The Rocker That Holds Her (The Rocker...)

  Strong hands touched my shoulders tenderly. Axton had moved to stand behind me. When I didn’t move he kissed the top of my head. “Go talk to Nik. Put him out his misery. Poor bastard is all kinds of fucked up right now.”

  Chapter 16

  One Step Forward…

  The half-moon was shining bright over the Gulf Coast. I frowned up at the sky, full of stars and hope for those that wished on those twinkling little diamonds. I was almost desperate enough to wish on one myself tonight.

  Emmie had been in her room all day. I had gone to check on her a few times and the room had been so quiet inside that I had figured she was sleeping. Each time I turned away from the door that led into our shared room my heart had felt a little heavier. When Axton had finally arrived, I breathed a little easier, but I still couldn’t shake my unease.

  Way too many What Ifs kept flashing through my mind. What if Emmie didn’t believe me, or even Axton about Gabriella? What if she couldn’t move on from this? What if I lost her?

  My hands shook as I thought of what my life would be like without Emmie in it. My throat grew dry, and I took a long swallow from my Corona to ease some of the tightness. It didn’t help so I took another drink.

  “It’s a beautiful night out.”

  My head jerked up at the sound of Emmie’s voice. I had been so lost in my own misery that I hadn’t heard her approaching. She was standing right beside my lounger, looking up at the sky with the slightest hint of a frown on her beautiful face.

  “Yeah. Beautiful.” But my eyes were on her, not the sky. Nothing was more beautiful to me than Emmie.

  She stood there for the longest time just staring at the water and the star filled sky. I didn’t mind the silence. Simply having her next to me eased some of the tightness that had been clenching my heart all day long. If she was down here with me now, that had to be a good sign.

  “I woke up feeling stupid,” she said in a voice so quiet that I had to strain to hear her. “I don’t have any right to be mad at you for something that happened more than a year ago.”

  “Em…” I tried to stop her, to explain that there was nothing for her to be mad about in the first place, but she stopped me by turning to face me.

  Even in the dim light of the half-moon and the lights coming from the beach house behind me I could tell that she had been crying. Her big green eyes were still puffy and her face still a little pink. “Axton told me that Gabriella lied. I’m sorry, Nik. I’ve made such a mess of things lately.”

  I reached for her. Taking her hands, I pulled her down onto my lap and did the only thing I really could do. I kissed her. Her lips were salty from her tears, but still the sweetest things I had ever tasted in my life. I let go of her hands and tangled my fingers in her hair. I was helpless to control my groan when she opened her mouth and let me inside her hot mouth.

  The kiss lasted forever, but nowhere near long enough. When I pulled back I was reluctant to let her mouth go but knew that we needed to talk. I kissed her lips one last time, savoring her taste on my tongue. “I love you, Em.”

  Her chin trembled. “I love you, too.”

  Every time she said it, every time I heard those words leave her mouth, my heart stuttered in my chest. “I wish you would have said something about Gabriella, baby. There was never anything going on between us. Never. By the time she came on the scene I was barely functioning because I wanted you so much. Even if she had wanted something, I never would have been able to touch her.”

  “We’ve both been idiots. We could have been together long before now if we had opened our eyes.” She sighed and buried her face in my neck. “I’ve loved you for so long, Nik. Even now it’s kind of hard to get my head around the fact that I finally have you.”

  I pressed a kiss to her cheek. “I know. It’s the same for me.”

  Slowly she raised her head. “About that kiss with Axton …” I tensed, the images of her kissing my friend making my stomach turn and my heart squeeze. But I didn’t say anything. I needed to hear what she had to say. “It didn’t mean anything, Nik. I swear. I don’t know what it was for him, but for me it was just him playing around. Axton is my friend. It would never be more than that.”

  “I know, Em.” I pulled her head down onto my chest. “I know.” I honestly believed that for her it had only been Axton teasing, just as I believed that for Axton it had been so much more. But I wasn’t going to think about that. It would only drive me crazy and ruin my friendship with Axton.

