Shelter for Quinn Read online

  “I could make a batch of that caramel dipping sauce we had tonight and bring it over tomorrow after you get off work.”

  That did it.

  Quinn sighed and swung her legs off his lap. She sat up and looked at him. “You don’t play fair.”

  He laughed. “I’m not sure if I should be offended or impressed that caramel won out over a kiss.”

  She smiled at him. “Well, I would’ve gone for the kiss, but I had a feeling if I held out, I’d get the really good stuff.”

  “The good stuff, huh?” he teased, then swiftly reached for her.

  Quinn screeched but didn’t try to get away from him. Driftwood had her on her back in seconds. He hovered over her mock menacingly. “I’m not the good stuff, woman?”

  The smile left her face as she stared up at him. “You’re the best stuff, John.”

  As Driftwood looked at her, he realized that not once tonight had he thought about the mark on her face. Oh, he saw it, but it was as much a part of her as a beard would be on a man, or a freckle or mole. Quinn was a remarkable person. And she was his.

  He slowly dropped his head, giving her time to protest. But she didn’t. Her arms wound around his neck and she pulled him the last inches down to her mouth. Driftwood felt the heat from her chest against his own, and he wanted nothing more than to straddle her hips and lay himself down on her.

  But instead, he simply enjoyed making out with her. She was as passionate as he was. Their tongues dueled, and eventually he reached up and held her head gently so he could get the angle he wanted to kiss her.

  How long they lay there kissing, he had no idea, but eventually, he sat up.

  He noticed that she was breathing just as hard as he was. He’d never been the kind of man to rush into the bedroom, preferring to get to know the women he dated before going there. But he had a feeling he and Quinn were going to end up tangled in his sheets sooner rather than later. Maybe it was because he already knew her. Because of her friendship with Sophie, she’d been around a lot. They’d already gotten to know the basics.

  The foundation for a friendship had already been laid. Now they were filling in the cracks. Getting to know each other on a more intimate level. And he liked what he was finding out about her.

  “Come on, Emmy. Let’s get you home before I kidnap you and refuse to let you leave my house.”

  “If you feed me that caramel sauce every day, I won’t want to leave.”

  “I’m going to go to the store tomorrow to stock up on supplies to make it,” he said, only half kidding. If all it took was some caramel sauce to get her to stay, he’d make sure it was always available.

  Taking her hand in his, he helped her stand. They found her shoes under the coffee table and she put them on. They left his house and soon they were on their way back to her apartment complex.

  “Working on anything new at work?” he asked as they drove.

  After hearing all about what her week had in store, Driftwood pulled into the parking lot and shut off the engine.

  “What’s that on my car?” Quinn asked.

  Driftwood looked over to her Toyota Corolla and saw a pamphlet under her windshield wiper. Then he looked at the Jeep next to her car, and saw the same thing. Every car in the lot had one of the pink sheets of paper tucked under their wipers.

  “Just an advertising flier,” he said as he got out of the car.

  “That’s illegal in our lot,” Quinn mumbled, but didn’t seem too concerned.

  Driftwood walked her to the lobby and, after looking around to make sure it was clear, he said, “Drive safe going to work tomorrow.”

  “I will. What are you going to do on your day off?”

  “Probably meet up with the guys and work out or something.”

  “On your day off, you’re going to meet up with the guys?” she asked. “Aren’t you sick of them?”

  Driftwood shrugged. “Not really. I’m around them so much, they’re like brothers. They annoy me sometimes, but they’re family. It would seem weird if I didn’t see them.”

  “Do you…want to come to the hospital for lunch?” she asked.

  Driftwood nodded immediately. “Yes. But I’ll bring us something.”

  “You don’t have to. The cafeteria is fine.”

  He shook his head. “Nope. If you don’t mind, I can bring leftovers from tonight.”

  “Including the caramel sauce?” she asked with a grin.

