22. Kelsey
Chapter twenty-two
Kelsey
Neither of us really knew what to do or say once Quentin closed the door behind me. Being alone with him felt odd. We’d been alone with each other plenty of times, but the kiss had changed everything.
“Do you want to put your things in the bathroom?” Quentin asked me. He nervously rubbed his hands together and averted his gaze. “I’ll prepare the bed for you in the meantime.”
“It’s fine. I’ll just sleep on the couch.”
“No, you’ll take the bed. Just give me a moment to put fresh sheets on for you, okay?”
He disappeared into his bedroom before I could protest any further. I put my toiletries on the bathroom sink and returned to the living room, not really knowing what to do with myself. While I waited, I took a look at his bookcase. Some titles I recognized, but most of them I didn’t.
As I let my eyes wander over the rows of books, I stumbled over a thick leather book without a title. A photo album. Would it bother him if I took a peek? Quentin was still busy in the bedroom, so I decided to take the risk. I skimmed over the first few pages. The pictures showed him as a cute, chubby little toddler, along with his parents. His father looked a lot like him, sans scars, of course. Little Quentin on a bike, little Quentin under a Christmas tree, the whole family in front of the Grand Canyon, and teenaged Quentin in front of a computer.
The next pages were more vacation pictures, but his father looked gaunt and ashen faced in those. He must have been sick already when those were taken. Turning the pages was like watching a tragedy unfold. The goofy pictures stopped, then the smiles stopped. Then his father was gone from the pictures. One showed a young Quentin in his graduation gown, with only his solemn-looking mother by his side. The next one I looked at the longest. It showed Quentin, maybe eighteen years old, his brown hair cut short, wearing the dark-blue dress uniform of the US Army. He was young, extremely handsome, and completely healthy. That was the very last picture. A few months after this picture was taken, he was badly injured during a mission and returned home with a disfigured face and a broken heart.
I closed the book and put it back on the shelf. My heart felt heavy. Quentin had endured a lot. He was such a good person, but for some reason, only bad things happened in his life. I wished I could do something to comfort him. I wanted to make him feel better, wanted to love him better, but I knew I couldn’t.
My mother’s words echoed in my head. I wasn’t that type of woman. Quentin was not an easy man to love—that much I understood. He had so many wounds and scars, and all I had to offer was a whole lot of baggage of my own. Quentin needed someone strong, and I wasn’t strong. I didn’t like to hear that, especially not from my mom, but she was probably right.
Quentin cleared his throat. He was leaning in the bedroom doorway, watching me. How long had he been standing there ?
He smiled, but his eyes remained sad. “Satisfied your curiosity enough?”
Quickly stepping away from the bookshelf, I felt myself flush. “Sorry, I shouldn’t have done that.”
“It’s fine,” he said. “With you, I actually don’t mind. The bed is ready.”
“Where are you going to sleep?” I asked, with a mix of hope and desperation. I couldn’t help it, even if I already knew the answer. A girl could hope. Because seeing him in that T-shirt did things to me. Yes, it revealed more of his scars, but I didn’t care—I had stopped caring long before—but it also revealed more of his body, showing off his muscled arms. God, I wanted to grab that biceps so badly. But as expected, Quentin crushed my hopes.
“I’ll sleep on the couch,” he said.
So that was what we did. After a quick trip to the bathroom, I retreated to Quentin’s bedroom, and Quentin made his bed on the couch.
I closed the door behind myself and sat on his bed. The sheets he’d put on for me smelled clean and fresh, but I would’ve preferred sleeping in the same sheets he had so that I could at least have his scent around me if not the man himself.
Being there, in his bedroom, without him, felt strange, intrusive almost even though he’d allowed me to be there. Everything was clean and orderly, and there were more books, of course. I climbed into bed and pulled the heavy blanket over myself.
I was tired. I had just worked an eight-hour shift at the diner then endured my mother for over an hour, so sleep should’ve come easily. But it didn’t. Of course it didn’t. How could I sleep when Quentin was only a few feet away from me and I was in his bed and he was not in his bed? It was maddening. With a frustrated huff, I turned the light back on. Maybe some reading? I just needed to find a book boring enough to make me fall asleep, so I got up and walked over to the bookshelf.
