“Either of you hurt?” Javier asked.
“No,” Shannon said quickly.
“Fine,” Quinn said briefly.
“What the hell were you doing?” Gordon asked Shannon.
To Quinn’s amazement, she said, “I don’t know. I must have been leaning over too far when the boat veered to head back toward the marina.”
“Thank God you didn’t hit the propeller,” Gordon said vehemently.
“He’s right,” Suarez said.
Quinn stayed silent. A minute later, they reached the boat, and the anxious captain was there to greet them. Doug helped Shannon from the boat, then assisted his brother, looking at them both in silence.
Shannon quickly assured everyone that she was fine, as her friends, associates and students swept around them.
“I’m so sorry, everyone,” she said. “I guess my balance isn’t what I thought. You all can remember that when I’m giving you grief when you’re dancing.”
A little ripple of laughter rose, but despite her words, Quinn knew she was still convinced she had been pushed.
Someone pushed through the crowd. It was Richard Long, and he was carrying take-out cups. “Coffee and brandy, one for our lovely-even-when-wet instructor, and another for the man willing to risk his life to save her. Whoops, wait a minute. He owns the boat we’re out on, right? Maybe he’s trying to make sure he doesn’t get sued.” Long spoke teasingly, and laughter rose again.
“Sued? Are you kidding me? I couldn’t take the chance that my instructor might drown. I’m just beginning to catch on to the whole dance thing,” Quinn said lightly.
“All’s well that ends well,” Sam said, stepping forward to give Shannon a warm hug.
“Drink the coffee,” Ella said. “You’re just standing there shivering.”
“Coffee sounds great. Thanks, Richard,” Shannon said, reaching for a cup.
Once they were docked, Quinn had a few words with the captain, who swore that he hadn’t taken any turns too sharply, something Quinn assured him he was already certain of.
When he was ready to debark himself, Quinn saw that Shannon, a bit damp, her clothing still hugging her frame, had taken her place with the rest of the Moonlight Sonata group, saying good-night to everyone. Her trip overboard had become part of a good time, something they would all talk about for years to come.
Quinn had made up his mind. Screw policy.
As the instructors began to say good-night to one another, he came up to her. “We need to talk.”
She arched a brow, looking around her, silently reminding him that they were surrounded by her entire staff.
“I need to take Marnie home,” she said.
“No, you don’t,” he said. “Someone else can take her. I can have Doug do it.”
A strange expression filtered into her eyes. He thought that she was going to refuse him again, and belligerently. Instead she turned around and called softly to Sam, asking him, “Can you take Marnie home, and—” she hesitated briefly, looking at Quinn “—stay with her tonight?”
Sam looked surprised at first, stared at her, then glanced at Quinn and smiled broadly.
“Sure.”
“And stop grinning.”
“Absolutely. No grin.”
Everyone continued the process of kissing each other good-night, but finally almost everyone had straggled off the dock toward the parking lot.
Gordon lingered, asking Shannon, “You’re sure you’re okay?”
“Absolutely. Honest, Gordon, I’m sorry I caused such a stir.”
“I wouldn’t be sorry for that. After it turned out you were okay, the students enjoyed it. Hey, how often have any of them gotten to see you uncoordinated?”
She smiled. “There you go. I was the entertainment.”
Sam was still hovering nearby with Marnie, and Doug remained, as well.
“Doug, looks like everything is all right. Go home or…wherever.” She smiled knowingly, and he waved, then walked off toward his car. “Sam, quit looking like a two-year-old in training pants. Go ahead and drive Marnie out to the beach.”
“Well,” Sam murmured.
Marnie gave them each a kiss on the cheek, casting them a look that was too wise for her years. “Have a good night,” she said, preceding Sam along the dock. He shrugged, a smile still hovering on his face, and followed her. With a last, curious look, Gordon left, as well.
Quinn and Shannon turned to each other, both feeling the worse for wear.
Boats knocked against rubber guards at their docks; a bell clanged from somewhere; waves lapped against boats and pilings. From a distance, they could hear the drone of conversation, the sound of a mellow reggae band playing at Nick’s.
Quinn stared at Shannon, ready to argue the point as to whether or not she had been pushed, but she shook her head before he could speak. “Stop,” she said. “Don’t…. Just don’t.”
He frowned, slowing arching a questioning brow.
God knows who might be around, but she took a step toward him.
Then she slipped her arms around his neck and pressed against him, rising on her toes, the length of her body like a caress, and pressed her lips against his. She tasted like salt, like the sea breeze, like a promise of sweet and decadent sin. He returned her kiss, parting her lips with a ragged and swift hunger, sweeping her mouth with his tongue, deep, returning her initiative with passionate insinuation of what could come. She was trembling in his arms, whether shivering from the touch of the breeze or trembling with anticipation, he wasn’t at all certain. Nor did he care. The Twisted Time was just yards away. And when her lips parted from his, the words she whispered against his ear were liquid fire. “Don’t you ever want to forget it all…just for a few hours, forget it all and…”
His response was so guttural and startling that it evoked an eroticism beyond memory. He drew back, staring at her, cupping her cheek in his hand, a smile slowly taking hold of his lips as tension streaked through him, muscle, sinew, blood and bone.
