by Brooks, Anna
“So, is Maddy short for Madeline?” his mom asks.
“Yes. It is.”
“I’m assuming you prefer Maddy since that’s how you were introduced?”
Q pauses with his fork almost to his mouth. “I call her Madeline, but everyone else calls her Maddy.”
His sister’s green eyes bug out of her head, and she hides a smile with her cup as she takes a drink.
“Did you ever ask her if that’s what she wanted to be called, Q?” His mom raises a brow.
He turns and drops his chin to his collar bone. “You like it when I call you Madeline, sweetheart?”
“Yes.” So much that when I confirm, my answer is a sigh. It makes me feel special. I like it almost as much as when he calls me sweetheart.
“That answer your question, Mom?”
She doesn’t get a chance to answer because Tessa clears her throat. “Did you ever ask Q that question, Mom?”
“Shut up, Tessa,” Q growls.
“Wait, what?”
“She doesn’t know?” she asks mischievously.
“Doesn’t know what?” I ask, curious.
She looks at Q, then back at me. “What his real name is.”
“Your real name isn’t Quinten?” I ask in disbelief. I just assumed.
“No, Q is a nickname.” He grunts.
“What’s your real name?”
I’ve never seen him even remotely embarrassed, but a slash of pink tinges his neck, and he looks over at his mother and narrows his eyes with a grin on his lips. “Thanks, Mom.”
“What?” She rests a hand on her heart. “I didn’t do anything.”
“You know exactly what you did when you brought that shit up.”
“Language, young man,” his dad rumbles.
Q runs his tongue across his lips and fights laughter. “My real name is Tanner,” he educates me, totally ashamed.
“Really? That’s a cool name. Why don’t you go by it?”
“It’s a dog’s name.”
“It is not. But he’s so smart that at the age of five, his IQ was already off the charts,” his sister teases him. “So obviously the nickname evolved from there, and whenever someone asked if Q was short for Quinten, he just said yes because of how much he hates Tanner. Very few people actually know his name.”
I nod and bump shoulders with him. “Yeah, I’m seeing that.” There’s a lot that I don’t know about him, which I was well aware of, but I thought that I at least knew his name. It makes me wonder what else I’m going to find out about him.
“Okay, can we stop that shit no—”
“Language,” his dad snaps with no authority whatsoever. It’s like he has to say it because his wife and daughter are in the room, but I have a feeling when the two of them are alone, f-bombs are dropped without the blink of an eye.
“Sorry, Dad.”
“I know!” he exclaims, and I jump. “I see you when I’m getting coffee at the shop down on Main and Vine.”
“Um… I don’t drink coffee.”
Q’s shoulders shake, and I kick him beneath the table. My toe connects with his shin, and he winces.
“Well, darn…” His brows scrunch together, and he actually rubs his chin. “Q told us you were a teacher, so it couldn’t have been at your work that I saw you unless you have a second job.”
I press my lips together and shake my head, but Q drops his head and snorts.
“Did you go to the same school as Tessa?”
Another head shake. “No, I didn’t.”
“Oh, I know. When I was coming—”
“Dad!” Q shouts and slams his fist on the table, laughing so hard he has a legitimate tear rolling down his face. “Stop. Plea… please just stop.”
“Stop what? I was just saying when I was coming out of the parking garage downtown the other day, there was a girl I almost hit with my car who had that same color hair. It wasn’t you, was it?”
I press my lips together and shake my head, then clear my throat. “Nope, not me.”
“Oh good. Hmm.” He takes another bite of chicken, and as soon as he swallows, he points at me. “The gym?”
“Dad, you don’t work out.” Tessa rolls her eyes. “There’s no way you saw her at the gym because all you do when you go there is hang out in the steam room with a bunch of other old men and talk about the good old days.”
He chuckles. “You’re not wrong, but if it’s not the gym or any of those other places, then why do you look so familiar? It’s rather strange that I can’t place you.”
“Like she said,” Q finally stopped laughing. “She gets that a lot, so you more than likely haven’t actually seen her anywhere before.”
“Yeah, probably.” He nods in agreement and lifts his fork to his mouth. “I know! The grocery store!”
* * *
After his dad unsuccessfully continued guessing where he thought he knew me from, his sister took off because she said she needed to get back to Ed, and Q and his dad went into the living room to watch the game. I’m with his mom in the kitchen cleaning up, and it’s actually a task that I love, because I missed out on all this stuff when I was a young girl. I’ve been just chatting with his mother and already know that the more I get to know her, the more I’m going to love her. She’s sweet and kind and… motherly. “I’m so glad you gave him a second chance, darling. He was so upset when you guys broke up, but as they say, time makes the heart grow fonder. Even though it was only what, a couple weeks that you weren’t together.” I can’t believe he told his mom all of this. “Although…” She tilts her head and scrunches her lips. “In some cases, like with his stupid fiancée, Lexi, I hope time made his heart grow a shield from that retched woman.”
Okay. Whoa. Wait. Fiancée? Put the brakes on for a second. He was engaged to someone? He never even mentioned it. And thinking on it, he didn’t ever talk about any of his exes. I recalled a couple of mine, albeit briefly, but he never mentioned any of his.
