I had frowned at Killian’s profile for a second. I’d known he was smoking again since I’d been close enough to smell it on him, but seeing it was a different story. Inexplicitly, it hurt. Seeing the smoke spiral out of his mouth signaled something that cemented the distant between us, despite last night. Despite all of his words and promises. He’d given up smoking for me. And now he was doing it again. It had to mean something.
Mark hadn’t given me much time to contemplate this, luckily. He’d looked me up and down, frowned for a second, then handed me my first coffee of the day, barking orders at someone on the phone to get Mario here stat. I guessed the lack of sleep was easy to see. I inspected the floor of the kitchen while sipping my coffee cup. All evidence of the night before was gone. Someone had swept up the shards.
Hannah probably.
“At one fifteen, you’ve got a prerecorded satellite slot on the Today Show,” Mark began to run through my schedule while I sat at the breakfast bar, trying to wake myself up.
“You’re awake,” a gruff voice interrupted Mark, who scowled over my shoulder.
I didn’t twirl around. “Either that or there’s a zombie situation in this place,” I said into my coffee. “If I start trying to eat any brains, someone shoot me in the head.” Sarcasm was the best way to shield myself against reality. Against the truth that something had changed last night. There wasn’t any hiding from it now, but I was going to try my hardest to until I was properly caffeinated.
The chair whirled around thanks to a huge man behind me. I was faced with an ice blue gaze. “You didn’t sleep last night,” Killian continued, jaw hard.
I jerked at the observation. For him to know that, he must have been somewhere near my bedroom and awake the entire night himself. I decided not to grill him on how he knew, not in front of grim-faced Mark and wide-eyed Hannah.
I held my coffee cup up. “That’s why nectar of the gods was invented. Not that it’s any of your concern.”
He bent close to my face. “It’s my concern, freckles,” he murmured. Then he pushed off the chair and disappeared around the corner.
I blinked after him then twisted myself back around. Mark glowered and Hannah was grinning.
“What was that?” she asked.
“What was what?”
She nodded to the corner where Killian had disappeared. “That.”
I sipped my coffee. “What?”
She scowled at me. “Lexie,” she warned.
“Hannah,” I replied in the same tone.
She sighed, obviously not impressed with the game I was playing. “That.” She pointed. “With you and Killian. That was something.”
“That was nothing,” I lied.
She opened her mouth.
“Hannah, don’t you have to organize the schedule for today?” Mark snapped with impatience.
Hannah didn’t move her gaze from me. “It can wait.”
“It cannot. Do it. Now,” Mark said, his voice hard.
She rolled her eyes. “It was something,” she called over her shoulder as she walked out to the living room.
“No, it wasn’t,” I yelled after her.
Mark’s shrewd gaze was focused on me.
“What?” I asked defensively.
He shook his head, looking like he was going to say something. Instead, he continued to go over what I should and shouldn’t tell the various reporters today. Like I didn’t already know.
My day had been so full of interviews and press that, luckily, I didn’t get a second alone with Killian. We didn’t even take my Jeep. Thank Buddha. Clyde was waiting outside my place when we exited at eight. I had my second coffee in my hand. Noah had rolled out of bed five minutes earlier, hair mussed, clothes wrinkled and eyes red but still looking like he could grace the cover of GQ. He had declared that he would attend all press with me. I thought it was because he was acting as a bodyguard against my bodyguard. I hadn’t told him of the night’s events, I hadn’t told anyone, but Noah knew something went down. He had freaky-deaky super senses.
I’d walked up to Clyde and kissed his cheek. His expression didn’t change, but his wrinkled eyes softened slightly. A stab in my stomach made my breath catch slightly at this; it reminded me of Steve.
“That wasn’t just any old dive bar last night, was it, Clyde?” I asked him softly.
He looked down at me, the corner of his lips turned up. “I may have taken a singer or two there in my time,” he replied. “Good place to be anonymous in a world where such a thing is almost impossible.”
