Chapter Seven An Unexpected Encounter
Tenn followed Quinn back to her place. He was thinking about what she said about Quill not being ready to share, his comment about it being too bad Tenn was married because he felt Tenn and Quinn would like each other, plus the fact that he gave Quinn his contact number after he told Tenn to hire a PI and Quinn to give Joel an ultimatum and that it all happened within a few days of each other after he told Quill about his wife's behaviour and that she started at the Porsche dealership.
His thought process was interrupted when he noticed his wife's fuchsia pink Porsche Boxster Convertible parked several houses down from Quinn's place. He had been livid when she came home and proudly showed him her new car. But she insisted that it was like a loaner; she didn't pay for it, and she was expected to drive it as an employee of the dealership. He had combed over their finances that night but couldn't find anything to say she had bought it and let it go. Now, he was wondering if Joel had gotten it for her.
When he pulled up and parked behind her, he jumped out and caught her arm. “My wife is in your house.” He pointed up the street. “That's her car.”
Quinn looked at her house for a minute and then turned back to him. “Can you follow my lead?”
“What?” Tenn stared at her. “We're about to potentially catch them red-handed!”
“Yeah, I need more time to look into some things, and so do you. Can you follow my lead and not lose your temper?” She gazed at him imploringly.
Tenn looked into her emerald eyes, saw the determination, and nodded. “Yeah. I can.”
“Are you sure? No matter what we might hear?”
“We also might see.” He pointed out, bile rising in his throat. He may not want to be with Viki anymore, but the thought of walking in on her getting railed by Quinn’s husband filled him with disgust.
“No, Joel believes sex is a bed sport only.” She shook her head. “And my office is the first room off the hallway, and the bedroom is the last. Just follow my lead.” She took his hand off her arm and squeezed it. “Ready?” He nodded and let her lead him into the house.
He heard his wife making high-pitched, breathy moans when she unlocked the door, moans that he’d never heard her make. They almost sounded… Child-like? He felt his stomach twist. Was that why she was cheating? He would have stopped immediately if she had made that sound with him. Quinn's house was a one-level bungalow, and the hallway to the bedrooms was just to the right of the entranceway. Quinn met his eyes, and while he could see hurt and anger in them, he could also tell she was trying not to laugh. Somehow, the situation became funny to him as well, and he snorted. She put her finger to her lips, and they crept into the hallway. His wife was amping it up, and he saw the door was left open at the end of the hall.
“Just wait in here, Tenn, while I tell my husband to turn down his porn. I'm so sorry about this.” Quinn spoke at a normal volume, and suddenly everything got quiet, and there was a soft thud and a muffled curse.”
“Don't worry about it.” Tenn watched as Quinn walked down the hall and was met by Joel, wrapped in a blanket, in the doorway.
“Quinn! I wasn't expecting you home so early or for you to bring company.” He glanced at Tenn. His face was so red, you could have lit a match on it.
“Well, I am, and I did. So, turn down your porn and shut the door, please.” Quinn paused, and Tenn had to admire her poise at that moment. He was torn between wanting to run down the hall and confront them both and wanting to see how this played out.
“Right. Yeah, sorry about that. Are you guys sticking around or...” Joel trailed off and swallowed nervously, which gave Tenn immense satisfaction and allowed him to stick to Quinn’s plan.
“We'll be working in my office on some stuff.” Quinn started moving toward the door again, and Tenn realized she was trying to see how far she could push him.
“What are you doing?” Joel looked panicked instead of nervous now and stepped forward to block her from entering the bedroom.
“I need my charger.” She went to move around him, and he put out an arm to stop her.
“I'll grab it; you probably don’t want to see the state of things in there.” He disappeared inside, and Quinn leaned on the wall as he brought it back. “You should have warned me you were coming home.”
“I didn't think you'd be here.” She shrugged and turned to leave. “And Joel? Switch to amateur or homemade porn. That poor woman was working far too hard to fake it.”
