Crazy for You Read online

  “Good guess.”

  “So who’s the brother-in-law to you?” Thea said.

  “Absolutely nobody. Okay, if we thin the dye as we go toward the top—”

  “And I thought I was obvious about Jason,” Thea said. “That is not nobody. Even if you didn’t know who he was, he wouldn’t be nobody.”

  “Trust me,” Quinn said. “He doesn’t even exist.”

  “What did he do?”

  “Thea,” Quinn said sternly.

  “Just asking.” Thea looked past Quinn’s shoulder. “Hi.”

  “Hi,” Nick said, and Quinn shivered a little, he was so close.

  “I told you on Saturday, I’m fine,” she said without turning around. “You don’t need to be here.”

  “I was asked,” he said, still close behind her. “Edie sent for me.”

  She swung around on that, trying not to enjoy having him near her again. “She did not.”

  “Your light booth,” Nick said, looking down at her with those dark, dark eyes. “She wanted an electrician.”

  “You are not an electrician.”

  “Sure I am.” He smiled at her and scrambled her thoughts. “Joe taught me.” She turned her back on him. “Edie’s down in the front. With Darla. Walk to the edge of the stage, you’ll see her.”

  “Okay,” Nick said.

  When he was gone, Thea said, “He must have done something really lousy.”

  “Worse than that,” Quinn said.

  “So bad he doesn’t deserve another shot?”

  Quinn looked up to see Thea watching Nick with sympathy. Probably relating to her own problems with Jason. “I gave him three shots. He blew all three.”

  “Oh.” Thea’s sympathy returned to Quinn. “One of those.” She looked back at Nick. “He’s really hot, though. Is he the one you were talking about? The one who made you want to throw up? Did he send the roses? How’d you get him?”

  “I don’t have him,” Quinn said. “And I don’t want him.”

  “You have him,” Thea said. “I got a contact high from standing next to you when he looked at you.”

  “Beautifully put,” Quinn said. “Now, about the dyes—”

  After Thea had gone to work on the backdrop, Quinn sat on the edge of the table and tried to be practical about her life again. Clearly, being exciting had just screwed things up for everybody, including her, especially her love life. Nick was great as a friend, a disaster as a lover. She needed somebody dependable, somebody who would stick around and wake up with her, somebody she could count on—

  Oh, hell, that wasn’t what she needed, that was Bill. At least, it was Bill before the storeroom and the sabotage.

  Across the stage, she heard Nick laugh, and her eyes stole to the edge of the stage, to where he was grinning down at Edie, who looked up at him gratefully. Nick, broad-shouldered and slim-hipped—Nick who did you to Fleetwood Mac, her practical side pointed out—Nick who’d moved hard between her thighs and bruised her mouth—Nick who dumped you for a pizza, practicality reminded her—Nick who’d made her come so hard she was blind and breathless—Oh, hell, take him back, practicality said. Orgasms like that don’t grow on trees.

  And then she’d end up alone again. She felt her throat tighten and knew that orgasms weren’t enough, she needed the stuff Zoë had with Ben, the attention and the security and the outright demonstrations of love, the stuff she’d been doing without all these years. And Nick couldn’t give it to her. She’d looked at him too many times the way she was looking at him now, aching to have him hold her while he turned his back on her.

  So he was just a friend. A distant friend.

  She turned her back on him and concentrated on her work.

  When Quinn got to practice on Tuesday, Nick was there again.

  “Okay,” he told her when he met her at the prop table. “The light booth is now safe once more, or as safe as it’s going to get. This place is old.”

  “Thank you very much for your help,” she said. “You can go now.”

  “So we’re doing the spots now,” he went on, staring up at the light strips. “I need to know where you want them and what color gels you need.”

  She blinked at him. “We have crew guys who can—”

  “They can.” Nick transferred his attention back to her and made her breath come faster. “But only if somebody shows them how. The lighting is a full-time deal and you’ve been putting it off and your dress rehearsal’s in three weeks. Edie gave me a stage lighting book, and I read it last night. I know how to do this. So I’m going to help.”

  Quinn swallowed. “This is nice of you.”

  “Not really,” Nick said. “I like it.”

  “Oh.”

  “You’ve got some good kids here, and Edie is working her butt off. It’s a good project. You deserve the support.”

  She watched him to see if he was snowing her, but he was looking up above at the spots again, frowning at the rigging.

  “That catwalk does not look safe,” he said. “Don’t send kids up there.”

  “Well, then you’re not going up there, either.”

  “I’ll be careful. I have a lot to live for.” He dropped his eyes to hers. “I have to have you again before I die.”

  Her knees gave way and she sat down hard on the stool.

  “Your ankle okay?” Nick said, instantly concerned, and she said, “Fine. Everything’s fine here.”

  “Listen, I screwed up.” He came closer as he talked, making his voice low. “I’ll probably do it again, and I know you’re hurt, and this isn’t the time. But I want you back.”

  She stuck out her chin so it wouldn’t quiver. “You never had me.”

  “The hell I didn’t,” he said, and the heat in his voice made her dizzy. “I had you to talk to and laugh with, and I had you naked and coming, and you remember all of it.”

  “Oh, sort of,” Quinn said faintly. “I remember the pizza, definitely.”

  “You remember the good times and you remember the sex,” Nick said. “You remember coming your brains out even while you fought it, which for the life of me, I still don’t get. The next time we do it, you cooperate.”

  Quinn got her voice back. “Fleetwood Mac was playing, right?”

  “Damn good music,” Nick said. “Be as bitchy as you want, I don’t care. But when you’re tired of making me pay, we’re going to laugh again, and then we’re going to be naked.”

  Quinn tried to think of something snappy to say besides Thank God, but his eyes were on the lights again.

  “This place was built with chewing gum and string,” he said, disgusted, and started for the catwalk. “Find your lighting plan, will you?” he called back. “I’m not a mind reader.”

  “Thank God,” Quinn said.

  Bill sat in the dark parking lot and watched the students leave one by one. He’d been there every night since Quinn had said no, trying to catch her alone so they could sit in the car and talk, but she always came out with Darla, and sometimes with Jason and Thea, too, and Nick and Max and Edie were there, she was never alone, and that’s how he needed her. Alone. So he could talk to her. So he could make her listen.

  He was considering ways to get rid of Darla when the passenger door opened and Bobby got in.

  “You know, Hilliard,” he said, in the snide tone he’d taken to using since that day in Quinn’s bedroom, “stalking is against the law.”

  “I’m not stalking,” Bill said. “Get out of my car.”

  “You’ve been here every night,” Bobby said. “Not good. Somebody sees this, they could get the wrong idea.” He snickered. “Or the right one.”

  “Get out,” Bill said.

  “I don’t want to see you in this parking lot again,” Bobby said, as if what he said mattered. “I want you at home fixing your coaching.”

  “There’s nothing wrong—”

  “You lost twice this week already,” Bobby said. “One more, we don’t even go to regionals.”

  �€