Chapter 21
Quinn
I sat back on my heels, rubbing at my aching spine but filled with a fierce joy as I looked around the front room. What was once a heap of rubble, crumbling plaster, and a fireplace on its last leg, now looked transformed.
After pulling up the atrocious forty-year-old carpet to find the original farmhouse hardwood floors, it had taken weeks of elbow grease to get the floorboards cleaned, sanded down and re-stained but now they glowed with a deep amber sheen that set off the warm taupe and French gray color I'd just finished painting on the walls perfectly.
Two months. Two months until the deadline. The thought echoed in my head, my constant companion over the past weeks as time had continued to speed by faster and faster. The main spaces were almost done but the bedrooms were all still half-finished and then there was the furnishing and decorating, the marketing and promotion.
I’d found the time and scraped together enough to put a small ad in a local tourist magazine about the springs and surrounding area. I’d already gotten two calls about customers interested in booking a room for the summer. Now, I just had to make sure there were rooms they could sleep in.
Panic tried to rise inside me. The same panic that told me I was a failure. The same panic that told me I could never make it, never be a success. Two months. How can I possibly finish this in two months? It’s impossible.
I’ve done impossible things before, I reminded myself fiercely. I went to college when no one thought I could. I got out of this small town.
And now you’re right back where you started, no better off now than you were then. For a moment, doubt threatened to beat me, but I pushed back. All I had to do was think about all the hours of hard work I’d put into the Mayhew house. How many hours Lily and Charlotte and the boys had put in. And Leo.
The thought of him sent the last whisper of doubt fading away as confidence replaced it. I knew what I was doing. I knew I could turn this place into a successful business. And I knew I wasn’t doing it alone. That made all the difference.
Things had begun to change between Leo and I. Deepen, become more serious. And it wasn't only our relationship that had changed. I had changed as well. I had never opened myself up to anyone like I had with Leo. Not just because Jonah would have beat the living daylights out of them, but because it was hard for me to trust. I could be honest with myself about that.
Because of mom and dad. The thought echoed and I nodded to myself. I’d had plenty of years to determine just how badly my absentee, drug addict parents had screwed me up. A pang of guilt shot through me. They were gone now, I shouldn’t still feel guilty but there it was.
It happened at odd moments. I’d be talking with Jonah or grocery shopping or any of the hundreds of normal everyday things we do and I would remember, like a bolt of lightning. My parents were dead. Even being at the ranch house was a reminder of them.
Months had passed and I still didn’t know how to feel about it. Throwing myself into work had helped. And throwing yourself into Leo. I flushed at the stray thought, my heartbeat picking up its pace as a picture formed in my mind.
“Hey, sunshine. There you are.”
I jumped at the sound of Leo’s voice, wondering at first if I’d imagined it but when I glanced over my shoulder he was standing there in the doorway, all six foot of tall, dark, and so handsome it should be against the law of him.
“H...hey.” I finally managed to mutter as I got to my feet.
“How’s everything going down here?” Leo asked as he walked towards me, his gaze took in the trim I’d just finished painting. “It’s looking good.”
“Isn’t it?” I looked around the room, feeling that same sense of satisfaction that had filled me earlier start to rise again. It really was looking good. The doubt tried to creep back in but I ignored it, shooting Leo a fierce smile instead. “What about upstairs?”
“The upstairs bathroom is nearly ready. Just hooked up that fancy round bathtub you got.”
"It's a Japanese soaking tub," I said, still smiling as I met him halfway in the middle of the room. "And, it's wonderful. Or it will be. For the guests."
“Just for the guests?”
I paused at the note of mischief in his voice, “What are you talking about?”
His arms wrapped around me, pulling me close as he whispered in my ear, “Want to go try it out?”
Our eyes met for a moment but it wasn’t long before a husky laugh was bursting from my mouth.
“We probably shouldn’t.” I said, trying to sound like the reasonable one but the thought of Leo, naked and dripping, was too much to resist, “Oh hell. Why not?”
“That’s the spirit.” He grabbed my hand was tugging me along behind him up the stairs before the words were barely out of his mouth.
By the time we reached the second floor I was already panting with desire and laughter. Leo tossed another mischievous grin over his shoulder at me, not stopping until we were falling through the open bathroom doorway.
Before I had the chance to even see the tub, he was kissing me, blocking out everything else until all that was left in my world was him and the way his arms felt holding me tight against his hard body.
I could feel the length of his erection beneath his paint-splattered jeans where his thigh pressed against my hip and the desire that was always on a simmer burst into full flame.
“Leo, I want you.”
"I want you too, sunshine," He gasped against my lips, "but damned if all I could think about all day was getting you wet and naked in this thing. What do you say? Make my fantasy come true?"
I kissed him back with all the passion I had pent up inside me. It was all the answer either of us needed.
The next instant he was moving, tearing at my clothes, pulling at the hem of my shirt but my mouth was fused with his and I didn’t want to let him go long enough to let him get it all the way off.
He was like a fever in my veins, lighting me on fire and driving me higher and higher but there was only one thing that would satisfy me.
“Leo, let’s skip the bath.” I whispered, feeling drunk from the kiss, “Maybe we should try out one of the bedrooms instead.”
“There aren’t any beds in any of the rooms yet.” Leo countered, still pulling me towards the waiting bathtub that sat in the corner of the room.
My lips curled up into a small smile that was swallowed as Leo kissed me again. After a moment, I pulled back, breathless and weak with wanting him.
“We haven’t needed a bed before.”
Leo threw back his head on a loud belly laugh, warmth and humor and some other emotion shining from his dark eyes. Something deeper and sweeter than anything I’d seen before.
“And who’s fault is that?” He drawled, his hands still moving, pulling my shirt over my head in one frantic movement before leaving a trail of kissed down the side of my neck.
I could admit it. “Mine.”
“That’s right. Yours.” He punctuated each word with another touch of his lips to my skin, “Now it’s my turn.”
He didn’t wait for my answer before his mouth angled over mine, drawing whatever I might have said from my lips and drowning the words with his kiss. I could feel his hands, tracing every bare inch of skin they could find, and his tongue teasing mine. As if it had done so a million times, my body melted against him.
We were so lost in each other that neither of us heard the footsteps outside the bathroom door until it was too late.
“What the fuck is going on?”
All the breath I had left shot from my lungs in a pained gasp.
“Jonah! Just calm down-.”
“Leo? What the fuck man, my sister? How could you?” Jonah’s face was red and mottled, his jaw so tense it looked like it was about to shatter as he glared at Leo. It’s like I hadn’t spoken, like I wasn’t there at all. That made it somehow so much worse.
Leo flinched under his best friend’s angry stare, struggling for the words but before either of us could explain Jonah’s expression froze as he turned and walked away without another word.