The Mighty Quinns: Sean

The Mighty Quinns: Sean
Kate Hoffmann

The only thing that can bring down a Quinn is a woman…The next Mighty Quinn…P.I. Sean Quinn lives by one rule–never get involved. And he's always held to it…until his latest case, where he nabbed a polygamist just before the guy led another poor woman astray. His mistake? Agreeing to break the bad news to the man's fiancée. Because that woman is already at the church, expecting to become a bride. And she's just asked Sean to be her groom….His downfall…If Laurel Rand can't prove to her uncle that she's married, he'll leave his entire fortune to a bunch of coin collectors. But before long, convincing her uncle is the least of Laurel's problems. Confined with Sean in close quarters, trying in vain to ignore the overwhelming chemistry between them, Laurel sees just what great "husband" material Sean is. And she's determined to make him see it, too. Luckily, the deal they made covers the honeymoon stage….

“Tell me something,” Laurel said. “Are you married?”

Sean cleared his throat, an uneasy expression crossing his face. “Uh, no.” He took a step back. “I’d, uh, better be going now. You have a lot to take care of. You probably can’t return the wedding dress, but maybe your guests will let you keep the gifts—once they realize this isn’t your fault….”

“What size jacket do you wear?” Laurel quickly turned and retrieved a garment bag from a hook on the back of the standing mirror. “I’m pretty sure this will fit,” she murmured as she unzipped the bag and glanced down at his shoes. She could still salvage something from this mess. “I doubt we’d be so lucky that the shoes would fit, too. Edward had really big feet.”

“No way. I’m not getting all dressed up so I can tell your guests that you’re not getting married,” Sean said. “I’ve done what I came here to do. I’m leaving.”

“I don’t want you to tell the guests,” Laurel said. “I do plan to get married this afternoon.”

“Eddie is in jail. And I don’t think they’ll let him out.”

“Oh, I’m not going to marry Edward,” she said. “I’m going to marry you.”

Dear Reader,

I can't believe that the last episode in my MIGHTY QUINNS saga is finished and in your hands! When I started this project, I signed on for three books. And now, seven books later, I’ve married off all the Quinns—Conor, Dylan, Brendan, Keely, Liam, Brian and finally, Sean.

It’s no wonder Sean was the last to find love. He’s been the one to resist it more than any other Quinn. But when I chose Laurel Rand as the heroine of this book, I knew that Sean was a marked man. No matter how hard he tried, love was going to get him. He was about to fall very fast and very hard.

I hope you enjoy the last book in my MIGHTY QUINNS series. I can’t tell you if I’ll write any more. I’m sure there are Quinn cousins out there somewhere, waiting to find love. But for now, you can visit www.katehoffmann.com to learn more about my upcoming releases for Harlequin Books.

Happy reading,

Kate Hoffmann

The Mighty Quinns: Sean

Kate Hoffmann

www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)

To old friends and new fun.

To Mary, Jane Y., Lisa, Lori, Jan, Ruthie, Susie and Jane W.

Contents

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Epilogue

Prologue

SEAN QUINN sat on the front steps of his house on Kilgore Street, his chin cupped in his hand, his elbow resting on his knee. He didn’t have to look down the street to know his twin brother, Brian, was approaching. But right now, he didn’t want to talk to Brian. He didn’t want to talk to anyone. He just wanted to be left alone.

“Sean!”

“Go to hell!” he shouted as Brian strode up the front sidewalk.

“Come on, don’t be that way. Why didn’t you stick around? She wanted to talk to you. You just stood there like a lump.”

Sean’s fists clenched and he fought the impulse to strike out, to put a nice purple bruise on that pretty face of Brian Quinn’s. “She wanted to talk to you,” Sean shouted. “She’s only pretending to like me so she can get to you. I’m not stupid. I see the way she watches you.”

Brian stopped cold, his jaw agape. A frown wrinkled his brow. Sean took a small amount of satisfaction that he’d had the rare opportunity to best his brother. When it came to the mysterious motivations of seventh-grade girls, Brian still couldn’t tell when he was being hosed.

Sean unclenched his fists, knowing that he couldn’t hit his brother for simple stupidity. Still, he wouldn’t mind popping Brian good just for fun. Although they were twins, they didn’t have much in common beyond looks. Brian was part of the cool crowd at school, always knowing how to act and what to say. The teachers loved him, the girls adored him and he had a wide circle of buddies who seemed to hang on his every word.

Sean was known for nothing more than the fact that he was Brian Quinn’s brother—the shy one, the dumb one, the silent one. He’d always struggled to fit in, knowing Brian’s friends expected so much more from him—and were constantly disappointed when he didn’t deliver. When Colleen Kiley started paying attention to him, he thought, for one brief instant, that he might have found someone who actually saw him for who he was. But it hadn’t taken him long to realize what she was really after. He had always been able to sense when he was being manipulated or lied to.

“She…she doesn’t like me,” Brian stuttered. “She told me she likes you.”

“Get real. Sometimes you can be as dumb as a pile of dirt,” he muttered as he turned and walked to the front door. “Go ask her to the dance and see if she doesn’t say yes. She doesn’t want to go with me, she wants to go with you. She’s just using me to get to you.”

Sean yanked open the ragged screen door and stalked inside, letting the door slam behind him. He stormed through the house, past his little brother Liam, who was sprawled on the floor watching television, and past his oldest brother Conor, who had just come home from the police academy. Dylan, a high school senior, was off with one of his friends and Brendan was sitting quietly at the kitchen table, his nose buried in some dumb book about India.

Life was relatively normal, now that their father, Seamus Quinn, had left for another swordfishing run on the Mighty Quinn. They’d be without their only parent for at least another month, but Sean almost wished his father wouldn’t bother coming home at all. His infrequent periods of residence only threw the family into turmoil and emphasized the fact that the six Quinn brothers were existing on the edge, just a few steps ahead of the social workers and the bill collectors, just a few dollars away from eating ketchup soup for dinner.

Conor had managed pretty well over the years and kept the family from falling apart. Now that he’d graduated from high school and was bringing home a regular paycheck, the future looked a little brighter. Their father’s luck at poker no longer determined whether or not they’d go to bed with empty bellies.

Sean hurried to his bedroom and closed the door behind him. After flopping down on his bed, he covered his eyes with his arm. Sometimes his twin brother was so dense. Jaysus, for a guy who had so many girls drooling over him, he should have figured them out a long time ago.

Each of the Quinn boys had a particular quality they were known for. Nineteen-year-old Conor was the steady one, the provider. Dylan, the next oldest, was the playboy. All he had to do was crook his finger and every girl within a hundred yards was his. Then there was Brendan, the dreamer. He was fifteen and already he could tell the best stories, better than any of the Mighty Quinn tales their father told.

And Brian. For a thirteen-year-old, Brian was smart. He got the best grades in school, he’d been elected class president and he was good at sports. He could stand up in front of the class and give a report without turning all red and fumbling over his words. Sean could already tell that, someday, Brian would be famous. Maybe he’d even be on television. His youngest brother, Liam, was only ten, so Sean wasn’t sure what he’d be good at.

But Sean wasn’t good at anything. With a soft groan, he rolled over and hung off the side of his bed. He pulled a shoebox from the bottom drawer of the bedside table, then sat cross-legged on the bed and set it in front of him on the tattered quilt. He pushed off the lid, then flipped through the contents—his stamp collection, his baseball cards, a purple rabbit’s foot—until he found the small framed picture of the Virgin Mary.