Loving Quinn Novel by North Rose

(Quinn)

Dionne tilts her head to the side as she stares at my naked chest. A smile plays on her red lips as her eyes appraise my body. Her lust filled gaze makes me feel dirty and I don’t like it one bit. The look she is giving me is too friendly to my liking. It reminds me of the way she used to watch me when I was her patient.

All those sessions in her office while I talked about my battle traumas always felt her eyes on me in a very unprofessional way. It was like she was undressing me with her eyes as I poured out my demons for her. It is no wonder we ended up naked and sweaty in her office that day.

Shaking those thoughts away, I look at her with all the hatred I feel for her in my eyes. “What the f*k a**re you doing here, Dianne?”

Before I can stop her, she pushes her way inside, then spins us around so that my back is against the doorframe. One of her hands slips inside my pants to stroke my c**k while her other hand grabs the back of my neck to pull my-mouth to hers.

Anger fills me the moment her lips touch mine. I grab her arms with both hands before she can press her body to mine, then push her away from my body. With swift movements, I spin her around, then shove her out into the hallway.

“You smell like sexx, Quinn,” Dionne says.

Her voice is thick with arousal. The desire in her eyes makes me sick to my stomach. We were once so hot for each other, but now the thought of her skin against mine makes me want to vomit. That is when I realize that I never really loved her. I desired her, cared for her in the way I thought I should, but I never loved her.

“Get out

out of my building now and don’t come back.”

“I miss you, baby. Seeing you at the hospital that day made me remember how good it was between us, I want that back. The way you responded to my touch tells me you do too.”

“My d***k was already hard because 1 just f***d my fiancé. It had nothing to do with your touch.”

Annora isn’t my fiancé yet, but Dianne doesn’t need to know that. From the look on Dionne’s face, I can tell I shocked her, but she covers it quickly with a smirk. The desire in her eyes never fades.

“Oh, Quinn, I know you don’t mean that. We were so good together. Who is she?”

“Two years ago, you aborted our child. I could never get hard for any woman who would do that to her child because it was inconvenient timing”

She reaches out to touch me again, but I move back out of her way. That was when I hear Annora’s high heels clicking on the marble floor behind me. Rage fills me because of the situation I find myself in. I haven’t had the chance to tell her about Dionne yet. We haven’t really talked much about anything in the last six months.

Last night was the most we have talked since that night at the fundraiser. Our entire conversation was about Grace’s life all these years. Then later, when she came to my room, there was no talking. Annora is right about one thing. We don’t know each other anymore. It is -time to fix that.

After I get rid of my nightmare ex-girlfriend.

“DE: Masters? What are you doing here?” Annora asks.

What the f**k? They know each other? I turn to look at Annota and I can see from her angle that she has a clear view of Dionne’s face from the doorway.

175

Da** me for not blocking the entire doorway. When I look back at Dionne, I can see an equally shocked expression on her face at seeing who is behind nie.

How the hell do they know each other?

“Are you here to talk about getting back on staff at Mercy General? Couldn’t that be done at the hospital or their office?”

There is a tone in Annora’s voice that lets me know she is angry. I am sured that she is jumping to conclusions. Wrong ones on my part, but not on

Dionne’s. D**n this woman for possibly shattering the new beginning I have with Annara.

“Ah, Dr. Winters. It is nice to see you outside the hospital. I didn’t know you were on such good terms with one of the new owners.”

The tone of her voice, along with the insinuation she is making, causes me to glare at her. In a quiet voice, I whisper to her. “There is a restraining order in effect against you. Leave now and I won’t call the police.”

Dionne laughs at that statement. Her eyes glittering with an unknown joke. “She doesn’t know about me, does she? Why don’t we see how she feels when she knows that we almost got married.”

I tense when I feel Annora step up next to me. “Why did you come to his house on a Saturday morning?”

Dionne spares her one glance, then strokes her hand down my chest in an all too familiar way. “I will leave Quinn to tell you about that.” Stepping away from us, she walks down the hallway but calls over her shoulder before she presses the button for the elevator. “We are not done, Quinn. Not by a long shot. I know something that you don’t, so I suggest you answer the next time I call.”

1 step back into my apartment, then close the door behind me. When I tace Annora, her eyes are filled with the rage I feel. It is time to dredge up the ugly past thanks to Dionne’s unwelcome presence at my door..

“Grace is on a video call with her classmates talking about their science project. She will be busy for about an hour. You have that long to

tell me what the f***k that was.”

The steel in her voice along with the swearing makes it hard to not to want to pin her against the door and f*** her again. However, sex won’t solve this problem, and if I want this thing between us to work out, it is time for full honesty.

“Dionne is my ex-fiance. Let’s go out on the balcony for this conversation. I feel there may be some yelling directed at me.”

“You bet your a** there will be.”

Thankfully, she handed me a shirt as we walked to the balcony door. After what Dionne did to me just now, I feel very dirty, I pull the t- shirt on as I open the door, then sit down on one of the cu*d ch**airs. This is not how I was hoping to spend my alone time with

Annie.

“Start talking.” Annie says when she sits down on the other chair. She angles her body to face me.

“Can I ask a question first?”

Ope,” she says as she glares at me.

“How do you know her

“She was on staff for about six months, then she left after she got married. Her second marriage, from what I understand. She was from New York and came to take over for our head of Psychology. Now get to why your ex-flancé was here with that hungry look on her face.”

“You have absolutely nothing to be jealous of from her. I hate that woman.”

“Tell me about her, Quinn.”

“After my first deployment, I tried to shove what happened aside, but it failed. They assigned me to a shrink. Dr. Masters. She was my doctor for years when I wasn’t deployed to active duty. Then one day we crossed the line,”

I lean my elbows on my knees as I stare out at the city below us. Not all my history with Dionne was bad. Just the ending.

