by Shannyn Leah
She was leaving. No contact with her family...a family it was clear she needed right now more than ever.
Was she blind to everything he saw?
Her once glowing sun-kissed skin was now pale, almost translucent, like a ghost who hid in the shadows. The dark, haunting circles under her eyes proved that she was hiding a secret. A secret that he had a growing suspicion had to do with Robert.
What had been Robert’s angle? Why had he exposed Quinn to Anya that night? Robert didn’t do things without reason. To this day Quinn had assumed Robert’s exposure was to protect his daughter...as not Robert as that sounded...from a man who appeared heartless.
Originally, when Quinn had learned that Anya left, he’d assumed it had everything to do with him. Now he was starting to connect the pieces. The signs were flashing neon red notifying Quinn that Robert was involved somehow with Anya’s disappearance. The fact she was sneakily searching out a file confirmed it. Then she was going to disappear? Vanish into the night.
That didn’t sit well with Quinn.
Anya was right; twenty-four hours was not enough time to figure out what she was hiding. Quinn needed another plan, and it was a good thing he had a backup. He’d been contemplating it all morning, but hoped Anya wouldn’t force him to use it.
She had.
Quinn turned toward the resort, when he had hoped he would be going home. He was exhausted after a night of surveying Anya’s shack, but there was something he had to do first.
Anya wouldn’t like it. In fact, she was going to be right pissed off at him. But, if she was too stubborn to ask for help then he was going to get it for her. Then, after she was finished being angry, they could get the files. Together.
Quinn should have been parking out front of the automatic glass doors that welcomed guests to the extravagant lobby of The Caliendo Resort. Instead, he turned down the Caliendo’s private lane, typing in the code only they knew and drove around the Caliendo suites. He parked in front of Eliza’s suite.
It was Marc who had contacted him with concerns about Anya, but it was Eliza that Quinn had given his word that Anya was alright. He’d given his word because he’d believed she’d left him for a better life.
She hadn’t.
Now he owed Eliza the truth.
Quinn moved up the stairs and, as he held his hand up to knock on the door, he sent his father a silent apology for his decision.
I will bring her justice, he silently promised. But first he had to do this. There was no doubt in his mind that this was the right choice for Anya.
He just hoped he wasn’t losing his one and only real opportunity to get his hands on that file. This was the closest he had ever been.
Chapter Four
MIDNIGHT TICKED BY and two came quickly. It was time to start the hike back through pitch-black bushes and to the spot where Quinn would be waiting.
Quinn.
What was his angle? Why was he acting like he cared about her after he’d made it crystal clear two years ago when she’d confronted him about his career that she was no more than a fling? She’d been at peace with his honesty that night. Maybe not at peace, but she’d accepted it...grown to accept it.
Aggressively Anya hit a tree branch out of her way and the flexing stick flew back and hit her upside the head.
She groaned and stopped to grab her head for a brief moment while collecting her thoughts. She couldn’t storm through the bushes in such a hostile state, she’d be sure to be bleeding in every direction by the time she met Quinn. And then what would he say? Or how would he act?
She groaned again.
Stop thinking about what he thinks or how he feels because he is the man who used you, lied to you and walked away from you.
She started her quick-paced walk again.
His words from this morning bothered her now as much as they had all day. What right do you have to be mad at me? You gave the option. You walked away from me.
It made no sense. He had literally walked away from her. Was there hidden meaning behind his words and, if there was, she certainly couldn’t figure it out.
Anya wished she’d been able to get more sleep today, especially now after a half hour into her walk when her body screamed exhaustion. But her thoughts were fully wired putting a little extra bounce back in her walk.
When she reached her destination, she found Quinn nowhere to be seen.
Her eyes automatically scanned the windows of the suites before checking the time on her cell phone.
She was early.
Anya breathed in a deep lungful of Caliendo Resort air. Even though the resort was on the other side of the bushes, fenced off so tourists wouldn’t wander into their living area, the smell was the same: blooming trees, beachy water and summer.
It was the warm smell of summer warmth.
Leaning against a tree, her body thanked her for the rest. As quick as she touched the bark her thoughts were lost to her childhood.
The resort had been their personal playground, as long as Eliza was close by. But these woods were their real playground. Hide and seek, tobogganing, hiking, fishing...they did it all growing up in these woods. Anya’s niece Sophia and her nephew Parker were born and raised at the resort too, giving this sanctuary the opportunity to repeat its presence. Only a couple summers ago Anya had been roasting marshmallows around the campfire with her family. It felt like a lifetime. She missed Sophia and Parker. She missed her whole family.
Maybe after this...maybe.
“Let’s go.” Quinn’s deep, hoarse, and almost angry voice startled her.
Anya jumped away from the tree and stumbled on thick roots growing out of the ground. Tripping forward, she gasped in pain as her foot twisted. When her knees didn’t hit the dirt like she’d expected, she felt Quinn’s arm snake around her waist and he lifted her whole body up and against him.
Heat soared through her ankle sending stabbing pain all the way to her toes. But it was the heat of his arm around her middle and her butt against his hip that made her breathless. When he asked if she was alright, she squeaked out a yes.
