Lost the Handle (Nashville Assassins: Next Generation #8)

Chapter 38

Chapter

Thirty-Eight

Quinn

Ava has never cried in front of me before.

She sobs on the couch as I lean against the buffet cabinet that holds photos of her grandma who is passing away. One kidney has already failed, and the other is on its way out. I feel for Ava; I do, but all I can think is how I feel when Emery cries. How I desperately want to brush her tears away. When she cried at the club, I had to walk away before I smothered her in my arms and begged her not to believe me when I said I didn’t love her. I know it makes me a jackass, but Ava’s tears do nothing for me.

Damn it.

Why do grandmas have to die? I just lost my grandparents, so I know Ava’s pain. And while she’s been a cunt to me these last couple months, I feel bad. Jesus, if Emery were here, she’d cut me with a look and curse the grandma.

Channel your big dick energy , I hear her say, and I blow out a breath. Fuck Granny.

“I’m sorry, Ava. That’s rough.”

“You know how much I love her,” she cries, shaking her head. “It’s just unfair.”

“It is. I know how you feel,” I tell her. I leave out the part about how she didn’t come to my grandparents’ funeral or didn’t even seem to care that I lost two people I loved in a matter of days. Someone did come, though, and then Emery made sure I knew I wasn’t marrying anyone but her.

“God, I’m so mad,” she exhales, shaking her head. “But Daddy wants to move the wedding to Sunday. He wants to have your family over tomorrow for dinner and to plan things. Will that be a problem?”

Her eyes set on me, and the challenge in them gives me pause. I stare into her eyes, and I don’t even see my friend from so long ago. I have known this girl since I was seventeen, and I wonder if she ever truly cared about me as a person—or if she always thought she’d need me one day. I fill my lungs with air and ignore my heart that’s more like a kick drum than the muscle that belongs to a certain curly-haired spitfire. “A big one.”

She draws her brows in, her eyes narrowing. “What? Why? It doesn’t matter when we do it. Let’s do it so my granny can be there.”

Tears stream down her face, and I shake my head. “I can’t, Ava.”

She stands then, her scrubs a wrinkled mess. Tears stain her top, and her eyes are wide and red-rimmed. “Quinn?—”

“I won’t,” I say sharper, my tone deep and dark. “You know how much I love Emery, and how badly it fucked me up when she left.”

“I do because I was you for a whole semester!” she shrieks, more tears spilling from her eyes. “I did your classwork and took your tests! All while you cried over a girl who didn’t want you!”

“And hid the girl you loved,” I fire back, and I feel my shoulders tense.

“Don’t you dare bring Yvette and me into this!”

Her words are the gasoline I need to burn bright for my love. “I don’t want to, but you keep bringing up Emery, painting her in a bad light, and it’s not right. You don’t know her. You don’t know what happened between us, only my side. There are always two sides to a story. I didn’t know her side until recently.”

“Which is so convenient, when the person she thinks she owns is marrying someone else. How nice she told you now, when you’re moving on.”

“I’m not moving on. I was just helping you, but I can’t do that any longer.”

She laughs incredulously. “Not gonna deny that she says she owns you like a fucking possession, though, are you?”

“Because she does,” I say with a shrug. “She owns all of me, as I own her. How can you question it? Don’t you feel like that for Yvette?”

“Sure, but I am doing what needs to be done.”

“No. You’re forcing us into something that neither of us wants. I will give you the money?—”

“It’s not about the money. It’s my family. I don’t want to lose them.”

“So, you’ll lose Yvette?”

She scrunches up her face. “Yvette understands and supports me. She isn’t going anywhere. Unlike Emery, who’s over here fucking with you! She isn’t worth?—”

“She is worth everything,” I snap, pushing off the buffet. “You don’t know how my soul craves hers. How I am lost without her, and how, now that I have her back, I refuse to do anything but be with her.”

Ava throws her hands up, her face bright red. “She is playing with you. Can’t you see this is a fucking game to her? She doesn’t love you, Quinn!”

