Page 171 of Quinlan

Fuck, I don’t make it a habit to be this obvious. I shrug, crossing my arms over my chest. “Can’t stop thinking about how we should’ve kidnapped her much sooner.”

Liam stares. Rome’s expression is flat.

When Rome and I fucked her, I meant it as a sex thing. After that first night we slept together, it became something else. Whenever I think of the years she’s suffered by herself, a knife twists in my chest.

I’m serious enough for my friends to see that I mean that too.

We’ll make it up to her. All those years. She’ll forget about them; we’ll make sure of that.

“We couldn’t have been there.” Rome pats my shoulder once, puts his hand back in his lap. “We could’ve done more, that’s also true, but at the end of the day, we worked with what we had. It hurts and I feel the same guilt as you do, but we can’t go backand change anything. She’ll have the best future up ahead. That’s where our focus should be.”

“Yeah.” My teeth clench. Every trace of humor is sucked out of me. “Just because she went to school, because her parents didn’t look that bad, I… Fuck. Just fuck.”

“She’s ours. Nothing will hurt her ever again,” Liam sums it up, concise and to the point as ever. “Speaking of. You two can expect an email from Quinlan in”—his gaze slides to the screen, eyes growing dark—“three…two…one.”

Our phones buzz. All three of them.

“You haven’t been busy with research.” My need and something that feels a lot like love push me out of the chair and rounding Liam’s desk. “You’ve been watching her work.”

Her email interests me. Of course it does. The love she puts into her work, into us. Those little signs that show she cares.

I’m dying to read it.

I’m dying to look at her beautiful face on Liam’s screen.

“I have.” Liam’s tone is flat. He can fake indifference all he likes.

Problem is, we’re childhood friends. I know this guy better than he knows himself.

As does Rome. “You’re falling for her.”

“And?”

I’m finally there, standing next to Liam’s chair, hand pressing to his desk.

Our Quinlan is on the screen.

My God, she’s beautiful. Breathtaking.

Our captive.

Mysavior.

Raising a finger, tracing it on the screen, it’s a subconscious movement. My body craves the feel of the soft skin, where her tattoo is, so I do it. I get lost in the face on the screen.

Her long sandy blonde hair is piled in a messy bun on the top of her head. She’s wearing a gray tank top I dressed her in after we soaped and washed her beautiful hair.

If her laptop’s camera would go lower, I bet I’d find her in the charcoal leggings Rome picked out for her.

A little frown curls her lips down, drawing creases on her forehead. She’s concentrating on another project for one of her other clients. We can see it on the small window in the bottom right on the screen.

She’s safe.

Rex is still out there, a risk. A bigger one with each passing day, since he’s started suspecting Quinlan isn’t really a captive. That she’s with us of her own free will.

We’ve been informed that he’s read her emails to her parents. Maybe he even thinks she really ran off. That she sends her parents money and ditches her responsibilities.

He hates this. Yesterday, he had to go visit his dad. Quinlan had paid for two more weekly sessions, and his dad skipped one. Rex had to go there when no one picked up the phone, then smashed a plate against the wall. He didn’t like it that his dad forgot his Uber ride and slept throughout the afternoon.

---