  “Wouldn’t dream of forgetting it,” Driftwood said. Then he leaned down and gave her a brief but deep kiss. “I had a good time today, Quinn. Thank you for spending the day with me.”

  “Thanks for not minding just sitting around doing nothing.”

  “Doing nothing with you is a hundred times better than watching you being miserable. Sleep well.”

  He backed away and watched her head up the stairs to the second floor.

  On his way back to his truck, Driftwood detoured to take the flier off of Quinn’s car. He glanced at it…and frowned. It was a doom-and-gloom advertisement declaring God’s wrath was coming and evil was everywhere.

  Crumpling it into a ball, Driftwood threw it onto the floor of his backseat before climbing in and starting his engine.

  His thoughts were on Quinn all the way home. Right before he headed to bed, he sent her a quick text.

  * * *

  Driftwood: Good night, Emmy. Sleep well.

  * * *

  Not expecting a reply, as he figured she was probably already fast asleep, he grinned when he saw what she wrote.

  * * *

  Quinn: I’ll be dreaming of caramel…and you.

  Chapter Five

  A week later, Quinn was at the grocery store trying to get everything she needed to make John a nice dinner. Every night he had off, he went out of his way to make her a delicious home-cooked meal. She wasn’t that good of a cook but she still wanted to let him know she appreciated him.

  Her plan was to make something and bring it over to Station 7. John was working tonight, but she’d hoped to get there before he’d had a chance to eat. She’d left work early so she’d have enough time to get to the grocery store and pick up what she needed, get home, cook, and get to the fire station before dinnertime.

  Sophie had spoken to Chief, and he was going to do his best to keep John busy so he didn’t eat before she got there.

  In a hurry, and not paying attention to her surroundings, Quinn turned a corner down another aisle while looking at her phone and the grocery list she’d made, and crashed into someone else’s cart.

  Looking up, an apology was on the tip of her tongue—when she met the eyes of a very angry man. A familiar one.

  It was Alaric. The man from The Sloppy Cow.

  “I’m sorry,” she said quickly, not wanting things to escalate out of hand.

  “You.” Alaric said with a sneer. “Are you following me?”

  “What? No!” Quinn said in surprise.

  “I think you are,” he said, but instead of getting in her face, he took a step backward. “Stay away from me, witch.”

  Witch. It had been a long time since she’d been called that.

  Before she could respond, Alaric went on. “You’ve got the devil’s mark.” He gestured to her face. “You’re bad luck! A pox on decent society.”

  Quinn had heard it all before. “You’re welcome to believe what you want, but that’s a load of crap.”

  “You’re a bad seed who should be eliminated before you can infect the rest of us.”

  Quinn supposed she should be alarmed—she’d basically been threatened—but she was mostly just annoyed. So much so, she couldn’t help egging this jerk on.

  She reached toward Alaric—and smirked when he backed away from her even more.

  “Don’t touch me, witch!”

  “Then get out of my way,” she told him as she took another step toward him. Her grocery cart was between them, and she had no intention of really touching him. She was seriously irritated that he though
t she was the problem with society.

  Without another word, Alaric quickly backed farther away before turning his cart and hurrying down the next aisle.

  Quinn chuckled. She really shouldn’t take such pleasure in scaring people like that, but they brought it on themselves. And if they were that ignorant, then they deserved to be scared.

  A noise behind her startled Quinn.

  And she turned to see her neighbor, Willard, standing there. As usual, he didn’t say a word, just stared at her in that disturbing way he had.

  She guessed he was in his mid-forties, about her height, but he outweighed her by at least a hundred pounds. He had brown hair that was thinning in spots, and his belly stuck out over his pants. He usually wore sweatpants and old T-shirts with the necks stretched out, and today was no exception.

  Now it was Quinn’s turn to beat feet down the aisle. She supposed her neighbor being there was karma for taunting Alaric the way she had.

  She finished up her shopping in record time, and luckily, she didn’t see either Alaric or Willard when she went to check out. A woman waiting behind her in line surprised her by bringing up the incident.