Again, a few titles I recognized, but a lot of titles I’d never heard before. After some searching, I found a thick book with a dark-blue cover that said The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire . It looked perfect for my purpose, so I pulled it out, and as I did, something fell on the floor. At first, I thought it was just a piece of paper, a long-forgotten shopping list maybe, but when I picked it up, I realized it was a photo. And I recognized it. It was the picture we took at the baseball game, with both of us on it, but it was folded in half, one side showing only me, the other only him. I blinked in confusion. I’d only sent the picture to his phone, so he must’ve gotten it printed out. But why? Why did he keep a physical picture of us hidden between his books? The edges were a little wrinkled already, like he’d handled it often. Weird.
A dim light was spilling through the gap under the door, so I assumed Quentin must still have been awake too, and I decided to just ask him about it. I had no idea what I expected out of this conversation. It was a harmless, ordinary picture and perfectly reasonable for him to have, but it would give me an excuse to leave the bedroom and talk to him some more.
Picture in hand, I opened the bedroom door. Quentin was lying on the couch and reading a book, the lamp next to the TV still on.
He sat up when he noticed me in the doorway. “Do you need something?”
I held up the picture. “I found this. If you want, I can send you more. I took lots more that day.”
To my surprise, Quentin looked absolutely mortified, like I’d just confronted him with some damning evidence of a terrible crime and not a selfie from a baseball game.
Now, that was interesting .
I crossed the room and sat down next to him on the couch. He quickly scooted to the opposite end of the couch. He seemed to be blushing. A thought formed in my head, a very spicy thought. I was starting to get an idea about why exactly Quentin had kept that picture hidden, and it sped up my heartbeat. I needed to find out more.
“Why do you have this?” I asked.
He took a jagged breath. “I… It’s… it’s completely inappropriate, I understand. I’m so sorry.”
Inappropriate. I felt a spark of hope and had to suppress a grin. So he did find me attractive, after all.
“Why do you have this?” I asked again. I tried to sound stern and maybe a little angry. I wasn’t angry at all—I was intrigued—but if I pushed him a little, this might actually go somewhere.
Quentin swallowed hard. “I like… looking at it.”
I raised my eyebrows. “You like looking at us at a baseball game?”
“Not us,” he said quietly, staring at his hands in his lap. He paused for a long moment. “You.”
He looked up, his expression vulnerable and his eyes searching mine for my reaction.
“You do?” I repeated gently. I did not understand what was going on with this man. He liked looking at me, but he did not like kissing me?
Quentin let out a sad sigh. “Of course I do. You’re beautiful.”
I shook my head in confusion. “I thought you didn’t like me that way?”
He furrowed his brows in disbelief. “You thought that? You thought that was the issue?”
“Well, yes Quentin. If I try to seduce a man and he runs away—literally runs—then I assume he’s not into me.”
He looked at me, full of sorrow. “How could you think this?” he said quietly, more to himself than to me, then he reached out hesitantly and caressed my cheek, sending my heart into overdrive and my stomach to my knees. “Kelsey, how could you ever think this?”
I leaned into his touch, soaking up the warmth of his hand against my skin, but before I knew it, he retreated again.
I snapped. Was the man trying to drive me insane? “What? What is it then?”
He closed his eyes and rubbed his face. “It’s complicated.”
But it really wasn’t. He wanted me, and I sure as hell wanted him, so why were we still sitting three feet apart?
I was all out of patience. Without further thinking, I launched toward him, grabbed his head with both hands, and kissed him full on the lips. He leaned into the kiss, his lips hot against mine for a few wonderful seconds, then he broke away again, panting.
He lowered his gaze, but I tipped his chin back up and made him look at me.
“Is this about your burns? Because I don’t care about your burns, Quentin.”
He gently my hand away. “You don’t understand. These scars on my face? They are the least affected part. The rest of my body looks worse, much worse.”
“I don’t mind, I told—”
He cut me off. “And it’s not just the burns. A bomb exploded next to me. What do you think that did to my body? There are chunks missing from me. My leg and hip were shattered. They tried screwing the pieces back together, but it got infected, and now I have an artificial hip. Like some geriatric grandfather. And when that fails—because those things don’t last forever—I might end up in a wheelchair.”
“I don’t care.” Why wouldn’t he listen? What would it take to make him listen? I had no clue what else to do, so I kissed him again, more gently this time, and again, he let it happen for a moment before retreating again.
“But I care, Kelsey. My body is a broken ruin.”
“Okay, you are scared of rejection,” I said, stroking the side of his face, planting another kiss on his lips. “So am I. But I want to give it a try.”
I kissed him again, and he kissed back, and slowly, I felt the tension leave his body. Quentin’s lips caressed mine, gently at first, then his tongue slipped into my mouth as he deepened the kiss and his passion became more urgent.
