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I just wished that was the worst of it.
“Beck has a history of depression,” I continued. “Medication has helped stabilize him, but fifteen months ago he…”
Fuck, I didn’t even want to say it.
“He what?” Quinn asked, though I could tell by the tone of his voice that he already knew what I was going to say.
“He tried to hang himself.”
Quinn’s eyes slid closed and he covered them with his hand for a moment as he sucked in a deep breath. “Fuck,” he whispered.
I let Quinn have the moment he needed to absorb what I’d told him and I watched the emotions play out on his face when he dropped his hand. I could see that despite that night in the bathroom being a one-night stand thing, like me, it had been more for Quinn too.
“That’s why he kept saying…”
“What?” I asked when Quinn didn’t continue on his own.
Quinn shook his head and rested his forearms heavily on the table. “He kept asking me to tell his fathers it was an accident – that he didn’t do it on purpose.”
“I guess one of his fathers was the one who found Beck that day. He’d come home from work early. If he’d been even a minute later…”
“Jesus fucking Christ!” Quinn ground out as he slammed his hand onto the table, rattling our mugs enough so that coffee spilled over the side of mine. “Sorry,” he muttered when he saw the mess. He reached for a napkin from the dispenser on the table and started cleaning up, but I gently grabbed his hand when I saw how badly it was shaking.
“I got it,” I said quietly.
Quinn didn’t pull his hand free of mine right away and I had the strangest urge to link our fingers. His hand was warm against mine and the rough callouses felt good against my skin. I actually felt the loss when he pulled it back. I turned my attention to cleaning up the mess even as I subtly watched the other man. He looked the part of a cowboy with his black hair, rugged, work-hardened body and tanned skin. His chiseled jaw was covered with the perfect amount of stubble and his gray eyes reminded me of a coming storm. While the encounter in the bathroom had clearly pegged him as an alpha type, the vulnerability I could see in his eyes was intriguing.
“Is he okay?” Quinn asked. “He had a cut on his head.”
I nodded. “He’s fine. He’s got a concussion so he’ll spend the night here for observation. I checked on him before I met you in the lobby. I made sure he didn’t see me,” I added when Quinn shot me a questioning look. “A nurse told me one of his fathers arrived a few hours ago.”
We both sat in silence for a moment before I worked up the nerve to ask, “Do you think maybe he was trying to convince himself he wasn’t gay?”
“What do you mean?” Quinn asked.
“Why else wouldn’t he have wanted the sex to feel good?”
Quinn shook his head. “He walked into that club knowing exactly what he wanted. No hesitation. Someone who was still questioning wouldn’t do that, would they?” Quinn was quiet for a moment. “I thought maybe he got off on the pain, but when I touched him…” He dropped his eyes and shook his head. “Guys who like pain still feel pleasure…he seemed surprised by it…like he’d never even gotten off during sex before.”
I nodded, even though nothing made sense.
Quinn shifted in his seat and then he was picking up the cowboy hat he’d put on the bench next to him when we’d first sat down. “I never should have touched him.”
“Quinn-” I began, but he shook his head.
“I need to go.”
“You’re not going to go see him?” I asked.
“I don’t think that’s a good idea.” Quinn stood and hesitated. “I guess we might be running into each other since we know some of the same people…I just…”
I waited patiently for him to find the words he wanted to say.
“I’m not looking to start anything up,” he finally said. “I go to clubs like that to scratch an itch, nothing more.”
Even though I was of a similar mind when it came to my feelings on sex and relationships, his declaration still bothered me more than I wanted to admit.
“Understood,” I said simply and watched him go, my eyes falling to the sway of his trim hips and tight ass. He really was a good-looking guy, but there was something about him that tugged at something deeper inside of me. He had a certain sadness about him that seemed to be too ingrained to have been caused by the events of the day.