I grinned at him, my eyes twinkling. “Thank you. And thank Artie.”
He nodded. “Was his and my pleasure watching you play and enjoying your company, Miss Williams.”
So the day had been full and my mind had been running on autopilot. Not exactly autopilot. A lot of the questions I was faced with after the show were jarring.
“You’ve never played “Skeletons of Us” live,” a reporter pointed out. “Why last night?”
“I felt like it was time to play it. Our fans deserved it,” I replied simply, doing everything in my power not to look at Killian, whose gaze was burning into me from the corner of the room.
“Is it to do with your heartbreak over Andrew Bruntley’s recent death?”
The energy in the room changed. It was pulsing with Killian’s fury over the mention of Drew. He looked as if he was going to step in and stop the interview, which would have made things a thousand times worse.
Jenna took that moment to step in, like an Armani-clad angel. “We were clear Lexie wouldn’t answer any questions relating to Mr. Bruntley. I’ll have to end this interview if you do so again.”
I’d given her a weak smile and waded through the rest of the morning. Now we were picking up Sam so we could head to the studio and record some of our latest songs. Plus, I planned on showing them the songs I’d written last night.
“What are you, my mother?” I asked, walking beside him to Sam’s front door.
He put the key in the lock and stared at me. “Just a concerned party who is worried about the fact you may have a heart attack from caffeine overdose.”
“Have you met me? There’s no such thing as a caffeine overdose. The only thing I’m in danger of is a caffeine underdose.”
We walked through the living room, my step faltered and my eyes widened slightly at what assaulted my vision when I first entered the room, but only momentarily. Noah and I exchanged knowing grins and looked forward. Killian, however, stopped entirely.
“What the…?” he bit out, eyes on the center of the room.
When it was apparent we weren’t sharing in his astonishment and disgust, I heard his motorcycle boots fall into step with us. I could feel the heat at my back and already heard the words he was conjuring. Thankfully, we entered the kitchen where Sam was closing the fridge door, a beer in his hand, clad only in boxers.
“Dude,” he greeted Noah with a chin lift, throwing him the beer he was obviously intending for himself while opening the fridge once more. Noah caught it expertly.
Sam closed the door, one beer and a soda in his hands. “Dudette,” he grinned at me, walking to pointedly hand me my drink on account of his knowledge of my poor hand-eye coordination skills. He pointedly ignored Killian, acting like the menacing presence in the room didn’t exist. Like two hundred pounds of biker, of pure delicious Killian, wasn’t standing at my back glaring at him. He’d perfected it over the past week.
“Sammy,” I greeted, lifting my cheek up for him to kiss. After he did so, he winked at me and padded over to sit next to Noah, who was gulping his beer at the breakfast bar.
I took a sip of my soda, leaning beside the sink across from them. “So, do I even want to know?” I asked, nodding into the living room.
Sam grinned even wider. “What?” he asked, feigning innocence. “They wanted to recreate a certain movie. I was more than happy to oblige.”
“I’m not e
ven going to ask which movie.”
“Did the pointy hats not even give you an inkling?” he asked mischievously.
The two women perched naked in Sam’s living room had been wearing nothing but wizard hats and things I didn’t look too closely at that I guessed were meant to be used as ‘wands’.
I screwed up my nose at the memory. Seeing it once was enough. “Let me guess, Tatiana and Lucinda?”
He nodded. “Dynamos, both of them.”
I held my hand up. “And that’s where we stop this conversation and you put on some pants so we can go and record.”
“Just pants?”
I winked at him. “Well, I need some eye candy for the recording session.”
Killian’s form stiffened beside me. I ignored this.
Sam shook his head. “Tatiana and Lucinda will be very upset at this turn of events.”
“My heart bleeds for them.”
Noah chuckled.
Sam leaned in to kiss my cheek. “You okay after last night?” he murmured in my ear, staying close.
