Sunset Rivalry: The Caliendo Resort (By The Lake: The Caliendo Resort Book 2) (5 page)

Welcome home? Welcome home!
She wasn’t home. Not to stay. She wasn’t even staying the night, but they didn’t know that. 

Anya stepped back trying to break the Caliendo family tug. It was hard to deny the strong bond that connected them all.

She could so easily slip back into this life and forget the outside world. But it wouldn’t be fair to Rebecca. Anya had to stay focused on her plan. 

How was she going to get out of this? How was she going to go free? 

QUINN WOULD HAVE felt guilty for betraying Anya and going back on his word if it hadn’t been the right thing to do.

The intervention was almost as though he had thrown her into the lion’s den, unguarded and unprepared. Only the people waiting for Anya weren’t her enemy and wouldn’t eat her alive. They were her family. They were the people she needed in her life in order to survive.

Whatever the hell she’d been doing on her own was clearly not benefiting her. If Anya didn’t get her act together she wouldn’t survive. But these people would help her. These people would protect her.

He knew Anya was pissed. She’d looked at him only once, long enough to shoot daggers from her eyes right into his heart. Then she’d made it a point not to turn her eyes to him again for the next hour.

Carl had wandered over in his direction long enough to thank him and dismiss him at the same time. Carl was wary of him and Quinn didn’t blame him. Quinn was fully aware that Carl wasn’t in the dark about his on-the-side jobs for Robert. He even considered the possibility that Carl was aware of Quinn’s ulterior motive.

Quinn waited in Anya’s suite with the lights off, sitting in the dark so the rest of her family...or Anya...wouldn’t know he lingered.

If she knew he’d stuck around, Quinn suspected when the time came for the family to separate from the lounging area around the pool, she wouldn’t have come inside her suite.

He watched her from the window as she headed across the marble floors in his direction. He couldn’t get over how frail she looked.

Eliza and Carl watched Anya until she shut the door and he was sure they all wondered if she would be here in the morning. Quinn had given his word to Eliza that morning that he wouldn’t let Anya leave again and if she did, he would track her. He owed Eliza.

Anya didn’t turn the lights on.

Her soft sigh floated into the air and pulled him out of hiding. 

Her head twisted in his direction as he stepped out of the shadows of the dining room, six feet away from her right.  

She straightened, her body inhaling a deep breath before turning on pot lights that only lit the living room to her left. 

They stood in silence staring at one another.

Anya didn’t try to hide her anger, not that she would be good at it if she had.

Nothing had really changed in the situation between them. He still needed his file, which meant he needed her to show him the exact location of the file room. She still needed him. Quinn had the key card, which he was aware she could easily obtain another one from her family, but he had one bargaining chip left. Quinn had access to the security system.

Anya finally moved, but her eyes stayed on Quinn. She closed the distance between them, her step unwavering and her jaw clenched tight, tugging the delicate features of her face. 

She stopped in front of him and her open hand forcefully slapped him across the face.

He didn’t move at the contact, but flinched at the stinging that lingered...and what was coming.

“You did this. You son of a bitch,” she accused. “Who do you think you are?
God?
You had no right to run to my mother and tattle like a little child.” 

Tattle like a little child?
Did she honestly think his intentions were so dense it was childlike? He was
protecting
her.

And right now, crossing her arms so tightly across her chest he was surprised she could breathe
, she
was the one acting like the little child...maybe it was about time someone told her so.

“Running your body on empty, living in a cabin that is ready to crumble to the ground and sneaking around instead of being up-front and talking to your family
are
juvenile acts. If you stop acting like a child people won’t treat you like a child.” 

Anya grunted.

“You are one to talk. You’re here for the exact same reason as me.
A file.
I could have told them exactly what you were up to after that shit you pulled tonight.”

But she hadn’t and it was because she needed him.

Quinn cut into her ramble. “But the fact you’re hiding and lying to them, desperate to get a file,
like a child
, indentifies and sums up your maturity.”

Her mouth fell open and she shook her head.

“Do you even hear yourself Barker? You secretly dig up dirt on people for money.
Money.
” She said the word like it was a pathetic motive, but being a Caliendo she didn’t understand what it was like to be poor. Quinn’s actions had nothing to do with money, but it was his dad’s greed that had.

Quinn hated going down the conflicting road of his father, Max’s actions, still loving a man who put Quinn’s siblings at risk. Quinn even understood his motives, but couldn’t relate to his idiocy at allowing money to sway Max onto Robert’s private payroll.

Anya continued her angry rage against him with no idea that his memories were constricting his chest.

“You unearth secrets about people that will destroy them. Sure, some information might be illegal and maybe those people deserve what they got, but who are you and my dad to decide the punishment for their actions? And what about all the innocent people whose path accidently cross my father’s? You screwed them.” She pointed a finger at him and stepped closer. “And trust me, every single person that you assisted my father with, he took that information and destroyed them, their families...their entire lives. That’s on you Quinn.” 

Quinn sucked in a deep breath of air, angry that he needed to do so in front of her. But damn this woman did not understand and he couldn’t tell her.

When he’d been met with her tear-stained face, two years ago, accusing him of being just like her cruel father, Quinn had kept the truth about Robert’s involvement in the death of his sister from her.

When Anya’s pleading eyes begged him to tell her that he was nothing like her heartless monster father, Quinn couldn’t reveal to her that he’d build a barrier around his emotions to keep the heartaches at bay.

He also hadn’t told Anya that she was the only woman who had ever touched his soul and the only person he had ever
wanted
to talk to. Even before he’d begun working for Robert, Quinn had never felt a connection with a woman like he had with Anya.

