Read Seduced in September (Spring River Valley Book 9) for Free Online

night.”
    “Too drunk to know who you were sleeping with?”
    “I…hey, I’d know who you were if you’d stuck around this morning, or if you left your name on the note. Who just leaves an anonymous phone number?”
    “Maybe someone who doesn’t want to be identified.”
    “So you have regrets?”
    “After this conversation, maybe I do. You know, I almost didn’t call you back. Now I wish I hadn’t.” She hung up, loudly.
    The noise served to remind him his hangover was only partially mollified by the aspirin and tomato juice. He winced and rubbed his forehead. Real smooth, Preston. You had to push it by saying her name. The wrong name. Who was Madelyn Moriarty? And more importantly, who was her niece?
     
    * * * *
     
    After letting Ricki back inside, Lily sat at Aunt Maddie’s kitchen table for a long time, arms crossed over her chest, staring at the phone on the wall. Now it all made sense why Quinn had called her. He’d just wanted to find out who he’d been with last night, since he had no idea. She taxed her brain, thinking back through all the highlights of the evening and realized he hadn’t actually said her name at all. She assumed he knew her because she saw him all the time at the hospital. All right, if she was being honest with herself, she’d assumed he knew her because she knew him and had worshipped him from afar for quite long enough. She’d congratulated him when he saved lives, and she’d cried for him when everyone feared he might lose his own after the disastrous Stanton house fire last spring. It seemed so foolish now to think that she’d only imagined he was as aware of her as she was of him.
    The worst part was, she was old enough to have learned this lesson already. The booze may have given her courage and allowed her to get out of her own way long enough to enjoy a no-regrets evening, but it hadn’t prevented her from actually having those regrets. In truth, as much as she’d tried to convince herself she could handle it, she’d fallen for every drunken word he’d said and secretly hoped for more than either of them had agreed to give. Now she had the audacity to blame him for her own stupidity.
    Ricki put a tiny paw on her knee and gave her a sympathetic look that she didn’t deserve. She scooped the little dog up and allowed him to lick her face. Dog slobber was small consolation, but at least he cared.
    “Come on, Ricki, do you want to go for a ride?” The dog’s ears pricked up at the question, and he started that infernal yipping again.
    Lily set him down and snatched up his leash from the hook next to the back door. She could take him back to her apartment for a while. Hopefully Claudia would be there. Now Lily felt guilty about plotting to skip out this morning on her roommate’s inevitable lecture about the pitfalls of one-night stands. She needed that lecture now, so she’d never be tempted to make this kind of a mistake again.
     

Chapter Seven
     
     
    He’d banished his hangover by Monday, but Quinn’s guilt remained in full force on Tuesday, weighing him down like a brick. He sat in the firehouse kitchen, a bowl of Tanner’s five-alarm chili in front of him, hoping an ambulance call would pull him out of the doldrums. The weather, deteriorating to cold wind and rain as a late summer storm blew in from the north, only served to worsen his dark mood.
    “You’re not still hung up on your mysterious blue-eyed blonde, are you?” Tanner asked, taking a seat across from him at the small Formica table to finish his own lunch.
    Quinn set his fork down. It was a shame to waste even a drop of Tanner’s chili, but embarrassment had dulled his appetite. “I have to find out who she is. I can’t stop thinking about her.”
    “All that thinking and you still can’t remember her name?”
    “The only thing I know for sure is it’s not Madelyn Moriarty.”
    Tanner’s jaw dropped, his fork poised in mid-air. “Who?”
    “That was the name on the Caller ID