Quinn ran at Thierry with a yell that reminded me of men racing across the battlefield to meet the enemy.
Thierry was still, so still, that for a moment I thought that he was going to let Quinn stake him without trying to defend himself.
“Thierry! No!” I screamed.
His attention flicked to me for the briefest second and our eyes met. Then he turned back to the charging
Quinn and brought his hands up, moving so fast I could barely see him trip Quinn, snatching the stake out of his hand. Quinn fell to the floor, and in a flash, Thierry was on top of him, pinning him down, one hand clutched around his neck, the other with the stake pressed to his chest. Quinn grabbed at Thierry’s wrist,
but the look on his face was pure panic. And defeat.
“Kill me,” Quinn managed. “Go ahead, asshole! Do it!”
There was a sheer sheen of sweat on Thierry’s forehead. I approached, my entire body shaking and my mind reeling from what I’d just witnessed.
Thierry could see me out of the corner of his eye. “I would ask you what I should do with your hunter here, Sarah, but I have a feeling I already know what you’d say.”
“Let him go,” I said quietly. “Please.”
“That’s what I thought you’d say.” He looked up at me, his eyes filled with the raw emotion that he’d been trying to hide. But it was still muted. Still controlled. “He would have killed me without a moment’s hesitation.”
“I know.”
His gaze trailed to the bite marks on my neck and his expression grew pained. “I’m sorry about last night.” His voice broke on the words.
“I know that, too. Let him go.”
His grip on Quinn’s neck tightened as he glared down at him. “Do not mess with me again.” He let him go and stood up in one fluid motion and threw the makeshift stake away to the side where it clattered against the floor.
Then with a last look at me, Thierry turned away and left the club, slamming the door behind him.
I fell to my knees beside Quinn. “Are you okay?”
He touched his neck where Thierry’s grip had left red marks behind. “Do you seenow ?”
I frowned. “What?”
He coughed, then slowly got to his feet. “That he’s a goddamned monster?”
My frown deepened. “Why, because he managed to kick your ass?”
He snorted. “He didn’t kick my ass.”
“Shall we watch the slow-motion replay on that?”
He closed his eyes and let out a long shaky breath. “Well, maybe I was having an off day.”
“You shouldn’t have provoked him.” I gingerly touched his cheekbone, which bore a cut from his introduction to twenty broken bottles. He caught my hand and kissed it.
“I will take an ass-kicking any day of the week if it proves to you that what I’m telling you about him is absolutely true.”
I pulled my hand away from him. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
He carefully sat up, wincing as he did so, then slowly got to his feet. “I need a drink.”
“Help yourself.”
He slowly walked behind the bar and grabbed a beer from the fridge. He cracked it open and took a long gulp from it.
I watched him warily. “Now continue. What were you saying?”
He wearily leaned against the bar top. “That everything I’ve told you about Thierry just got proven. You saw it for yourself.”
“What I saw was two little boys getting into a scrap over hurt feelings.”
“That guy doesn’t have any feelings.”
“He does.”
“Yeah? Could have fooled me.” He laughed wryly. “Like I said before, I’m willing to wait for you,
Sarah, but I’m just not all that happy about it.”
I stood up. “So you think that I should leave Thierry.”
He shrugged, then winced at the movement. “Duh.”
I glanced off in the direction that Thierry had gone. “Tell me why I should.”
“I think I’ve given you many valid reasons, but okay.” He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I originally didn’t come back to Toronto just to see you again, but I’m here now. I think I might be a little bit in love with you. That’s why you should leave him.”
I swallowed hard. “You don’t mean it, but I appreciate the thought.”
He shook his head. “Why would I say it if I didn’t mean it?”
I tried to choose my words carefully. “I love you, too.”
A smile sprang to life on his super-serious face.
I held up my hand. “Not so fast. I think you’re great, Quinn. I really do. And I do think you’re sincere in wanting to change and be a better person now that you’ve seen the other side of things and remorseful for what happened when you were a hunter.”
He nodded. “All that and a bag of chips.”
I looked at him. A little beaten up but still really gorgeous. Any girl would be lucky to have Quinn say those words to her. He was a wonderful man. And he’d just succeeded in making things crystal clear to me.
“The problem is that you’ve morphed that remorseful feeling into this torch you’re holding for me.”