Fast (Not Like the Movies #2) Read online

  I wish there was something I was passionate about like that, but the only thing that plays on my mind every day, that affects my each and every choice, is missing my brother. And holding onto every memory of him I have so it doesn’t float away.

  “Quinn.”

  I still, my eyes glued to the dull pavement, then the brown Doc Marten’s that come to a stop in front of me. Gradually, I drag my eyes up the black jeans that hug narrow hips, the T-shirt that reveals a pair of tanned arms squeezing out the top of it, the strong jawline and the hazel eyes flecked with gold that haunted my dreams for so many years.

  Even though I’ve managed to avoid him for the better part of two days, I somehow knew this moment would come.

  “Liam.” I nod my greeting.

  “I’ve been hoping to catch up with you all week, but you didn't come back for coffee.”

  I shrug. It had taken some persuading, but Macy had agreed to swap all morning responsibilities with me on the condition that I reported any flirting I saw Sanjeev getting up to with the other mailroom employees.

  “I ...” I lick my wind-ravaged lips. “I’ve been busy with—”

  “Cut the crap, Quinn.” Liam steps closer. His body fills my vision until he’s all I see. “I know you’ve been avoiding me. It doesn’t take a genius to work that out.”

  “So what if I have?” I try to sound nonchalant, but my heart hammers against my chest. Seeing him again makes me question why I said no to his offer of a date. Seeing him again makes me question my ability to not throw myself at his feet and beg to lick his ankles.

  “So I want to know why. You don’t want to go on a date with me—that’s fine. But I thought at the very least we could hang out while you’re in town. We used to be friends. We used to be honest with each other.” Those muscled arms shrug to his sides, and something inside of me breaks.

  “We never used to be friends, Liam.”

  “What do you mean?” Lines crease his brow.

  “I mean, you might have thought you had a crush on me back then, but me? It was more than that. I used to love you, Li. I loved you, and then you left.”

  As soon as the words are out of my mouth, I want to take them back. Oh boy. That was so not what I planned to say.

  Liam’s lips part and his eyes focus on the building behind me, the pavement in front of him—anywhere and everywhere but on my face. I cover the side of my mouth with my hand, embarrassed that I’ve done it again—I’ve put my foot in my mouth, just like I always do.

  I shake my head and turn toward the McWilliams & Co building. “Look, I should go.”

  “Quinn, wait.”

  Liam stops me. He’s always had the power to do that. A man brushes my shoulder on his way past. A woman steps right in front of me as the early-morning pavement pounders bear down upon us. Heels clack, voices snap orders over mobile phones, cars chug past, and still I manage to hear his voice above it all.

  “I left because I couldn't cope. When we lost Braden ... it hurt more than anything I’d ever experienced. More than anything I’d ever known.”

  Slowly, I turn around. Against the sea of fast-moving commuters, it’s as if I’m stuck in slow motion.

  “I didn’t know what to do. I was young, and the guy I grew up playing football with, the guy I was planning on heading off to study with—he died. He died, and I wasn’t there to help him.”

  A few heads turn in Liam’s direction, but no one stops, no one slows down. “He was my brother, Li.” I shake my head. “I get it.”

  “You two were so close—seeing you felt too much like seeing him. Q, I was just a kid. I wasn’t strong enough.” He shakes his head, as if the memory physically hurts him. “I didn’t realise that maybe if I’d stayed—maybe things could have been easier for you. For the both of us.” His Adam’s apple bobs with his swallow. “Confession?”

  I manage a small smile. “Go ahead.”

  “I always thought I wasn’t good enough for you. Not the smart girl with the big dreams, the one with the world at her feet. The best I could hope for was a kiss in the hall at a party, one you probably ended up regretting.”

  “You never kissed me back.”

  He shrugs. “You never even gave me a chance.” Liam steps closer, closer, closer still, until there’re only a few centimetres of tension between us. One hand cups my jaw as those hazel eyes bore into mine. “And I’ve spent every day since wishing I’d taken that opportunity, snatched it with both hands and never let you go.”

