Always My Girl (The Shaughnessy Brothers) (9 page)

“Oh thank God,” Zoe cried, pulling Anna into her arms. “Are you okay?”

“I…I don’t know. I think so,” Anna said. The sound of a loud crash had her looking over Zoe’s shoulder. “What’s going on?”

“I’m sorry. I really tried to stop him, but—”

“Oh my God…is that Quinn?” Anna tried to step around Zoe, but she held her firm. “Zoe?”

“Sweetie, don’t, okay?”

“Why is he here? And why is he beating up Jake?”

“We’ll talk about it later. Let’s get you home.”

Anna’s head was starting to clear. She managed to outmaneuver Zoe and headed toward where Jake and Quinn were pounding on one another.

“You son of a bitch!” Quinn snarled. “Is this the only way you can get women to go home with you?”

“Screw you,” Jake spat.

“I will end you,” Quinn said and got in one more punch before Aidan pulled him off.

“That’s enough!” Aidan said, yanking his brother back. “The last thing you want is to make this worse.”

Quinn broke free and turned on him. “
Worse?
This asshole drugged Anna!”

“You don’t know that,” Aidan said, trying to be the voice of reason.

“He’s done it before,” Quinn said, his breathing ragged. “Granted, it was years ago, but…it’s why she’s sick right now.”

Neither of them noticed Anna’s approach. “You knew he drugged girls?” she asked, her voice small and shaky as she came to stand in front of Quinn. “You knew and you didn’t tell me?”

“Anna, that’s not… I didn’t think… I had no idea you would actually go out with him.”

She slapped him hard across the face.

The room went silent.

She looked over to where Jake was sprawled out on the floor and felt her insides lurch again. Placing a hand on her stomach, she forced herself to breathe through it. Then she returned her focus to Quinn and almost smiled at the red handprint on his cheek. “Honestly, the
one time
you don’t warn me off a guy.”

Quinn reached for her, but she stepped away. “Anna…I’m sorry. Please. Let me explain.”

She turned and spotted Zoe, who was now standing next to Aidan. “I’d really like to go home now.”

Without a word, Zoe took Anna’s hand and together they walked out of the bar.

Five minutes later, Aidan and Quinn came out, their expressions grim. “You should have taken her home,” Aidan said softly to Zoe when they got close enough.

“We needed to make sure the cops weren’t coming and that you were okay,” Zoe replied. “Everything okay in there?”

“We just wanted to talk to the manager and apologize for what happened. Sort of.” Aidan turned and took Anna in his arms. “You okay, kiddo?”

She nodded and let out a shaky breath. “Yeah. I’m going to be okay. The fresh air is really helping.”

“Come on, we’ll take you home,” Aidan said and turned them toward his car. “We’ll pick up your car in the morning.”

“No,” Quinn said. “I’ll take her home.”

“Quinn,” Aidan warned. “This isn’t the time. Let it go for tonight.”

“No,” he repeated, more firmly this time. “Please.”

Aidan looked at Zoe and then Anna. When she nodded silently, Aidan kissed her on the top of the head and stepped away. “Call us if you need anything,” he said as he put his arm around Zoe, watching as Quinn stepped forward and put his own arm around Anna. She immediately moved away and Aidan and Zoe couldn’t help but smile.

“I think she’s going to be okay,” Zoe said quietly.

“Are you kidding me? She’s going to be great. I just wish we could be flies on the wall to watch her do to him what he just did to Jake.”

* * *

The entire ride was spent in silence.

Anna couldn’t wait to just get home, take a shower, and put the whole night behind her. It probably wasn’t the smartest idea, letting Quinn be the one to take her home, but she knew him well enough to know that if she hadn’t let him, he would have shown up eventually to check on her. Maybe now she could just get it out of the way and be done with him for tonight.

“Thanks for the ride,” she said as soon as the car came to a stop in her driveway and reached to open the door. When Quinn shut the car off and she heard the jingle of keys, Anna turned and faced him with disbelief. “What are you doing?”

“I’m coming in with you,” he said gruffly, his expression tinged with anger.

“Um…no, you’re not. It’s been a bad night and I didn’t invite you in.” Quickly, she climbed from the car and walked up to her front door. Quinn was beside her in an instant.

