Devlin leaned forward and kissed me, deeper than he had in over an hour. The taste of beer didn’t completely mask his own unique taste and I opened my mouth, silently begging him to take more. When he did, I knew it was past time we left. My panties were drenched and I was throbbing between my legs for his attention.
Without warning, Devlin stumbled against me. His hands caught me around the waist, righting us both before I hit the bar. His eyes asked me if I was okay and I nodded before he turned with a snarl to the man who had just pushed him.
“What the fuck, asshole?” Devlin demanded as he faced Zander. “You nearly made me fall on my girl.”
I bit back a groan at the sight of Zander standing there. His glassy eyes told me he was drunk, without having to see the further proof of it in the way he was walking. He’d been drinking a lot more often over the last few weeks, even more so when Devlin and I started seeing each other. I knew it was because of me and I hated it. I’d never led him on, had always made it obvious that all we would ever be was friends. That didn’t seem to matter to Zander, because he’d been nothing but an angry bear to me and everyone else.
“Sorry, bro. I didn’t see you standing there,” Zander said with a sneer before turning his attention back to the bartender and ordering a shot and a beer.
Devlin clenched his fists at his sides and I could tell he was about to punch his friend. Emmie had threatened to join the tour if they got into another fight, and I honestly didn’t want to see more bloodshed between the two men. Stepping between Devlin and Zander, I put my hands on Devlin’s chest. “I’m ready to go, babe.”
Aquamarine eyes lost some of their hostility when they landed on my face and I breathed a sigh of relief. “Let me pay the tab, baby, and we’ll go.”
“Don’t let me rush you off.” Zander tossed his shot of whisky back and slammed the small glass on the bar top. Picking up his beer, he turned toward us. Devlin was talking to the bartender who had started his tab. I tried to ignore Zander, not wanting to make Dev any more upset than he already was. The two had once been best friends but now, because of me, they could barely stand each other. I hated that I was the cause of the rift between them.
Zander’s cold hand wrapped around my elbow and swung me around to face him. The smell of alcohol on his breath made me blink a few times it was so strong. “Stay and dance with me, Nat.”
I gave him a grim smile, not wanting to hurt his feelings. Until recently, I’d thought we were good friends. Now I wasn’t so sure. “I’m tired, Z. I just want to go back to the hotel and go to bed.”
“No, you want to go back to the hotel and fuck Dev.” His words made me gasp in pain because they had been like a slap in the face. I didn’t deserve for him to talk to me like that. “It’s alright. I just don’t get it, though. Dev’s won the bet, so I figured once he had been in your pants he would move on. Must be some good pussy.”
If his first words had been a slap, the rest were a punch to the gut. I felt tears burn my eyes even as confusion clouded my brain. “What do you mean, bet?” I demanded louder than I’d intended.
Behind me, I felt Devlin wrap an arm around me as he turned back from paying our bill. At my question, however, I felt him stiffen. Zander gave me a drunken grin and tipped his beer bottle to his lips, making me wait for a response even as I felt Devlin shifting behind me.
“The bet I made with Dev two months ago, babe; the one that he put his prized John Bonham drumsticks up for grabs against my signed Geddy Lee bass.” Another drink of beer, this one longer as his words burned like acid across my skin.
My fingers were trembling as I grabbed the beer bottle from him and threw it on the ground where it shattered and spilled the rest of the contents across my sandal-clad feet. “What was the bet, Z?” I demanded through gritted teeth.
Another shrug, as if he didn’t know or just didn’t care that his next words were going to shatter my heart. As if his words weren’t going to destroy me to the point of no return. “First one to bag you was the winner. Lucky for Dev, he now has my bass.”
Devlin moved so fast I didn’t see the fist as he swung out and punched Zander. Zander stumbled back, knocking three people down in the process. I just stood there, watching with deadened eyes as Devlin jumped his best friend. I didn’t move out of the way as Zander somehow rolled and started punching Dev in the head. The glass from the broken beer bottle didn’t faze them as they rolled around, fighting.