“Hell, yes,” he told her. And he lowered his head, whispering back, “You mean like feeling so desperate that nothing else matters except crawling right into someone? Not time, place, words, anything?”
She nodded, drawing a line down his damp chest. Low. Down to his soggy belt line. Below.
“You’re wasting time now,” she informed him.
He swept her up into his arms because it seemed the simplest, easiest and fastest move to make at that moment.
His own balance and agility were put to the test when he jumped the distance from the dock to the deck of his boat, but necessity seemed to be the mother of coordination as well as invention.
Balancing her weight, he fumbled in his pocket for his key, then burst into the cabin, banging his elbow and her head as he made his way down the steps into the salon. They were both laughing then.
And then they weren’t laughing, they were gasping for breath, heedless of everything else as they struggled to peel away wet clothing and crawl into each other’s skin.
Draped over Quinn’s bare length, Shannon smiled and then winced. In the heat of the moment, they had wound up on the floor, in the narrow space between the table and the sofa, and she had apparently banged more body parts than she had realized in the process. Now it was awkward trying to rise. She made the attempt to avoid him, but wound up with her knee right in his abdomen.
“Ow!” he groaned.
“Sorry.”
He eased to his side, laughing. “Could have been worse. How about I get up first? But what’s the urgency?”
“Shower. I’m pure salt.”
“I’ll come with you.”
“We won’t fit,” she told him.
“We’ll make do.”
The shower was ridiculously tiny, but the water was steamy and hot, and despite the fact that they barely fit, the rush of warmth brought on by the spray that covered them was delicious. Purely sweet at first. Then purely sensual. Quinn’s hand was braced on the Fibe
rglas wall behind Shannon, and his mouth seemed as hot as the water, moving over her flesh. His wet hair teased against her skin, and she was both breathless and laughing again at the erotic maneuvers he managed in the tiny, tense space. His hands laced around her midriff, and she found herself lifted to stand on the seat of the commode as the sensual movement of his tongue continued down the length of her body. When her knees gave, she was pressed against the Fiberglas herself, aware then of the pounding of water, the rush in her ears, and the force and thrust of his body, bringing her crashing over a brink of sweet forgetfulness and raw abandon once again. Climax shuddered through her with the strength of the rushing water, and she shivered and was held upright only by the power of his body and the smooth shower wall. They stayed there as moments slipped one into another, crushed together, still one, caught in an intimacy that seemed to go beyond any act of love.
At last they stirred, found soap, found shampoo, and, since there really was little choice, washed and soaped various body parts for each other until that too became so intimate and arousing that there was nowhere to go except back where they had been, but this time, when the level of arousal escalated to insanity, Quinn slammed off the showerhead, opened the door and dragged them both back into the cabin, oblivious to the fact that they drenched the floor and sheets.
But there was space…space and limitless comfort, and here she had the freedom of his body, room to slide and creep and crawl all over him, taste and savor and caress the length of his body, hear the thunder of his heart, the gale wind of his breath, the feel of his arms and hands, know his eyes when he rose over her, drowning in the first slow, excruciating moments as he sank into her with the full force of his body, hunger and being. Then, finally, when it seemed to Shannon that her whole world had rocked and exploded to the highest peaks, she drifted down in comfort and warmth and lay at his side, totally relaxed for what seemed like the first time in forever. Then her mind began working, because it was impossible to turn off her brain, and she felt the first sense of self-defense, because it was frightening to feel so desperately for someone, to want him so badly, not only in such a sexually passionate manner, but in moments of laughter, fear, purpose and just plain existing.
His fingers moved through her hair as he pulled her close, and she was stunned by the first words that left his lips.
“She’s right, you know.”
“Who?”
“Marnie. I am falling in love with you.”
She was afraid to reply.
He gripped her harder, pulling her taut to the curve of his body, into something that had surely been a male hold since the beginning of time. She was wrapped in him, and it was good, very good. She wanted to whisper something back, but fear kept her silent.
“Okay,” he murmured softly. “Don’t reply. Though that is one of those things that kind of demands an answer.”
She wasn’t facing him, instead lying flush against him, her back to his chest, her rump curved into his hip.
“I think you were pretty incredible.”
He laughed. “Always the judge. We’re not talking performance level here.”
“Cocky, too,” she murmured.
He rolled her to face him, and the laughter was gone. His eyes were the deepest, most piercing blue she had ever seen, and his features were striking, strong and taut.
“I don’t want to play games anymore. I quit being a student. Screw the friggin’ Gator Gala. I want to be with you.”
“I’m…I’m…”
“A coward. A chicken.”
Anger flickered through her.
“I am not!”
“Then at the least admit you want to take a chance.”
She hesitated, uncomfortably aware that he was right. “I want to stay with you until morning. I want to sleep with you over and over again,” she said.