  We sat like that for a good hour, neither of us talking as we held on tight to each other. The sound of the water hitting the beach and rolling back out was soothing. I was sure that as long as I had Emmie in my arms nothing else would ever matter again.

  Emmie sat up so suddenly her head almost knocked my jaws together. “Oh my gods!” she whispered.

  I rubbed at the sore spot on my chin where her head had connected. “Are you okay?”

  “I think…” She giggled as she held her hand over her stomach. “There it is again.”

  “What?” I demanded, concerned.

  “The baby. I just felt her. She’s kicking up a storm in there.” She grasped my hand and laid it over her stomach where she had just been touching. “Right here.”

  I smoothed my hand over her slight bump, and she pressed my hand a little tighter against her. At first I couldn’t feel anything and felt disappointed, but then Emmie shifted a little and I felt it, just a little flutter under my fingertips. My heart contracted and my throat grew tight. “Was that her?” I asked in an emotionally rough voice.

  “Yeah, that was her.” Emmie laughed. “This is so amazing, Nik. I was scared I wasn’t ever going to feel her kicking, and now she’s starting to use me as a punching bag.”

  I grabbed Emmie’s waist and lifted her until her stomach was level with my mouth. Her hands gripped my shoulders to steady herself, but she should have known that I would never have dropped her. Grinning, I pressed a kiss against her stomach where I had felt our child moving. “I can’t wait to meet you, little girl,” I whispered against Emmie’s flesh. “I can’t wait to show you the world.”

  Emmie’s hands moved from my shoulders to my hair, tangling in the thickness as she held me against her for a moment. Then she was pulling away, straddling my waist. “Make love to me, Nik.”

  “Here? Now?” I was already reaching for the snap on my jeans, but I had to be sure that this is what she wanted.

  “Yes,” she breathed, pulling my head down for a kiss that had me losing all my reasoning skills.

  The beach was private so I wasn’t worried about anyone stumbling upon us. As for my band brothers and Axton, I didn’t give a fuck if they saw us. I stripped Emmie’s shirt off of her, relishing in the sight of her alabaster skin in the pale moonlight. I was sure that I was never going to see a sexier sight.

  When she was free of all of her clothes, I pulled my dick from my jeans and positioned Emmie over me. I had never in my wildest dreams thought I would get to make love to this woman, and now here I was loving her on the beach as if we were pagans. Out of all the freaky shit I had done in my life, this blew my mind.

  Neither of us could stop the whimpers of pleasure that escaped us as I slipped into her tight, hot, little body. She felt so damned good I knew I wasn’t going to last long. It was almost embarrassing how quickly Emmie could get me to the edge of exploding. Fortunately, she always got me hard again as soon as I did.

  I was still trembling with the effects of my first release, but I was stone-hard as she kept riding me. She was wild in my arms, a true tempest as she let herself go to the pleasures that I could give her.

  “Nik!” She cried my name as I felt her inner muscles clamp around my shaft, urging me toward my second release in as many minutes. “Gods, Nik. I love you so much.”

  Some Shit Hits The Fan!

  The house phone was ringing.

  That should have been my first clue that something was up. No one knew the number at the beach house h
ere. If anyone important needed to reach us they could easily get hold of us on our cell phones, and if it was overly urgent they knew to call Emmie.

  I ignored the annoying sound of the phone. That particular noise had always been like nails on a chalkboard for me. It seemed like nothing good ever happened when I heard a phone ringing.

  After a few more rings someone answered the insistent thing and I went back to reading over the last few lines of the latest song I had been working on. I was so lost in what I was doing that I didn’t notice how quiet it had suddenly gotten inside the house. The sun was shining down on me and I didn’t have a care in the world.

  “NIK!”

  My head shot up at the sound of Emmie screaming my name. I knew that tone. It wasn’t a “Nik, I need help” scream, more like a “Nik, your fucking ass is in trouble.” I gripped my pen and wondered what the hell I had done now.

