Fuck. She was absolutely right. I couldn’t do it.
“If it’s real, Quinn, if it’s meant to be, it’s gonna happen at some point anyway, but you’d be saving her years of heartbreak and pain if you intervene. Trust your gut, sweetheart. Have faith that things will work out the way they’re supposed to. And don’t be afraid to lean on your man too. He’d want to support you in doing what you know is right.”
I hung up but stared at the phone in my hand for a long while.
I wanted to believe that Champ would support me. Under any other circumstances, I was sure he would.
But I also knew that being honest with Marissa meant that Champ was going to have to come up with a new plan with only hours to go, and he was going to be incredibly, incredibly angry.
Possibly angry enough to end our non-relationship relationship.
Did I really have enough trust in him, in us, to risk that?
“Morning, Quinn!” Marissa called as she sailed in the door, ready for her appointment. “Ready for the rehearsal dinner?”
“Marissa, honey.” I blew out a breath and forced a smile. “We need to talk.”
20
CHAMP
With one day to go until the wedding, my job had become a total fiasco.
Despite two weeks of trying with our own vault door and multiple consultations with experts ranging from vault manufacturers to an imprisoned art thief named Le Chaton, we still hadn’t found a way into the safe without making a hell of a lot of noise and leaving an obvious hole in the damned thing to announce our theft. Unless a solution fell into our laps, we’d have to go in during the wedding reception and stage a burglary, which was the most inelegant solution I could have imagined for a group of trained professionals.
Jacob Horn was breathing down my neck about getting this resolved “one way or another,” reminding me that our contract was up in just five months, and complaining nonstop about the additional protection coverage I’d put in place for their executives at my own personal expense.
On top of that, Vince had not only talked to Quinn after the SnoBall—a fact which enraged me to no end—but he’d also ambushed me when I was leaving Annie’s Bakery the other morning with Quinn’s donuts and threatened me right out in the middle of the fucking street to get him the missing Horn or he’d put me in federal prison for interfering in an investigation.
It had been all I could do not to confront him then and there about the surveillance equipment in my office, but I hadn’t wanted to play that card yet. I wasn’t sure if we’d been infiltrated by the DEA, the cartel, or some third factor I hadn’t even accounted for on my mental chessboard, and telling Vince would narrow my options.
In fact, the only redeeming thing about the past two weeks was that this was almost over… and that when the wedding was done, for better or worse, I’d still have Quinn by my side.
I sat back from my laptop at Carter and Riggs’s big kitchen table and rubbed my face with my hands. This shit was getting on my last nerve. If I didn’t care so much about retaining the Thicket’s largest corporation as my client, I’d let them go just to have it be over once and for all. I was sick and tired of hearing about Horn of Glory.
“So of course I let him tinker with my bobbetts,” Kev said, talking to anyone who would listen, which was approximately no one as far as I could tell. “I mean, wouldn’t you? Anomaly451 decimated the swarming audacious volt-hornets that were en route to my Fern Fairie camps, easy as you please, with his laser volt-revokers and spin traps. It was like… well, it was like a knight riding in on a danged pegicorn.” He bent down to pet Hercules.
Hux clapped his hands over his ears and cried, “Boss, tell Kev to shut up. This is killing me. It’s… it’s workplace harassment or something.”
“I can’t harass you by talking about the video game created by Champion Security’s biggest client,” Kev said smugly. “I can talk about my Horn all day. And maybe I will.”
“Kev, please try to contain yourself, okay?” I demanded impatiently. “And Huxley, do your fucking job.”
“But who gives a shit about any of Kev’s Fern Fairie camps? If the volt-hornets had destroyed them, you could have purchased new ones at the solstice marketplace next week. Jesus.”
Kev shot him a hateful glare. “Anyone can buy a win, Huxley. The truly honorable player wins with nothing but hard work and the might of his Horn. Not that I’d expect you to know that.” He sniffed. “You’re just jealous because Anomaly451 likes me better than you. Did I mention he gave me his crystal jade? Because he did. I’m going to mount it on a scepter and get plus ten royalty every time I wave the damned thing. And I’m going to wave it at your shithole tambor-oxen hovel every time I pass it on my air-speeder!”