“Th-thank you, Wroth,” I whispered. “That was perfect.”
Still cupping my face he offered me a small smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “Anything for you, sweetheart.”
The door opened again and there stood my nurse, tapping her foot. I shot her another glare, but Wroth sighed and pressed a kiss to my forehead before standing. “I’ll be in the waiting room, sweetheart.”
“I don’t want you to go.”
“I’m not going anywhere. As long as you’re here, I’ll be here too.” He winked down at me. “Goodnight, Mari.”
I swallowed hard, trying not to cry again until he was out the door. “Goodnight, Wroth.”
Chapter One
Marissa
Present Day
The smell of coffee pulled me out of a dream-filled sleep. I blinked open my eyes, trying to fight the melancholy that washed over me as I tried to pull the dream back, attempting to remember why I was feeling so sad all of a sudden. I knew that it had to have been a dream about Wroth, because he was all I seemed to be able to dream about these days. And I knew that it hadn’t been one of the many wet dreams I’d been having since I could freaking have wet dreams, but had intensified since the spring tour over a year ago. I also knew that it wasn’t even the dream where I kicked his ass, because those dreams always left me feeling pissed off but a little vindicated when I woke up.
Fighting the urge to cry, and angry because I didn’t know why but did know the most likely cause, I crawled out of bed and pulled a thin robe over my tank top and shorts pajamas. My long hair was a tangled mess so I pulled the thick tresses into a knot on top of my head and slowly made my way down the hall. The television was on in the living room to some show on E! but I refrained from rolling my eyes at my roommate’s reality show addiction.
The scent of coffee was getting stronger and my own addiction was calling my name. I was a coffee addict, and since moving to New York last year, that addiction had only grown since there was a different coffee shop on every corner. As I entered the kitchen I had eyes only for the coffee pot, so when the refrigerator door closed with a thump, I turned my head to glance at Linc.
Only to wish I hadn’t when my gaze landed on his very naked body. Well, damn! It wasn’t the first time I’d seen Linc Spencer’s dick in the last twelve months. It wasn’t even the fifth time. And like every time before, and every female with red blood running through her veins, my gaze lingered on his very impressive man parts. Sadly, however, I felt nothing below the neck at the sight of such male perfection. Which was probably a good thing, seeing as that lusting after my very gay roommate would only lead to hurt feelings because he would never be able to feel that way about me.
“Morning, Rissa,” Linc greeted me with a smirk because he knew exactly what I was gaping at.
Pink filling my already warm cheeks, I turned back to the coffee pot and poured myself a gigantic mug full of the strong brew. Thankfully Jesse Thornton had given Linc the recipe for his special morning coffee during OtherWorld’s and Demon’s Wing’s fall tour and Linc had started making it when he and Natalie had returned back in November. My other roommate wouldn’t go near the coffee pot now, but Linc and I seemed to be attached to it in the mornings.
“Morning,” I murmured before taking my first sip of rich coffee.
“Tonight’s the night,” he informed me as he set a dozen eggs, a whole tomato, onion, mushrooms and spinach on the counter by the stove where a pan was already sprayed and waiting for him to make a mammoth omelet. “Are you ready?”
Instead of answering him, I took a bigger gulp of coffee to give myself a moment to decide if I was ready for tonight or not. Last week my brother had asked me to have dinner with everyone tonight. Everyone being all the members of OtherWorld, the members of Demon’s Wings and their families, and the two new bands that would be touring with them over the summer. A tour that would start in three days. A tour that I didn’t want to go on, but foresaw my brother asking me to join him on anyway.
Liam had begged and pleaded for me to join him on the fall tour, not wanting me to be alone in New York for two months since both my roommates would be gone. But I hadn’t been able to face another tour. Not when the wounds of the last tour had been so fresh. This tour was going to be considerably longer than the fall tour. Fourteen weeks long actually, so I knew that Liam wasn’t going to deal well with me staying in New York alone for that long.
