Natalie, Felicity Bolton, Zander, Devlin and Jesse were already inside waiting. Felicity, a hot chick with short obviously dyed red hair and a curvy body sat between Zander and Jesse with her legs crossed in front of her. She was Emmie and Nik’s nanny and from what I had heard she did a really good job at taking care of the kids. I’d also heard that Zander had tried to get in her pants once—and only once. Felicity wasn’t looking for hookups or even a relationship apparently. Or so Axton had assured me when he had eventually stopped laughing his ass off long enough to tell me how convincing Felicity had been when she had told Zander to get lost.
With a knee to the balls.
The chick had grit and I respected that.
Once I was seated, there were limited spots to choose from. Shane got in behind me and Harper climbed onto his lap. Axton sat with Dallas on his lap, his hand going automatically to her still flat stomach. The way those two kept reproducing they were going to have their own rock band within a few years. Rhett and Linc got in with Linc having to sit between me and Devlin and Rhett to squeeze in between Natalie and Shane, leaving Marissa the last one to get in.
She stuck her head in and huffed. “Okay, now where is my big ass going to sit?”
“Marissa!” Dallas, Natalie, and Harper all scolded her with a glare.
“Hey, my ass makes two of any of yours. So yeah, it’s big. Now where do I sit?”
Before I could open my mouth, Linc reached forward and pulled her inside. “Your sexy ass is going to sit right here.” He arranged her on his lap and then buried his face in her neck, making her giggle. “Damn girl. You smell so good. If I didn’t like dick so much I’d totally be all over you.”
I gritted my teeth, silently repeating to myself that Linc was gay and I had nothing to worry about. There was no reason to rip his spine out through his throat. None at all.
Rhett and Natalie’s snickers caught my attention, distracting me momentarily from thoughts of wanting to destroy the man who had been able to help Liam turn his life around so completely with the personal training he provided. Rhett had his arm around Natalie’s shoulders, whispering something that was making them both crack up. The way those two acted around each other was a lot like the way Rhett and Marissa acted. It confused the hell out of me.
Who was he really after? Which one of them was he actually sleeping with?
Devlin grunted at the sight and turned to pound on the partition that separated the back from the driver. “Let’s get the fuck going,” he barked and the limo pulled out into traffic.
Traffic was still pretty backed up from all the fans going home from the concert so it took a good thirty minutes before we got to the club in downtown Chicago. When we got there we went straight to the VIP room that was on the second floor and had its own bar. Surprisingly, Emmie and Nik were already there along with a few of the members of Trance and Alchemy.
“How did you get here before us?” Jesse demanded as he took the bottle of Corona that Emmie offered him. “I thought you weren’t leaving until later.”
“Interesting story,” Nik said as he handed me a bottle of Bud. I took a thirsty swallow as he explained how their driver had taken a detour that had gotten them to the club ten minutes ahead of us even after they had left after us.
“I’m surprised that Emmie let the driver live,” Natalie commented as she took a long swallow from her glass of Sprite.
“He might be alive, but he won’t be forgetting Em anytime soon. Not with that black eye she gave him,” Bishop, the lead singer for Alchemy assured everyone with a hard laugh. “But I realized a valuable lesson. I’m never gonna piss her off.”
“Yeah, you’ll live longer that way,” Nik assured the man with a grin. Wrapping his arms around his wife, he leaned back in his chair, sipping at his own beer.
For the next hour I turned my attention to drinking beer and trying not to let my eyes stray too often toward Marissa who was doing everything she possibly could to avoid me but also gain my attention all at once. She didn’t drink her usual white wine, instead going straight for shots with Felicity, Rhett, Carver, Dave, and Linc. She laughed and squealed as she danced with several of Trance’s band members all at once, then wrapped her arms around Rhett’s waist and swayed back and forth to a slow song with her head on the rocker’s shoulder.
