Crazy For You by Jennifer Crusie Page A

function. He sat for a minute, trying not to think about how stupid he’d just been, blowing twenty years of self-control like that.
    “This did not happen,” he said and started the truck.
    It was all that damn dog’s fault. If it hadn’t been for the dog, Quinn would still have been with Bill. As long as Quinn had been with Bill, he’d known how the world worked. And before Bill it had been Alex and before that it had been Greg and before that—why in the hell hadn’t she married any of those guys? Not that they were good enough for her, but why was she still rolling around town unattached, a loose cannon with a mouth that made men stupid?
    Why did he care?
    He put the truck in gear and backed out of the driveway and drove away from Quinn and confusion and trouble, and the farther away he got, the easier it was to deny anything had happened, that anything had changed.
    Because nothing really had.

    Quinn sat poleaxed on the big red couch while her mother stared at the garbage bags in the kitchen and her father moved around her to turn on the TV. ESPN kicked on with a guy in a blazer and a bad hairpiece talking about some team’s loss as if it were a major tragedy.
    “Hi, Daddy.” Quinn moved over on the couch to make room for him, trying to get her mind back from heat and surprise. Nick had almost made a move on her. And she’d been all for it. Amazing.
    “How you doing?” her father asked as he sat, never taking his eyes from the screen. Joe’s question was the equivalent of “nice day,” not a request for information. Quinn was fairly sure that whatever was going down with Nick, he didn’t want to know.
    “I’ve left Bill,” Quinn said, to test the waters.
    “Good,” her father said, his eyes still on the TV, and then part of it must have registered.
    “What?” He frowned at her a little, but Quinn knew he was bluffing.
    “Never mind,” Quinn said, and when he patted her knee and put his attention back on the TV, she put hers back on her own life, which was suddenly interesting.
    Nick had almost made a move on her and she’d said yes. Not an hour after she moved out on one guy, she was sending signals to another one, feeling hotter than she had in her whole life and, stranger yet, feeling that way about Nick, and the more she thought about him now, the dizzier she got. How long has this been going on?
    “What’s going on?” Meggy said from the kitchen. “There are nine garbage bags here. Nine.”
    “Right.” Quinn got up and moved away from the couch where she’d almost done something exciting, and into the dim little kitchen of her childhood. “I’m staying with you for a little while, if that’s okay.”
    “There’s a dog in here,” her father called from the living room.
    “Don’t pet her,” Quinn said, and then Katie came clicking around the couch, casting worried looks over her shoulder in Joe’s direction.
    “Does she bite?” Meggy said.
    “No, she pees.” Quinn scooped her up. “Her name’s Katie. I’m keeping her. I have a dog now.”
    It sounded wonderful. I have a dog. And then there was Nick. Such an interesting life she was getting. Finally.
    “In your apartment?” Meggy frowned, her pretty,- faded face crinkling with incomprehension. “Is this why you’ve left Bill? You couldn’t be that frivolous—”
    “Sure I could.” Quinn hugged Katie closer. “I’m gone. It’s over.”
    Meggy’s frown bleached out into simpler worry. “Oh, dear, I think this is a mistake. Relationships take compromise. Maybe if you go back—”
    “He took my dog to the pound,” Quinn said. “I told him I was keeping her, and he took her anyway while I was at school.”
    Meggy looked torn, probably between wanting to escape and wanting to save her daughter from being manless.
    “Quinn, dear, we’re talking about a dog. This isn’t like you. You’re the—”
    “No, I’m not,” Quinn said. “Not anymore. I’m tired of being sensible and settling. I’m