Quinn

Let’s just say that Abby wasn’t the person who made me discover my dominating tendencies. I didn’t have any interest in staging an elaborate scene to explore power dynamics in a sexual setting. Some role playing is nice and all, but what really gets me off is the spontaneous control she gave me. To use her how I saw fit.

I found this out about myself on my own when I was a teenager. The idea that this is what fascinated me and made my blood shoot straight to my cock without hesitation was daunting at first. And I never got the kind of release I sought with anyone, so those fantasies only existed in my mind.

Until Abby. Who was a virgin until I got my hands on her. How someone so new to the world of pleasure was able to bring it out of me and engage in that kind of play, I won’t ever know.

But it’s enough to make me addicted. I have no interest in controlling her until kingdom come or treating her like an object. She’s my equal in every way, and when she bends over and allows me to do with her as I see fit, it’s the greatest possible expression of the bond that exists between us.

So, it’s not without a lot of protest that I agree to take her out to eat. And then go back to her place because she doesn’t feel comfortable sleeping over just yet.

“You can sleep over,” she tells me. “I just… I hate that cabin but at the same time, I came back here for it. It’s twisted that I want to go back when that thing is literally my albatross but it is what it is.”

“Say no more,” I reply. “Your wish is my command.”

I watch her get dressed, my mind jumping back to the last scorching moment we shared. I fully expected her to tell me to take it easy or to dial it down, but she didn’t. If anything, she goaded me to doing much more than I ever would have permitted myself. To go further than I suspected anyone else would.

My cock twitches again, stiffening for the millionth time.

The clock on the dashboard informs us it isn’t yet seven in the evening. “It’s early enough that most restaurants in town are open. Like I told you, a lot changed in your absence. But there’s still plenty that’s exactly the same. Where do you want to go?”

“Moe’s Diner?” She smiles at me. “I used to go there after school all the time when I knew there was a game. No offense, football isn’t my thing and I could only watch so much before I zoned out. The coast would clear at Moe’s and I got a lot of writing done. Vampire novels, mostly, but every respectable writer needs to have a solid number of trunk novels.”

There’s so much about her sentence that I want her to explain but the first thing I need to address is her choice of venue. Going to Moe’s isn’t as easy as, well, just going to Moe’s. If we had met under different circumstances, I’d agree with her. But that traitorous fucking bet I accepted meant I had to avoid my brothers when I was with her. At least until I got a chance to talk to them myself.

“Quinn?”

“Sorry, I was just thinking that Tate and Killian and maybe even Derek will be at Moe’s. You know how high school never ends for some people? They’re regulars there almost every day of the week. Except for the days they’re at Marty’s.” It’s slimy of me to make her come to the same conclusion as me like this, but it’s the best I’ve got.

“You know, I think I had a change of heart,” she says, bolstering my hope that she’s about to side with me. “High school was awful for me but I’ll need to get over it. Nothing can bring me down today, so it’s not a problem if they’re there. Not for me, anyway.”

Shit.

“Are you sure? A triple dose of my asshole brothers...” I shake my head and sigh. “I avoid them like a plague most days of the month.”

It’s patently obvious that her interpretation of what I said is a lot more offensive than what I meant. Abby slumps her shoulders, a look I am familiar with enough to know it’s synonymous with defeated, and she nods. “Sure. You pick the place then.”

“Abby, you know this isn’t about you, right?” I try to keep my eyes on the road but I keep peeling them away to look at her.

“No, I get it. High school never ends and I’m not the kind of girl you introduce to that crowd.” She plasters a smile on her face and turns to face me head on. “It’s fine. Really. You’re protecting me.”

“That is not what I said. I’m worried that they’ll put a damper on your mood. Just seeing them last night was enough to bring up a lot of-sorry, I don’t mean to pressure you. I don’t know what it is that they did, but when you want to share it with me, I’ll listen. And you’re right, I want to protect you.”

“Then take me there,” she says defiantly. “I have you as an ally. They won’t mess with me. And if they do, I can take it.”

“If they do, they’ll have to take it up with me.” I glower at the road ahead, trying to cover all my bases. If I send word that they need to keep their trap shut, there’s a good ten percent chance they don’t step in it.

Moe’s Diner appears down the highway. I enable the turn signal and pull up. Abby sees the familiar establishment and lights up.

“Are you sure?” She bites her lip.

“Yes, but you still haven’t explained to me why this place. Of all the other restaurants we could go to or even the grocery store and I’ll cook for you.”

Really, there’s nothing special about Moe’s. It’s the only diner in town, which is where it’s claiming to fame begins and ends. It’s a popular place for high school kids because it’s open 24/7, so if you sneak out and go on a bender with your friends, it’s only natural that you’ll need coffee and some comfort carbs afterward.

Abby unbuckles her seatbelt. “Moe used to be a big deal. He wrote a ton of sword and sorcery stories for pulp magazines back in the day. It earned him enough to build his business from the ground up.”

“He struck gold and this is what he wanted to invest in?” I say, glancing at the shabby building. It’s not that owning your own business isn’t an enviable position to be in. But when I got my own windfall from my dying career, I splurged on a place that I could enjoy to myself. Not somewhere that would entail me serving others for the rest of my life.

I seem to have struck a nerve.

Abby crosses her arms in front of her and scowls. “Do you know how long this place has been here? Decades. It’s an institution. And back in his time, this kind of business in a sleepy town like ours was the American dream.”

I hold my arms up. “I’m sorry. It was a shitty thing to say. I guess times have changed.”

