First and Tension (Summersweet Island 4)

“I didn’t throw it away; you did. Because you care more about me lining your pockets than you do about what makes me happy,” Quinn reminds Tyler, spitting the words out with the force of his pain and anger, everything happening in front of me suddenly feeling like a nightmare I can’t wake up from, instead of the dream it was just a few minutes ago. “But I would throw it all away for her, because she’s worth it, and you aren’t.”

No, no, no, what the hell is he doing?

“Jesus, how are you this fucking blind?” Tyler shouts, waving his bloody napkin around with his flailing arms. “She used you, and you don’t even fucking see it! She got what she wanted out of you all along, and now she doesn’t need you anymore. She got a nice, cushy position as Director of the Sharks Cheerleading Organization that Jeanie offered her a week ago.”

Oh God, no.

In all this chaos, I completely forgot about the job. I thought Ellen’s interview was just her grasping at straws to be a bitch, not because she actually knew I was offered it. I should have known better. I should have known it wouldn’t be something as simple as her bringing the fake dating into light.

“Quinn,” I start, kicking myself in the ass for not telling him about this as soon as I got the email, when his confused eyes meet mine over his shoulder, where the guys are still keeping him off Tyler a few feet away from me.

“Little Miss Cheerleader got exactly what she wanted. She definitely picked the right player to fuck.” Tyler snorts.

Quinn’s imploring eyes are still locked right on mine, and he doesn’t make a move to put Tyler in his place again for saying something like that, and I don’t know whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing. There’s no way he actually believes what Tyler’s saying.

“I’m guessing she didn’t tell you Jeanie sent her the formal offer letter last week,” Tyler continues, Quinn’s eyes never leaving mine as everything inside me just starts to wither and die. “She doesn’t need you anymore, man. She got what she wanted, and you played right into her hands. You heard her say it in her own voice. She’s very good at what she does.”

Tyler laughs cynically again, while I quickly shake my head back and forth, trying and failing to blink back tears when Quinn finally speaks, so quietly I can barely hear him.

“Is it true? She offered you a job?”

Even a complete stranger who had never met Quinn would be able to hear the raw pain in his voice, and it almost brings me to my knees. Panic is like a vise around my throat, making it hard to breathe, and think, and figure out how this could have all gone so badly in such a short amount of time and what the hell I can say to him to make this better and to make him understand.

“I was going to tell you, I swear. I just needed—”

“Stop.”

Quinn’s quietly muttered word sounds like a gunshot in the room, and it feels like it just ricocheted off the wall and hit me square in the chest. I want to crumble into a ball in the middle of the floor when his emotionless eyes jerk away from mine to glare at Tyler.

“You’re fired. Get the fuck out of my sight.”

My heart plummets right into my feet when Quinn says these final words to Tyler, every fear I had about him being with me coming to fruition right in front of my eyes.

“Are you shitting me right now? I just told you she’s fucking you over, and you’re still picking her over me?” Tyler screams—louder than anything he’s shouted in this room tonight. “After everything I’ve done for you? I will fucking end you!”

Quinn doesn’t reply; he just turns his back on him to look right at me, while it takes three very large professional football players to drag Tyler’s flailing, screaming, and cursing body out the back door of the restaurant, and everyone else just quietly stands around in shock, watching it all happen.

Once Tyler is finally out of the building, Patrick’s wife tells me everything will be fine and not to worry, and I realize she was the one who came up behind me when all this started, placing comforting hands on my shoulders. Biting back the tears, I give her a thankful smile and a nod as she moves away from me to go to her husband. Everyone starts moving around the room then, grabbing their drinks from the table where they set them down, talking amongst themselves, until it’s just me and Quinn standing here a few feet away from each other.

I want to apologize for all the chaos I brought into his life. I want to beg him to forgive me for not telling him about the job sooner and for not explaining I wasn’t even sure if I was going to accept it, and certainly not before I discussed it at length with him. I want to wrap my arms around him and give him all the comfort I know he needs after such a harsh betrayal from someone he thought was one of his best friends. But I don’t do any of those things, because the look in Quinn’s eyes as he just stands there staring at me tells me everything I need to know.