Hero of the Month: Cam Quinn.

I know, I know…I’m so sorry, I haven’t had a new Hero of the Month post up in the last three months but I swear it, I’m going to get better at this, for real.

In the past couple of weeks, I’ve been doing a lot of skimming of my Nora Roberts books, mostly because my friend, Lilo has been wanting to read the Key Trilogy and I can’t find the second book in the series, so while I’ve been looking for it, I’ve been skimming through the other NR books on my shelves. And I always come back to Seaswept, Cam Quinn and Anna Spinelli’s book.

A book that captured my heart and a little bit of my soul so long ago when I read it for the first time. I thought the book flowed extremely well with the personality of the hero, Cam Quinn. It’s kind of hard to explain but the story mirrored Cam’s personality so well that it is still my absolute favorite Nora Roberts book.

What totally made the book work for me was the hero himself. Cam Quinn wasn’t always the man that we read about throughout the book. He wasn’t always the stand up man, who is trying to keep his family together. Oh no, Cam turned into that guy because of the parents that raised him. The parents that cared enough to welcome him into their home and gave him what his young heart needed the most.

Love.

To read this book is to love it. I promise, it’s one of those books that swept me up from the very first page to the very last one. Cam Quinn was one sexy motherbrother and his story was very real. It was well written and just flowed so well that I love going back and reading it every chance I get.

If you haven’t read this book, then you can’t really appreciate Cam Quinn and his brothers. You see, the series starts off with the death of Cam’s father, Ray Quinn. Now, Ray wasn’t Cam’s biological father…no, he was Cam’s adoptive father and raised him to be a fantastic man. A family man, a man who doesn’t turn his back on his family, a man who would do anything and everything he could to keep his family together.

A man who would drop the life he built for himself because his father died, leaving a 10 year old little boy who came fully equipped with nasty rumors and an even nastier attitude. A little boy named Seth Quinn. Cam, being the eldest stepped into the head of household role when he came back to try to do right by his young “brother” that his father left behind.

It wasn’t easy trying to keep Seth around, didn’t matter a lick that in Cam’s eyes, Seth was a Quinn and he belonged with Cam, Ethan and Phillip (Cam’s brothers) …oh no, they had to fight tooth and nail in order to keep Seth with them and the things that Cam went through, the measures Cam went to just so that Seth could stay with them, warmed my heart and made me love him oh so much.

Cam was used to the fast life, he was used to living in the moment and going where the wind took him. It was thanks to Ray and Stella Quinn that Cam had a shot at the life that he always wanted and he never forgot it. He never forgot his parents and seeing him struggle to be a family man was pure comedy…pure heart warming comedy.

Imagine if you would, one sexy, sexy man who was used to fast cars, faster women and freedom… staying home and doing laundry, washing dishes and vacuuming the living room…hating every minute of it but doing it anyway because it needed to get done in order for them to have a fighting chance at keeping his younger brother, Seth.

What I loved most about Cam Quinn is the way he was with Seth. He didn’t treat Seth with kiddy gloves but there was no doubt that Cam considered him family. He may not have been happy with it at first, but he did right by the kid and eventually, he grew to love the kid as if he were his own and the slow formation of feeling is what totally got me about Cam.

The following scene is probably my most favorite scene in the whole book and shows the kind of man, Cam Quinn was and why I love him so much. Now mind you, his new younger brother, Seth Quinn has not been shown love. He views life as him against them. No one has ever taken the time to get to know him and no one has certainly ever stood up for him…until Cam.

Across the room, Seth was slumped in a chair, staring up at the ceiling. Trying to look bored, Cam assumed, but coming off as sulky. Kid needed a haircut, he realized and wondered who was supposed to deal with that. He was wearing jeans frayed to strings at the cuffs, a jersey two sizes too big, and incredibly dirty high-tops.

It looked perfectly normal to Cam.

He rapped on the doorjamb. Both the vice principal and Seth glanced over, with two dramatically different expressions. Mrs. Moorefield smiled in polite welcome. Seth sneered.

“Mr. Quinn.”

“Yeah.” Then he remembered he was supposed to be here as a responsible guardian. “I hope we can straighten this out, Mrs. Moorefield.” He stuck his own polite smile into place as he stepped to her desk and offered a hand.

“I appreciate your coming in so quickly. When we have to take regrettable disciplinary action such as this against a student, we want the parents or responsible parties to have the opportunity to understand the situation. Please, Mr. Quinn, sit down.”

“What is the situation?” Cam took his seat and found he didn’t like it anymore than he used to.

“I’m afraid Seth physically attacked another student this morning between classes. The other boy is being treated by the school nurse, and his parents have been informed.”

Cam lifted a brow. “So where are they?”

“Both of Robert’s parents are at work at the moment. But in any case–“

“Why?”