If she wanted to make my blood boil she was doing a flawless job of it. And the madder I got, the more beer I drank. Two hours in I was feeling the effects of a few too many beers and the need to make Marissa and every fucking body else know that she belonged to me and only me.
She was out on the dance floor with a glass of something fruity in one hand and her other hand wrapped around Rhett’s arm as she danced between him, Natalie and Linc. I slammed my now empty bottle of beer down onto the bar top, making Emmie—who had been standing close by—jump. But I didn’t think to apologize. My mind was cloudy but focused on only one mission.
Kiss Marissa.
“Fuck, why am I the only sober one when he is suddenly shit faced?” I thought I heard Axton whine behind me.
Was I shitfaced? Maybe, but I didn’t care.
As I strode toward my girl, someone stepped in front of me, but I pushed past him, not caring if I knocked the man on his ass or not. As I drew closer, Natalie and Linc stopped dancing and Natalie took a few steps back, pulling Linc with her. After a small hesitation she reached for Rhett and tugged him back with her and the muscle head. Marissa, oblivious to her friends’ desertion and my approach continued to sway to the soft music with her eyes nearly closed.
My buzzed mind decided to take advantage of her like that and I wrapped my arms around her from behind. My hands folded around her waist and I lowered my head even as she stiffened in my arms. Burying my nose in her neck, I inhaled like a man deprived of oxygen would take in lungful after lungful of fresh air. Dallas had been right earlier. Marissa’s shampoo did smell good. It was something different from what she had once used, but it smelled delicious and made her hair soft and shiny.
Marissa tried to turn in my arms but I tightened my hold around her waist, locking her in place against me. As if it had developed a mind of its own, my tongue snuck out and tasted the soft skin under her ear, rewarding me instantly with a shiver that she was unable to contain. Around us everyone else disappeared and I swayed to the music with her. I didn’t dance, but if it meant I got to have her in my arms then I would do the fucking Macarena.
The feel of her in my arms, the taste of her skin on my tongue and her body brushing against mine as I forced her to dance with me was working havoc on my body. With the seven beers I’d consumed lowering my inhibitions, I was powerless to control the hunger that was starting to consume me. With a groan that sounded like a growl even to my own ears, I turned her around to face me.
Blue eyes stared up at me with a mixture of hurt, confusion, and anger. Her mouth, that beautiful luscious mouth, opened to say something but I fused my lips to hers and swallowed whatever she had been about to say. She stiffened in my arms even more, but I brushed my lips back and forth coaxingly until she relaxed against me and began to kiss me back. The taste of her invaded my senses, consuming me with her honey flavored essence. I wanted more, craved more. I felt her sigh more than heard it and her hands grabbed hold of the hem of my T-shirt and pulled me closer.
Everything in the room faded until there was just me and Marissa. Her nails biting into my back as she kissed me back with a passion that rivaled my own.
Chapter 7
Marissa
One minute I was dancing with my friends, having a nice time even though I was tipsy and on my way to being drunk. I’d been determined to forget that Wroth was even in the room with me, and with each drink I consumed, the easier it was to pretend. When you were on your way to drunk town it was surprisingly easy to pretend.
The next minute I was in his arms, the feel of his front pressed to my back making my entire body come alive even as my heart beat my chest to death with a mixture of ex
citement and hurt. I’d felt the tears start to burn my throat because it felt so good to have his arms around me while he swayed to the beat of the music with me. Another thing that came easy when nearly drunk? Your emotions easily came bubbling to the surface. It wasn’t so easy, however, to hide them once they did. I wasn’t so sure I liked that and decided then and there that drinking so much was a bad idea. One I wasn’t likely to make again anytime soon.
And then I was facing him. A million different things bubbled up in my throat to scream at him but I didn’t get the chance to express one of them before his lips were on mine. I tried to remain impassive, to not respond to the heat of his mouth on me. I didn’t want to want him. My body, treacherous bitch that it was, didn’t give me an option before it shut down my brain and I was kissing Wroth back with a need that had been lying dormant for far too long.