The fight went on and on. People moved quickly to get out of their way. A table was destroyed, along with two chairs and numerous bottles and glasses. I remember watching a live MMA fight with Linc once, and that was what the two men before me seemed to be doing right then. They twisted at odd angles to get their punches in, didn’t seem to care if they fought dirty or not when Zander double-punched Devlin in the stomach and then kneed him in the balls.
Wasn’t that a big taboo with men? Never go for another man’s package?
Devlin groaned in pain but didn’t pause in his attempt to annihilate his friend. He gained the upper hand in a move that I wasn’t sure possible for such a tall man and started hitting Zander in the ribs.
Two bouncers broke through the crowd and tried to pull Devlin off Zander. He shrugged them off like they were just bees that annoyed him. Two more stepped forward to help and finally they were able to break the two rockers apart. Both were bleeding, throwing curses at each other in a verbal battle now that they couldn’t continue with their fists.
Still I remained where I was, not even sure if I was breathing because the pain that was ripping through me was so consuming.
It was all a lie. My relationship with Devlin Cutter was nothing more than the product of Devlin wanting to win some bet against his friend. All our nights spent in each other’s arms, all his whispered words of how much he cared about me, worshipped me… They were all lies. I was nothing more than a bet. Nothing. I was nothing to him.
Natalie
April
I loved my job. How many people my age got to do what I did, meet the people I did, without a college degree or any experience? Emmie had showed nepotism by hiring me to be her East Coast assistant when I was eighteen, doing it as a favor for my brothers, but I’ve never given her a reason to regret her decision to give me a chance.
But tonight? I hated my job tonight. Honestly, I would rather have been in a dentist’s chair with no Novocain while he filled every tooth in my mouth. Emmie had known that was the case when she told me I had to come tonight, and she hadn’t batted an eye as she told me over FaceTime that it wasn’t negotiable. I had to go to the freaking charity ball thing to represent her since she was unable to make it to the East Coast. Jagger had a fever and she wasn’t going to leave her son when he wasn’t feeling well.
I understood that, but why did it have to be me? Why couldn’t my brother and his wife have gone? Drake and Lana were in New York for a few weeks to promote the new season of America’s Rocker that would start in the fall. I got that Lana was having a rough time with morning sickness, but it was eight thirty at night; shouldn’t that shit be over with by now? But what did I know? I’d never been pregnant, and it wasn’t likely to ever happen since to get that way you had to have sex.
Sex was not on my to-do list that was always attached to my clipboard. If it wasn’t on my to-do list, then it wasn’t happening.
Muttering a curse, because I was pretty sure I needed to add sex to that freaking list so that I could work off some of my stress and maybe even move on after my messy breakup with douchebag Devlin Cutter, I stepped out of the town car that had picked me up from my apartment twenty minutes before. Knowing the driver would find a place to park and wait on me, I took a step toward the hotel, determined to get through tonight without stabbing someone.
It wasn’t that I didn’t like to represent Emmie at the many charity events that she always had her fingers in; if anything, I was honored to be able to contribute to such worthy causes. Like a battered women’s shelter that
Emmie had donated more than a million dollars to last year, or the new children’s wing of a local hospital that Emmie and the Demons had all made possible right before Christmas two years ago. Tonight’s charity ball was to raise money for a foster home that was specifically for children who had been badly abused. The money raised would go toward plastic surgeries that some of the kids needed because of the disfigurement their parents or someone else had caused during beatings, as well as a few other things that the children needed. I was glad to help out in any way I could for this charity.
What I was pissed about was finding out that Axton and Dallas, who also contributed to this particular charity, hadn’t been able to attend and had asked someone else to go in their place. I was going to have to sit beside him, all night, and smile for the cameras that would no doubt be flashing as millionaires handed over excessive amounts of money. All night.
All. Fucking. Night.
