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“I can’t wait for you to fall in love,” Bethany says with a giggle.
“Me either,” Quinn says. Her giggle turns into full-on laughter. It’s so contagious, I break into a smile. I spend the rest of the night watching her from where I am.
“See something you like?” Ghost murmurs, sidling up next to me. “She’s pretty.”
“Yeah.”
“Gonna make a move?”
“She’s not for me,” I say with a sigh.
“Bullshit!”
“Look at her. Now look at me. We’re from two different worlds,” I tell him.
“You see Abigail, then look at me. We’re from two different worlds. We just care enough to create a world that works for both of us. If she’s the right woman, she’ll fight for you,” Ghost says just loud enough for me to hear him over the music, then walks away.
Then Quinn glances up, and our eyes lock. She does a quick blink, but her gaze holds steady. Her lips part slightly, and I know she’s feeling what I’m feeling. A need. A hunger. Her face flushes, her eyes go wide, taking me deeper into the violet expanse that I want to lose myself in.
What do you do with a woman so perfect that you know one night would never be enough? Should I take the chance and have a night that would have to last me for the rest of my life, or do I walk away knowing that no one and nothing else would ever measure up? I can’t keep her. She’ll find out soon enough about my past. I won’t hide who I am.
Even though I’ve become a good man, I wasn’t once. I swear her eyes are begging me to go to her.
I’ve got to let her go. She’s not for me.Leave!My head tells me to walk away and walk away right the fuck now.
One step.
Two steps.
I find myself standing in front of her, my hand out, waiting for her to place her fingers in mine.
ONE
No Strings
QUINN
Isense eyes on me. As I look around the room, I notice several men glancing in our direction. Then again, they’re looking at all the pretty women, and I think nothing of it. But this feeling I have is a pull, a strong one. I try to shake it off by getting up and dancing with Bethany and the others. That doesn’t ease this fluttering in my stomach as I make my way back to the table.
Bethany is laughing and dancing away. She deserves the happy ending. She and Frankie started off as high school sweethearts. They fell in love, and I wish I could say it was hearts and flowers from start to finish, but it wasn’t. Frankie was determined to hit it big in the music scene. It’s been his dream since I’ve known him. He sacrificed a lot to get where he is, almost at the expense of losing Bethany.
Hanging with record producers who would promise him the world, and drugs, and worst of all, groupies, Frankie was getting in too deep. The whole band was falling down the rabbit hole and into a black abyss. Bethany did the hardest thing she ever had to do, and that was to walk away from him.
I sat with her that night, and every other night until she was able to get back on her feet. Bethany is an accountant. Bethany changed her life to be with Frankie. She decided to work for herself instead of some corporation. She’s always wanted to be her own boss, so she set a schedule that would accommodate Frankie’s music and eventually the family she wanted to have. When things went bad and they broke up, she threw herself into her work, a blessing for the moment. The sadness lingered. Bethany would say and do all the right things, but she wasn’t truly happy without her Frankie.
On the other side, Frankie was a complete and utter mess without his girl. Bethany was his muse. His music suffered; he became unbearable to be around. His band was at their wits’ end when he started drinking hard. It was almost the end of everything he’d worked for. Then he made his biggest mistake. He slept with another woman and woke up the next day completely unaware of who she was and what the hell she was doing there. He confessed all this to his bandmates, and they dragged him to an AA meeting.
Lucien was there that night and recognized the band members. He’d heard about them and would have approached them himself on a record deal, but he’d heard about their wild boys’ reputation and decided against it. Lucien runs a clean label. Having gone off the deep end himself and watched his best friend die in front of his eyes due to drugs and alcohol, he wasn’t going to be part of that, so anyone who signed with his label needed to meet his standards. Seeing Frankie and his buddies at the meeting meant they were ready to make a change.
And here we are today. After a year of wooing Bethany, Frankie succeeded in winning back his girl. Wooing entailed a lot of groveling. The happily ever after exists, but so does the pain of losing one another, which makes their bond that much stronger.
Until tonight, I never understood the connection Bethany keeps saying she has with Frankie. But I feel it in this room now, and when I turn my head and finally set my gaze on the mysterious dark stranger leaning against the wall, a swoosh in my belly hits me like a ton of bricks. I find it hard to breathe. My eyes are glued to his. At first glance, his eyes appear gray, but the longer I stare into them, the more they turn a hazy green. His nose is slightly crooked. He must have broken it at some point. His dark blond hair is cropped short, but the tattoo decorating his neck with a swirl of black ink makes him a sight to behold. He’s any woman’s dream bad boy. From the broad shoulders to the tapered waist to his thighs straining against the denim of his jeans, he’s glorious. And he’s looking right at me.
I’m a reasonable girl. Bethany is all light and magic, but I’ve always been the girl with the plan, weighing the pros and cons. There’s black and white and a whole lot of gray in the world, and this man is walking a fine line right in the middle of it. I feel his heaviness, but more than that, I feel his desire. He’s fighting this too. His jaw tics, and his lips twist like he’s been struck. He’s a lion assessing his prey and wondering if the risk is too great to cross the room and seek out what he wants.
This is the first time, ever, that I want a man to come for me. He glances toward the exit. My heart plummets. A profound loss washes over me. Then he looks my way once more and takes a step in my direction.
He’s coming for me. I hold out hope, knowing my expression is one of stunned disbelief. He extends his hand, palm upward, waiting for me to place mine in his. It’s like my mind and body are possessed, and instinctively, I take his hand. He pulls me to my feet.
