Quinn was definitely a Morgan, a leaner version of the standard-issue, carved-from-granite Morgan, but still as molten sensual as a shot of whiskey in hot drinking chocolate on a cold night. More poet than justiciar, the third Morgan boy carried himself looser than the others, sliding gracefully though the crowd instead of shouldering past anyone standing in his way. He was tall, a little bit taller since the last time Rafe’d seen him, or maybe just taller because there was no shoving Quinn back into the little-boy box Rafe’d placed him in years ago. There was no denying it anymore. Quinn Morgan had definitely hit manhood and made it his bitch.
His black hair was longer than his brothers’, evidence of his life outside of law enforcement. It fell down to nearly his shoulders, tousled carelessly away from his handsome face. The deep green of Quinn’s gaze was still a sharp flash of lush forests, but Rafe knew he’d see little specks of gold dappling Quinn’s irises when he got close. His mouth was full, kissable, and Rafe swallowed, remembering the taste of Quinn’s lips the one time he’d risked life and limb to sample a bit of forbidden fruit.
A single birthday kiss—one given to an innocent eighteen-year-old boy who celebrated adulthood and master degrees all in one fell swoop.
It had been like sucking on lightning, burning away Rafe’s reluctance in agreeing to give Quinn the one thing he’d asked for—a single birthday kiss in the shadowy darkness of his parents’ backyard before Rafe went back to live out his life as a rock star.
His heart seized up when Quinn gave him a short nod and began to head straight for him. Fucking hell, now what are you going to do, Andrade?
Rafe excused himself from the conversation, giving Damien a quick, distracted grin when the guitarist said they’d hook up soon. He didn’t have time to think about promises and music. Not when Quinn was closing in on him.
“Excuse me,” Quinn murmured to a short woman with pigtails sticking out from either side of her head. His Irish accent was a softer roll than his father’s, more than a hint of green and peat hidden in its silky depths. Quinn got in close, their shoulders brushing as he jockeyed for space. “Hey. Just the guy I’m looking for.”
“Yeah?” He played it cool. If there was one thing Rafe knew, it was how to be cool in the face of a firing squad, and Quinn Morgan was definitely a loaded gun waiting to go off—and usually at the wrong moment. “Whatcha need?”
“I needed to ask you a question.” Quinn blinked, his lashes sweeping shadows down over his cheeks. “I kind of need to lose my virginity. And I was wondering if you could help me out.”
If the earth could have opened up beneath his feet and swallowed him whole, Rafe would have been okay with that. Or even if a dragon imprisoned in the depths of the Bay somehow broke loose and rampaged through San Francisco, looking for a single bite of Portuguese meat to satiate its appetite, Rafe would have volunteered—willingly—and asked his draconian executioner if there were any particular condiments he preferred Rafe baste himself in.
“Wait.” The still functioning bit of Rafe’s brain seized on the one piece of information he didn’t need to have in his life. He reached for something to hold on to, snagging an old familiar teasing from their younger days, and Rafe snapped back. “You’re joking, right? This is a joke. Hard to tell with you sometimes, Q.”
If there was anything Rafe’d learned in the short time he’d spent sober, it was that the universe had a really fucked-up sense of humor. In the scheme of things, he could have been saying something much more inflammatory just as the conversation din in the coffeehouse dropped, and his voice carried across the now relatively silent floor.
“Seriously, Q? A virgin?”
He’d been onstage in front of amps powerful enough to blow his hair back, and when a night was done, there was a silence throbbing in his eardrums that he could only call deafening. It was a whisper compared to the echoing stillness around him, and Rafe realized he’d caught the attention of every Morgan, Finnegan, and Murphy in the shop.
“Yeah, it was a joke. Just… something silly.”
As if they weren’t standing in a pool of quiet so deep Rafe could hear the demons beneath his feet cackling in hell at his discomfort, Quinn’s full mouth quirked with rueful remorse.
“God, I was just trying to tease. This is why teasing never works for me. It always ends up going really stupid.”
“Teasing’s never been your thing, Q.” Rafe pulled up short as a flush pinked Quinn’s cheeks. “It’s kind of like getting into a fight. You… you’ve always been the go-in-to-end-it kind of guy when usually the punching’s kind of what you need. How’re you doing, kid?”
It was safer to call him kid, so much safer for Rafe’s brain to handle, but something in the way he said it must have rubbed Quinn wrong because he bristled, tightening his shoulders. Rafe couldn’t count the number of times he’d shoved Quinn back, needing a bit of space from his best friend’s all-too-delectable younger brother. Kid, that kept Quinn back, back into the toy box and Little League games neither one of them excelled at.