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“What’s wrong with that?” he asked.
“Nothing, but I wanted something different.”
Something he couldn’t deliver. So instead of sex with him, she was talking, and it wasn’t going to get either of them what they wanted.
He should leave. Just get up and go.
When he rolled to his side to do so, she stopped him.
Quinn tugged Logan down next to her on the blanket and rolled so she was facing him. He was complex and always made her...well, feel a million and one things at once. She should let him go. But she didn’t want to.
“Don’t. I can’t do this. I wanted to be chill, but it’s not me,” he said. “I want you. I don’t want to talk or rehash the past. I just want sex and maybe to hold you the rest of the night so I can pretend for a few short hours that things are normal. I know that’s not what you want, and I completely appreciate where you are coming from, but I can’t turn it off. I never have been able to around you.”
God.
This was the one thing she’d never been able to understand about Logan. He played to win but he played from a place of total honesty. Maybe that was why it was so hard to walk away. Even though she knew that if she stayed, she could get hurt, his honesty made her want to try. Try to figure out a way to get what they both wanted.
“I’m not trying to make this harder on you,” she said.
“I know,” he said. “Let me leave. You can go back to the party and I can do what I do best.”
Quinn wondered what he thought he did best, but didn’t ask. There had been too much talking and it hadn’t moved them any closer to sorting anything out. She moved quickly, straddling him and putting her hands on his shoulders.
She saw the surprise on his face, yet couldn’t really read the emotions in those bright blue eyes of his. She didn’t need to. “I want this too. I think I was trying to justify it to myself, but the truth is, it’s been a long time and I’ve missed you, Logan.”
He put his hands on her waist; she felt his fingers squeeze her. “If this isn’t what you want...leave now or let me leave.”
She leaned down then, her lips brushing his before she kissed him long and deep. She pushed her hands into his thick hair and held him underneath her. Pretended for the moment that he was in her control.
His tongue brushed over hers and she shifted on his lap, taking the kiss deeper. She had been kidding herself when she’d thought that she wasn’t going to have sex with him on the beach.
This was Logan. The one man who still haunted her. The guy she’d never been able to really stop judging every other man by. And she needed this. She needed to have sex with him as an adult so she could stop idealizing that college relationship.
She was sure that sex with him would be as mediocre as it had been with all the other guys she’d dated in the last few years. That something had changed in her and there was no going back to those wild years. But she quickly realized how wrong she was as Logan’s hands slipped down the backs of her thighs and he raised himself up, his abdomen tightening underneath her. She wrapped her legs around him and he paused, resting his forehead against hers.
Quinn opened her eyes, stared into his, then closed them again. It was too intense. She felt him all around her, his exhalations brushed over her face as his chest bumped her breasts.
She opened her eyes again and this time he was watching her. “I know what you said, but are you sure?”
That old hurt that had lingered for so long inside her soul started to melt a little bit. He’d given her more chances to walk away than any other man would. “I’m where I want to be tonight.”
“I’m so glad,” he said as he tugged her T-shirt up in the back.
She felt the cool summer breeze on her skin a moment before his warm palm was on the small of her back, just holding her with that one touch as he shifted underneath her. “Are you on the pill? I know that question seems awkward, but I’d rather know now than find out you aren’t at the wrong moment.”
She nodded. “Me too. Yes, I am. Also, I’m healthy, so nothing to worry about on that front.”
“Me too. Just had my yearly physical for the board so I can keep my job as CEO,” he said.
“Glad to hear it,” she said, putting one hand on his shoulder. He looked into her eyes again and something changed inside her. She knew she’d told herself this was to close the door on the past and finally move on from him, but there was something about this that felt new and different. And if she were being honest with herself, it had absolutely nothing to do with the past.
Quinn shoved the thought aside as she felt his hand in her hair, cupping the back of her head as he kissed her again. It was slow and seductive. Not the starter gun at the beginning of the race, but more of a tentative testing of the waters.
Four
The Jack Daniel’s hadn’t really made a dent in his temper or caused him to forget anything, but the touch of Quinn’s lips was doing just that. He shoved everything aside but the fiery redhead in his arms and focused on her as if she were a million-dollar deal he didn’t want to lose.
Her lips were full against his; her hair was soft and smelled like spring when the blossoms in his mother’s orangery bloomed. He held her gently though what he really wanted was to roll her beneath him and let go of all his inhibitions. But he knew that would be too much.
