stopped outside Harrison’s door that he turned back and spoke to me again.

  “When you said you wanted more, what did you mean?”

  I thought about it for a moment. “I just want to find my person.” I told him quietly.

  His expression softened and he smiled, and for a moment, I thought maybe he understood that there was more than this out there for the both of us.

  “I know what you mean.”

  I breathed out a sigh of relief.

  Thank god.

  “I want you to be my person Quinn. I’ll show you that I can be yours too.”

  He turned away from me and opened the door to the room, leaving me standing completely stunned in the hallway.

  What the hell just happened?

  5. Harrison

  “You should have slept longer, you still look like shit.”

  I grinned at Colt, standing in the doorway. I had to admit, it was bloody good to see h
im. He looked relieved to see me awake; and I felt a pang of guilt that he might not have been doing too great while I was out.

  “I’d still pull a hotter girl than you.” I goaded him.

  He laughed, but his eyes flashed with sadness. He was alone too – if I had to take a guess, I’d say that this mystery girl Quinn had kicked him to the curb.

  “Shit it’s good to see you awake.” He told me genuinely. “Are you okay?”

  “Yeah, apparently this one isn’t broken after all.” I gestured to my left arm. “But this one is pretty smashed up. They put some metal rods or whatever in there.” I waved my cast at him as he walked into my room.

  My ribs were taped up so tight it was hard to breathe and my head was pounding, but I didn’t bother mentioning that, or the other assortment of cuts and bruises I had all over my body – I didn’t deserve his sympathy.

  “No internal bleeding. So I’m good to get out of here.”

  “What happened? Do you know who did this?” He sat down in the green eyed girl’s chair.

  “You sound like the cop I had in here earlier.” I joked, trying to down play the situation. “It was just bad luck.”

  “Would you recognize the guys?”

  I shook my head no. “I don’t remember too much.” I lied.

  He nodded and his eyes fell on the book next to the bed. “Since when do you read girly books?” He chuckled as he reached for it.

  She’d been reading it to me. It wasn’t my book, and I was hoping I’d be able to return it to her.

  “It’s not mine.” I muttered as he knocked it to the ground. He turned to pick it up and my eye caught sight of movement in the doorway.

  Holy shit… it’s her.

  I was sure my imagination had made her out to be more than she was, if it wasn’t for the fact that the nurses had seen her, I would have been starting to think that my drug induced mind had dreamed her up.

  I didn’t think it was possible for someone to have such green eyes, such full lips and such a banging body… but there she was. Every glorious inch of her, right here in my hospital room, for the second time today.

  “You came back.” I blurted out.

  “Huh?” Colt asked as he swung his body back into the chair, book in hand.

  I ignored him. I was talking to her.

  She leaned against the door frame with an anxious expression on her face as though she was worried about what might happen next.

  I wanted to ask her a million questions, ‘who are you?’, ‘why did you come here?’, ‘how do I make you stay?’ but instead I just stared at her.

  Her gaze fitted nervously between Colt and me, before landing firmly on me.

  I didn’t know what to make of her. She was a stranger to me – I knew that without a shadow of a doubt – a guy didn’t forget meeting a woman that looked the way she did. But yet she felt familiar to me, almost as though the most important person in my world had just walked through the door. My whole body tingled. She was having an effect on me, even if my mind didn’t know her.

  “Oh hey.” Colt said. “Harrison, Quinn. Quinn, Harrison.” He waved his hand between the two of us.

  Neither of us moved. We just stared at one another. Her eyes were begging for understanding.

  “You’re Quinn?” I managed to ask, disbelief coloring my voice.

  She’s Quinn?

  She nodded slowly and took a step towards the bed.

  “Hi Harrison.” She replied softly. Hearing her voice not only gave me goose bumps, but a rush of fuzzy, unclear memories.

  Her voice… reading to me.

  How many times has she come?

  She looked down at her hands before meeting my eyes once more. The space between us crackled. I wanted so badly to reach for her and run my hands through her long brown hair. I’d never wanted to get hold of a woman more than I did right now. I smiled at her and the shine in her eyes showed me she liked what she saw.

  I certainly liked what I saw. Her tight black jeans were doing a mighty fine job of showing off her long, slim legs.

  “Do you two know each other?” Colt’s voice snapped me back to the reality of the situation.

  She’s Colt’s fucking girlfriend.

  I met his confused expression and felt inexplicably guilty.

  “I’m not sure.” I admitted. I looked back at her for answers. “Do I know you?”

  She closed her eyes momentarily, like she was exhausted. “I came and read to him a couple of times.” She explained, talking to Colt now.

  “Why?” He asked quickly. I could tell he wasn’t happy about this revelation.

