Page 170 of Beautiful Liar

41

SYNC

QUINN

Maybe my cracks aren’t so bad.

Maybe the chasm isn’t as deep as I thought.

Maybe she’ll take the leap with me.

Maybe with her, I’ll survive the fall.

Maybe she’ll even save me.

Maybe. Maybe.

Maybe…it’s too late.

***

LUCKY

I step out of the limo and take a bracing breath. Above me soars the skyscraper that holds Quinn’s home. Or so Fionnella tells me.

I’ve been in so many of his properties I’ve lost count. But this Upper East Side building is where he is right now.

Where fuck knows what will happen.

I’m still slightly stunned by my decision. The last minute dash to the airport temporarily silenced the vicious butterflies demanding to know what the hell I was doing.

But here, now, staring at the glass façade, I hesitate. I shouldn’t have come. Hell, I should have fled the other way. But will I ever forgive myself if, after all that’s happened, I lend a hand in the downfall of a man who clearly needs help?

The Monday afternoon sidewalk traffic is light, or as light as can be without all the tabloid frenzy that dogged me a few months ago before I escaped to Vancouver. Everywhere I went I saw my face on the news. Pictures of Quinn and me outside XYNYC alongside a censored one of me and Q in bed seemed to be pictures of the year.

Although humiliation still burns from being publicly exposed by Quinn’s film, I’ve made grudging peace with myself. Even before Fionnella pointed it out yesterday, I accepted that I walked into the Lucky/Q thing with my eyes wide open and therefore was accountable for my own actions.

It’s the Elly part of my story that tore my heart in shreds. And that heart hasn’t recovered.

Twenty-four hours. That’s all I’ve promised to give him. I owe him that for the tracker he put in the cash that helped locate Clayton. I don’t have the emotional stamina for any more. I’m still raw from the depth of his deception.

Pushing my shoulders back, I walk toward the revolving doors. I can’t linger on the sidewalk. I’m already attracting curious glances.

The doorman holds it open for me and the concierge doesn’t stop me as I head for the private elevator.

Fionnella provided me with the security code for the door. The possibility that Quinn won’t be in a state to answer his own front door isn’t something I’m prepared to deal with so I just open the slate double doors myself and walk right in.

The interior is gloomy. The air-conditioning is turned up high and the place is dark and cold and desolate.

I want to call out to him, but fear freezes my vocal cords.

What I can see of the minimalist decor looks bleak and clinical. The floor-to-ceiling glass wall is frosted, blocking out the blazing July sun.

I search the living room until I find the window remote. I’m about to click when I hear a sound behind me.

Quinn.

“Leave it,” he croaks, his voice full of rocks.

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