The quick in my cats claw is not where it should be

So I trim my cats nails on a regular basis and I have trained him to let me handle his paws and claws to the point that when it's time for me to trim them he lays on his back across my lap and hands me each paw in turn (I always trim them in the same order)
He's never complained about it until today when he growled at me when I touched one paw and particular. So I positioned him in a way that was more comfortable for both me and him and carefully cleaned him claw and was astonished to see that the quick (or blood vessel) in this particular paw was actually sticking outside the protection of his claw. I've looked at many websites trying to figure out what (if anything) is wrong with my cat and have found nothing. I hope someone on here knows something about this. Here's a picture of what his claw looks like
You can just barely see the quick sticking out on the inside of his claw. I'm worried that it might lead to an infection if I don't take care of it quickly but I honestly don't know what to do in this situation. Any insight on this would be greatly appreciated.

Wow I didn't know that was possible! 

Maybe he ripped a piece of nail off when playing, and then the quick was exposed and grew through?

I would probably take him to the vet and see what they say, as I personally wouldn't know what to do.

Sorry, no help from me. Keep us posted!

There are a couple of threads where other people have had cats with the quicks exposed for one reason or another.  The main concern is infection,  but I don't see any evidence of that in the picture.  But I also can't tell exactly in the picture what is claw and what is quick.

Here's one of the threads, if it helps:  http://www.thecatsite.com/t/286194/...-ripped-torn-claw-cats-quick-has-been-clipped

Okay, so I've been keeping it covered and and it's healing on it's own. I've also been cleaning and washing it regularly so as to make sure it doesn't get infected. I still don't know why it's out in the first place because he doesn't do anything that would result in this. He rarely even uses the cat scratch post.