  “I heard what that guy said to you,” she said.

  Embarrassed, Quinn shrugged. “I’m kinda used to it.”

  “Well, that sucks. I don’t understand people sometimes. I mean, his attitude makes him the ugly one, not you.”

  Quinn smiled a genuine smile at the woman. “Thanks.”

  “It’s true. I work with the public all the time, and I swear, sometime between nineteen ninety-five and now, people have forgotten their manners.”

  “What do you do?” Quinn asked.

  “Oh, sorry. Here I am, talking about manners, and I apparently don’t have any myself.” She held out her hand. “I’m Koren. Koren Garner. I work at a travel agency. I know, I know,” she said, rolling her eyes after Quinn had shaken her hand. “With all the websites and stuff that are out there now, why does anyone need a travel agent?”

  Quinn laughed. “I wasn’t going to ask.”

  Koren smiled. “Yeah, well, you’d be surprised at the number of people who still think it’s just easier for someone else to do all the research and booking of hotels and airlines for them. And we can sometimes get really good deals on cruises. But those same people who are so happy after we make all the arrangements can get pretty brutal if anything goes wrong. I once had someone call me a ‘fucking bitch’ for not refunding their money when their cruise ship left without them in San Juan. They’d been shopping and drinking and lost track of time. I tried to explain that wasn’t my fault, but they still bitched me out.”

  “Ugh. That’s ridiculous. I think I’m glad I work in a lab all day and only have to talk to my coworkers, who are all very nice.”

  “I’m jealous,” Koren said.

  “I’m Quinn,” she told her, smiling warmly.

  “Hi.”

  “I love your name. It’s very unusual.”

  She chuckled. “My mom claims my dad misspelled ‘Karen’ on my birth certificate. She was super pissed when she realized it, but then decided she liked Koren better.”

  They moved forward in line, and it was Quinn’s turn to check out. “Thanks for making a crappy shopping trip better.”

  Koren shrugged. “My pleasure. Don’t take anything that guy said to heart. You’re beautiful.”

  Quinn couldn’t think of anything to say to that. She couldn’t exactly say that she wasn’t, and she’d never been good at accepting compliments, especially about her looks.

  “Maybe I’ll see you around,” Koren went on. “I shop here all the time.”

  Quinn smiled. “Hopefully.”

  She paid the cashier and hurried out to her car. As she raced home, she forgot all about the encounters with Alaric and Willard at the store as she mentally planned her surprise for John.

  “What is up with you, man?” Driftwood asked Chief as he put off starting dinner for the tenth time. “I’m starving. Get off your ass and get to the grill.”

  “I will. In a second.”

  “You’ve been saying that for the last half hour,” Driftwood bitched.

  “Hi,” a feminine voice said from nearby.

  Driftwood turned so fast he almost fell over. “Quinn!” he exclaimed, all thoughts of being hungry dissipating at his concern for the woman looking uneasily at everyone in the room. “Are you okay?”

  “Of course.”

  “What are you doing here?”

  She turned and picked up a bag from the floor. “I made you dinner.”

  Driftwood could only stare at her.

  “And because I’m not cruel, I brought tacos for everyone else.”

  Cheers went up around him, but Driftwood only had eyes for Quinn. He walked up to her and asked, “What’s this all about?”

  “You’re always doing nice things for me. You’ve cooked for me a million times and never complain when you have to make more caramel.” She grinned cheekily. “I just thought maybe I could do something nice for you for once.”

  “Emmy, simply being with you is doing something nice for me.”

  She blushed. “I wanted to.”

  He caught a waft of whatever it was she’d made coming up from the bag she was holding, and his stomach growled. “Far be it from me to complain about someone feeding me,” Driftwood relented. “I’ve been begging Chief here to start dinner for the last thirty minutes.”

  “Sorry I was late,” Quinn told Chief, looking across the room at him. “Traffic.”