This time, it was I who broke away. I needed to make sure. “I want to try,” I said again, reaching up to caress the scarred side of his face. “But before we go any further, I need to know you want that too.”
He closed his eyes, leaning into my touch for a moment. Then he kissed my jaw. “Okay,” he whispered in my ear as his mouth wandered downward to my neck, sending shivers down my spine. “Let’s try.”
He kept peppering kisses on my skin until he reached the collar of my T-shirt. His finger played at the hem of my shirt as he raised his gaze, questioning.
Not wasting any time, I took my shirt off and threw it onto the floor.
“God, you are beautiful,” he said, taking the sight of me in for a moment before pushing me back until I was lying on the couch, his body hovering above me.
He continued kissing the newly exposed skin, slow and careful at first, until I sat up and disposed of my bra. His hands were shaking a little as he reached out to touch me, gently stroking my breast, before he leaned down and let his tongue brush against my nipples. A surge of pleasure went straight to my core, making me moan. I wrapped an arm around his shoulder and pulled him closer.
He was breathing heavily, and I could feel the firmness of his erection against my thigh .
I let my hand wander over his back and butt, pushing my hips up against him. His raspy groan sent a surge of desire through me. Arousal overtook me, and I grabbed his T-shirt and pulled it upward, but Quentin grabbed my hand and stopped me. He looked me in the eyes and silently shook his head.
Before I could respond, his lips were kissing a trail down to my stomach again. This was unfair. I wanted to touch him too, wanted to feel his skin against mine.
Then Quentin unbuttoned my pants and pulled them down, and I was too distracted to complain. Wherever this was going, he was on the right track. I quickly helped him remove my pants and lay back down again. He scooted downward and settled between my legs, his hot, unsteady breath against my thigh.
His finger brushed over the edge of my panties. Again, he paused and looked up at me, his eyes asking for permission to continue. I nodded.
He pulled my panties down, and his eyes went dark with desire as he lowered his mouth to my core. His tongue brushed against my folds, and I arched my hips against him. He caressed me gently, but I was already so on edge that my pleasure built quickly. My fingernails scratched over the back of his neck, the pressure almost unbearable yet so wonderful. Then my release came, and I threw my head back, moaning his name as ecstasy spread over my body. Waves of pleasure washed over me until I felt heavy and limp and incredibly satisfied.
Quentin peppered a few more kisses against my thighs before he retreated, resting his head on my legs.
I felt boneless, and my body was still tingling, but I managed to lift my head to look at Quentin.
When his gaze met mine, I could see the nervousness in his eyes. “Was that alright?” he asked .
With a laugh, I let my head fall back. “Quentin, that was mind-blowing.”
He smiled though a hint of insecurity still showed in his expression.
I pulled on his arm. “Come here.”
He crawled up until we were face to face again. I wrapped my arms around him and buried my face in his neck. His heart was beating rapidly against his chest, and his breaths were short and strained. I let my hand wander over his back and felt his muscles tense under my touch.
I moved a little so that our bodies were resting side by side. Despite just having my release, the sight of his erection made heat pool between my legs again.
“Your turn,” I breathed in his ear, moving my hand from his chest downward, but he sat up abruptly and caught my arm before I could even get close to his groin. “You don’t have to.”
“But I want to.” I wriggled free of his grasp, but when I touched his stomach, he tensed up and not in a good way. That made me pause. “Do you want me to?”
As much as I wanted him, I didn’t want to push him too far tonight. If he needed to take things slow, I would take things slow with him.
He swallowed hard. I waited, searching his eyes for a hint of how to handle him. His body spoke a clear language, but his face spoke of fear.
“I don’t know,” he finally said. “It’s just… It’s been so long since anyone touched me like this. Can we… just lie here for a while?”
I stretched my arms out. “Come here.”
Quentin lay back down, nestled against me on the couch, his arm draped around me.
I locked our hands. “You’re so different from all the other men I’ve met before you,” I said, more to myself than to him.
“I’m sorry I’m making this so difficult.”
“Don’t be. We have all the time in the world.” I gently stroked his forearm with my thumb. “I want to do this right. I want to make you feel good. And safe.”
“You do that,” he whispered into my ear.
His body was already relaxing into a slumber, and soon enough, his breathing slowed, and his eyes closed.
I watched him for a while, taking in his scent and the warmth of his body, before I, too, drifted into a deep sleep.