Free Deadly Secrets by Jaycee Clark Page B

his hands, uncontrollable and unpredictable.
    She arched and pulled him even deeper.
    “God, Ella,” he groaned. “Have I mentioned how much I like waking up with you?”

Chapter 6
     
     
    New Orleans, four days later
     
    Aiden looked again at his phone. “He hasn’t answered a single damned call from any of us in about two days. None of us have seen or heard from him since we all ate at the Magnolia Grill Friday evening.”
    “He’s fine. The boy is getting laid and God knows he needed it,” Ian told him.
    Gavin and Bray snorted and closed their menus. They were all at the Magnolia Grill again on Decatur. Their last night. One night more than they had originally planned. All thanks to their little brother.
    “So we just leave him here?” Brody asked, sipping his drink. “Should of left his ass this morning. As it is, we’ll be a day later getting back.” He looked over the menu. “Wish I’d met a little blue-haired devil to keep me busy.”
    They’d all met the woman Quin was apparently spending time with a couple of nights ago. Here at the Magnolia Grill actually, but no one had seen either of them since. Brody had spent most of the meal apologizing to her for their previous meeting.
    Ian slapped Aiden on his shoulder. “Brother dear, you are the oldest, but we are all old enough to make our own choices. Stop being the mother hen. We brought him here to have a good time. Quinlan isn’t seven and drowning in the frozen river anymore.”
    “Feels like it,” Aiden muttered, shoving his phone into his pocket. “He could at least text for us to go on. How do we know the woman didn’t steal every cent in his wallet and leave him for dead in an alley in the Quarter or in some bayou?”
    “Because she has no criminal record, they’ve been holed up in her place for the last two days, and his credit cards haven’t been used,” Ian told him.
    Aiden just stared at him. Okay, so he didn’t know all of that. He did know the woman Quinlan was spending time with had no criminal record, the rest was a total lie. He knew the two were actually in Vegas because that’s what the credit cards said. They were currently holed up in the Bellagio. However, he was not about to share that info unless it was absolutely necessary. As yet, none of his brothers had figured out the plane wasn’t even here in New Orleans, but in Nevada.
    “I’m not the only mother hen, it seems,” Aiden said.
    Ian’s grin faded. “I didn’t pay attention before, and if I had, Quinlan wouldn’t have been hurt in the first damned place.” He swallowed all of his water and wished it were something stronger, but hell, he’d been doing stronger all weekend. “I won’t make the same mistake again.”
    “Fine,” Aiden said.
    They all ordered and then Ian waited. Aiden didn’t disappoint. “As long as Quin seems to be having a great time, I won’t worry about him.”
    Gavin snorted. “Yeah, right, that’s all we’ve done for the last year.” Gavin took a long swallow of beer.
    “So it seems like,” Brayden said.
    It was just them this evening. Gabe and Johnno were back at the house, nursing hangovers and just chillin’, they’d said. Fine. Christian’s brother had not been seen since that first night when he took them all out to his club, but then he was generally as busy as the rest of them, so that wasn’t a surprise.
    What was a surprise, at least to Ian, was not only the youngest of them getting over whatever the hell kept him celibate for the last year—which Ian knew was mainly one Hellinski bitch—but the rest of his brothers and their amount of worry for one grown man.
    Himself and his own worries he understood and owned. He shook his head.
    Brody leaned up and added, “You guys smother him. The tighter you do it, the more he figures to hell with you and closes up.”
    Ian smiled, and then there was Brody—Junior.
    “We’re his brothers,” the twins both said before giving each other irritated