I pivoted in my seat, studying her. Narcotics even? Interesting. She glanced over, and to my surprise, there wasn’t an ounce of regret. No excuses. When Keith had been in the thick of addiction, he’d been a bundle of lies and justifications. But Jess, she owned every last bit of it… and with a side of sass to wash it all down.
“Although,” she said, her eyes up as if searching her brain for clues, “I do remember the sketch monsters. Those were an unruly bunch of freaks.”
“What are sketch monsters?”
“Sketch monsters?” she asked, as if I should already be informed. “You know, the scary little hand-drawn hellions that terrorize the mind when inebriation sets in?”
I shook my head.
“Huh, I thought they were common knowledge. Do you think maybe I made them up myself?”
Given her wild upbringing, I wouldn’t put it past her. Jess was funny… so self-assured.
“Maybe.”
“Anyway.” She waved off the confusion. “You know what I’m talking about.”
“Can’t say I do.”
She raised a brow.
“What?” I shrugged. “I’ve never been much of a partier.”
“I don’t believe you,” she said with a mischievous grin. “A musician without a drug past is like a nun without a Bible.”
I held a finger up. “Not if you were a pretentious teenage musician like I was.”
“Really?”
“Oh, yeah. Had the whole stick up my ass and everything. Fancied myself a prodigy back then. It was all about practicing and writing and perfecting. I was going to be somebody someday, you know? Anyway, as you can see, I didn’t have time for fun… or for those freaky sketch monsters of yours. In hindsight, I probably should’ve lit it up.”
Jess studied me more closely, and I mentally scanned back over our conversation for anything even remotely incriminating.
“I’m sorry,” she finally said.
“For what?”
“For misjudging you. For insinuating you were a spoiled brat. You’re a solid guy, Quinn. And can I just say your dedication to your passion is admirable? I suppose I just assumed all musicians were tortured little creatures—but look at you, Mr. Well-Adjusted.”
I held onto the bitter laugh threatening to blow my cover. If ever there was an adjective that least described me, it would bewell adjusted.
Maybe in another life, but not in this one.
Never in this one.
6
Jess: Special Kind of Destruction
Flashes of skin could be seen through the windows of my car as Quinnchanged from his performance attire into something that would be more comfortable for the both of us. Those vinyl pants left nothing to the imagination. And trust me, I’d been imagining.
But his modesty wasn’t the only reason I was happy he was making the change. Despite preferring a more contemporary wardrobe for myself, I was a purist when it came to men’s clothing. Just the basics, please. I’d take a pair of nice-fitting jeans any day over fancy duds. Maybe I just hadn’t had enough swanky in my life to appreciate it when it slapped me in the face.
Tilting my sunglasses up, I made more of an effort to see inside the fogged windows and was glad I did because I was definitely catching some of Quinn’s strapping chest behind the condensation. He’d insisted on changing in the car, so I’d parked in the back of the lot to give him some privacy. Not that I was affording him any. I shouldn’t have been staring—I knew that—but it was near impossible to look away.
Quinn was an enigma, even after we’d talked nonstop for nearly an hour. Just when I thought I had him pegged, he went and flipped the switch on me. Those tiny droplets of truth he sprinkled into our conversation made me want to know more. Clearly, this was not an info-dump kind of guy. Getting what I needed out of him would require work. Luckily, no one had ever accused me of backing down from a challenge. Still, I had to be careful with Quinn because he would be so easy for me to fall for… and then watch, devastated, as he walked away.
I should get out now while I still had a chance. But I wouldn’t, because deep down, I craved his special kind of destruction. Quinn was fun. He was gorgeous. He was deep. And, my god, he was so far out of my league. Guys like Quinn were the confidence levelers—the ones that took girls like me down a notch… or two… or ten. Don’t get me wrong—I considered myself a reasonably attractive, self-assured woman, and operated under the assumption that most men were attainable if I gave it my all. But Quinn was the man at the bar that didn’t need to send a girl a drink. He didn’t need to try. Female attention must be lavished upon him. He’d expect it. In fact, had Quinn and I not met in such an intense way, he probably wouldn’t have given me a second glance.