But how could he expose her father’s illegal activity, bringing justice to Quinn’s sister and all the other lives Robert had destroyed
and
maintain a relationship with Anya? Robert’s daughter? She might hate Robert’s actions, but he was still her father. Quinn knew better than anyone that loving a person and not loving their behaviour were two entirely different feelings. Quinn couldn’t put Anya in that situation two years ago and he wasn’t going to now. Not when he was so close to the truth.

“I haven’t been a part of your father’s side-business in two years, or anyone else’s. I have been clean for two years. I came back to the resort when Marc called me about you.” The strength in his voice was swallowed by the guilt he carried.

Yes, he’d given up on finding the file and bringing justice to his sister, but only to take the money he’d earned on Robert’s off-the-record payroll and put it toward monitoring the lives that Quinn was responsible for destroying. From a distance he helped to ease some of their hardships and some of his guilt. None of it had worked. All the mended fences wouldn’t replace the loss. But now he could get his sister justice and make the fences he’d broken have hope again and not loss.

Anya’s eyes narrowed with a slight bit of softening as she caught his tone shift. She might be readable, but she was smart too. In all the time they’d spent together he hadn’t let her in other than sharing his father’s death. A death she’d been acutely aware of since Max worked in the resort until he died. Anya didn’t know his mother and sister were dead or
that the accident that claimed the life of his father had also put a rift between Grayson and his brother
. He kept it all to himself to protect her.

“Well, aren’t you the saint.” He was sure she meant for it to come out angrier than it did.  

He grinned at her. “I wouldn’t go that far−”

“I wasn’t. What are you even doing here? Get out of my suite.” 

“We aren’t finished talking.” 

He would rather talk about how he felt about her than finding the files, but that wasn’t an option right now. The sad part was that it would never be an option. Their parents had made it impossible for them to be together, even if she didn’t see that was what kept them apart.

She groaned.

“I would slap you again if it didn’t hurt me so much,” she snarled and walked past him into the kitchen.

Quinn turned on his heels and watched her move around the kitchen pouring a glass of water.

He wondered if she ate supper that evening. He knew it was almost three in the morning, but she looked like she skipped more meals than she ate nowadays. 

She downed the liquid in the glass, set it on the counter with a loud thump and was in front of him again. 

“Give me the key,” she demanded, holding her hand out. 

“Why? So you can get the file now and leave before morning?” 

That wasn’t happening.

“I’m certainly not telling
you
my plan. You have an uncontrollable blabber mouth.” 

He crossed his arms across his chest and took a deep breath. “I will make a deal with you.” 

“We all know how well
you
can be trusted.” 

“We both still want our file−”

Anya took a step toward him cutting him off again. “I’m not helping you get your file. You went behind my back like the lying, selfish jerk you’ve always been. You want your file? Get it yourself.” 

“You want the key? Go get one yourself.”

He could find another way into that office and re-search it now that Anya had clarified that the files were somewhere in that office. If Anya had to resort in asking her family for help, then they might be able to do more than give her the file. 

Quinn thought the cherry red coloring rising up her neck and across her cheeks might cause a replay of another slap across his face.

He was okay with that. He could handle a little stinging slap from this woman. Truthfully, he deserved it.

What he hadn’t expected was for her to attack him. She was full of surprises.

“Give me the key card!”

Like a tiny, quick mouse, her fingers were everywhere in a matter of seconds. In his jacket pockets, unzipping his jacket while digging into his slacks pockets...everywhere.

Quinn caught one hand only to find the next hand touching him somewhere else. And she was wiggly. From front to side, then back, she moved at the speed of lightning, grumbling angrily to herself about him like he wasn’t present and she wasn’t touching him all over like a crazy woman. 

“Anya!”

He caught her wrist to stop her, but she didn’t stop. They could play this game forever. She wouldn’t find it. He wasn’t an amateur. 

Tired of this wrestling match−tired in general−he caught both her wrists and spun her around, pulling her backside against his front and trapping his arms around her front.

He hated how frail she felt beneath him. Hated she didn’t know she was frail and hated more that he’d let himself believe she was okay. 

She objected, trying to wiggle and yank her body free. Frail but feisty.

Quinn had her immobile and her stirring did no more than make his body fully aware of her hips driving against his waist, her derriere taunting his man-hood and her round, plump breasts rubbing against his arms.

Finally, Anya stopped and he felt her body sigh in defeat. His body sighed too, but the relief was for entirely different reasons. 

Quinn grazed the side of her face taking in her sweet scent and feeling the pressure of her chest rising and falling with each breath. He pressed his cheek against her soft skin and whispered, “I will come back tomorrow when you’ve calmed down and we will talk about getting the files together like we discussed. Nothing changed because your mother knows you are on the premises. You still need the file and I still need my file. We need each other to get the files.” He was glad when she didn’t argue, but when she said nothing he asked, “Agreed?” 

Anya’s heavy panting began to slow. “Does it matter if I agree?”

He supposed it didn’t.

Quinn let her go, but she didn’t move. Her body pressed up against his as firm as when his arms had been wrapped around her. 

What was she doing? Why was she debating?

Why was he not stepping back to break the contact?

They didn’t need to produce more confusion to their already chaotic situation. This family was a perplexing mountain of mystification. Nothing was ever easy...for any of them. In the short time he’d worked for Robert he’d witnessed a lot of pain pass between this family. Obstacles most people didn’t have to attend to...unless you were on the other end of Roberts’s wrath.