He released her, sending hammering pain to her ankle. If she hadn’t shifted her weight to the other foot she would have collapsed.
“Then let’s go.”
Then let’s go, she mimicked in her head with his snarky attitude as she followed behind him.
Her eyes burned a hole through the back of his black jacket as he broke through the bushes and started toward her suite.
Picking up her pace, she tried to keep up with Quinn, but her ankle wouldn’t allow it. He was waiting for her at the door by the time she caught up. Her foot was killing her. The right foot too, great for driving.
Ugh.
“You’re hurt.” There was concern in his voice again and he looked like he wanted to reach out and touch her.
What had happened to this man since she left?
He used to be a solid man of few feelings or emotions, making the moments he showed them to be treasured. Like the first time he had laughed with her, not his chuckle, which he shared regularly. There was a chuckle when he was amused, when he was not amused, when he was angry and when he didn’t believe her.
The first time he laughed, not a simple chuckle, had been at the private Caliendo beach. They’d snuck through the bushes and started a bonfire on the sandy shore. It had been a marvelous night with stars sparkling above them as they curled up on a blanket and listened to the crackling wood.
Quinn had been quiet as usual, which Anya never minded. Her family was large and there was always something going on, so it was nice to sit with Quinn quietly. It was the first−and only−time that Anya had burped in front of Quinn. Not a little tiny pass of gas, no. It had been a full on loud and unexpected burp. But it had been her excuse that had made him laugh out loud. “It’s because we mixed our foods,” she’d said.
Loving food, Anya had learned that mixing certain foods caused different reactions in your body and how it processed them. She di
dn’t live by this rule, however she was aware of it. When she explained the theory to Quinn he had laughed so hard that he’d had to sit up. He hadn’t believed her or he’d thought it was ridiculous. Either way, he never said, but he held her soda out to her and said, “This is your villain. The bubbly soda you drank.” He laughed again and kissed her. From there it had turned into a night of lovemaking.
Anya mentally shook the thoughts away and pulled the key card for her suite out of her pocket.
“Now I see why my dad paid you the big bucks. You don’t miss anything, do you?”
“I missed you,” he whispered so low Anya wasn’t sure she’d heard him correctly.
She’d been about to tell him it was too risky to go through her family’s living quarters, but she stopped short at his admission.
Anya’s eyes flew to his.
Concentrating on finding her key and hobbling up the stairs, she hadn’t realized how close they were until their faces almost touched now. She felt the warmth of his front pressed up against her. His hip leaned against the door frame, with one arm hovering above them encasing them in a cocoon.
Quinn tilted his body closer and she felt the warmth of his breath kiss her cheek and she wished it were his lips.
For a brief moment she wished it was two years ago, before the night that tore them apart.
His hand reached over and brushed the piece of hair that had been yanked out of her ponytail by the unforgiving branch. He tucked it behind her ear and his hand lingered there, cupping the back of her head.
When he spoke, he whispered the words through raw emotion that convinced her he wasn’t lying. “Not a single day has gone by since you left that I haven’t thought about you. Or saw your beautiful eyes, longed for your touch, or the quirkiness about you that made me smile when everything around me dragged me down. I had hoped you had found something better than what I had to offer.”
Had she briefly fallen asleep in the cabin and was dreaming? That was the most emotion she’d ever heard come out of Quinn. Ever.
And what the hell did it mean? What was he saying? Was he going to kiss her?
Kiss me. No, don’t kiss me. Do it, there’s a bed just through this door.
The file could wait...couldn’t it? She hadn’t felt this alive in years. Or this scared. Or...
Anya swiped her key card. “Did you misunderstand what a fling meant when you brushed us off as nothing more than sex between your hours at the office?” she asked, flinging his exact words back at him.
She didn’t wait for his reaction, quite frankly she couldn’t. He was sending her mixed signals as if her life wasn’t already complicated enough and then add his...his...she didn’t even know what to call whatever this was.
Anya turned the knob and ducked underneath his arm, escaping the grasp of his stare.
Walking into her familiar foyer, she trembled, heading directly to the back door.
She didn’t glance down the hall where she’d made love to Quinn too many times to count, or to the couch, or the dining room table...
She didn’t dare look anywhere near the kitchen where she was fighting the other part of her that would rather gather the pots and pans and chop food for hours. Too many memories and emotions in this suite that she didn’t have time to deal with. Rebecca trumped them all.
Anya quivered again opening the back door and stepping into the warmth of the tropical indoor pool area. Once a magnificent relaxing area, today it offered no comfort.
Waiting for Quinn to catch up−he was taking his sweet time−she glanced around the dim room noticing darkness from each of her family’s suite windows.
Quinn stopped inside her suite door.
“You have the key right?” she asked, realizing he still hadn’t given it to her.
Quinn glowered down at her. “I was not finished talking in there.”
Anya folded her arms across her chest. “I didn’t know we came here to talk.”
He glanced around the pool room still not coming out from her suite.
“Oh it’s clear. Would you relax,” she hissed.
“I want to talk.” He reached for her.
Talk? Talk! Was he mad? There was nothing to talk about.