  It had been a few days since we had cleared the air about the whole Gabriella issue. Axton was still hanging around, but I knew he was ready to head back to the West Coast. Now that we had decided to find a house on the West Coast too, Axton was pretty happy. We were all Axton had really. His family were all dickheads and he didn’t claim them, and even if Emmie wasn’t like his sister, I knew that he needed her just as much as my band brothers needed her.

  The door behind me slid open and Emmie came out, the house phone in her hand. She swung it around like it was a weapon and I bit down on the inside of my cheek to keep from grinning. That would only raise the temperature of her rage and send that pot to a full on boil. See? I was getting smarter.

  “What’s wrong, baby?” I asked, both cautious and curious.

  “Rich let it slip about the baby. Now every tabloid this side of the globe has the story and is running it.” She tossed the phone on the table in front of me. “I’m the most hated female on the planet right now. The stories range from how I trapped you into asking me to marry you to how I am secretly your sister and that the baby is going to have webbed toes and a sixth finger on each hand.”

  A snort of laughter escaped me before I could stop it, and Emmie glared down at me. But through the anger I saw the real problem. Emmie was still feeling insecure and I could see the doubt hiding in the depths of those big green eyes I loved so much. “You didn’t trap me into anything, baby. We both know that you couldn’t get me to cross the street unless I really wanted to. Marrying you, that’s a dream I thought would never come true. Don’t worry about the tabloids. That will all blow over in a few weeks.”

  Some of the anger drained out of her, and I reached out, pulling her down onto my lap. “No pouting.” I kissed her lips, sucking her pouty lip into my mouth and savoring that taste that always went straight to both of my heads. “I love you.”

  She sighed and leaned her head on my chest. “I love you, too.” She sighed again. “You know it was Rich that tipped them off to get back at me, right? He blames me for you refusing to tour anytime soon.”

  I grimaced. “Yeah, I know.”

  Rich was really starting to get on my nerves. He had been an awesome manager up until Emmie had come on board. Once she had started taking over his responsibilities, he had taken the easy way out. Jesse and I had to make him start paying Emmie for all the hard work she did. He had turned his attention to some of the smaller bands that he managed and still made a hell of a profit off of us. Our contract was up for renewal in a little over a year and a half, and I was sure that I wasn’t going to sign a new one when it was up.

  “Don’t worry about Rich either, Em. We’re on vacation, and I forbid you to worry about anything but the baby. Well other than making love to me at least twice a day.”

  Flames sparked in her eyes. “You forbid me?”

  I grinned and kissed her again. “Yes, I forbid you.”

  She punched me in the stomach. “The day I let you rule me, Nik Armstrong, is the day that I lose my mind.” She punched me again. “As for making love twice a day… I’ve already done that this morning. I guess I’m free to do whatever else I please for the rest of the day.”

  I chuckled, rubbing the sore spot she had left on my abdomen. “Aww, man. I was hoping you would come upstairs with me and we could have some more fun.”

  “Maybe you should have said that before you forbid me.” She gave me a deep smacking kiss then pushed off my lap. “Guess you will just have to wait.” But she gave me a steamy look over her shoulder as she went into the house, a sly smile teasing her lips.

  I grabbed the lyrics I had been working on for the new song, along with the sheet music I had been playing with, and chased after her.

  Chapter 17

  Just Another Day In The Demon’s Lair

  You would think that this is the part where I tell you time flies in the blink of an eye. But it didn’t. Not really. At least not for me.

  The next few months passed slowly, and I loved every minute of it. Well, mostly.

  While we were still on the Gulf Coast, Emmie worked with a realtor via emails and online tours of some possible houses. By the time our vacation was over and we were making plans to head into the recording studio to work on some of the new material I had been slaving over, Emmie had found us a house—a huge six bedroom right on the beach in Malibu.

  As big as the house was, Emmie needed help. I didn’t want her to have to worry about the house, business issues, and the baby all at once. That was how Layla came into our lives. That little hottie not only tied my best friend in all kinds of knots, but she did the one thing I was sure was impossible. She became Emmie’s best friend.

