Page 51 of Frequency of Attraction

Vadim received a text from Quinn an hour later letting him know that Baba Mila had been called in to work at the bakery and he’d have to meet them there. Even absent, she was handling everything.

Do you like pastries?she’d added at the end.I think I ate that whole box by myself.

He chuckled.You did. Any recommendations?

Try all of them. Every single one.

Turned out Eastie, the neighborhood where the bakery was located, was too far to walk from Quinn’s Beacon Hill brownstone, even for Vadim, so he used a ride share. He felt a deeper pull to the city with every passing mile. The river reminded him of Toulouse, and though Boston couldn’t compete with that ancient city in beauty, it offered its own charms.

The bakery, tucked inside a plain brick storefront, smelled like the best parts of home. Calm stole through his soul. His daughter—hisdaughter—was perched in a back booth with too-big headphones on.

Mila came out from behind the counter. “I promise you that she only gets to watch TV when things like this come up. Magda’s husband is sick again.”

Vadim shook his head. “You’ve done a wonderful job with her. She is loved and happy. I don’t give a damn about the TV time.”

Little Mila looked up then, and Vadim felt like he had fallen from astronomical heights. “Papa! I had oatmeal with egg for breakfast like you! Where’s Quinn?” She pronounced itkin. She didn’t wait for an answer. “I likeBubble Guppies. Molly has pink hair.Babushkawill let me have a cookie later if I’m good. Look at my arms! I drew pictures andBabasaid I could. Want to see where I nap?”

He laughed out loud as she scrambled out of the booth and grasped his fingers in her fist. The collapsible playpen in the back held a pink elephant and a blanket that had likely once been whiter than its current gray. The sight tugged at his heart. He’d missed so much. How could he make sure he didn’t miss more when his dream job was thousands of miles away?

Vadim made good money at OrbitAll. Really good. But he couldn’t come to Boston every weekend. His obligations to his employer were too great. He also couldn’t move Mila to Victory, not with her grandmother so integral to her life. Maybe Quinn would have some ideas.

Vadim spent the rest of the morning and all afternoon in the bakery. To appease Quinn, he tried five different pastries. Little Mila helped. The apple cake was her favorite. The layeredmarlenkacake was his. He watched two episodes ofBubble Guppiesand didn’t entirely hate it. They took a walk and found lots of pink and purple flowers in bloom. He took oodles of selfies with his daughter to send to his family. He received the longest hug of his life, which ended in tears for one of them—and it wasn’t Mila.

When he stepped onto Tate’s plane later that evening, Vadim’s heart had never been fuller. And he knew exactly who he owed that to.

25

News of Hadrian’s alcohol overdose seemed to have spread to every news outlet in Europe. The Google alerts on Quinn’s phone were as constant as the buzzing of insects, but she didn’t want to miss any updates from Maude, who had rushed to Cannes from Paris to be with her brother, so she kept her phone on for the duration of the flight.

She didn’t care about the reputational aspects of Hadrian’s overdose. She cared about her cousin. Mostly. Maude had told her Federica had broken it off with Hadrian, and he had decided to drown his sorrows in their best gin. Quinn would have to remind him that when aiming for destruction, one needed to use a rival product.

Each new alert added tension to her jaw. She tried to stretch the stress out, but that didn’t help. Sometimes PR was nothing but a nightmare. The joy of new products and stores, and even events like Chen’s successful flight on Stratos, did not always balance out the bad press. Maybe Vadim had been right. Maybe an outsider would be better at PR for their family company. With a change in role, Quinn might be able to focus on making the Geier Group better, not less worse.

Dropping her phone back in her lap, Quinn wondered what Vadim and Mila were up to. Missing the reprised play date hurt more than she’d expected. Vadim in the doting father role, with his tiny mirror image at his feet, opened pockets of her heart she hadn’t known existed. Quinn wanted to be with them more than anything. And that kiss. The goodbye kiss that felt like anything but. Vadim’s soft lips and searching tongue had felt like the start of everything Quinn wanted.

Hadrian was sleeping when Quinn walked into his hospital room many hours later. Maude was slumped in a chair by the window, phone in hand.

“Winnie!”

Quinn’s nickname from childhood, when Maude, her slightly older cousin, couldn’t pronounce her name. The model-esque woman rose to embrace her, surrounding Quinn with expensive perfume and the smell of cigarettes. She looked rumpled and exhausted. Quinn likely looked the same after her multiple flights.

“How is he?”

“Despondent. In pain. They won’t give him any drugs for the hole in his stomach thattheycaused. And they obviously aren’t honoring patient confidentiality. Everyone on the planet knows he’s done this to himself.”

“Do we know if this was accidental or on purpose?” Quinn didn’t think Hadrian capable of true self-destruction, even with his all-in attitude toward the women he fell for, but she needed to be sure.

“Of course it was accidental! Hadrian wouldn’t kill himself over Federica Ferrari, of all people. She has no sense of humor or style.”

Quinn rolled her eyes. So, if Federica had better clothes, suicide might be more understandable? That was delirium. “Why don’t you go get some sleep? I’ll take over here.”

Maude exhaled in relief. “I know you’ll fix this. You fix everything.”

For once, Quinn didn’t want to fix it. Hadrian had made a choice, and he should live with the consequences. She wouldn’t be around forever to spin their stories and sweep their every mistake under the rug. She certainly couldn’t fix Hadrian’s hurting heart, and wasn’t that what really mattered here?

Hours later, a gravelly voice that sounded nothing like her cousin’s woke her from an uneasy nap. “Little hen has arrived to save the sky from falling.”

Quinn shook her head at her cousin. Even with bedhead and a hospital gown, he looked roguish and handsome. “Just here for you.”

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