Broken, p.29
Broken, page 29
“You’ve got a bad habit of taking my belongings, Quinn.” She scowled at him.
He tossed the sunglasses in the direction of Morgan’s desk, not looking away from her face. Damn it, how could he have made the mistake he’d made? The face might technically look the same, but there was a strength in Sam’s that the woman in the wedding picture hadn’t had. Strength. Pride. Determination . . . everything that made her Sam.
Everything that made her the woman he’d fallen so hard for.
He swallowed the knot in his throat and forced the apology out. “I’m sorry.”
“Oh, really?” She cocked her head and rocked back on her heels as she studied him. “What exactly are you sorry for?”
“For what I did. For what I was going to do. For not trusting you.” He wanted to touch her, so bad. Wanted to brush that hair back from her face, look into those amazing eyes. Hold her against him. He didn’t, though. He needed to get this done, and if he touched her, she was likely to belt him one. And if by some slim chance she didn’t lay into him, he didn’t know if he’d get the apology out because he was likely to be all over her—glass walls or not. “I don’t trust people. I don’t like trusting people. But that’s my problem—not yours—and you shouldn’t have to deal with my problems.”
“Did you want to trust me?”
“What in the hell do you think?” he snapped. That cool, disconnected tone of hers was really starting to piss him off.
She shrugged and turned away from him to restlessly pace the carpeted floor. “Frankly, Quinn, I don’t know what to think.” She sighed and pushed a hand through her hair. She paced as far as she could and pivoted, started back up the floor.
She didn’t look at him—stared straight ahead, but Quinn suspected she wasn’t looking at anything outside the expanse of windows. She was seeing things within her own mind. Whatever she was thinking about left her face looking grim, resigned.
Quinn found himself remembering the way she always paced before she’d go on one of her runs, bracing herself. Mental pep talks—
“What was the deal with the running?” he asked.
Sam jerked her shoulder in a shrug. “Sarah and I are twins—technically, we’re identical, but we haven’t looked much alike since eighth grade. Sarah was the golden girl, cheerleader, ran track. When we hit puberty . . .” Her voice trailed off and she blushed. Spinning around to face him, she stared at a point over his shoulder. “I ended up having some issues and had to go on the pill, put on weight.”
She paused but Quinn didn’t need her to fill in any more blanks. He’d already suspected it. “You were doing it so you could pass yourself off as your sister. Why?”
“Isn’t it obvious?” she asked, her voice dry. “I had to face him, Quinn. I had to. I had to try to make him stop, try to make him let my sister go.”
“He abused her.”
“On a regular basis. Not at first, and he was good at hiding it, and Sarah was so ashamed. He was very good at isolating her—I should have known—”
“How?” Quinn’s heart clenched. That shattered, angry look on her face was going to haunt him. Just one more ghost to keep him company late at night. “You’re not a mind reader.”
She scowled. “You don’t have sisters, do you?”
“No. But I’ve got a brother.” He rubbed the heel of his hand over the ache in his chest as he started to pace. Unaware of Sarah’s intense gaze, he continued, “There’s been a time or two when he’s had things going on in his life—bad things. Things I felt like I should have been able to stop, or at least control. Times when he’s had problems going on and he kept quiet about them. I know what it’s like to feel like there’s something you can do to make things better, but it isn’t always possible. Besides, in the long run, you did help her, right?”
“Not enough,” she said, her voice cold and hard.
“Why not? You got her away, right? This taking off thing, was it her idea or yours?”
Sam just stared at him.
He wanted to make it better for her . . . and he knew he couldn’t. “She’s safe. She’s alive. She’s away from him. That’s going to have to be enough for you.”
Those eyes of his were somber, intense. Sam tore her gaze away from him and braced against the pain in her heart, a pain that slowly, insidiously crept through her body. Looking at him, she ached to touch him. She couldn’t. There was too much going on inside her head, too many thoughts to process, too many emotions to understand.
She needed to get away from him, get herself under control. But she had a question first. Looking at him over her shoulder, she asked, “How did you find out?”
Thick lashes lowered, shielding his gaze from her. A dull, ruddy flush crept up his neck, until it had stained his cheeks. “I saw your picture.”
Sam stared at him, confused. “You saw a picture?” she parroted back.
“Yeah. And I figured out there were things going on that I didn’t know jack about. I just knew that the woman I saw in that picture wasn’t the same woman I saw in the wedding picture.”
“I can only imagine what picture you saw that clued you in there.” Sam smirked and stroked a hand down her hip. “Let me guess . . . in the picture, I was a little bit rounder, maybe a little bit dumpy. My hair was anything but blonde or brown—”
She stopped in midsentence as he crossed the carpet to stand in front of her. He wasn’t avoiding her eyes now. No, he was staring at her with eyes that glittered and burned. He caught her chin in his hand, angled her head back. “It was your eyes,” he said gruffly, pressing his thumb to her lips. “You have the eyes of a fighter and your sister doesn’t. I should have seen it right away.”