“Right.” Joel immediately looked pissed off, and Tenn had to duck into the office to hide his laughter.
“Oh, and I guess congratulations are in order, too.” Tenn jammed his fist in his mouth to stop making noise so he could listen.
“Congratulations?”
“Yeah, you finally convinced Anita to buy a Porsche. Little surprised she went with such a bright pink, but hey, good job, Honey.”
“Thanks.” Tenn could hear Joel's confusion and panic and grinned. Quinn was quickly becoming his dream woman.
“I'll have to remember to ask her about it when I see her at the HOA meeting Wednesday night.” Tenn desperately wanted to see Joel's face and poked his head out. The blood had drained, leaving him pale, clammy-looking, and like he was about to pass out.
“I need to lie down.” He whispered.
“Sorry to interrupt,” Tenn said calmly. “But where's your bathroom?”
“Oh, right there.” Quinn smiled at him and pointed at the door, slightly behind her on the right, then looked back at her husband. “Still not feeling well? That's too bad. Don't worry; we won't bother you.” She turned and went back into the office as Tenn closed the bathroom door.
When he came out, he noticed the bedroom door was shut and smirked. They had effectively trapped them in the bedroom. He could only imagine the level of panic going on in there. He walked back to the office with a smug grin on his face.
Quinn's office was large, with lots of built-in shelving units full of art supplies. A large easel was in one corner with a half-completed painting of what looked like a bear and a cub. A long, narrow desk was against the wall with a large square window, her computer on one end and the other covered in paper and pens. The floor was a taupe grey linoleum for easy cleanup of paint spills, and the walls were the same dark teal as her kitchen cabinets. Everything else was in different shades of grey and teal.
Quinn was sitting in front of her computer, and she gestured for him to sit in a chair next to a pile of books. When she looked up, he saw she was in tears, and he immediately got up, shut the door with a tiny click, and went over to hug her, letting her cry softly into his shoulder. “Are you okay?” He asked after she stopped but stayed in his arms, resting her head on his shoulder.
“My house, in my bed.” She whispered. “Just hit me that this is happening.”
“I'm sorry, Flac?r?.” He paused as the Romanian word for flame came out. He hadn't spoken Romanian since his grandparents died six years ago. Where had that come from?
Quinn sniffed. “That's pretty. What does it mean?”
“Flame.” Tenn gently eased back and picked up a lock of her hair. “When you got out of the car at the rose garden, I thought your hair looked like liquid flames.” He let it slide through his fingers. “Do you always change your hair when going through something?”
“Yeah. And I get tattoos too.” She shrugged her cardigan off her shoulder so he could see. Tenn grinned as he looked over her new tattoo. “I have ten now.”
“It's very well done. Who's your artist?”
“Bishop Ramone. Rilla's husband.” Quinn smiled faintly and seemed happy for the distraction from their spouses. “Do you have any?”
“I have a few.” Tenn grinned as he pushed up his sleeves to reveal Van Gogh's Starry Night on his right forearm and Da Vinci's Vitruvian Man on his left. “There's more, but these are the easiest to show.” He sat back in the chair. “The faking comment was pure gold. I almost lost it.”
Quinn laughed softly as she got up and opened the door. “I don't want to give them an opportunity to escape,” she explained as she came back, then her expression became excited. “We might even be able to hear them.”
“How?” Tenn raised his eyebrow, he desperately wanted to know what was currently happening in the bedroom.
Quinn sat at her desk again and woke up the computer, pulling up a security program. “There's a camera that picks up sound on the end of the house, above the bedroom window, and the bed is under it. We both like having the window open when we sleep.” She brought up the camera for the side of the house and turned up the volume. Soft sobbing reached them, and they grinned in delight at one another.
“What the fuck are we going to do?” Viki's tear-filled voice came over the speaker. Quinn grabbed her wireless headphones, handed one to him, and connected them to the computer turning the volume up so they could hear everything clearly.
“Wait for your husband to leave and for Quinn to go to bed. She'll sleep in the spare room if she thinks I'm sick.”