I nodded. “I’m fine, Sammy.”
He pulled back, frowning, but he finished his beer and wandered out of the room.
“I’m actually genuinely surprised he hasn’t had a baby momma come out of the woodwork,” Noah commented.
I nodded. “He’s still young. Give him time.”
Noah chuckled.
A buzzing went through the large kitchen. Noah glanced down at his phone, his jaw went hard and his eyes went strange. “Got to take this, babe. Be five,” he said to me before strolling quickly out of the room. I frowned after him.
Because of my thoughts being on Noah, I didn’t notice Killian advance until it was too late, until he was there, right there.
“What the fuck was that?” he growled. Yes, growled.
I glanced up at him, trying to make it seem casual, even irritated. “What?”
“You walkin’ into a fuckin’ porno and not flutterin’ an eyelid and Sam not even fuckin’ apologizing.”
I leaned back, actually shocked by the anger in his tone. “This is his house. He’s allowed to do as he wishes in it, no matter how… icky,” I said, screwing up my nose. “Plus, I lived with the guy. That”—I nodded to the living room—“is not the worst thing I’ve walked in on.”
“Fuckin’ hell,” Killian bit out.
“In case you haven’t noticed, Killian, I’m not an innocent teenager anymore,” I snapped.
His eyes flared. “Trust me, baby, I’ve noticed.” He paused, letting those words simmer between us.
Then, without warning, he snatched the soda from my hands and it clattered on the table. I didn’t even get the time to protest because his mouth was on mine and his hand dove into my hair, yanking me flush against his body.
The moment his mouth settled on mine, every single plan I had to protect my heart shattered into a thousand pieces. Every idea I had to stay away from him, to make sure this exact thing never happened again, went to dust.
I not only surrendered to him, but I kissed him back with the ferocity that mimicked that of last night, with that desperation that caused every cell in my body to sing his name while quieting every sound in my mind.
“What. The. Fuck?” an angry voice jerked me out of my trance and I immediately pulled back, my head turning.
Sam stood in the doorway, a shirt in his hands, jeans on, and a face like thunder.
“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” he roared, dropping the shirt.
“Sammy,” I began, trying to find a way to explain this.
He didn’t give me a chance because his fist plowed through Killian’s face before I got another word out.
Killian fell back a few paces but stayed upright.
“You fucker!” Sam yelled, advancing on him. “You really think you can wiggle your way back in there, so you can fuck her up again? Not on my watch.”
He looked like he was going to hit him again, but Killian recovered and beat him to it, landing his own punch. Sam half fell onto the breakfast bar.
“Stop!” I screamed, scrambling to get between them.
Noah pushed past me and stood in the middle of the men, his jaw hard. “Are you two out of your fuckin’ minds?” he yelled.
Both Sam and Killian glowered at each other. Sam struggled against Noah’s hand on his chest, blood trickling from his nose. “He was fuckin’ kissing her,” he bit out, breathing heavily.
Noah’s eyes flickered to me. “Yeah? Well, last time I checked, who Lexie kisses is her business.”
Sam’s eyes bugged out. “You’re fuckin’ kidding, right? You know what he did to her. You’re gonna stand here and let it happen?”
Noah stared at him. “It’s not up to me to let anything happen. Or you. You’re certainly not helpin’ anyone throwing punches. Ice your hand,” he declared. “Unless you’ve forgotten, you’re a drummer. We need the hands to record. Though the thing between your ears is optional, so do what I say before I decide to hit you too.”
Sam looked like he might challenge him, but he shook his head and muttered curses under his breath before pushing up and stomping off to the freezer.
Noah stood in front of Killian, who was still, despite the fact his eye was swelling. Something passed between the two of them; I wasn’t sure what.
“Noe,” I said, trying to find the words.
His blank stare cut me off. “We’ve got to record.” And with that, he turned on his heel and left.
