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Now his eyes came open all the way. “Keith fucking Bowen?”
“He had a motorcycle.” I explained. “And let’s face it–I wasn’t making the best choices as a teenager.”
Callum made a sound that could have been agreement or disinterest.
“Jason Cain was obviously the standout bad choice, but there were others along the way.”
Callum rolled up onto one arm, dislodging me from my comfortable spot in the crook of his arm.
“Hey,” I protested.
He looked down at me, a five o-clock shadow stubbled across his chin. It didn’t suit his clean-cut look, but it was hot. He caught my wrist when I reached up to brush my hand over it. “Quinn, I don’t want to listen to you reminisce about your questionable teenage choices. I was there when they were happening. That was bad enough.”
“Oh, you weren’t paying attention,” I protested. “You didn’t even know I wanted to kiss you.”
Again, the smirk. “I knew.”
“No way. Because I also loathed you. You were so straight laced. Sometimes, you were my kissandmy kill.”
“I knew,” Callum repeated. “And Iwaspaying attention.”
My soul shivered with something deeper than joy at the look in his eyes. Callum didn’t lie. If he said he knew, he knew. If he said he had been paying attention, he had been paying attention. “Why?” I whispered.
His gaze skimmed over my face. He reached out and smoothed a wild lock of hair back from my face before letting his eyes drift down to my throat, my breasts. “Do you even have to ask?”
“You thought I was pretty?” I forced a teasing note into my voice. I’d never been good with intimacy, and this wassointimate.
“I thought–Ithink,” he corrected himself, “–you are exquisite, Quinn. Not just how you look, although you know you’re beautiful. It’s what’s inside that makes you special. Your talent. Your attitude. Your heart.”
There was a lump in my throat so big now I couldn’t speak. I wanted to tell him I thought he was exquisite, too, or whatever the male version of that was. I wanted to tell him that he was good and noble and a dozen other things that I hadn’t been smart enough to appreciate as a teenager. That I’d been an idiot for wanting to kiss him and marry Keith Bowen.
But since I couldn’t say anything, I pulled him back down and kissed him instead.
When we were teenagers, Mia and I joked that Callum needed to get laid. Maybethatwould dislodge the stick from his ass. We said it derisively, but with an undercurrent of wistfulness. Now, I wished I could tell Mia that it had worked. The Callum I woke up to the next day was a lighter, brighter version of himself. He told me what had held him up–lunch with Jason. The idea sent a wave of panic through my body, but Callum said it had actually been good news–Jason was considering signing the new contract. The one that would free me from him for the low, low price of two birthday parties and one wedding.
I don’t know if it was the sex or the news, but I felt like a lighter, brighter version of myself, too. Even after Callum went to work, my heart felt buoyant in my chest. The songs my fingers found in between the six strings of my guitar were sappy and happy, and I wrote two of them down afterward.
The idea of releasing an album of love songs after my first album being indie rock and my second being a pop-star wannabe had an ironic, amusing appeal. Put side by side, I would call them the three faces of Quinn Collins. The first album was the real QC; the second was the mask that Jason Cain had forced over my face, cutting off my breathing; and this third one would be the new side of QC, one I didn’t even know existed until now. Although, if my third album was with Jason, there was no way he was getting these songs. It would be like handing him my heart, and he’d already contracted my body and soul.
No, these would be for me. I would record them when I was free of him. AndmaybeI would release them.
The day went by so quickly, most of it spent bent over my guitar, that I was shocked to look up and see it was the afternoon. I called Callum just to hear his voice, armed with the excuse that Icould pick Noah up, if he wanted. I fully expected him to say no, but he surprised me.
“That would be really helpful.”
“Yeah?” I did a spin around the kitchen at the idea of driving again. God, it was like I was sixteen and newly licensed all over. Once I was free of Jason’s frightening control, I’d never let anyone have that kind of power over me again. “And do I have to bring him straight home, or can we stop off somewhere?”
That one was harder for Callum, but he must have been feeling positive about the Jason situation because he said after a moment, “Fine, Quinn. Stop off wherever you want. But don’t buy him a guitar.”
My face split open in a grin. Of course Callum knew where I was planning to take him. He knew me down to my bones. What a strange and wonderful feeling.
“I solemnly swear,” I said, finishing the quote in my mind,I am up to no good.
“What?”
“Nothing.” Callum clearly stuck to his lawyer novels and hadn’t readHarry Potter, but that was for the best.
I pulled my hair back into a ponytail rather than fight the tangles, swiped on some lipstick so I didn’t look like I’d just rolled out of bed, and headed to the school. The look on Noah’s face when he saw me behind the wheel was the cherry on top of a delicious ice cream sundae of a day. He actually did an awkward jump up and down before he ran over to open the door. My heart melted, and the grin I didn’t think could be any wider hurt mycheeks. How crazy was it that picking up this kid from school made me so happy? I’d never been the maternal type.