“Seriously?” she said over her shoulder. He didn’t budge or even react, so she opened the door and stepped inside.

Quinn shut the door behind him and watched her move around the house. “What’s going on, Anna?”

Without looking at him, she nervously fluttered around, hoping he’d take the hint and just leave. “It’s been a long night. I’ve got a headache and I just want to go to bed.”

“Do you feel all right? I mean…do you still feel sick from—?”

“From the drug your friend slipped me?” she asked sarcastically.

Quinn cursed. “Damn it, Anna, I swear it never occurred to me he’d do something like that again. It was years ago and it was never proven, but he’d been accused of it.”

“You should have told me,” she said defensively. “You heard him ask me out in your shop that day and you didn’t think to warn me? I mean, what the hell, Quinn? You warn me off guys all the damn time! You once told me not to go out with a guy because he liked to listen to jazz music, and you didn’t think telling me Jake had a history of drugging women was important enough to mention?”

“Okay, I’ll admit it, I screwed up! You can’t possibly know how sorry I am, but…come on. I’ve apologized. What more do you want from me?”

She stared at him hard. “I want you to leave.”

“No.”

Her brown eyes widened with disbelief. “Excuse me?”

“I’m not leaving. I think it’s time you and I sat down and talked.”

“I don’t want to sit and talk, Quinn. I’m fine. I just want to go to bed.”

He stepped farther into the room. “Quit shoveling, Anna.”

“Shoveling? What the heck does that even mean?” she asked, looking up at him from across the room.

“I know when you’re lying and when you’re just shoveling bullshit around. So spill it. I know you’re dying to light into me about tonight. And normally you wouldn’t have held back this long. You haven’t been acting like yourself lately and you’ve been blowing me off and I want to know why.”

Anna rolled her eyes. “Okay, for starters, yes, I would like to light into you, but in case you haven’t noticed, I’m not quite feeling like myself. I had to stick my finger down my throat to get whatever was in that drink out of me. Excuse me if my feeling like hammered shit hasn’t allowed me to put all my attention on you.”

“Anna—”

“And for the record, I haven’t been blowing you off, Quinn. Sheesh. Has it ever occurred to you that I have a life and I have better things to do than wait on you?”

“You’ve been there for every move and every store opening I’ve done in the tri-state area. It’s a whole new phase for me starting now and you’ve hardly come by. And the one time you do come by, you spend the entire time flirting with Jake. And look how that worked out for you.”

“You bastard,” she hissed, ready to smack him again. “You’re seriously going to stand here and lecture me? Now? Do you have any idea how scared I was tonight?”

He immediately apologized. “I…I am so sorry. You’re right. That was a low blow. I don’t know what I was thinking.” They stood in silence, facing one another. “You’re just never around anymore.”

A million retorts were on the tip of her tongue—most were childish—so she went for the basics. “I have a new job, a new career. I don’t have time to play cheerleader for you and bake cookies. Besides, you have more than enough people around you helping out.” Turning her back to him, she put her purse on the kitchen table and then walked in the direction of her bedroom. “Be sure to lock up on your way out.”

Closing her bedroom door, she silently prayed she’d ticked him off enough to make him leave. Maybe something would go her way tonight. With a sigh, Anna kicked off her shoes, walked over to her dresser, and pulled out her pajamas. Without a thought to keeping her room neat, she stripped right there on the spot and walked to the en-suite shower, turned the hot water on full blast, and stepped in. It wasn’t about relaxing or luxuriating; it was simply about washing the night off of her.

It would have been easy to just stand there and cry, but she didn’t even have the energy for that. With swift efficiency, she shampooed her hair and soaped her body from head to toe. She stood under the spray until the water cooled.

Stepping out, she dried off and pulled on her flannel pajama pants and slipped the cami over her head. A quick glance in the mirror showed a very tired, very defeated woman. After taking a minute to towel-dry her hair and brush her teeth, she sighed.

“It figures the only kind of guy I’d attract with any ease is a psychopath,” she muttered. Kicking her discarded towel aside, she shuffled back into the bedroom, and when she had nothing left to do, she contemplated going back out to the living room.

She no longer had a headache.

And she wasn’t tired.

She could only hope Quinn was gone.