Her smile returned, small, attentive, questioning. “Why, Mr. Quinn?”

“Why did Seth slug Robert?”

Mrs. Moorefield sighed. “I understand you’ve only recently taken over as Seth’s guardian, so you may not be aware that this isn’t the first time he’s fought with other students.”

“I know about it. I’m asking about this incident.”

“Very well.” she folded her hands. “According to Robert, Seth demanded that Robert give him a dollar, and when robert refused to pay him, Seth attacked him. At this point,” she added, shifting her gaze to SEth, “Seth has neither confirmed nor denied. School policy requires that students be suspended for three days as a disciplinary acton when involved in a fight on school premises.”

“Okay,” Cam rose, but when Seth started to get up, he pionted a finger. “stay,” he ordered, then crouched until they were eye to eye. “You try to take this kid down?”

Seth jerked a shoulder. “That’s what he say.”

“You slugged him.”

“Yeah, I slugged him. Went for the nose,” he added with a thin smile, and shoved at the straw colored hair that flopped into his eyes. “It hurts more.”

“Why’d you do it?”

“Maybe I didn’t like his fat face.”

With his patience as frayed as Seth’s jeans, Cam gripped Seth by the shoulders. When Seth winced and hissed in a breath, alarm bells went off. Before Seth could evade him, Cam tugged the arm of the oversized jersey down. Nasty little bruises–knuckle rappers, Cam would have called them–ran from Seth’s shoulder to his elbow.

“Get off me.” His face heated with shame, Seth squimed, but cam merely shifted him. Scrapes were scored high on Seth’s back, red and raw.

“Hold still.” Cam moved his grip and laid his hands on the arms of his chair. His eyes stayed on Seth. “you tell me what went down. And don’t even think about lying to me.”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“I didn’t ask you what you wanted. I’m telling you to spill it. Or,” He said, lowering his voice so only SEth could hear, “are you you going to let that punk get away clean?”

Seth opened his mouth, closed it again. He had to set his jaw so it wouldn’t wobble. “he was pissed off. We had this history test the other day and I aced it. An idiot could’ve gotten an ace, but he’s less than an idiot and he flunked. So he kept hassling me, dogged me down the hall, jabbing at me. I walked away because I’m sick to death of ISS.”

“Of what?”

Seth rolled his eyes. “In-School Suspension. It’s boring. I didn’t want to do more time, so I walked. But he kept jabbing and calling me names. Egghead, teachers pet, and all that shit. Didn’t let it bother me. But then he shoved me back against the lockers and he said I was just a son of a whore and everybody knew it, so I decked him.”

Shamed and sick, he jerked a defiant shoulder. “So I get a three-day vacation. Big deal.”

Cam nodded and rose. When he turned around his eyes were nearly black with fury. “You’re not suspending this kid for defending himself against an arrogant bully. And if you try, I’ll go over your head to the Board of Education.”

shocked to the core, Seth stared up at Cam. Nobody had ever stood up for him. He’d never expected anyone to stand up for him.

“Mr. Quinn–“

“Nobody calls my brother a son of a whore, Mrs. Moorefield. And if you don’t have a school policy against vicious name-calling and harassment, you dman well should. so I’m telling you, you better take another look at this situation. And you better rethink just who gets suspended here. And you can tell little Robert’s parents that if they don’t want thei kid crying over a bloody nose, they better teach him some manners.”

She took a moment before speaking. she’d been teaching and counseling children for nearly thirty years. What she saw on Seth’s face at that moment was hope, stunned and wary, but hope nonetheless. It was a look she didn’t want to extinguish.

“Mr. Quinn, you can be certain that I will investigate this matter further. I wasn’t aware that Seth had been injured. If you’d like to take him down to the nurse while I speak with robert and ….others–“

“I can take care of him.”

“As you wish. I’ll hold the suspension in abeyance until I’ve satisfied myself with the facts.”

“You do that, Mrs. Moorefield. But I’m satisfied with the facts. Now I’m taking Seth home for the rest fo the day. He’s had enough.”

“I agree with you.”

The child hadn’t looked shaken when he’d come into her office, she thought. He’d looked cocky. He hadn’t looked shaken when she’d told him to sit down and called his home. He’d looked belligerent.

But he looked shaken now, finally, with his eyes wide and stunned and his hands gripping the arms of the chair. The thin, hard shield he’d kept tight around him, a shield neither she nor any of his teachers had been able to so much as scratch, appeared to be deeply dented.

Now, she decided, they would see what they could for him.

*sigh*

I’d be here all day listing all the reasons I love Cameron Quinn but you’ll just have to read his book to find out for yourself, this guy is all that and two bags of chips, try his book out, you won’t be sorry…it’s a great, great series and Cam Quinn rocks my socks!

Until next month, enjoy this month’s Hero of the Month in Cam Quinn.

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