Now Sam was the one blushing. The heat of him scorched her. All along her front, she could feel the warmth of his body, reaching out to hers, warming everything that had gone cold and tight the minute she realized why he’d tracked her down at the train station in St. Louis. She wanted to melt against him, feel his arms come around her and then she wanted to cry.
She didn’t know if the mess with James Morgan was over. She didn’t know if her sister could come home. She didn’t know if Sarah would ever be safe. But for the first time, it seemed like maybe she could get her life back. Hell, maybe her sister could even find a life.
But Sam didn’t know where to go from here.
Too much emotion, too many fears, all trapped inside her, struggling to break free with tears. But she couldn’t give in. Not with him. Too much had happened between them, and she didn’t know if they could get back to where they had been.
Or if he even wanted to.
The thought of that chilled her.
She pulled free of his grasp, letting her hair fall down to shield her face. Calling on the stubbornness that had gotten her through the past two years, she composed her features and when she looked at Quinn, she had locked down. “I’m not much of a fighter, Quinn.”
Edging around him, she started across the carpet but then stopped. There was still a whole hell of a lot of people out in the lobby, staring in through the glass walls with avid interest. Don was out there, playing the peacekeeper and from what she could tell, he was running interference, too, trying to keep some of the others from barging into the office.
She really wasn’t in the mood for an audience.
“If you’re not a fighter, then why did you come here to face him?”
“Because of my sister,” Sam snapped, turning around and glaring at him.
“Because she wouldn’t stand up to him?”
“She couldn’t. She was terrified of him. The one time she tried to leave him, he came after her and threatened—” She snapped her mouth shut. The ice in Quinn’s eyes was sharp, blade-sharp.
“Threatened what?”
Glaring at him, she said, “Why does any of this matter?”
He ignored the question, his eyes narrowing down on her face. “You. He threatened you. That’s why she finally left him.”
Sam crossed her arms over her chest and averted her gaze.
“She left him because she wanted to protect you,” Quinn murmured. “And you came back here to face him. To protect her. To fight for her because she was too afraid of him hurting you.”
“I don’t need protecting, Quinn. And I came back because I was sick and tired of letting him run our lives.” Swallowing the knot in her throat, she added, “I’m more than capable of taking care of myself.”
“I noticed.” She looked so pissed off. So angry. And somehow, vulnerable. Quinn hated seeing that broken, confused look in her eyes. Hated knowing she was still worrying, still scared.
He shoved his hands in his pants pockets. It was that, or reach for her. Haul her close. Maybe go to his knees and tell her he was sorry—so fucking sorry. Sorry and desperate—he needed her. With him. Always.
Pride kept him from begging, though. Pride and uncertainty. He felt something for her.
Something—shit, man, you really are a coward. You’re in love with her. Deal with it.
What if she didn’t feel anything?
What if . . . stop. No what ifs, not right now.
“I’m sorry. I don’t know if I can say it enough times to make you believe me, but I am sorry. You are a fighter,” he said, quietly.
“I should have remembered that.”
Sam glanced at him. “You know something, Quinn? If we get right down to it, neither of us really knows the other.”
“Bullshit.” He scowled at her.
Once more, that cool, composed mask settled over her features and she cocked a brow at him. “We don’t know each other. You know as much about me as I know about you. Hell, less. You only know what I’ve let you know. And now, if you don’t mind, I’ve got a million things I need to take care of.”
It’s the truth, Sam insisted. She started for the door and as her heart cried out in agony, she tried to bury the pain under a layer of ice. She had a life and she wanted to get back to it. It was way past time.
“I know you well enough,” Quinn said from behind her.
She ignored him and reached out for the doorknob. Some of the people had finally drifted out of the lobby, but she wasn’t going to be able to slip away unnoticed. That was pretty obvious.
Quinn came up behind her, silent. He reached up and braced a hand over the door, keeping her from opening it. Sam refused to look at him, refused to turn around. “I know what I need to know,” he said gruffly.
He touched her. Sam jumped as he brushed his fingers over her hip. Her heart skipped a few dozen beats, it seemed, and then settled down into a rapid-fire tango, beating madly against her rib cage. But he didn’t linger. All he did was push something into her pocket and then his hand fell away. Automatically, she reached down and patted her pocket, felt the familiar outline of her phone.
He brushed his lips over her cheek and murmured, “I know I fell in love with you . . . and I know I fucked things up. I’m sorry.”
Then he let go of the door.
Sam stood there, numb and frozen. Her mouth opened. “You can’t love me,” she said, her voice rusty.
“Not your call, Sam.”
She tried to force herself to talk, but she couldn’t get a damn thing out. Her throat was frozen. She couldn’t manage even a whisper as he gently nudged her out of the way and then slipped outside.
Frozen, she stood there and watched as he cut through the tangle of bodies and made for the elevator. Frozen, she stood there as he climbed on. Just before the doors closed, he turned and looked at her.
That look in his eyes—naked and bruised.
Hurt.
Broken.
TWENTY
“DEAD?” Quinn repeated, staring at the TV in his hotel room
without really seeing it.
“Yes.” It was Alison Mather on the other line. “He was found this morning by a member of his house staff. There’s nothing official yet, but from what I’ve heard, he put a bullet in his head. Since his crimes were all white-collar, he made bail.”