I didn’t want to worry my brother. He was doing so great with his recovery not only from the accident that had nearly killed him last year, but also with his drug addiction. He had been clean for nineteen months now, the longest he has ever been clean since he had started using when he was in his teens. But I always worried that he would eventually fall back into old habits, was terrified that he would turn to the drugs if I stressed him out. After watching his struggle with heroin back when I had been so sick with cancer, I couldn’t help but worry that I was one of the reasons he had needed the drugs in the first place.
Still, I didn’t want to go on a stupid tour with stupid rockers… Grimacing, I shook my head. Okay, so only one of them was stupid. So stupid that I wanted to kick him in the head a few times in the hopes of fixing his stupid problem.
I was definitely conflicted about tonight. Unsure if I could say no to my brother, but knowing that I needed to. I couldn’t handle being that close to Wroth Niall again. I’d moved from Tennessee to New York City to get away from him. Made sure I was busy when he was in town, and had even gone so far as staying in a hotel when he’d camped out in the apartment for an entire weekend waiting for me to come home. The closest I’ve been to him was on Valentine’s Day for Austin Bradshaw’s wedding and then the after party which had taken place in a maternity ward waiting room where the reception had ended up being because Dallas had gone into labor.
Even then I had avoided him, going as far as boxing myself into a corner with some of Dallas’s family members. It wouldn’t be any different tonight. I didn’t want to be near Wroth. I didn’t want to see his handsome face, or smell his spicy scent. I didn’t want to look at him and worry if he’d been getting enough sleep, been eating enough, or was dealing with his demons—all the things I’d made sure of and worried about when I’d lived in the same house with him.
“I’m sure it will be fun,” I finally told him with a smile that hurt my cheeks because it was so forced.
Linc raised a brow at me, letting me know that he didn’t believe me, but didn’t call me on it. Instead he started putting together two omelets. I topped off my coffee and took my seat at the kitchen table. When Linc put my omelet in front of me I nodded my thanks and devoured the deliciousness. Linc went to put some clothes on and by the time he returned, I was half finished. When my plate was empty, I sat back to finish my coffee and waited for Natalie to join us.
Natalie wasn’t working this morning, but I knew she would have things to do before tonight’s dinner. As Emmie Armstrong’s right hand, Natalie worked her ass off. Emmie demanded a hundred and ten percent effort from all her employees and Nat gave her a hundred and fifty, going above and beyond for her boss.
When the beautiful girl walked into the kitchen, she was dressed for the day, but her face was clenched and I knew it was because she was just as reluctant to see certain rockers as I was. Unfortunately for her, she had to deal with those rockers on a regular basis. She didn’t have the luxury of ignoring them because she worked for them—him.
Moving to the fridge, Natalie pulled out a cup of Greek yogurt and a bottle of water. Standing by the sink, she ate her small breakfast in silence. The way her eyes stared into nothingness I knew she was in a world of her own so I let her stay there, sipping at my coffee while Linc finished up his breakfast.
Linc took both our plates to the sink and rinsed them off. Dropping a kiss on top of Natalie’s head before grabbing a bottle of water from the fridge, he gave me a small, tight smile. “Well, I gotta go wake your brother up. His lazy ass has had long enough to
sleep in.”
A glance at the clock on the microwave showed that it was just now after seven. I grinned, because until his accident and Linc had taken over as his PT and then his personal trainer, Liam had slept until two in the afternoon every day. Since Linc had been helping him get into shape, Liam’s whole personality had changed. He wasn’t as moody, wasn’t as scary quiet, and was a lot more outgoing. He also had about thirty pounds of muscle on him, when before he’d been practically skin and bones. It had done nothing but make skank groupies drool over him all the more. Yuck!
“Have fun,” I told Linc.
Linc’s eyes turned mischievous. Linc was into pretty boys, and they didn’t get more pretty boy looking than my brother with the exception of the Stevenson brothers. Liam had a face that, despite all his years of heavy drug use, was still young looking. I knew that Linc would never put the moves on Liam, but I was sure that he was more than happy to scream and yell at my brother every morning when he worked out with him. “I will, but he probably won’t.”
