All For You (Rocktown Ink #5) by Sherilee Gray (fantasy novels to read txt) 📗

suspected something. She wasn’t one hundred percent sure, but she thought something was up.

Lila laughed, overly loud. “Leave your poor brother alone.”

Yep, and Lila as well. They both suspected something was going on between Mase and me.

Brick.

Oh god, Brick must have said something to Riff about Mase walking into my trailer.

Mase gave Quinn a tight smile. “Not your business, brat.” He opened his wallet, fished out the money for his cookies, handed it to her, then walked out the door, completely forgetting about the coffee he’d come in for.

Quinn stared after him, a concerned look on her face, then spun back to us. “I can’t believe he’s seeing someone and hasn’t told me or Bull. I mean, why would he do that?”

“Perhaps there’s nothing to tell,” I said, barely able to meet her eyes.

“You mean like some meaningless fling?” The concern grew on Quinn’s face.

“Maybe you should just be happy for him,” Eves said, now studiously not looking at me. “From what you’ve said, he’d closed himself off. This has to be a good thing, right? He obviously got out there and met someone.”

“Bull and I were supposed to just be a fling, look how that turned out,” Quinn said.

An ache grew behind my ribs. There was no chance of Mase and I turning into another Quinn and Bull.

Quinn sat back. “And honestly, I thought eventually he’d get back with Janie. They had their ups and downs, but they always seemed so perfect for each other.”

“I thought she was seeing someone else?” Addy said.

Quinn nodded absently. “Yeah, but things aren’t going great there. Don’t get me wrong, I do not want them to get back together. I hate that she hurt my brother. I hate it. I was so pissed with her…I still am. I’m not sure I’ll ever get over the way she ended it, the damage she did. But they were so young when they married. I think she’s starting to realize just what she threw away.”

Hearing about Mase and his ex-wife was torture. I didn’t want to know how perfect they’d been together.

“It sounds like it’s past time for them both to move on,” Lila said.

“Yeah.” Quinn sighed. “Janie’s actually been texting me a lot lately, asking about Mase. I haven’t told her anything because I’m not going to do that shit behind my brother’s back. But she did tell me she’d called him to talk about maybe a reconciliation in the future, or at least sit down and talk to see if something’s still there.”

I froze, my stomach sinking to my feet. They’d talked about a reconciliation?

“What did Mase say?” Cassy asked.

“I’m not sure, but she sounded positive about it.” Quinn shook her head. “I have no idea what my brother is thinking, but if he’s still talking to Janie, if he’s given her even a scrap of hope, then I guess he’s right, he’s not ready for something serious with someone else. I thought hanging out with Deb would be good for him, that it might help him move on…I seriously miscalculated that one. Janie isn’t right for him anymore, but I think he’s still in love with her. He was devastated when she left, and he hasn’t been the same since. I hope whoever owns those panties knows it won’t last. The whole thing has rebound disaster written all over it.”

Eves changed the subject quickly…and I did my best not to throw up. Mase and I were never heading toward a happily ever after, but this hurt. Hearing about him and Janie and his undying love for her cut me deep.

She was his one—whether they got back together or not.

He told me he couldn’t give me more and he’d been telling the truth, because Janie still owned his heart.

I couldn’t even blame Mase. Unlike Adam, he hadn’t lied to me, he hadn’t made me any promises. I’d gone into this with my eyes wide open. A relationship was the last thing I’d wanted as well.

Until I got to know him. Until he made me feel things, experience things I never knew were possible.

Until he went and made me fall completely and utterly in love with him.

Mase was expecting me.

But instead of going to his house, I’d hustled to the trailer. The conversation with my friends today, the things Quinn had said, had totally thrown me.

Admitting to myself the way I truly felt about him had sent me into a tailspin.

I was in love with Mase.

I’d done the one thing I’d been trying to avoid at all cost. I’d been desperate for an escape from the pain of losing Gran, the weight of knowing I was alone in the world, because I sure as hell couldn’t rely on my brother, and I messed up. I’d been emotionally vulnerable and I’d dropped my guard—I’d fallen for a man who was in love with someone else.

When the knock at my door finally came half an hour later, I still wasn’t ready to see him. I had no idea what I was going to do or say.

But I couldn’t leave him standing outside, so I opened the door, and my heart filled with longing, then cracked right down the middle as soon as I saw him. He smiled, warm and affectionate, and I died a little inside. Mase was the most affectionate, tactile man I’d ever met. He made me laugh, and he was so incredibly sexy I wanted him constantly.

And he would never be mine.

This was all I’d ever have of him.

He walked in and his smile turned pained. “I’m sorry about today. I saw you and got flustered.” He chuckled and it was awkward and sweet. And I loved that, too.

I let my lips curl up and patted his arm, teasing, keeping up the front that I was fine, that everything is fine. “I noticed.”

He moved in, cupped the side of my face, and grinned. “You looked so cute and sexy sitting there, I lost my mind for a few moments.”

“Maybe it’s your age?”