I Dated Brian Quinn

Chapter Twelve

The ride to drop Sarah-Lynn off at her apartment was a silent one. Jackie kept her focus on her hands in her lap.

Brian hadn't been mad when she finally saw him after being released. He had taken her in his arms and hugged her. Although he wasn't angry, his body language told her he was disappointed. She needed him to say something, even if it was to yell at her for being so stupid.

Brian pulled in front on Sarah-Lynn's apartment and put the jeep in park.

"I'll pay you the money back, Brian." She told him before she opened the door.

He nodded but didn't look at her. Sarah-Lynn reached over the seat and gave Jackie's shoulder a squeeze to let her know she was there for her. When she had made it inside her apartment, Brian spoke before putting the jeep in drive.

"I thought you were okay." He reached across the seat and took one of her hands out of her lap.

"The truth is I'm not. I wanted those pictures, Brian, so that I could look at them alone. I wanted to figure out who took them and I wanted to hurt them the way they hurt us. I wanted to invade their privacy the way they invaded ours." She felt the anger rising inside her again but she kept it in check. She wasn't angry with Brian and she didn't want him to be on the receiving end of it.

"You can have the pictures, but you're not going to get any information from them. I'm sorry I didn't see how much it affected you."

She could feel him looking at her.

"You can't go around assaulting everyone that you think is taking pictures of you." She heard the amusement in the statement.

"Well why the hell not?" Jackie laughed and finally looked at Brian. "Eventually, the odds are I'll find the person responsible for them."

Brian tilted his head to the side and gave her a disapproving look. Jackie took a deep breath.

"I'm sorry. I know this complicates things for you now. And I promise I'll make it up to you. And the owner of the bar." She looked down at her arms that had started to itch. She was covered in beer. Beer that wasn't gluten free at that.

"Yes, it will probably bring more publicity than I'd like. And you just doubled the amount that any magazine will pay to find out more about you. But it's fine. Lucky for you, the owner of the bar and I are good friends. He's agreed to let you work off the damage that you caused. Though I don't know how someone as small as you could do the damage he described. And to let you pay his medical bills, which included stitching up the side of his face and also setting a dislocated shoulder after you jumped on him from behind." 

 Brian had called his friend the minute he'd gotten the call from Jackie. He couldn't help but laugh after he hung up the phone with the bar owner. Only Jackie would cause such a ruckus.

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Brian didn't even offer to drop Jackie by her apartment. He drove straight to his house. Once inside, he handed her one of his t-shirts and left her to change in the bathroom. Even though she had her own clothes at his place, the gesture of letting her wear something of his was comforting.

She looked at herself in the mirror. There was a small cut across her cheek. More than likely from when Sarah-Lynn had tried to stop her from jumping on the guy and instead ended up running a fingernail across Jackie's cheek and poking the guy in the eye.

Her hand also ached. Jackie stretched the fingers on her right hand out and noticed that the smallest finger didn't exactly look like it should. The fact that it was twice the size that it was supposed to be was unsettling.