  “It’s okay. Tacos make up for just about any inconvenience. I hope you brought enough…you do know how Taco got his nickname, right?”

  “Yeah. I brought a dozen just for him.” She gave Taco a shy smile.

  Hamming it up, Taco got down on one knee and put his hands to his heart, saying dramatically, “Will you marry me?”

  “Shut it, Taco. You’ve got your own woman, leave mine alone.”

  Taco got up from the floor and mumbled, “But my woman told me she doesn’t like tacos.”

  Everyone laughed raucously.

  “You better go feed your boyfriend,” Chief told Quinn. “I thought he was about ready to chew his arm off.”

  “You set this up with Chief?” Driftwood asked.

  Quinn nodded.

  He swallowed hard. It meant a lot that she’d gone out of her way to surprise him. Turning his head to his friends, he said, “We’ll be out back.” Then he reached for the bag she held, so she didn’t have to carry it. He headed to a door off to the side that led to the back of the fire station. There was a picnic table back there under a canopy to keep the sun off the area.

  It was late enough that the heat of the day was waning and it was a comfortable temperature. But more than that, Driftwood wanted some time alone with Quinn.

  He put the bag on the table, then pulled her to him. As if it was the most natural thing in the world, he bent and kissed her. Talking to her on the phone just wasn’t the same as seeing her. With their schedules, it wasn’t as if they could see each other every day, but with every one that passed without seeing her, he seemed to miss her more. “I missed you.” The words were heartfelt and honest.

  “I missed you too,” she immediately returned.

  “Thanks for coming by,” Driftwood said.

  She shrugged. “I did want to do something nice for you, but I admit to being a little reluctant since I wasn’t sure what you’d think of me invading your space.”

  “You aren’t invading my space.”

  “You know what I mean.”

  He shook his head. “No, I don’t.”

  Quinn waved her hand in the air. “Your fire station. Your work thing.”

  “Emmy, it’s a building. Yes, I spend a fair amount of time here, but in the end, it’s work. Hanging out with you at my house…that’s what I consider ‘my’ space.”

  The smile on her face was absolutely beautiful. “How do you always know the perfect thing to say?”
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  “Believe me, I don’t. I’m just telling you what I feel. I’m sure there will be plenty of times in the future when I fuck up and say something that’s taken wrong. So far things have been great with us, but I hope you aren’t the kind of person who runs at the slightest provocation.”

  She frowned and tried to take a step away from him.

  Driftwood tightened his arms around her. “Oh, no, you don’t. Talk to me.”

  She braced her hands on his chest and pushed until there was a bit of room between them. Driftwood wouldn’t let her go any farther.

  “Why do you assume I’m the type to run if something goes wrong?” she asked with a huff.

  “I don’t. I just said that I hoped you weren’t.”

  “It sounded like you expect me to bail,” Quinn said, looking at his chest and not into his eyes.

  “Look at me, Emmy.”

  She slowly raised her gaze to his.

  “We’re gonna fight. All couples do. But believe me when I tell you that I’ve never felt about another person the way I feel about you. Even if you try to pull away, I won’t let you go without a fight. I’m a guy, I’m going to fuck up, it’s inevitable, but if you know from the start that you’re more than just a casual girlfriend, maybe you’ll cut me some slack. And on the same token, don’t sit back and take my crap. Call me out on it. If I’m rude, let me know. If I hurt your feelings, for the love of God, tell me so I don’t do it again. I don’t ever want to hurt you. You’ve had enough of that in your life. I want to protect you from assholes who think just because you have a birthmark, you don’t have any feelings.”

  He ignored the way her eyes filled with tears and hurried to finish what he wanted to say. “I know you’re uncomfortable when people say stuff about your birthmark, and that you’d rather just ignore them than call them on their idiocy. But I’m not that guy. Anyone that hurts you is fair game as far as I’m concerned. I’m not talking about fighting them, but if I hear that crap, more often than not, I’m going to set them straight.”

  “I hate that you feel like you have to do that,” Quinn told him.