  A miracle, right?

  With Layla came two sisters that turned our lives upside down for entirely different reasons depending on whom you asked. Lucy captured my heart the first time I laid eyes on her. Sweet, imaginative, funny, and for me the little girl that Emmie should have gotten to be at that age. There wasn’t one of us that wasn’t caught in her spell, but that was okay. Lucy was special.

  Then there was Lana. Beautiful. Feisty. Smarter than any one person had the right to be. Her biggest quality? She could make Drake laugh without even trying. My band brother was in deep within the first week of meeting Lana, and I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not. That girl was just what he needed, but he fought it tooth and nail. Yet, at the same time he couldn’t go two hours without talking to her.

  Our strange little family of five—six, if you included Axton, which Emmie made sure that we did—grew by three. Other than Drake drinking more heavily, life was good for us. The only thing I really had to worry about was Emmie’s C-section that the doctor said she had to have because the baby was too big for Emmie to have naturally.

  The big day was creeping up on us fast. I had a week to finish up as much work in the studio as I possibly could before our baby girl joined us. So it was with complete reluctance that I climbed out of bed that morning and into the shower.

  Downstairs Layla was already hard at work. It was hard for me not to hug her every time I saw her. Over the last few months she had taken such gentle care of Emmie, from taking her to the doctor when I wasn’t able to, to consoling her when no one else could. And of course there was the baby shower that she had given Emmie, which had brought my girl to tears. I loved Layla for that alone.

  “Don’t let her overdo it,” I told her with a smile as I grabbed a mug and poured a cup of Jesse’s special blend of coffee.

  Layla laughed, rolling her chocolate brown eyes at me. “Sure, I’ll try.”

  I was rinsing my mug out when Jesse came into the kitchen with Drake and Shane. Jesse gave his girl a kiss goodbye and we were off to the studio for another day of recording. The morning went normally. Jesse was able to get the drums the exact way we wanted them on the second attempt, leaving me bewildered as always at how good he was. How could such a big man move so effortlessly when it came to playing the drums like that?

  By lunch time I was starving, having skipped breakfast like I tended to do most mornings. Emmie’s craving for
bacon was starting to make even me hate the smell of frying pig in the morning.

  Shane was in the middle of cracking jokes when Jesse’s cell rang and then all hell broke loose.

  Emmie’s water had broken and Layla was rushing her to the hospital. Out of all the planning the doctor had prepared us for, he hadn’t said anything about Emmie’s water breaking or her going into labor. That was why he had scheduled the C-section at thirty-eight weeks, instead of waiting for her to go full term.

  I was shaking as Jesse pushed me into the back seat of a taxi. My heart was racing and I was sure that I was having something close to a panic attack. I couldn’t think about anything but Emmie and getting to her. She must be terrified.

  When the doctor had first told her that she had to have the C-section she had lost it. Her fear alone had scared me. Layla had helped, and then the doctor had made sure that the rest of the guys and I knew exactly what was going to happen. I had been ready, at least that was what I had been telling myself about ten times a day for the last few weeks.

  I wasn’t fucking ready. I was never going to be ready! Emmie was going to have major surgery, and even I knew that there could be any kind of unforeseen complication. My stomach twisted and turned and I was close to vomiting by the time the taxi reached the Women’s Center. The car hadn’t even completely stopped and I was opening the door, needing to get to Emmie now.

  I saw a desk and stopped for directions, knowing that I couldn’t find her without help. But when I opened my mouth to talk, I started babbling like a stroke victim. Jesse saved my ass and asked the questions that I couldn’t.

  The elevator ride was nerve-racking. I was sure I could have ran up the stairs faster than that damned thing moved. When we stepped off a nurse’s station stood in our way. Again, it was Jesse who did the talking. The lie that we had been telling everyone since the day Emmie’s mother died slipped from his lips and then someone was pointing the way to where I wanted to be the most.