Total pages in book: 35
Estimated words: 33029 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 165(@200wpm)___ 132(@250wpm)___ 110(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 33029 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 165(@200wpm)___ 132(@250wpm)___ 110(@300wpm)
Quinn takes a couple more pictures of us and then tucks her camera into the case by my foot. She leans back and points her face upward, looking every bit like a beautiful flower basking under the sun. We’ve been together for six years now. Since college, we’ve spent our time traveling. Quinn’s camera has taken photos of us hiking in the snowy Andes, swimming in the clear waters of the Maldives, walking along the path of gods overlooking the Amalfi Coast.
Along the way we had Trudy. Our friends expected us to settle down—or I should say Quinn’s friends. I’m still suspicious of everyone who wants to be near us. My past experience makes me leery of trusting people, particularly around Quinn, whose existence is what I get up for in the morning.
But Quinn loves traveling and I love Quinn. Trudy’s not hard, anyway. I tuck her in the carrier, stick a couple of diapers in a bag, and we’re good. Someday we’ll settle down. I’ll build a giant garden. Quinn will set up a language school. Trudy will terrorize the neighborhood boys. Until then, we’re nomads, traveling the world, eating local food, and enjoying the cocoon of love we’ve made for ourselves.
“So what were you really talking about?”
“Ahhhhh—” I stall for time and try to think of a plausible story.
Quinn rolls her head until she faces me. Her beautiful face is lit up with a knowing smile. I cave.
“I was talking about hits. You know the Italians were really bloodthirsty,” I say as if this explains away the things I was talking to Trudy about. “They killed a pope. Some guy whacked the emperor. I’d have fit in good. Shit, they even carried out a whole massacre in a church.” I leave out the part where the plot failed and the assassins were hung from the windows of a palace in the middle of Florence, but, damn, those were some juicy stories the tour guide told us up north.
Quinn laughs. “I guess that’s why we keep coming back here.”
“That and because you speak the language.” Quinn studied the Romance languages in college, but since we’ve started traveling she’s gotten almost fluent in about four of them. It’s easy to travel with her because of it.
“In my defense, I did say my favorite place so far was the gardens at the Villa Borghese.” Those were astoundingly beautiful.
“Not because you learned that there was a sculptor assassin?”
“No, but that was cool.” I’m not going to deny I have a predilection for that shit. I spent almost a decade dealing with death. I’ve come to terms with it and, thankfully, so has Quinn. These days, I’m busier with diapers and pacifiers, but there have been times my past skills have come in handy. We had a run-in with some asshole in Amsterdam who tried to feel Quinn up when she was waiting to use the toilet. I took him out behind the pub, broke all ten of his fingers and his nose. He’s lucky I didn’t mangle his dick but Quinn felt that the finger thing was a fair punishment.
Trudy’s head starts to droop. I loop our travel bag over one shoulder, tuck my daughter’s small body to my chest, and help Quinn to her feet.
“Come on. If we can make it back to the hotel in the next fifteen minutes, we can have some alone time.”
“Oh? And what will you do with that alone time?” Quinn teases.
“Things. Many things. Dirty, twisted things that I can’t put into words because our daughter isn’t sleeping yet.”
Quinn’s laugh spills out into the open space. Heads turn and people stare because she’s gorgeous and happy and the whole world wants a piece of her, but she’s mine. I gather my woman under my arm and kiss her, squishing our daughter between us. Quinn tastes like sunshine and joy. Her love has filled all the dark corners of my life and washed my past sins away.
We kiss and kiss and kiss until Trudy squirms and lets out a sleepy protest. Reluctantly, I release Quinn’s mouth. Her lips are shiny red and her face is pink with desire. My hand slides down her arm to capture her fingers.
“Come on, baby, let’s go.”
She lays her head against my shoulder. “I love you,” she murmurs.
Love really isn’t a good enough word for what I feel for her, but it’s all I have. “I love you, too.”
There’s good in this world and most of it is within the circle of my arms. I’ve never done jack shit on this planet to deserve her or Trudy, but I have them both. I’m a lucky bastard, I know this. Maybe the skills I learned early on weren’t for nothing. After all, somebody competent needs to be protecting these treasures. And, for all my faults, the one thing I can do well is guard Trudy and Quinn. Nothing will ever hurt them as long as I’m still breathing and even if I have to go down that dark path again to keep them safe, I will.