Off in the distance, she heard the ding of the microwave and sighed with defeat. Not only had the jerk not left, but he was clearly making himself at home. She pulled the door open and spotted Quinn walking across the room with a large bowl in his hands. “What do you think you’re doing?”

“I made us some popcorn. I haven’t had any time to just chill in a while, so I thought we’d watch a movie.”

“Didn’t you hear me? I’m tired. I want to be alone.” She said the words, but there was little force behind them.

“I’m not going anywhere,” he said defiantly. If it were anyone else, she would have thrown him out on the spot. But this was Quinn, the one guy she could talk to about anything.

“Quinn,” she whined. “I think I’ve earned the right to be alone after the night I’ve had. Can’t you just for once deal with not getting your own way?”

“This isn’t about getting my own way,” he said quietly, his voice thick. “This is about making sure you’re okay.”

“Well, I’m not, okay?” she cried. “I went out on a date I really didn’t want to go on and the guy was a freak! Even if it weren’t for the fact that he slipped something into my drink, he was a complete ass! He only talked about himself!”

“Then why’d you go out with him?”

“Why not?” she said, self-loathing lacing her tone. “He was a good-looking, successful man and he wanted to go out with me. He called me every day for a week. I figured what harm could one date do?” She gave a mirthless laugh. “Well, now I know, don’t I?”

“Anna—”

“No, it’s the truth. Clearly, the only guys who want to go out with me are freaks. Banner day for Anna Hannigan!”

“That’s not true and you know it.” His expression softened. “I’m so sorry. I really don’t even know what to say. It’s not like Jake and I are really good friends. We’re just doing business together. It wasn’t until you called Zoe that I even remembered the incident when he…you know…years ago. Please tell me you forgive me, Anna. Please.”

She was completely torn. It would have been so easy to just say yes and forgive him, but she also knew that if she did, it would just take her back to where she had been before.

It was a no-win situation no matter what she did.

“Come on, Anna. Just come and sit on the couch. You can have the sectional and relax.” He put the bowl down on the coffee table and turned back toward the kitchen to grab some drinks. “And besides,
Monty Python and the Holy Grail
is on.”

Dammit. That movie was one of her weaknesses and judging by the smirk on Quinn’s face, he knew it.

Jerk.

“Fine. Whatever,” she muttered and walked over and flopped down on the couch.

With a full-blown grin, Quinn sat down and picked up the bowl of popcorn and put it between them before reaching for the remote and turning to the movie.

As much as she wanted to be pissed, the scene was oddly comforting—probably because it was something they’d done since they were kids. It just sucked that she wanted more—wanted Quinn to see her as a woman instead of a buddy. A lover instead of a friend.

It didn’t take long for them to settle into the movie and soon they were laughing and quoting lines right along with the actors. Anna snuggled with her favorite throw and found that the more comfortable she got, the heavier her eyelids felt. She thought she could hold out until the end of the movie, but the reality was she was practically asleep.

Quinn looked over at Anna and smiled. He didn’t know what had been going on with her lately, but he missed her. There were a ton of questions he’d wanted to ask her tonight, but he had decided to just let them go and do what he could to get her to relax around him and to try and erase the thought of what could have happened to her.

Beside him, Anna sighed and began to lean toward him. If he didn’t do something, she was going to fall face-first into the popcorn bowl. He quickly scooped it up and put it on the coffee table—and froze with shock when Anna shifted and lay down with her head in his lap. It took a moment for the shock to wear off, and then he slowly let himself relax. The last time they had been like this had been the night before Aidan and Zoe’s wedding and at least he had had a pillow acting as a buffer then.

“Not a big deal,” he muttered and shifted to get them both a little more comfortable. The movie was almost over, and it didn’t take long for him to get pulled back into the plot while he mindlessly played with Anna’s hair. When the movie ended and he realized what he’d been doing—again—he pulled back like he’d been burned. He cursed. “I have
got
to stop doing that!”

“Anna?” he whispered, but she didn’t move. He muttered under his breath and tried to think of what he should do. He knew he needed to leave—it was late and he had a lot to do at the new shop early in the morning—but he didn’t want to disturb her.

The scene was eerily familiar and was seemingly becoming a habit for them.