  The words unravel the tightly-wound ball of hurt inside my chest. It loosens and eases until all I feel is Liam, my heart beating his name double-time, Liam Liam, Liam Liam. Years of missing and longing reel in closer, shortening, until it almost feels like yesterday that he was a boy at a party and I was a girl who so desperately wanted to be his.

  “Confession?”

  “Yes,” I whisper the word, afraid to speak and break this moment.

  “I want to kiss you more than I want to think. More than I want to breathe.” And with that, he leans in and presses his mouth to mine.

  Liam’s kiss is nothing like the soft, gentle touching of lips that occurred all those years ago. No, his mouth is a tempest, wild and strong, demanding yet yielding when I move my own in return. His hold on my jaw tightens until I feel nothing but the pressure of his hand, the heat of his lips, and the softness of his tongue as it stokes a fiery passion deep inside me. Kissing Liam is everything I’d dreamed it would be, but somehow something more, something bigger—something greater than I’d ever thought possible.

  And then, just as quickly as it began, it’s over.

  He steps back, his hands dropping to his sides, his gaze fixed to mine. His cheeks flush pink, and he smiles the sweetest smile that makes me want to kiss him again and again just to see that shyness revealed.

  I touch the side of my face where I still feel his fingers pressed into my skin. For the first time in forever, I’m not hiding the memories of the past painted on the side of my lips—I’m touching a nearby spot and yet it feels entirely different.

  It feels like the future.

  Chapter Ten

  “Wow.” I manage to say through my fog of oh-my-God-please-kiss-me-again.

  “Wow.” Liam nods.

  A briefcase taps the side of my leg and I stumble, quickly righting myself. I barely feel it. I’m flying on my newfound hottest-kiss-ever wings, and nothing will bring me down.

  “So did you want to—”

  “Do that again? Absolutely.” I nod sagely.

  “I was going to say chat about this later,” Liam says. “I have to get to work. We both do.”

  I press my hand to my forehead. “Of course. Of course we do.”

  “Goodbye, Quinn.” He presses his lips together, as if he’s about to say something more, then turns and walks away.

  My heart floats from hottest-kiss-ever high down to soles-of-my-Nine-West-shoes low. That’s it? He’s just leaving me here?

  “Q?”

  I whip around so fast my ponytail dances on the side of my lips. “Yes?”

  “I do. I do want to do it again.” He grins. “So damn bad.”

  ***

  I fly through the day in the office. Not even Shantel’s snide remarks about my still-bruised legs can bring me down, and I complete the proofread Madison gives me with ease, handing it in a full half hour before any of the other interns.

  “I’m impressed.” She scans the computer screen in front of her. “You’ve done a really good job.”

  “Thanks.” I smile from ear to ear.

  “I mean that.” Madison clasps her manicured hands on the desk in front of her. “Not just with this task. All week you’ve excelled at everything I’ve asked you to do. The only thing that seemed to rattle you was getting the coffee.”

  Heat rushes my cheeks like a firestorm. She’d noticed? “I—”

  “Don’t make excuses, Quinn. The point is, it got done, and I’m not going to ask for the particulars.” She ti
lts her head to the side. “Do you like working here?”

  I frown. What kind of a question is that? “Yes, of course.”

  “Good.” She gives a prim nod. “I just haven’t seen you smile like you have today since you started. How have you been going with your assignment?”

  “Honestly, I haven’t been ‘going’ at all. I just don’t know where to start.”

  One side of Madison’s lips lifts in a smile. “They say you should write what you know.” She leans in closer, her voice low against the purr of feminine tones in the open-plan office. “What do you know, Quinn?”

  I study her, her brown hair, her English-rose skin, her round blue eyes. What do I know?

  Pain.

  Suffering.

  Guilt.

  But today, there’s something different as well. An entirely different emotion, similar in composition to my fall-back of hurt, but entirely different in composition.

  Hope.

  I feel hope.

  And there’s something so damn exciting about that.