“Like you said yesterday, the homogenization of the American economy. They have. And I feel strongly about supporting a business-like Moe’s.”

“Then it’s a good thing we’re here. Shall we?” I open the door and step out. Her frown disappears when I stride to her side and open the door for her.  

“Soon you’ll be calling me m’lady and thinking that washes out the dude-bro,” she says. “You still have some ways to go until I trust that your brothers haven’t done any lasting damage.”

She doesn’t know how right she is. It’s only been a day but I feel it in my gut that Abby is going to play a large role in my future. And that means I need to get on top of cleaning up my act and ridding my brothers of any ammo they might use against me. I might not have spearheaded their bullshit all these years, but I’m complicit.

As expected, the three are inside. They sit in a corner booth that accommodates eight people, and they’re not alone. The minute I see the bleached hair that’s Sheila’s calling card, I freeze.

Abby doesn’t pick up on it. “I just realized I need to go to the bathroom. I’ll find you in a moment.”

This is my opportunity. As soon as she disappears inside the women’s bathroom, I hurry over to the Cooper both. Tate sees me first. He pumps his fist in the air and grins. “Look who’s come out to play. Tell us everything.”

“Hi, Quinn,” Sheila coos. “How are you?”

“Sheila, will you give us some privacy?” I ask, cutting to the chase. “I need to talk to my brothers.”

“If you’re going to be giving them the play-by-play about your night with not so little Abigail Swan, I have to decline. I want to know all about it.”

I narrow my eyes at her and then look at Tate, Killian, and Derek. “You told her?”

“Sheila’s practically family, bro,” Tate says. “Just because you were dumb enough to dump her doesn’t mean we all blacklisted her.”

Sheila winces but remains composed. It’ll be a cold day in hell before that girl ever shows her true colors. I could fill pages and pages of stories about how despicable she is but I stupidly decided to let her save face and say we just “drifted apart” after our split.

“It’s not like that. I care about her. I really care about her. I want out of the bet, and I don’t want Killian to pay for it. You guys can have my vintage Fender if we can pretend it never happened,” I say.

That gets their attention, all three of the idiot bunch and even Sheila. She widens her beady snake eyes at me, visibly floored.

“What? You’re willing to part with your beloved little toy?” she asks. “You don’t even play the guitar and that thing got more action from you than I did when we were together.”

“And you know why that is,” I tell her, and turn to my brothers. “Do we have a deal?”

“So, you want to get out of the bet we wagered fair and square last night and you’re putting your precious Fender up as collateral?” Tate says. “What’s the catch?”

“The catch is you never tell Abigail what the bet was. And Sheila, I’ll think of something for you. I know you don’t want the guitar.”

“Keep your fucking guitar or any other loot you have,” she says. “I’m not going to tell her anything because I don’t even talk to that fatso.”

“Huh?”

“Dude, Abigail Swan was that fat girl.” Tate stares at me like I’m supposed to know what he’s talking about.

“Rubenesque,” Derek corrects.

“Potato, potahto,” Killian says. “She used to follow you around with that notebook she was always writing in? Like some kind of spank bank in the form of a diary. She was, like, obsessed with you. I bet you she wrote all her dirty thoughts in it.”

“It’s not potato, potahto,” Derek protests. “She wasn’t ever fat. She just wasn’t anorexic.”

“Dude, she was chunky,” Tate says. “Do we have to go down the rabbit hole to find a picture of her from the glory days?”

Well, this answers the question of what it was my brothers did. I do remember a girl they used to pick on during high school, but her face is a blank on my mind. As I recall, she wasn’t even close to having a weight problem. And even if that were the case, Jesus, they’re an embarrassment to the Cooper name. My head was in football to an obsessive degree during the time, so I never paid attention to what huge dicks they all were.

“For fuck’s sake.” I slam my fist on the table. “Who fucking cares what you remember about her or what she looked like. I need you to keep your mouths shut. You have no idea how much this will hurt. She cannot know about that stupid fucking bet that I didn’t want to take in the first place.”

“Q - Quinn?” a voice behind me says.

I close my eyes and wonder if there’s any way to turn back time. Because the person who says it sounds like they’re shocked and on the brink of tears, so that sorrow is marring the words. But it’s unmistakably Abby. And if I turn around and look at her, then this becomes real.

Whatever she overheard becomes real.

“Cat’s out of the bag,” Sheila says, preening. “Hi, Abigail. May I call you Abby? We have so much to talk about. Let’s catch up sometime. I can’t wait to bond with someone else who was the victim of Quinn’s betrayal.”

“Shut up, Sheila,” I say through gritted teeth.

“Fuck off, Quinn,” she snaps. “I won’t be silenced again and watch you ruin this poor girl’s reputation.”

“You are such a-”

“Quinn,” Abby says again. “What’s going on?”

“Your new boyfriend only took you home as part of a bet he made with the idiot parade,” Sheila says, feigning concern. Is she that vapid that she doesn’t realize she doesn’t fool anybody? Just a second ago she was positively gloating. “The thing with Quinn is, everyone thinks he’s the exception to the rule. That he might have these awful, misogynistic brothers, but no, he’s not like that. He’s the golden boy.”

I finally face Abby in time to see a single tear roll down her face. She meets my eye and doesn’t look away, as if she’s daring me to see her hurt. My stomach ties itself in knots and sweat pools fucking everywhere.

There is no going back from this. Not ever.

“Abby-”

She storms off, letting the double doors slam behind her. It takes a moment for the reality to sink in but when it does, I bolt after her.