She paused then sighed. “The cops had a solid case against him. There was no way he’d go to prison, arrogant prick—should have known he’d try this.”
“Look at it this way . . . he saved the taxpayers some money.”
“Hmmm. True. Dad’s rather pleased with that part, I’ll say.”
Since he hadn’t gotten the name of the lawyer who had been there when James Morgan was arrested, Quinn had tracked down Alison Mather’s number, kept in contact with her.
It had been a week since he’d walked away from Sam, but he hadn’t left Chicago. He hadn’t been able to, not until he knew she’d be safe. Morgan had been released on bond—Quinn hoped he would try to disappear, because he wanted to get his hands on the bastard who had put Sam through such hell.
Hadn’t happened, though, and now Quinn knew why. The man had a serious, solid case against him and even if he didn’t do jail time for some of the more serious white-collar crimes, he’d be a long time in recovering, if it ever happened. A number of his employees had bailed on him, and several of the board members were also looking at charges.
James Morgan was an arrogant bastard—Quinn had known that the moment he saw the man. If he couldn’t live his life the way he wanted, he’d just end it.
“Does Sam know?” he asked.
“Yes. I spoke with her a little while ago.”
“And her sister . . . ?”
“Sam said she’d let Sarah know. I wouldn’t know how to reach her—Sam did a damn good job of putting her under.”
In the past week, Quinn had done everything he could to learn as much about Samantha McElyea as possible. She and Alison had actually known each other in college, and from what Quinn had been able to put together, they had done a number of charity-type things together over the years.
Sam was a nurse, a fact that didn’t surprise him. He’d suspected she had some sort of medical background the day he’d gotten that black eye. She worked with battered women and children at a shelter, and although nobody had really confirmed it, he suspected she was also responsible for helping abused women disappear.
Women like her sister.
It wasn’t any wonder that she’d managed to stay hidden for two years. She knew all the tricks.
“Are things with Sam going to be okay?”
“There are some issues, but I know some people.” Alison didn’t pretend ignorance. Disappearing came with consequences. Things like losing a home, possessions. She’d spent those two years getting paid under the table, which meant she could be looking at trouble with the IRS. “We’ll get things worked out.”
“Thanks.”
“Sam’s a friend of mine. No need to say thanks.” She hesitated and then asked, “Are you going to try to talk to her?”
It was the first time she’d asked, although Quinn wasn’t surprised. Since he’d been calling her every day to check on things about Morgan, it wasn’t like the woman could ignore the obvious. “There’s no reason to,” he said.
No reason. He’d told Sam he’d fallen in love with her, and her only response had been, You can’t love me.
When he’d walked away, she hadn’t stopped him. Hadn’t so much as said his name. And she hadn’t tried to call him, either.
Definitely no reason to try talking to her again.
Shoving a hand through his hair, he scanned the small hotel room where he’d been living for the past week. It was time to go home.
Morgan couldn’t hurt Sam now.
Her sister could come home.
No reason for him to talk to her . . . and no reason for him to stay.
“HE checked out?”
The woman behind the counter couldn’t have looked more bored. She sat with her feet propped up and a book in hand. So far, she hadn’t taken her nose out of that book to look at Sam even once.
“When did he check out?” Maybe he was still in Chicago—
“Yesterday.” She said it without even looking away from the book.
Waited too long . . . Gritting her teeth, Sam barely managed to keep from grabbing the book and hurling it across the room. “You’re sure it was yesterday?”
“Positive.”
Sam left without another word, feeling oddly deflated. Up until she’d met Alison for coffee yesterday evening, Sam hadn’t even realized he was still here. He hadn’t left her—
But she’d waited too long. If she hadn’t spent the night replaying things through in her mind, if she’d just listened to her gut, she might have . . .
“Might have what?” she muttered as she made her way to her car. Well, not hers—her car had been repossessed. Fortunately her house hadn’t—she’d paid the house off with money she’d gotten after Mom died. She was borrowing one of Alison’s cars.
“You keep doing me favors, I might as well sign over my first-born to you,” Sam had told her yesterday while they drank coffee and ate yummy cheesecake at a little café close to the Sears Tower. “Hell, after what you’ve done the past few years, watching James and all, I probably already owe you my first-born. And a kidney.”
“My kidneys are good, thanks. As to the first-born, you might want to run that by the potential dad first.” Then Alison had grinned at her. “I’m curious who that might be . . . maybe Mr. Hot and Sexy that you still haven’t talked about?”
Hot and sexy . . . yeah, that was Quinn. Hot and sexy and so much more. She couldn’t even begin to describe the complicated mess of Quinn Rafferty. And now she didn’t even have a chance to try and talk to him.
He was gone.
“So you’re just going to let him leave?”
Sam slumped against the car door, staring at the hotel without really seeing it. It was on the outskirts of Chicago, in a less-than-nice neighborhood. Not exactly the kind of place where she’d been nervous to go, but definitely not the sort of neighborhood where she’d feel safe walking alone at night.
He’d left.
But she could go after him.
