Chapter Eleven

 

There was little that ruined an evening more than getting upset about something. Adam Quinn had been through four separate divorces—four—and countless breakups, and they'd all been on good terms. Because getting upset didn't just ruin his evening, it ruined the following evening, as well, and all of his time until he finally decided to give it up.

Four women he'd thought he cared about enough to marry them. Several women he'd given it serious consideration towards, and several more that had a nice enough body that he would be more than willing to forget about the future for a little while, and just have fun.

And now he was letting himself get hung up on a girl young enough to be his daughter.

In what must have been a hundred relationships, a hundred one-night stands and thousands of women who were something in between, he'd never once felt this way before.

When they were together, they were his and he had the right to get upset if they were out on the town—not that he preferred to. But before that? Why feel possessive? There's no need at all. Just let them do what they want to do. Women are joyous creatures. They want to go sleeping around? Sure. They can sleep around with whomever they would like, but if it was him then so much better.

But the minute he'd seen her, he knew. And the minute that he saw a train of men getting ready to proposition her, he felt something in the pit of his stomach. A primal urge to make sure that nobody could. Nobody but him.

The same thing that overcame him is what told him not to do it. If he's feeling that strongly, then there are risks involved. Big risks. Adam Quinn didn't mind risks. He took them more than most. Because he took the right kind of risk. The kind that paid off. He looked, then he leapt, and there was always some kind of backup plan.

Looking at Linda Owens, feeling the things that he couldn't explain why he felt, he knew instinctively that there was something there that he shouldn't have even remotely been feeling, because there wasn't any backup plan for something like that.

She was off-limits. Never mind the age difference—that had never been a problem before, and it hadn't ever hurt him in the past—she was an employee. Not a colleague, not an adviser. He paid her to work for him.

Which meant that if the press caught wind of it, it would look Monica Lewinsky bad. He'd be demonized as manipulating her, and using his money and his position to coerce her into whatever he wanted.

That was foolish to believe. Linda Owens was not the sort of women who was coerced, not from the impression that Adam had gotten so far. But there was more to it than that. Reality didn't count for much, when public perception was involved.

And more than that, she had every right to be left alone. She didn't come there looking for him. She went there looking for someone, but certainly not for him. So it was his own selfishness that made him force her to leave, not some kind of good nature. He wanted her for his own.

He took a breath. He was getting over-emotional about a subject that shouldn't matter. She wasn't married. If she was in a relationship, then she hadn't mentioned it. Adam's instincts told him that she wasn't. Maybe she was recently, but not any more. There wasn't time in her day for a relationship.

He played the scene back in his mind. Felt the flare-up of anger again, as if he were standing there and watching her for the first time. He put it away this time. Easy. Practiced. He'd be fine with it all by morning. Specifically, he'd be fine by not responding to it.

His phone rang. A deep breath, and then he pulls the phone out of his pocket. Delaney. Adam answers the phone, and the scratchy voice on the other end greets him.

"Adam. How are you feeling?"

"What's up?"

"You want to talk about it?"

"Talk about what?"

"Don't play coy with me. Your walkout is going to be the talk of the town by morning. And with Miss Owens, too?"

Quinn's face hardened. "News spreads quickly."

"Sure, I guess it does. But in my case, it didn't have to spread far. I particularly like the mole she's got—"

"Tom, I'm going to have to ask you to wait a minute. I've got another call."

Adam jabs the hold button and drops the phone into the passenger seat. He pulls off to the side of the road. He'll get himself under control. It's just a matter of time. Easy. Practiced.

He always had a temper as a young man. A mile-wide streak in him of disrespect and disobedience that they tried to get out of him with military school. Well, it might work. It might not. But the one thing was for damn sure.

He'd learned to get rid of that destructive streak. He'd tempered it into a stubbornness that served him well in the business world. Bull-headed enough to get what he wanted out of business, but managed enough not to lose his head over anything. Never lose your temper with a client or a rival, and never stay in because you were in too deep already.

Tom Delaney was a friend, in a certain sense of the word. The men knew each other better than most. In part because Tom was a dangerous man, and Adam was a sleeping bear. The word rival failed to capture their relationship.

But outside of this, Adam had no trouble admitting a positive sort of feeling about him. And if Delaney had walked up to him right now, Quinn might have broken his neck. Whatever his play was, now wasn't the time to make it.

Quinn picks the phone back up. He forces his anger into a box of steely calm and latches the lid. He presses the hold button again and brings the handset back to his ear.

"Okay, I'm back."