  Madison dismisses me and I walk back to my desk. Outside, the dark clouds have gone. Sydney Harbour sparkles a glorious blue, dotted with blinding white boats that scud along it. It’s as if the wind has blown away all the dirt and dreary greys of the city, replacing it with this fresh new landscape, where anything can happen.

  That’s exactly how I feel. I touch one hand to the side of my face, where Liam’s fingers made that invisible mark. I feel brand-new. I am the harbour—and he’s the storm that made me clean again.

  And as I sit down at my computer, words flow from my fingers to the white screen above. The blinking cursor barely gets a chance to fade as I let the emotions rip, describing how I feel about it all—the past, and how it can change you. How it shapes you as the person you are, but how sometimes, you need to let it go, too. Parts of the past are only skin deep.

  And when I finally hit save on the document and walk out of the doors of McWilliams & Co ten minutes earlier than usual, I have just one destination in mind.

  ***

  “Flat white, please.” I hand over my four dollars to the girl behind the register and wait to the side. Only five other people lean against the counter, or swagger near the doorway. The demand for caffeine has decreased with the sunlight to a mere dwindle.

  I crane my neck, searching the back room for Liam, but he’s nowhere to be seen.

  “Quinn,” the barista calls, flicking a dreadlock back over his shoulder and pushing my cardboard cup over the counter.

  I search again. Still no sign of him.

  “Excuse me?” I ask the barista as I pick up my too-hot cardboard cup.

  Chocolate eyes drill me.

  “Is Liam around at all?”

  A white-toothed smile splits his face. “Let me guess. You’re his Q.”

  Warmth wraps around my chest, creating this strange cosy feeling inside of me. His Q? I want to be his anything.

  Hell, I want to be his everything.

  “I ... I guess I am.”

  “He’s gone to meet you at your building. Looks like you two had a communication breakdown.”

  He barely finishes the sentence before I race out of the café back toward McWilliams & Co. Somehow, we missed each other. We got our wires crossed—not for the first time, it would seem, if what he told me this morning about his feelings for me were true.

  I jig from foot to foot waiting for the lights to change, then dart around the masses of commuters crossing the road, anxious to reach him as soon as I can. Liam. I need to see him. I need to tell him. I need—

  Seeing him is like a breath of fresh air after staying underwater too long. Oxygen fills my lungs and I gulp it in, my eyes trained on this man they can’t get enough of. He’s leaning against the same street pole he was this morning, eyes focused on the doors of my building. His hair is mussed, as if he’s run his hands through it one too many times, but his eyes don’t speak of frustration, only hope.

  I take one step forward, then freeze. What am I doing? Sure, this morning we shared a monumental kiss, but I’m only in Sydney for a short time. With the hours I’d be doing at the newspaper back home and his job at the coffee shop here, we’d never see each other. Nothing can come of this. No dating, no future, and certainly no sex if I want to keep my heart intact.

  He seems to sense my presence before I have the chance to leave. Our eyes meet, and for one glorious moment time seems to stop. I wish it would. I want to be here in this moment, on the brink of forever, for as long as I possibly can. I don’t want to end this dream. I don’t want it to end at all.

  He walks closer, and my feet glue themselves to the ground even though my brain is saying run, run, run.

  “Confession?”

  “Liam, I can’t do this. I—”

  “Just hear me out.” He holds his hands in front of him then takes a deep breath. “I’ve been thinking about this all day, and ... and I want to take your picture.”

  I blink. “Pardon?”

  “Q, I like you, more than I should. You’ve been on my mind all day—I can’t think of anything else.” He shakes his head. “I want to take you on a date. I want to show you my favourite restaurants. I want to bring you home to meet my folks, and I want to get lost in kissing you over and over again, until my head spins and what we did this morning looks like the kind of peck you’d give a nun on her way to confession. And yes, I want to take your picture. Because that’s what I do with the things that I feel right here.” He thumps his chest. “Deep inside.”

  I’m speechless. His words have stolen my knees, leaving them weak and jelly-like.