“Won't she want to come in and get ready for bed?”
“Fuck.”
“Why did you think this was a good idea? They’re both in town.” Viki hissed. “If we're caught, we're both fucked.”
“I thought it would be hot. Apparently, you disagree since you were faking.” Tenn and Quinn looked at each other and laughed loudly.
“Oh, my GOD. I wasn't!” Viki’s voice rose, and they could hear her clear annoyance.
“Keep your damn voice down! I need to think!” It was quiet for a minute, and then Joel seemed to make up his mind. “You'll have to go out the window.”
“What? No! It's like ten feet off the ground!” Viki protested, sounding scared. Tenn knew she hated heights; even using the step ladder made her dizzy.
“I'll hold onto your wrists and lower you down. You'll only drop like four feet.” Joel’s voice was confident and reassuring, but Tenn didn’t think he’d be able to do it. Joel was good-looking and in decent shape, from what he could tell, but holding someone's dead weight like that required more upper body strength than he thought he had.
“Oh, my god. This is amazing!” Quinn whispered, and Tenn met her eyes with a grin. Her expression was a mixture of disbelief and amusement.
“I'm not going out the window!”
“You don't have another choice. Quinn made a point to bring up that adultery is still a felony in Massachusetts, with up to three years in prison if convicted -”
“WHAT!” Viki shrieked.
Quinn smirked and went to the office door. “Joel? What was that?”
“Will you shut up?” Joel hissed in the earpiece, and then he raised his voice. “Uh, Nothing. Rolled over on the remote for the TV, the volume went up.”
“Smooth.” Viki snarked much more quietly.
“Don't lose the damn remote in the bed again. Put it on the bedside table.” She called before turning back to Tenn, who was in stitches of laughter.
“You need to go,” Joel said again. “Get dressed. She said she'd destroy me if she caught me cheating.”
“Why were you even discussing it?” Viki huffed, and they heard her stomping around the room. At this point, it was like she was trying to get caught; she wasn’t even bothering to keep her voice down.
“We were talking about the previous receptionist's husband cheating on her and knocking up his affair partner,” Joel explained with clear agitation. “Will you keep it down?”
It was quiet then the sound of the window opening sliding all the way open reached them. Quinn and Tenn watched the screen eagerly as they listened to them argue quietly about the best way for her to go out the window. “The bed is under it, but the window is about three feet above the headboard,” Quinn explained. “The only way would be for Joel to lift her up or go headfirst. The bedroom has a peaked ceiling, and the window is higher in the peak at the end of the house.”
Viki's legs appeared, and as she passed through, she manoeuvred to lie on her stomach, hanging out of the window. “We should have called the cops about an intruder,” Tenn said quietly. “This is incredible.” They watched as Viki wriggled her way out slowly until she was hanging by her arms. Finally, Joel's head and shoulders appeared, gripping her arms, grunting as he held up her weight.”
“You have to let go. I got you.” His voice was strained. They couldn’t see his face, but Tenn noticed his arms were shaking slightly.
“Are you sure?” Viki sounded terrified, and she looked up at Joel while holding on for dear life to the window sill. “Don't drop me!”
“I'm not gonna drop you.” But that was precisely what he did. As soon as she wasn't supporting herself, his hands slipped off her wrists, and she dropped into a pile on the ground with a short scream. Joel, to his credit, attempted to grab her, leaning out of the window, and making a swipe, but his forward momentum was too much, and he fell out too! Tenn and Quinn stared at the screen momentarily and then roared with laughter at Joel's naked body somersaulting out of the window and landing on his back on the ground. He let out a loud groan, and Viki smacked at him.
“You fucking dropped me!”
“Fuck off, Viki.” He groaned again. “I think I broke something. Call an ambulance.”
“Seriously?” Viki froze and then began searching for her phone. “My phone is in my purse!”
“Where's your purse?”
“On the bed.” She said in a small voice.
“You've got to be kidding me!” Joel yelled, looking completely done with life at that point.