She keeps rattling on before I can say anything. “Everyone thought they’d be together forever. He did too.” She shakes her head as she continues washing dishes. “Wedding date was set, he bought the house, they had all these plans, and then poof, she just up and vanished one day. She didn’t even have the decency to tell him to his face… cowardly woman. Can you believe she made her poor mother deliver the message?”
“No… I… I can’t.” I hear my voice in my head, but the words come out way meeker than I intended. “He didn’t tell me about her at all.”
Diana must sense my hesitation because her easy-going expression falls. “Oh, Maddy, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said anything. I just assumed that he told you.”
“I would have thought so, too.” I mumble.
“Please, just…” She shuts the water off and grabs a small towel, turning toward me where I’m drying the serving dish. She leans close, her fingers squeezing the towel so hard her knuckles turn white. “Forget I said anything. I shouldn’t have… H-he has his reasons for not telling you, I’m sure, and I’d hate to—”
I pull some strength from deep down and cover her hand with my own. “It’s fine,” I assure her. “I won’t say anything.”
“I’m so sorry.” Her eyes gloss over, and I shake my head.
“It’s fine. Seriously.” I smile. “Already forgotten.”
She sniffles and nods. “Thank you.”
“I do need to use the restroom, though. It’s down the hall, right?”
“Yes.”
“Thanks. Be right back.”
I set the dish down and then head in the direction of the bathroom, and once I find it, I flip the light on and close the door behind me, then pull some air between my lips. Okay, get your shit together. Calm down. I need to calm down because I’m freaking pissed.
How could he keep that from me? Even when I didn’t know who he was, he still told me stuff. He told me about his family, that was the truth. Told me about his job, brought Brodie around. When he kicked that guy’s
ass, he told me he had martial arts training as a kid, and that was the truth.
But in all the time we spent together, the nights alone, whispering in the dark, he never thought to tell me he was engaged. He was going to spend the rest of his life with another woman… He bought a house for them to live happily ever after in? What in the hell?
He has his reasons. As Diana said, I’m sure he has his reasons, so I need to give him the benefit of the doubt and not jump to conclusions. I need to open up to him instead of closing down and protecting myself from a threat that isn’t even there.
That’s what I did two weeks ago, and I’m not going to do it again, not with him. Because I don’t need to protect myself from him. He’s the one who protects me.
I finish up, and I’m making my way back to the kitchen when I notice a half-opened box sitting next to a garbage bag by the back hall with Q’s name on it, his real name, and inside, the edge of a photo. I still hear the water running in the kitchen, so I quickly bend down and open the flap of the box.
I shouldn’t look, but after what his mom told me and considering the fact he knew everything about me when we first met, I feel like it’s only fair.
Inside the box are pictures of Q and a girl… a woman. He’s as handsome as ever and smiling in every one of them. And it’s genuine. I’ve seen him laugh a few times and even smile with happiness, but I’ve never seen him as carefree as he is in these photos.
The woman in the picture is pretty. She has brown hair cut in a really cute bob and a button nose with the most perfectly straight white teeth I’ve ever seen. They look good together, like they fit. I continue digging through and see a few copies of their wedding invitations, a ton more pictures of the two of them, concert ticket stubs, and a flyer to a house. The house he lives in now.
I put everything back and drop my head as anxious, nervous, and fearful energy flows through my veins and webs out until my skin prickles, and the calm I tried to talk myself into vanishes.
The water shuts off, and I quickly stand, wiping my sweaty palms on my jeans. “Where is she?” Q asks, and if I’m not mistaken, there’s a touch of panic in his voice.
“Bathroom.”
I step back into the hallway the moment he turns the corner. “Hey. Everything okay?” He meets me in the middle and lifts one of my hands into his.
“Yep.” He studies me, and I watch as his eyes dart around my face, like he knows I’m lying with the single syllable. So I try humor to throw him off track. “Why wouldn’t it be, Tanner?”
He dips his chin and tsks me. “Girl… you’ll pay for that.”
“Promise?”
One side of his lips tilt up and he steps in toward me, crowding me against the wall. My pulse thrums against my rapidly heating skin, and when his head starts to ascend, we’re interrupted by his father. “Time for dessert!”
Q’s forehead falls against mine, and he rocks it back and forth. “That’s a mood killer if I’ve ever seen one.”
“Yeah.” I sigh.
He kisses my nose. “Go eat quick, so we can get outta here and I can eat you.”
A tingle shoots down my spine, and he pushes his hips into me, showing me exactly what I can look forward to later. Hopefully it’s something I’ll get tonight and every other night for the rest of my life.
Chapter 18
Q
After we came home from my parents, I did what I promised I’d do and ate her out until she screamed my name. She finally got her mouth on my cock, and I nearly exploded the second her lips closed around me.
As much as I wanted to come down her throat, I wanted to be inside her more. So I tossed her on my bed and followed her down, then made love to her. Slow and sweet, something I’ve wanted to do since the first time she threw herself at me.
She’s perfect, and I want nothing more than to be able to sink inside her every day for the rest of my life.