Laughing, I stood to refill my mug and watched as he left the kitchen. At the sound of the front door shutting behind him, I finally turned to Natalie, figuring she’d had enough time stewing over whatever was going through her head. “What are you doing this morning?”
“Shaving my head,” she informed me matter-of-factly before tossing the now empty cup of yogurt in the trashcan.
“What?” I was sure that I had heard her wrong. Natalie had hair that was past her shoulders. It was thick, glossy and freaking perfect in my opinion. It only added to her beauty and I would consider it a travesty to shave all of that glorious hair off.
Natalie shrugged, but didn’t elaborate. Grimacing, I sat back down at the table, figuring that her wanting to shave her head was to spite someone. Devlin Cutter, most likely. “Okay, then I’ll come with you. I need to get a trim.” I hadn’t cut my hair since it had finally grown back after my battle with leukemia, only trimming the ends off every few months to keep it healthy. My hair was past my waist now and I would probably cry if I ever even thought about shaving it all off. I’ve been bald before, I wasn’t ever going there again, let alone on purpose. “What else are you doing today?”
She gulped down half the bottle of water before hugging me from behind. “So many things, that I want to hide in a hole and hope that Emmie never finds me. Want to come with me? I could use the company instead of having to listen to my own thoughts for the rest of the day.”
“Sounds good to me. And then we’ll go shopping for a killer dress to make douchebag idiots regret every stupid decision they’ve ever made.” I didn’t shop often, but when I did it was with a purpose in mind. Today’s purpose? Make Wroth Niall sorry he ever broke my heart.
“Damn straight.” Smacking a kiss to my cheek, Natalie pulled away. “Thanks, Rissa.”
I frowned. “What for?”
“For understanding. It sucks balls, but I’m kind of glad we’re both in the same boat.” She tossed her now empty water bottle in the trash. “I fucking hate guys.”
“Me too, sweetie. Me too.”
Wroth
The club was dead when the cab I’d taken from the hotel pulled up in front of it. Dead in the sense that there was only one bouncer standing in front of a velvet rope with about ten girls and five guys standing behind it. I was early, hoping to catch Marissa before everyone else arrived. Once the place filled up with our friends and the rest of the bands that were touring with us this summer, I knew that I wouldn’t have a chance of speaking to her privately all night.
I’d been trying for months now to get her to just speak to me. She wasn’t having any of it though. Somehow she seemed to always know when I was in the city and made herself scarce. I’d even been desperate enough to camp out on her roommate’s couch in their living room for three solid days in hopes of getting five minutes to talk to her. She hadn’t come home and finally Linc had told me that Marissa wasn’t going to come home until she knew for sure that I was gone.
I hadn’t wanted to be the reason Marissa wasn’t sleeping in her own bed, hated the thought of whose bed she might have been in during that time. So I’d left and then gone back to Tennessee the next day when Liam had come to my hotel room to tell me to leave his sister alone.
“She doesn’t want anything to do with you, Wroth.” Liam had told me as he’d glared at me across the span of my hotel room. The closeness that my cousin and I had had in the past had been annihilated when I’d done something he’d thought was the worst crime on the planet. Broken his sister’s heart. I could have told him that what he and his sister—and everyone else for that matter—thought had happened that crazy night hadn’t been what they thought. I didn’t because I knew that it would only be a waste of breath and I didn’t owe anyone but Marissa an explanation. “Just go back to the farm and when she decides she wants to talk to you, I’ll let you know. Until then, stay the fuck away from her.”
I’d gone home, reluctantly, but only because I believed what Liam had said was the truth. Marissa just wasn’t ready to talk to me. She wasn’t ready to hear my side of what had happened that fucked up night. So I would respect her wishes until she was ready.
But that had been months ago and I was losing my fucking mind without her. I couldn’t sleep, only ate because my housekeeper had threatened to quit when I’d wasted the food she would place in front of me. I’d always hated that fucking old hag, but she’d always been nice to Marissa and so I would continue to keep her around because I held out hope that my girl would one day come back home.