“You were supposed to pass it out to me!”
Tenn wiped his eyes. “Please send me this video. This is incredible.” Quinn could only nod. She held her stomach as she laughed, tears streaming down her face.
“Help me get to the back door.” They watched as Viki helped Joel to his feet, and Quinn stood up and raced out of the room. Tenn watched her go and realized what she was doing when she came back with a smug smirk on her face.
“Did you just lock him out?” Tenn looked up at her in amazement as she came back in. She smiled and nodded. “I might love you.” Quinn blushed and laughed, switching to the camera in the backyard. They watched as they made their way slowly to the French doors that led to the patio. Joel reached out to open them, and they heard his devastated groan when he couldn't.
“Now what?” Viki said anxiously.
“Front door. I can use the code.” He said dejectedly.
“You'll have to go past the office where they are.”
“I'll tell the truth. I fell out of the window. I'll say the screen let go and was hanging, and I tried to grab it and fell.” Their voices faded as they went back around the side of the house. Quinn switched cameras again, but they were silent as Viki helped him around to the front.
“Hey, Quinn. Does the dealership give cars to their employees to advertise them?” Tenn asked as his thoughts went back to Viki’s car again.
“Fuck no.” Quinn snorted. “Why do you ask?”
“Because that was how Viki explained getting her car. Unless she has a bank account I don't know about; she didn't buy or finance it.” Tenn explained.
“Right.” Quinn nodded. “Want to divorce lawyer shop with me tomorrow?”
“I have meetings all morning, but why don't you come by my office tomorrow after lunch? We can search and make phone calls.” He suggested, elated at the thought of spending more time with her.
“Go stand by the window; I'll drop your purse out,” Joel instructed as he put in the code for the door. Quinn stood up and shut the door to the office.
“So tomorrow, I'll take our proposal to the faculty and get it approved, and you take it to your department head,” Quinn said, speaking a little louder than usual. “If everything goes well, we can do the Fall and Spring series at the university and the Winter and Summer series at the museum.”
“Perfect. So, we're good with the schedule for it? Weeks three, four, five, and six, three weeks break for midterms, and then Weeks ten, eleven, twelve, and thirteen, so there are three weeks for finals.” Tenn caught on to what she was doing and began suggesting the things he had been thinking about when he started seriously considering the project.
“Yep, that works. I have eight speakers so far; how are you doing?” Quinn smiled as they heard Joel make his way slowly past the office door.
“I have a bunch of feelers out and heard back from three so far, but I'm confident they'll all be okay with it.” Tenn paused, wondering how she would feel about his next suggestion. “Would you be up for travelling to meet with some of them?”
“Absolutely, yes!” Quinn said excitedly.
“They're in the office with the door closed; I was able to sneak by.” Quinn jumped. She evidently had forgotten about Joel and the camera for a second.
“Why is the door closed?” Viki snapped.
“Who cares? They were talking about their stupid project.” Joel sounded frustrated and like he was in a lot of pain, and Tenn admitted to himself that he was feeling a little sorry for him; he had hit the ground pretty damn hard.
“That's like foreplay for those two!”
“Go home, Viki. I'll talk to you later.”
“It doesn't bother you?”
“Not right now. I need pain pills.” The window slid shut, and Viki stood there glaring up at it for a minute before turning to leave. Quinn quickly downloaded the videos to her computer before Joel could delete them.
Tenn let out a loud sigh. “I guess I should head home too. It’s almost ten, and I have to work tomorrow.”
“Well, thanks for coming over. That would have been shitty to deal with on my own.” Quinn stood up with him and walked him to the door.
“We didn't get that much done, which means we need to get together again tomorrow, right?” Tenn looked at her hopefully.
“Yes, but maybe we need to find a place where we won't have interruptions.” Quinn smiled.
“I have just the place.” Tenn smiled happily as he hugged her goodbye, way too thrilled that she agreed to spend more time with him. “See you tomorrow.”
“Night Tenn.”