Inside the hotel, I found my way to the ballroom, which was already overflowing with men in tuxes and women in crazy-expensive designer dresses with diamonds dripping off them. As I entered the room, cameras flashed and I forced a smile as I nodded my head at the hostess. The woman came over and I handed over the envelope that Emmie had overnighted to me. Inside was a check for an amount of money I was never likely to see in my lifetime. Emmie was very generous to this charity in particular because of her own childhood, and hadn’t even batted an eye when she had told me how much the check was for.
“Thanks for bringing this, Miss Stevenson,” the hostess who had made this ball possible murmured after the cameraman had turned away to take a few shots of the couple that had come in behind me. “Mrs. Armstrong is very kind to help us like this.”
“It was my pleasure. If there is anything else that Emmie or I can do, please feel free to let us know.” My smile wasn’t forced this time and I returned her air kiss as we embraced. I moved on into the ballroom so the next person could have their five seconds of fame for donating to such a worthy cause by having their pictures taken and hoping it ended up on the society page tomorrow.
Yeah, I will admit that I hated pretentious people who used their ‘generosity’ just so people would think they were good people. Especially when I was sure that once those good people got home, they drank like a fish and beat their wives, ignored their children, and carried on affairs with their secretaries. Not all of them did that, I know. But a lot of them were exactly like that.
After a few steps I was swallowed up in the crowd. I worked my way through the worst of it and found a quiet corner where I could keep my eye on the people coming and going. I accepted a glass of champagne and tried to spot the man who was supposedly my companion for the evening. Or so Emmie had informed me two hours ago.
I was on my second glass of champagne and my third refusal to dance when it hit me: that subtle scent of Acqua Di Gio. In a room where expensive perfume was polluting the air, that fresh, clean, manly scent was able to reach me and teased my senses. My heart clenched painfully before my heart rate sped up, my hands growing damp, and my anger rising as I glanced around for the possible source of that particular scent.
Acqua Di Gio was my kryptonite.
Just like the man who wore it.
“Hello, Natalie.”
The sound of that voice was like a caress. It skimmed over every nerve in my body, awakening it with a passion that had consumed me just as badly as my love for him once had. I closed my eyes and let the anger I still felt ten months later fill me. Anger was better than the love, the pain. It was so much better than having to prick myself on the sharp shards of broken heart that still lay in my chest because I hadn’t been able to put it back together after he had shattered it.
I felt him step closer to me and forced my eyes open. Downing the rest of my second glass of champagne, I resolved not to break the delicate glass over his head and stab him in the eye with the stem. Zander had beaten his ass pretty bad that night, leaving him with a concussion, so I wasn’t going to get violent with him. Of course, Devlin had beat Zander’s just as bad. Z had walked away with fractured ribs and a broken nose.
Was it bad that I had felt slightly vindicated every time I’d seen them wince or groan in pain for the weeks following that enlightening night?
Turning, I faced Devlin, refusing to let a gasp escape me when I saw how devastatingly sexy he was in his tux with his hair falling over his shoulder and those damn hypnotic aquamarine eyes gazing hungrily down at me. No one should ever be allowed to look that good. I wasn’t a petite woman, but I wasn’t tall either. Devlin Cutter was one of the tallest men I’d ever met, second only to Wroth Niall. When I looked up at him, I had to crane my head back a little so that I could take all of him in. In another lifetime, I had loved looking up at him, loved seeing that look in those eyes I had adored. Had loved how his long, nearly black hair would fall over one shoulder and shield us while he kissed me breathless.
Tonight, Devlin didn’t look like the badass rocker that he was. His ink was covered up with an expensive custom made tux, and his hair, while unconventionally long, only added to his charm. His honey-tan complexion was the product of a Spanish grandfather, but his eyes… Those damn eyes… They were the only gift his mother had ever given him.