  “Shall we start with the date?”

  And even though I should say no, even though there are a million reasons why this won’t work, I find myself wanting to say yes. The word teases my tongue, lingers on my lips. God, I want this. But can I take this giant leap?

  Liam steps in toward me, and I know I have to say something.

  “Confession?” I breathe when he’s finally kissing distance away.

  “Go ahead.”

  “I’m scared. I’m freaking out with everything I have that this isn’t going to work, that we’re only going to get hurt, that what happened back then is a sign of things to come.”

  He trails his knuckles down the side of my cheek. “Then it’s a good thing we’re in this together.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Friday, I buzz with nerves. After work, Liam is picking me up and driving me back to Emerald Cove, where he’s taking me out to dinner.

  The day passes in a flash, and before I know it, it’s half past four and the drinks trolley is being rolled around the office.

  “Go on.” Madison nods toward the cart when it pauses at the entrance to our row. “You’ve all done quite well this week, in particular Quinn. I’ve been very impressed with you.”

  I flush with pride. Shantel shoots me a dirty look.

  “Feel free to grab a beverage, on me.” Madison indicates the cart, then turns to walk away. “Indulge.”

  “You don’t need to ask me twice.” Macy grabs two Heinekens, knocking the caps off against the wooden desk and handing me one. “Cheers.”

  “Cheers.” Our bottles clink.

  Shantel huffs a sigh and makes a big show of asking to sit somewhere—anywhere—else, so she doesn’t have to listen to our inane chatter once more.

  “Is it too soon to say I told you so?” Macy knocks back a mouthful of beer, resting the bottle on top of her notepad.

  “For what?”

  “I can’t decide between being right about you nailing this internship or you going on a date with the incredibly hot coffee-shop guy.” Macy winks.

  I smile. I have to admit, her being right feels good.

  No, better than good.

  Her being right is damn amazing.

  “You did tell me so, and I’m so ... so happy.” I shake my head.

  “Good. Now, are you prepared for tonight?”

  I s
hrug. All Liam told me was that we were headed to dinner somewhere. I’d chosen an outfit the night before, and had it ready to change into when the working day drew to a close. “I guess so.”

  “So you have the essentials?”

  Somehow, I have a feeling Macy isn’t just talking about my date outfit. “Such as ...?”

  She looks at me as if I’m an idiot. “Stuff to take with you in case the date goes well. Make-up. Dental care. A spare pair of knickers.”

  “Who carries around a spare pair of knickers?”

  Macy gives a wicked grin and digs around in her oversized tote before pulling out a lacy black G-string. “Ever since I saw Fifty Shades of Grey, I’ve been carrying this bad boy with me. I’m just dying for some guy to take me in a lift and rip my underwear off, but in case I end up with semen dribbles, I figure having a spare catcher pair is always a good thing.”

  I laugh. “Seriously? A spare catcher pair?”

  Macy shrugs. “Anyway, you want? I have these, plus some condoms, lube, lipstick, mascara, and a small hand moisturiser I use for massages that you could probably use on your face if need be.”

  “I think I’m going to pass, but thanks so much for the offer.” I think of my own handbag’s contents. Lip gloss. Some pens and paper. A packet of ibuprofen. It seems Macy and I are equipped for two entirely different activities when we leave the house.

  “Suit yourself. But if you end up with sticky legs, don't come crying to me.”

  I laugh at the idea, then quickly turn serious. While I certainly won't be sleeping with Liam tonight, the idea of going on a date with him after liking him for so long has finally hit home. “So I’m really doing this?”

  “You’re really doing this. You’re going on a date with that sexy hunk of burning love, forcing yourself to speak to him and spending a few hours in close confines with him.” Macy pauses, her eyes full of mischief. “What could possibly go wrong?”

  ***

  “I didn’t expect this to go wrong.” Liam clenches his jaw, his eyes focused over the dash in front of us, past the rain-splattered windscreen, the blue metal of the car, and the road that stretches into infinity beyond.