*****
“Okay, so is anyone going to tell me why Sam looks like he’s had a botched nose job, is icing his hand between takes, Killian has a black eye, and I feel like I need mittens to field the icy looks everyone is trading in this room?” Wyatt asked, taking a sip from a water bottle.
Sam glowered at me. “Ask Lexie.”
Wyatt raised his brow and looked to me. His shock was evident, as was mine. Sam never spoke in that tone, and he’d never directed such a cold look at me before.
“Sam—”
“No, Lexie. How could you be so fuckin’ stupid? Kissing him? Really? We’ve spent the past four years picking up the pieces from what he did, and he’s back for what? Less than a week and we’re back to this?” Sam clipped.
“You kissed him? That’s why we’re in danger of going in the direction of The Clash?” Wyatt didn’t betray too much disbelief. More like he expected that very thing.
Sam’s eyes bulged. “Is that not enough? Did you need Lexie to burn your signed Van Morrison record to ignite some significant fuckin’ outrage?”
Wyatt raised a brow. “Dude, seriously? Killian rides here the moment shit goes down with Lexie, puts his entire life on hold without blinking, stations himself as a sentry, all the while eating whatever shit we throw at him without comment? What do you think that is?”
Wyatt’s words struck me.
“Plus, the dude’s gained like twenty pounds of pure muscle, is covered in ink, and has some serious Riddick vibes about him. Only thing I’m surprised about is that it took this long for anything to happen. Though I’m guessing last night pushed things along.”
I blinked at him. “How did you know that?” I whispered.
Wyatt looked at me. “Babe, that song lays out your fuckin’ soul. Couple that with the way he looks at you, you’ve got a collision course.”
I chewed my lip. “And you’re not angry? I mean, you don’t think—”
Sam threw up his hands. “What is this, Oprah? Have we forgotten what Killian did?”
I stood up, my own anger flickering. “You think I could forget that?” I screamed at Sam. “You think a day doesn’t go by when I don’t remember it. I’ll tell you what, Sammy, it’s fucking exhausting. So I don’t need you telling me what I should and should not think.” I paused, breathing heavily. “Now, are we going to record?”
Sam blinked at me, his face blank.
Wyatt elbowed him. “I’d agree or you??
?re dead, bro.”
Sam didn’t grin but nodded stiffly instead.
We spent the rest of the day getting lost in the music and wading through our first argument as a band.
I spent the rest of the day trying to find silence and wade through Wyatt’s words and the memory of Killian inside me.
*****
“Thank you for choosing to fly with us today. We hope you have a beautiful day in our nation’s capital.”
I yanked my baseball cap lower down on my head as I got off the plane.
Someone was looking out for me, because I had yet to be recognized by anyone since I’d crept from the house. Maybe that was because it was a 5:00 a.m. flight and everyone was still shaking off sleep or catching snatches of it for the majority of the flight.
Not me. I was wide awake, like I had been for most of the night. I couldn’t stay in that house for one second longer. I couldn’t hear my own thoughts with the echoes of Killian and me. With the voice in my head whispering, urging me to forget everything, surrender my heart and soul to him and stop the struggle of trying to fight what was between us.
Everything.
Every part of me that I thought had died was brought back to life when I’d thought the bones would be littered in the darkest parts of me forever.
That’s why I left. Okay, that’s why I ran.
I wasn’t ashamed to admit I gave in to my fear and escaped the bones that were coming back to life.
It was funny, the stalker that lurked in the corner of my mind wasn’t the reason I was running. It was the man who owned that mind. My unquiet mind.
Switching on my phone, I ignored the countless texts and missed calls. I had ten from an unknown number, which I guessed was Killian’s.
A heap more from the boys. I swallowed the discomfort that crept up my throat at ignoring them. At causing them to worry.
It was selfish. I was aware of that, but I had to be selfish or I feared there would be nothing left of me for them to worry about.