“How did you tell them we met?” Madeline asks me as we’re lying in bed together, drawing me out of the almost unconscious state I’m in as I think about her and the future I hope we’re lucky enough to have.
I push up onto an elbow. “A club.”
“You told your mom a lot. I wasn’t expecting that.”
“Believe it or not, I don’t like lying.” She swallows and looks away, but I grab her chin and turn her head so she’s forced to look at me. “We’re not doing this anymore, Madeline. We’re not going back there everyti—”
“I’m not going back there.”
I rub my thumb across her lip.
“Baby, you just did.”
“Why didn’t you tell me you were engaged?”
Fuck.
I roll to my back and toss my arm over my face, not wanting to have this conversation ever, but definitely not when I’m lying in bed with her.
“Sorry, I shouldn’t have asked.”
“Who said something? My mom?”
She doesn’t answer, so I turn my head to find her biting her lip. “Please don’t be mad at her. She thought I knew, and I promised I wouldn’t say anything.”
“I thought she loved me. Thought I loved her. We dated for a couple of years, and it seemed like the next step. Everything was fine, great actually, since I just bought a house for us and we had a wedding date set. Then one day I came home and the single drawer that she had stuff in was empty.” I shrug like it didn’t kill me, but it’s hard to mask that kind of pain no matter how hard anyone tries. When she only brought enough to fill a single drawer in my dresser, I should have known. “I went crazy at first, thinking something happened to her, but found out rather quickly through her mother that she just wasn’t happy and didn’t have the guts to tell me to my face, so she left.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I’m not. She wasn’t the first, Madeline. All my relationships ended that way, with me thinking everything was fine and then getting dumped one day out of nowhere. After Lexi, that was my fiancée, I figured something was inherently wrong with me and gave up trying to date at all.”
She presses her lips together.
“What?”
“Nothing I just… is that why you said the whole thing about hooking up that night?”
“You aren’t the only one who’s pushed people away to protect yourself.” I shrug and hate that she has to see this side of me. “I know it’s weak, but I never even wanted to try again, not until I saw you.”
She shakes her head. “Protecting yourself isn’t weak.”
“I never knew why. I thought I did everything right; I could have sworn they were happy. But I was always proven wrong. Like, legit out of the blue they’d just say it was them and not me and—”
“It was,” she interrupts me and rolls over so she’s lying on top of me. “It was them. You’re the best, Q. Seriously. Look how long I went before I gave in. No matter what you think or what happened, I would have found my way back to you in some way or another. You might not have been perfect for them, but I’m glad because you’re perfect for me, and that means you’re all mine.”
“I’m supposed to be the one who says shit like that.”
She rolls her eyes and clears her throat. “Change of subject, but can I ask you a favor?”
“You can ask me anything, and if it’s in my power to do it, I’ll do it. And even if it’s not, I’ll find a way.”
“It’s been bugging me, and I just… I feel responsible and I worry. I don’t know if you can or not, but I thought that—”
“Just ask me, sweetheart.”
“Can you find out where Connor is and if he’s safe?”
I was hoping I’d be able to get a few more reassurances, but I already have an answer that I know she’ll be happy with. “He’s good. The foster home he’s in is with a nice older couple.”
“How do you know that?”
“I knew you’d want to know, so I looked into it.”
She stares openly at me for a minute, and I worry that I said something wrong. “I can’t believe I
wasted all that time being mad at you for no reason.”
“You had a reason.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“You don’t need to apologize again. You don’t need to go back there. Neither of us do. It was what it was, and as much as I hate that you were hurt, it happened. Soon enough, we’ll be able to put all this shit behind us and just move forward together. It’s so good now. We’re so damn good together. Just think of how phenomenal it’ll be when all this is over.”
She puts her palm on my cheek and rubs her thumbs over my five o’clock shadow. “I don’t know if it can get any better.”
That means I’m doing my job because she’s happy and not feeling all the shit that’s stirring around her. It’s excellent. It’s precisely what my goal has been from day one. No fear. Just joy and love and security. All I want her to feel right now is us. I just want her to feel me.
* * *
“Spread.”
Her lazy eyes flutter open at my command, and she parts her legs. I slide my hand down her chest, over her stomach, and between her legs, where I trace my finger over the cotton of her panties. “Morning.”
“Morning,” she sighs when I press in, finding the wetness I was looking for.
I push the fabric aside and tease my finger between her slick folds. “You ready, or do you need me to play with you more?”
She pushes her hips up with a mewl. “I’m ready.”
“Yeah?” I drop my forehead to hers, watching her eyes dilate as I slide two fingers inside her and fuck her with them. “I can feel how ready you are.”
“Q.”
“Maddy.”
“God.” Her thighs shake, and I rotate my hand, letting my knuckles graze her clit. “Jesus, Q.” She presses into me and reaches up, holding the back of my head and gripping my bicep with her nails. I feel a tear in my flesh and look over to see she’s punctured my skin. That’s hot as hell. I love knowing I make her so turned on she loses control. It makes my cock weep to be inside of her.
Removing my hand, I grab the crotch of her panties and tug them down as far as I can, then wait for her to kick them off. “Keep spread for me.”