“Why?” He smiled. “Other than the fact that we really are great together. Better than the most erotic dance known to man.”
She smiled, and then his smile faded, and his words were a promise of everything to come. “Because you are the best waltz I’ve ever known. The most erotic rumba, the greatest exhilaration, the wildest, most beautiful music.”
He kept staring down at her. Then, after a moment, he said, “Okay…so I think you are falling in love with me. At least a little bit.”
“I am falling in love with you,” she managed to say. “More than a little bit.”
He kissed her again.
She thought later that there was so much they needed to say. So much was happening that she needed to convince him, needed him to see, to understand….
Nothing could be real, nothing could be right…until the trail of corpses shadowing them came to a halt.
But that would have to wait until morning. Because now, more than anything, they needed the night.
CHAPTER 23
“I swear someone pushed me over,” Shannon said.
She was more appealing to Quinn than ever, hair fresh washed, dressed in a pair of jeans and a denim shirt borrowed from Ashley Dilessio, sitting at his table on the boat and sipping one last cup of coffee.
He was going with Jake down to the main station.
She was going to go home, check on Marnie, and let Sam have the rest of his Sunday for whatever he wanted to do. Strange, Marnie had been a street kid, but now Shannon didn’t even want her left alone during the day.
They’d spent a nice morning taking time for themselves, then having breakfast at Nick’s and spending an hour playing with the new baby, Shannon getting to know Ashley, Ashley getting to know Shannon, finding out they were fascinated by each other’s professions, quickly becoming friends. They had talked about the case, too. Shannon had expressed her sadness over Manuel Taylor but had been quick to point out that she had overheard Gordon mention him in a group, so his “role” was common knowledge at the studio.
Quinn couldn’t help it. He wasn’t satisfied with the possibility that the man’s death wasn’t connected, so Jake had offered to go down to the station with him, look at the report, then take a ride down to the area of the Grove, where it had happened. But first, he and Shannon had gone back to the boat so Quinn could get ready to go.
“The really strange thing is that right before I went overboard, I heard people whispering.”
“Saying what?” he demanded.
She frowned, thinking. “Something about having to stop, about there being no visible connection.”
“Connection to what?”
“I have no idea. I was eavesdropping. Well, not really. I was just there and heard pieces of the conversation.”
“I’m telling you, everything’s connected. I want you to watch out for Gordon, especially. Don’t ever be alone around him.”
“Gordon has been like a second father to me, you know,” she told him.
“I don’t care. Watch out for him.”
There was a call from topside. “Quinn, you ready?”
“Yeah!” he called back. He gave Shannon a kiss on the top of the head, suddenly loath to leave her, even for a few hours.
“See you later?” he asked.
She nodded. “If Sam doesn’t have plans, the three of us will probably head to the beach and get some sun.”
“Great.” With a wave to her, he headed topside.
“You know,” Jake told him, “I’m a big one for hunches myself, but we’re beginning to move a little strangely here. Two overdoses by prescription drugs. Two deaths by heroin overdose, both victims found near the studio. But this…okay, so Manuel Taylor was a waiter the day of the competition. But he was in Coconut Grove, not on the beach, when he was killed. And he was shot.”
“I know,” Quinn said.
“So?”
“I still say everything’s related.”
Jake shrugged. “All right. Am I driving?”
“Let’s take both cars.” Jake stared at him, and he shrugged. “I’m heading back out to the beach after we hit the Grove.”
&nb
sp; At the station, Quinn pored over the report, which had been prepared by Jake’s partner, Anna. The woman was thorough. Everything pointed to an innocent man being caught in gang war crossfire.
“I’ll make you a copy, then we can head out to the site.”
Jake disappeared. The station was staffed on Sunday, but it was still slow. When Quinn’s phone rang, it sounded like an alarm going off.
It was Marnie.
“Hey, is Shannon with you?” she asked.
“No, she was heading home.”
“She isn’t here yet.” Marnie sounded a little plaintive. She went into a whisper. “Sam is like a little kid. He wants to go the beach.”
“Try her cell. I left before she did. She might still be on the way.”
“I just tried her cell. She didn’t answer.”
“Try her again and leave a message, but I’ll drive on out there, okay?”
“Great. Thanks.”
He hung up. When Jake returned, Quinn told him he was going to head straight out to the beach. “Shannon’s not answering her cell,” he explained.
“She could just be out of satellite reach,” Jake told him.
“I still feel kind of antsy about this,” Quinn said. “Too much happening too fast. This may have nothing in common with the rest—or far too much.”
“Want me to follow you?”
Quinn shook his head. “No, I’m probably acting a little panicky. I’m just concerned, I guess.”
Jake made no comment on why he might be overly worried. “Call me if you need me.”
“Great. Thanks.”
As he walked out to his car, Quinn tried dialing Shannon himself.
Her phone rang and rang, and then he heard her voice.
“Shannon! It’s Quinn.”
“If you’d like to leave a message, I’ll get back to you as soon as possible.”