“We dated off and on throughout my career until two years ago. I thought I was in love with her, so I asked her to marry me. That was the night she told me she was pregnant.” My voice c**ks at the memory of that night, “I was happy. I thought she was too,”

“What happened?” Annora’s voice was barely audible as she asks.

Looking up at her, I see pain in her eyes and anger. Here I am, telling her I was going to marry another woman. She doesn’t get to be angry at me for my past. She married another man. We lived our lives apart for twelve years. What did she expect?

“A few weeks before the wedding, she was

is out shopping, and I was packing up her apartment since we were moving to Boston after the wedding. Her phone rang, so I answered it. It was a call from a clinic calling to make a follow-up appointment after her recent abortion.”

“What the f**k?”

The rage in her voice calmed me down a little. “I confronted Dionne when she returned from her shopping trip. She didn’t deny it. All she would say was that it was a bad time to have a baby. With everything going on in our lives, a baby was an inconvenience to her.”

“An Inconvenience. Those exact words?”

“Yes. Our baby was an inconvenience to her. She had the abortion three weeks before that call. I left her after she told me. I haven’t seen her or spoken to her until Aaron and I bought Mercy General.”

“Wait, today wasn’t the first time she has come here?”

“I ran into her in the physical therapy room the day we made the announcement in the lecture all. That was the first and only time I have seen her since I walked away from her two years ago. Until today. I don’t know how she found out where I live.”

“From the look on her face, she very much wanted to rekindle what you two had.”

“Well, she is out of luck. There is only one woman for me.”

“Is there anything else from your past that can hurt us, Quinn? If so, I need to know now,”

How the ** do I tell the woman I love that I have been a ma**e for the past two years? That will send her packing in an instant. However, if I don’t tell her, it will be worse in the end.

“After I left New York, I was a terrible man.”

Annora frowns at me. “You are not a terrible man, Quinn.”

“The conclusion you jumped to that day in the hallway when I told you I sent Rebecca home with a smile isn’t that far off. We had sex, just not after I had seen you again, I have used sex like a drug for the last ten years or so off and on, more over the last two.”

“Are you a sex addict?” Her brows raise in surprise.

“Not the way some are. PTSD can be terrible sometimes. When I was in the Army the nightmares were less frequent due to a lot of activities. I have had nightmares almost every night since I have been out of service. I have used a combination of alcohol, boxing, hiking, extreme sports, and sex to make me so exhausted that I just pass out when I come home. Anything to keep those nightmares at bay”

Annora looks at me with sadness in her eyes. The disgust I expected was nowhere to be seen on her beautiful face. However, I can sen

from the tension on her shoulders that we are not out of danger yet.

“I was prepared to put all of that aside and go back into therapy after I found you again. That day in your office, then later when you told me about Grace, cracked open the wall I had around my heart. I ruined when I said those horrible things to you. So, I am going to be fully honest with you”

“You haven’t stopped all those things. Havg you?”

“No. They were all that kept me sane.”

“Will you stop now?”

“I can promise you this, if you give me a chance, give us a chance, I will not touch another woman but you for the rest of my life. Boxing and sports stay.

“I have an IUD implanted so birth control is covered on my end. Do I need to get tested?”

“No. God no. I am clean and always use protection.”

I reach for her when she stands up to go inside. When she pulls away from me, my heart leaps into my throat. Please don’t let my past ruin my future with her. I follow her inside to watch her walk to the chair that her purse is on.

Annora pulls out a manilla envelope, then turns back to me. “Sign this and we will go from there.”

What the f***k? Is she asking me to sign my parental rights away? “Please don’t take Grace from me. Annie, please don’t do this.”

I close my eyes as that thought makes me fall to my knees. That thought of losing my daughter is the worst pain I have ever felt. All the bullet wounds, shrapnel in my skin, and broken bones I have survived pale compared to this pain.

When I feel her hands cup my face, I look up at her with tears in my eyes.

“I am not taking her from you, Quinn, Read it.”

I look down at the envelope in her hands, then take it from her with shaky hands. When I pull the document from inside, my eyes widen, then fly to her face. In my hands are not papers to sever my parental rights but documents, making me one of Grace’s legal guardians.

-you are on

“You are on her birth certificate, but it occurred to me that if something were to happen to her, you might not be able to decide for her if I can’t be there. I had these drawn up a few months ago but have been waiting for the outcome of the custody hearing today to have you sign them.”

She isn’t taking Grace from me.

“There are a lot of things we need to talk about, Quinn, but I am not backing away from you. All I ask is that we slow down and take our time getting to know each other again.”

“Like dating?”

“We did that the first time around and we should do it again. Go out, do things together without Grace, spend time together alone. No sex until I feel more comfortable with that part of your past.”

can live with that. Looks like it is time to find a good therapist again. Thank you.”

“For what?”

“For putting your faith in me after everything 1 just told you.”

Annora tugged on my hands like she wants me to stand up. I do as she wants me to then just look in her eyes. So many emotions go through me when she smiles up at me.

“You were in my heart all these years. I would dream of you at night. See you in our daughter’s eyes. Now we have a chance to rekindle that budding love we had for each other when we were eighteen. It burned so brightly back then. Twelve years later it is still burning deep inside me even if it isn’t as bright as it used to be.”

She wraps her arms around my waist and hugs me tightly. I embrace her in my arms then just breathe in the smell of my shampoo on her hair. I will do anything for that dream.

“Let’s make the future we dreamed of back then a reality, Quinn.”

Chapter Comments

Carmen Sang

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