Free Warrior Betrayed: The Sons of the Zodiac 3 by Addison Fox Page B

He could see it in the shape of her body as she leaned forward. The set of her shoulders as she sat staring at him expectantly. “What do you mean?”
    An image of her from the previous evening swamped his senses and the urge to reach forward and recapture a loose lock of hair had him lifting his hand from where he gripped the chair. Quinn stopped the impulse just in time, instead laying a hand on the edge of her desk as he leaned forward.
    “Think about it. You weren’t exactly born into a family that has to suffer with things they don’t like. If—and I think it’s a seriously big if, based on her recent behavior—your mother didn’t want to be a mother, what reason would she have to leave? All she needed to do was hire a nanny, pat you on the head from time to time and go on with her life. But she didn’t do that. She ran.”
    Montana nodded, those lush red curls he couldn’t keep his eyes off resettling around her shoulders. “Yes.”
    “And now your father’s dead and she’s back.”
    “You really think they’re tied together?”
    “I think it’s an awfully large coincidence that deserves some additional investigation. In the meantime, I need you to start thinking more objectively.”
    “About what?”
    “Your mother. Stop thinking like her child and start thinking like a woman who’s been targeted.”
    “It’s not that easy, Quinn.”
    “At least acknowledge there might be something else going on. Something related to her.”
    At her nod, he kept on going before the emotional land mine he’d just uncovered could slow them down. “Now tell me about that large board meeting you have in a week?”
    “My board of directors meeting?”
    “It’s a big deal. You’re taking the company public. Looking at all this through a new lens, maybe someone doesn’t want to see that happen?”
    Whatever lingering emotion had cloaked her vanished at the potential for problems his words implied. And with that implication, the wounded child became the competent CEO. “A public offering stands to make many people very wealthy. Inside and outside the company. It’s good for business.”
    “Not if some of your internal people have a few side businesses of their own.” Quinn decided to go for broke. It was the only way to divert her. The only way to keep her off the subject she kept returning to with unerring precision.
    Before she could reply, he pressed on. “Much of the business community thinks Grant Shipping is running some dirty business on the side. You go public and the people doing that are going to have a much harder time hiding it.”
    Quinn saw the moment his words penetrated, shifting her thoughts firmly away from Themis. “You think I’m dirty? Is that why you’ve taken a sudden interest in me?”
    “You have to admit, the timing is awfully strange.”
    “Strange? For what? You sit there, blithely insulting me to the very core and you have the nerve to chalk it up to fucking timing?”
    A lovely pink glow suffused her from her cheeks to the generous swell of her neckline. Quinn willfully tamped on the urge to look at the beautiful arch of her breasts, instead focusing on what he had to do: find a way to figure out if she really was as dirty as her old man.
    Was it really possible? This woman was light and innocence personified and what he mentally accused her of was the worldwide equivalent of kicking puppies for a living.
    Fuck. He needed to get his traitorous dick out of this and focus on the facts.
    She helmed the largest shipping company in the world.
    Said shipping company was up to its eyeballs in corrupt dealings.
    And she was clearly messed up with some nasty—and powerful—people since she’d been targeted for several attempts on her life by supernatural beings.
    “Isn’t everything in life about timing?”
    She shook her head, confusion now warring with anger. “Now we’re having a philosophical discussion? Well, let me give you a bit of philosophy to chew on. I’m not, nor