Wroth tasted bitter from the beer he had been drinking, something I’d been unable to not notice as the night had gone on. He’d been drinking far more than I could ever remember him drinking in the past. I’d been concerned for him as I’d watched him drain beers five and six and when the bartender had given him beer seven I’d turned away, trying to force myself not to care that he was getting drunk.
The bitter taste of the beer, however, didn’t hide the underlying deliciousness of Wroth’s own particular taste. I gripped him harder, my nails sinking into his thick skin as I followed his tongue with my own and relearned the contours of his sexy mouth. I felt his rumbling groan against my aching breasts, telling me he liked my exploration.
The fact that we were in some VIP room with over fifteen other people that we knew and a few other people that we didn’t wasn’t a concern for me right then as I swallowed his taste over and over again. Drinking up his kisses as if I’d been lost in the desert for a year and he was the first drink of life-giving water. Between my legs my expensive panties that I’d ordered from my favorite website were growing damp from the desire that was robbing me of coherent thoughts. I wanted Wroth so badly. All thoughts of getting back at him, of making him hurt the way he had hurt me, were wiped from my mind for the moment as I took everything he was willing to offer.
When Wroth finally lifted his head, I was unable to comprehend it for a second and then I blinked my eyes open and met his espresso eyes. His pupils were dilated with desire to the point that there was no color left. His nostrils flared as if he were trying to inhale me with each breath he took. I blinked again, only just then realizing that my nails were so deep into his back I was probably drawing blood. Swiftly I dropped my hands, but didn’t know what to do with them as I took a step back from him.
With distance came sanity and the desire was exchanged with anger. “Why did you do that?” I demanded, taking another step away from him.
“Because I couldn’t stop myself,” he responded, his voice low and almost animalistic it was so choked with desire. “I’ve missed the taste of you, Mari. I’ve missed you. I can’t stand that you won’t let me near you.”
The pain that twisted his face made me hurt and I lowered my eyes so that I didn’t have to see it. His confession that he missed me was like an arrow to the chest, digging deep into my heart. I’d missed him too. Probably more than he had missed me. Our short-lived relationship was like a slide show through my mind every night before I fell asleep. Of course the slide show was always followed by the big screen performance of the ending to that fleeting relationship. And it would make the pain come back with a vengeance and I’d be left curled into a fetal position as I fell asleep each night with tears drying on my face.
Thinking of the pain I had to live with on a daily basis reminded me of the payback I was going to have by the end of this tour. I should start it all right now, give in to him and let him think I was malleable, ready to start where we had left off before I’d confronted him about what I’d walked in on that horrible night…
But not yet. I wasn’t ready to start letting him close again yet. I had to school myself in hardening my heart so that when the tour was over and I left Wroth with a broken, bleeding heart, I wasn’t going to be wrecked all over again myself.
Raising my head, I met his gaze momentarily before hurriedly looking away, to my left where Natalie, Linc, and Rhett were still dancing but watching me closely. They all looked concerned but I knew that Rhett was the most concerned of the three. Unlike Natalie and Linc, Rhett knew that I’d been fighting bouts of depression that were so atrocious that I had to battle thoughts of suicide. I’d confessed it to him earlier and swore him to secrecy. He’d agreed, but only after begging me to come to him if I had any more thoughts like that.
“Mari-” Wroth began but I shook my head, unable to deal with him and the pleading look in those espresso eyes of his.
“No.” I shook my head and took another step back. “I can’t. Not yet. I just…can’t.”
He let out a long, pain-filled breath. “I know. I messed up bad, sweetheart. I know that. But do you think…” Wroth shook his head, a grimace contorting that face that I still foolishly loved. “Do you think that…maybe..?”
“I don’t know,” I told him honestly. “Just give me time.”
He lifted a hand and I wasn’t quick enough to step back and avoid it as he cupped my chin and stepped forward to press a kiss to my forehead. I closed my eyes tightly, savoring this gentle side of a man who was not gentle and never had been. Except with me. He’d always made me feel special, cared for. Precious. Cherished.