  She shrugged. “I don’t know.” She replied quietly, her eyes darting to me and then back to Colt.

  Fuck she is something else.

  She was gorgeous. The kind of stunning a guy never really saw close up like this.

  How the fuck did Colt pull a girl like that?

  She didn’t seem to be able to keep her eyes off me. Normally I would have felt pretty smug about that. But with her boyfriend – my brother, sitting next to me, tension radiating off him, it wasn’t so easy.

  “I’ve got your book.” I stated lamely, gesturing towards Colt’s hand.

  “It’s not mine. I found it there.” She pointed at the table next to my bed. She took a step back and bumped into a chair. “I’m… I… I’ll just wait… in the car.” She stuttered, backing from the room.

  “Quinn.” I called. I didn’t know what I would have said, even if she had stopped, I just knew I didn’t want to see her walk out that door. But it was too late, she was gone… again.

  I stared at the empty doorway until Colt cleared his throat.

  Shit.

  I sighed and looked at him, waiting for his response.

  He was pissed.

  “You want to tell me what the fuck that was all about?”

  If only I knew...

  6. Colt

  She looked at him the way a person looks at something truly majestic. It’s like he was the eighth fucking wonder of the world or something. He wasn’t much better with the way he was looking at her, but in his defense, she was a woman worth staring at.

  I could have left that room forming a conga line with every nurse on the ward, and I doubt they would have even noticed.

  It was like that moment in a chick flick, where the girl and the guy look into each other’s eyes and the whole world just falls away… it’s just the two of them and it’s all magical and shit.

  That’s what that was. That was what Quinn wanted… that moment, was the ‘more’ she was looking for.

  Now I just had to figure out a way to give her whatever the hell it was that he was giving.

  7. Harrison

  “What the hell just happened?” I asked him, totally bewildered by the last few minutes.

  “I just fucking asked you that.” Colt snapped back at me

  I just stared at him in disbelief. I had no idea what the hell was going on. My mouth opened and shut a few times, but no words found their way out.

  She’s Quinn?

  “How the hell do you know Quinn? And why has she been visiting you?”

  The possessive edge to his voice was nearly my undoing. I had no right to, but I felt like I had some type of claim over this woman. Like I wanted to protect her.

  I could feel my muscles tensing as I stared at my brother and I begged myself to calm down, getting mad at him was pointless, he looked as confused as I felt.

  I took a deep breath and looked him straight in the eyes. “I don’t know her.”

  He breathed a sigh of relief.

  “Well I don’t think I know her… she was here today. I know that much.”

  “She was here today?” His eyes narrowed at me.

  “Yeah, she was here when I woke up.”

  “She was here when you woke up?” He asked, exasperated.

  “Stop repeating everything I say.” I rubbed my temples. “It’s not helping.” This shit was really starting to hur
t my head.

  “Unbelievable.” He muttered. He huffed out a deep breath and shook his head. “Well what happened when you woke up?”

  I let my mind drift back to that moment.

  “I opened my eyes and she was sitting in the chair you’re in.” I nodded in his direction. “She was reading that book to me.”

  I didn’t tell him that I’d lay still for a few minutes, totally unmoving, unwilling to do anything that might cause her to stop speaking.

  “I had no idea who she was.”

  I didn’t tell him that even though I didn’t know her, I’d recognized her immediately – she was the beautiful woman that had taken over my dreams. I hadn’t even made sense of that myself yet, and I didn’t feel like trying to explain it to him.

  “Or how long she’d been there.”

  I didn’t tell him about how I’d reached out for her and knocked the book from her hands. Or how I’d caught a flash of the smile that played on her lips as she enjoyed the story, right before shock took its place.

  “She rambled on, called the nurses in and left.” I told him, trying to lift myself up and off the bed as I did.

  Pain shot through my ribs and I flinched.

  Mother fucker.

  “You don’t know why she was here?” He asked as he reached out to grip my bicep and help me up.

  “I’ve got no idea. But it was like I recognized her. I can’t explain that. I think the answers you want are going to have to come from your girlfriend.”

  He huffed out another breath. “She’s not my girlfriend.”

  My heart raced.

  Play it cool Hunt… play it cool.

  “She’s not?”

  “Nah. Never quite sealed the deal.” He shrugged. “We’ve been seeing each other a long time though.” He added quickly.

  “Maybe you should ask her?” I suggested, hoping like hell that he wouldn’t.

  He shook his head and laughed humorlessly. “She’d say no. She ended what we did have going on the way over here.”

  Thank fuck.

  I was a bastard. My youngest brother was here, apparently heartbroken, and I was rejoicing internally.

  Yip… total bastard.

  “I’m not giving up on her yet. She’ll come around.” He told me firmly, as though he could read my thoughts.