Anya stepped out of his grasp and took off toward to the main exit on the far side, where her father’s office was just beyond. She still didn’t have the key card Quinn promised, the key to her freedom.
Her feet didn’t get far before the lights around her flared to life.
Doors opened. Footsteps and voices invaded the silence.
Busted.
Anya turned toward the noise to find her mother and Uncle Carl emerging from Eliza’s suite. They didn’t look surprised or alarmed to find Anya walking around the pool room at this early hour.
Questions weren’t asked as they bridged the distance and, the closer they moved, the more awake she realized they were...like they had been waiting for her.
Anya didn’t have to turn and look at Quinn, even though she did, expecting to find his guilty face.
Quinn looked neither guilty nor remorseful for totally turning her in.
That ruthless trader.
“Anya.” Her mother’s voice swirled with emotions deep that Anya pulled her glare away from Quinn.
Oh, she was going to have a word with him later. Or maybe she wasn’t.
Eliza repeated her name as her hands cupped both sides of Anya’s face, kissing each cheek before wrapping her arms around her in a tight embrace.
Anya didn’t pull away or protest the affections of her mother. Her instinct had been to cut off the emotions that her mother’s love brought, but, she’d missed Eliza and there was no denying the soothing reassurance that her mother’s loving arms provided, swathed around like she’d done on many occasions when Anya was little.
Tears burned Anya’s eyes and she closed them, shutting out the demons that resided in her soul. Her arms tightened around her mother, as if begging Eliza to pry into Anya’s life. To silently know that Anya had found some days so hard she couldn’t breathe in the air, let alone live her life.
Anya’s fight to accept the affection was like a thickening substance moving up her throat and causing her to feel sick.
She couldn’t partake in what she didn’t deserve. Not when Rebecca was alone, scared, had no one...and it was all Anya’s fault.
When the time finally came for Anya to part from Eliza, giving her mother a chance to examine her, Anya found that she didn’t want to break the contact. But she smiled and said, “Hi Momma.”
Eliza wiped the tears away from her cheeks and Anya did the same. Eliza’s eyes spoke volumes, asked questions, voiced concern, but surprisingly she didn’t ask anything. Nothing.
“I’m okay,” Anya reassured her and didn’t miss the way her mother’s eyes doubted that was the truth, scanning the length of Anya’s body making her feel like the liar she was.
Anya’s love for pasta and the carbs that went with them had given her the gorgeous defined thick curves that she’d once been proud of. She knew her mother noticed her current weight loss.
“I’m okay,” she repeated.
Carl hugged her next. He had always been closer to her than just an uncle. He’d treated her and her siblings like they were his own children. When Robert had been present at essentially every meal, the same couldn’t be said about the other aspects of his children’s childhood. Robert hadn’t been there for recitals, or practices. He hadn’t hugged them or asked how their day was, but Uncle Carl always had.
Don’t cry. Don’t cry.
“Sweetheart, I’m so glad to see you’re alright.” He kissed the side of her head before letting go. “Welcome home,” he said.
Welcome home? Welcome home! She wasn’t home. Not to stay. She wasn’t even staying the night, but they didn’t know that.
Anya stepped back trying to break the Caliendo family tug. It was hard to deny the strong bond that connected them all.
She could so easily slip back int
o this life and forget the outside world. But it wouldn’t be fair to Rebecca. Anya had to stay focused on her plan.
How was she going to get out of this? How was she going to go free?
Chapter Five
QUINN WOULD HAVE felt guilty for betraying Anya and going back on his word if it hadn’t been the right thing to do.
The intervention was almost as though he had thrown her into the lion’s den, unguarded and unprepared. Only the people waiting for Anya weren’t her enemy and wouldn’t eat her alive. They were her family. They were the people she needed in her life in order to survive.
Whatever the hell she’d been doing on her own was clearly not benefiting her. If Anya didn’t get her act together she wouldn’t survive. But these people would help her. These people would protect her.
He knew Anya was pissed. She’d looked at him only once, long enough to shoot daggers from her eyes right into his heart. Then she’d made it a point not to turn her eyes to him again for the next hour.
Carl had wandered over in his direction long enough to thank him and dismiss him at the same time. Carl was wary of him and Quinn didn’t blame him. Quinn was fully aware that Carl wasn’t in the dark about his on-the-side jobs for Robert. He even considered the possibility that Carl was aware of Quinn’s ulterior motive.
Quinn waited in Anya’s suite with the lights off, sitting in the dark so the rest of her family...or Anya...wouldn’t know he lingered.
If she knew he’d stuck around, Quinn suspected when the time came for the family to separate from the lounging area around the pool, she wouldn’t have come inside her suite.
He watched her from the window as she headed across the marble floors in his direction. He couldn’t get over how frail she looked.
Eliza and Carl watched Anya until she shut the door and he was sure they all wondered if she would be here in the morning. Quinn had given his word to Eliza that morning that he wouldn’t let Anya leave again and if she did, he would track her. He owed Eliza.
Anya didn’t turn the lights on.
Her soft sigh floated into the air and pulled him out of hiding.