“I’d wait the rest of my life if it meant that you would forgive me.”
The words were a low rumble that brought tears to my eyes. And then he stepped back, turned and walked out of the room. Leaving me standing there with tears pouring down my face.
I’d only been standing there a few seconds when an arm wrapped around my waist and a head leaned against my shoulder. I didn’t have to look to know it was Emmie, but I was thankful for her presence. “Okay?”
I wiped my tears away with the back of my hand and shrugged. “Who knows?”
Emmie made an empathetic noise and hugged me. “It gets better, sweetie. And for what it’s worth…” She lifted her head and met my eyes with a knowing light in those big green eyes of hers, “I’m pretty sure he’s suffered just as much as you have. And take it from someone who knows, when your man hurts, you hurt ten times as badly.”
Chapter 8
Wroth
I woke up with a splitting headache. It wasn’t anything new to me. For the last year I’d been waking up with a hangover more often than not. It was just easier to fall asleep when my mind was so numb it had no choice but to shut down. But the only thing it really gave me was a better understanding into the mindset that Drake Stevenson had had for so many years and why he had always been seen with a bottle in his hands up until he’d met and married Lana.
It was getting old though, this pounding that felt like I had fallen asleep on top of jackhammer. The bad taste in my mouth along with the nausea rolling in my stomach weren’t a plus either. How was I supposed to win Marissa back if I was sick all the time from trying to forget her long enough to grab a few hours of sleep? This man, the one I was right then with the taste of stale of beer on my tongue and my head and stomach debating which was going to be the cause of my death, was not a man Marissa would be proud of.
Groaning, I rolled over in bed and nearly fell out of the roost I’d drunkenly picked last night when I’d come back to the bus. Muttering curses that I didn’t let anyone else utter within hearing distance of Marissa, I carefully climbed out of bed and took a moment to let the little men in my head stop using my brain for a trampoline and my stomach to settle a little before taking another step.
The smell of coffee was prominent in the air and I slowly made my way through the bus in search of caffeine. The bus was still moving and a glance at the watch on my wrist told me it was just after one in the afternoon. Almost everyone was still asleep from the quietness of the bus, but there were two people sitting at the tab
le when I finally reached the front.
Linc was wide awake with Liam sitting across from him at the little kitchenette table. To say I was surprised would have been the understatement of the decade. The old Liam would have been the last man to get up, he would have been holed up in his roost with an eight ball of coke or some meth and his pipe and we would have had to wait for him to be coherent enough to start jamming so that we could get our rehearsal in before we reached whatever venue we happened to be preforming at that night.
This new Liam was up at the crack of dawn, ready to work out with Linc and get his day started right. My little cousin wasn’t so little anymore. He was nearly as big as I was in the muscle department now and his once almost jaundiced eyes shone bright with a new passion for life. My surprise was replaced with pride for the man who I’d grown up with and loved like a brother.
“Dude, you need a shower,” Liam complained when I dropped down beside him at the table with a huge mug of black coffee that smelled like Jesse Thornton’s special concoction. “You smell like warm beer and something just as nasty.”
I lifted my half closed eyes at him for a fraction of a second, any longer and my aching head would have exploded all over the table. “Welcome to one of the joys that you used to put me through, cuz.”
“Go get cleaned up, Wroth.”
“When I’ve finished that pot of coffee over there I will,” I assured him as I took a long swallow of the scalding brew. When half the mug was gone, I was starting to feel a little more human and leaned back in the booth with a relieved moan.
“So is she okay?” Liam asked after a few more minutes of silence.
“She’s refused to talk to me about it,” Linc replied. “She never confides in me anymore, especially about him.”
My eyes popped open and my heart clenched thinking they were talking about Marissa. I’d left her last night with tears falling down her cheeks and gotten trashed in some bar on the cab ride back to the buses. Had I hurt her even more than I already had without realizing it?