When the fans standing behind the velvet rope saw me, the chicks started screaming and a few of them even dared to raise their shirts and flash me their tits. I glared disinterestedly in their direction for a half second before rolling my eyes and stepping past the bouncer and into the club. There were only a few other people inside. Emmie and Nik with their nanny, Felicity, along with their two kids Mia and Jagger. Lucy, Harris, and Devlin were helping set up some of the food that a caterer was putting out on the bar top. Other than that the place was quiet since there wasn’t any music playing yet.
“Wroth,” Nik called from across the club. He was grinning and holding up a glass of what looked like tea. I grimaced, figuring that was going to be the hardest drink on the menu tonight.
At the sound of my name, Devlin turned from setting another large pan on the bar top. He nodded his head in greeting and I tipped mine back. I’d seen him last night when I’d been checking into the same hotel we were staying in for the next few days. Unlike Dev, who always seemed to want the penthouse suite, I didn’t need anything other than a bed and a bathroom and was staying in one of the hotel’s blandest rooms several floors down.
It wasn’t that I didn’t have the money to afford the penthouse; no, if anything I earned more money than any of the other members of OtherWorld with the exception of Axton who got paid out the ass for the reality show America’s Rocker. The money I made from my farm was enough to let me live an above comfortable life without the need to even touch the money I made from OtherWorld. I just couldn’t stand over-the-top things.
As soon as I reached Nik he handed over a glass of iced tea and I took it with a nod in thanks. “How you been?” I asked.
“Crazy busy, but nothing new about that.” Nik pointed his thumb over his shoulder where his wife was talking to some chick in a waitress’s outfit and a sheet of paper in her hand. “I don’t know how she does what she does without losing her mind. I’ve been helping her for the last few days get everything ready for the tour and I’ve been about to pull my hair out with just the simple tasks she’s given me.”
I nodded. “Emmie is a superhero, man.”
“Momma’s a superhero?” a little voice suddenly demanded and I looked down to find Mia standing just behind me, her big green eyes so much like her mother’s, huge with surprise and awe. “For real, Daddy?”
Nik laughed. “Yeah, I guess she is, baby doll.”
“Awesome. C
an I have some cake now, Daddy?”
That she accepted her father’s word so easily made me smile while my friend told his daughter that she had to eat something a little more filling than cake before she got her dessert. With an exasperated sigh as if her world had to be put on pause for the moment until she could get her cake, Mia walked off to ask her nanny for a plate of ‘real food’.
Seeing Mia reminded me of the little girl that Marissa had been when she’d come to live with me and my parents. She’d only been six, a little older than Mia was now. She’d been so lost after the death of her father, so afraid of someone else leaving her because she only had Liam left. It had taken years for her to fully trust that my parents loved her just as much as they loved me and Liam because she wasn’t related to them by blood.
Just before Marissa had been diagnosed with cancer, my father had died of a heart attack and she had been devastated, but nowhere close to how she’d been when my mother had passed away. Marissa had still been in isolation when my mother had had her heart attack and died only hours later. The look on her face as I’d watched the doctors deliver the news while I’d watched through the window that was my only connection to her at the time had nearly brought me to my knees.
That same look of loss had still been in her eyes every time we would go visit my mother’s grave. And it was there, standing over the flower covered grave of Mary Beth Niall with our shared pain over the loss of such an amazing woman, that I had realized how I really felt for Marissa…
“It’s been three years and I still miss her,” Marissa murmured as she bent to replace the bouquet of dried roses with a fresh one. Yellow roses had been my mother’s favorite flower and Marissa made sure she had fresh ones every month.
I clenched my jaw, nodding my agreement. When my mother had died three years ago I’d been too busy worrying about Marissa and her recovery to really deal with my own sense of loss over my mother’s sudden death. I hadn’t even cried at her funeral because I’d been so worried about the distraught sixteen-year-old waiting for me to get back to stand outside her hospital room. By the time Marissa had been recovering from her illness and then considered in remission, Mom had been gone for nearly six months.