The door suddenly slams open, and Emery walks in, her skirt swishing along her thighs with each sure step she takes. Her eyes are narrowed, pure loathing in her gaze. I am so enraptured by the air of madness around her—how her shoulders are back and her lips are tipped up in a confident grin. She strikes her hands to her hips, and instantly, I’m hard for her. The desire I hold for this woman is an uncontrollable inferno, and I’d burn a thousand lifetimes over.

With her steel-gray eyes set on Ava, Emery snaps, “Don’t you ever tell him I don’t love him again. You can’t even fathom the depths of my love for him.”

Ava glares. And I’ll give it to her, most cower to Emery. “What? Are you going to hit me again?”

“Maybe,” Emery laughs with a smirk.

Just as Yvette asks, “You hit her?”

I hadn’t even noticed Yvette there, and Emery only waves off her question. “I grabbed her hair because she pushed Quinn.”

Yvette’s gaze snaps to Ava. “What in the world? Why would you put your hands on him?”

Ava holds out her hands at Emery. “He was basically pounding her against the wall at dinner.”

“So?” Yvette asks calmly. “We have sex all the time.”

Emery snorts as Ava’s glare deepens. “Yes, but we aren’t trying to pass off a fake marriage, are we?”

Yvette wants to say more, but I interrupt her. “It doesn’t matter. This is over.”

Ava swings her gaze over to mine, but I don’t miss the smug look on Emery’s face. “No,” Ava snaps, her eyes wild. “I will ruin you.”

“I wish you wouldn’t,” I say more calmly than I feel. As much as I have the support of everyone, I would like to make the decision to reveal my mistakes myself. “I wish you’d take my money and walk away, Ava.”

“You offered her money?”

I meet Emery’s inquisitive gaze. “I did. She’s got me by the balls with?—”

“I know,” she says, cutting me off. “I know all of it, and I told Yvette to offer her the money.”

I shouldn’t be surprised, but I am. “How long have you known?”

“A day.”

“You’re brilliant,” I say on a rush. “But I told you to stay out of it.”

“And I don’t listen,” she says with a shrug. “I don’t know why you did it. I could have changed your grades—or you even could have.”

I shake my head, my eyes burning into hers. “I couldn’t when it made me think of you. I missed you. I ached for you. I just wanted to wallow and be a husk of a man, because that’s all I am without you.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Not as sorry as I am. I should have chased after you.”

“I shouldn’t have pushed you. I hate that this happened, that you trusted this person.”

I shake my head. “I was lost without you.”

Tears gather in Emery’s eyes, and soon, she’s coming toward me. I open my arms as she crashes into my chest, wrapping her arms around me before our lips meet in a heated embrace. I kiss her like my ex-fiancée isn’t in the room with her lover. I kiss her like it’s the first, the current, and the last time I’ll ever feel her lips. I relish the feel of her in my arms and pray that when my time comes, I’ll never have to live a day without her. We part only because we can’t breathe, but there is no space to be had. She brushes her lips over mine as she holds my gaze, and she whispers, “I’m so sorry. I really am. I wish I hadn’t been?—”

“We’re moving forward, right?”

A tear spills over her bottom lash. “We are.”

“You’re here?”

“I am. And I’m never leaving.”

“Then all is well,” I tell her, cupping her jaw.

She covers my hand with hers, and the love in her eyes leaves me breathless. “I love you, Quinn, and I swear you’ll never go a day without knowing so.”

My lips tip up at the side, my heart slamming into my ribs, trying to get to her. “I love you, lovebug. Always and forever.”

Her lip trembles and I know she wants to say more, but our audience has another thing in mind. “You can’t do this to me, Quinn.”

I hold Emery close as I glance over at Ava. “I can, and I am.” I look down at my cherubic-cheeked, curly-haired craziness and grin. “I’m hers, and I won’t apologize for that.”

Emery’s eyes glaze over as she reaches up to cup my face. “Don’t ever.”

I turn to kiss her palm, and as I do, I know I never will.