I had to grit my teeth when I met his gaze. His eyes always told a story of their own. Of how much he still wanted me, how sorry he was, how much he missed me. I didn’t need to hear the words to know that Devlin was sorry. The only problem was I didn’t know what he was sorry for. For breaking my heart? For shattering me into a million and one pieces? For having his game exposed? I didn’t want to know the answer—was scared of the answer, actually. What if he was just sorry he’d gotten caught? My already broken heart would be annihilated and I would be left with nothing. Not even the broken pieces would remain.
It was safer not knowing.
“Hello, Devlin,” I greeted him coolly. “It was nice of you to come for Axton and Dallas.”
“I didn’t come for them. I wanted to see you.” He lifted his right hand and wrapped a lock of my long hair around his finger, his thumb rubbing over the silkiness. Some men had a weakness for boobs or asses, even feet. Devlin’s weakness? Beautiful hair. Sometimes I wondered if my hair was all he had ever seen, desired, and not me. It made perfect sense. It would have been why it had been so easy for him to make that fucking bet with Zander. “I miss you, Natalie.”
I jerked away, forcing him to drop my hair or hurt me. I had to turn away or I would have opened my mouth and told him that I missed him too. I missed him every day. Every damn day. I shouldn’t, but I did. I would wake up each morning with this ache in my chest because my bed was empty. I would go to bed at night with that ache multiplied by a million because he still wasn’t there next to me and silently cried myself to sleep.
It had been almost a year and I was still crying myself to fucking sleep.
Douchebag.
Devlin
The sound of a violin and piano playing drifted through the room but I didn’t hear it. Over three hundred people were in the huge ballroom, but I only saw one of them. Cameras flashed, people stopped to stare as I passed. I was oblivious to it all.
All I heard was the harsh pounding of my heart in my ears. All I saw was the gorgeous woman standing in the corner fifty feet away, sipping at a glass of champagne and watching the crowd with almost a bored expression on her elfin face.
Damn, she was beautiful. Large, blue-gray eyes in a face that could start wars—and had if you considered the war that I still had going on with my ex-best friend. A small, upturned nose over lips that just hinted at plumpness, but would swell to the lusciousness of Angelina Jolie’s after I’d kissed them. The silver evening gown she wore brought out the gray in her eyes and molded to every curve of her lean, albeit curvy, body. Tonight Natalie had on makeup, making her eyes pop and her lips look ripe. Her long, glossy dark-brown hair with its natural sun-kissed blonde streaks giving her peaches and cream complexion a natural gl
ow was loose and hanging just past her shoulder blades.
Fuck, I loved that hair of hers. Call me a freak all you want, but hair was my biggest turn on. I loved it long, healthy and shiny. Natalie’s was all that and then some. But it wasn’t just her hair that had attracted me in the first place. It had been the graceful way she had walked in and taken charge the first time I’d met her. She was quiet, but under that quietness was a fiery woman waiting on simmer for someone to make her boil over.
I’d gotten to make her boil over for two months before my stupid ass had let her slip through my fingers. And for nearly a year I’d been trying to fix what I’d broken, to get back the girl who owned me body and soul. The thing about Natalie Stevenson, though, was that she was a lot like her brothers. Stubborn was just one of the things that topped the list of how she was so identical to them in personality. Very, very stubborn. She wasn’t ready to forgive me.
But I was stubborn too, and I wasn’t going to give up. Not when she meant so much to me. There had never been another person to touch my heart the way that Natalie did. No one had even come close and no one else ever would. I’d tried to fight it in the beginning, to not fall for her, but it had been a losing battle from day one.
As I neared her, I saw the way her nose flared and I tried to hide my grin. How many times had I sprayed a little Acqua Di Gio on before going to bed just to make her snuggle a little closer and bury her face in my chest? Not nearly enough, that was for sure. I’d never been one for cologne, but Natalie had given me a bottle for Valentine’s Day last year and I’d been wearing it ever since. Tonight I’d sprayed a little extra on, knowing that she wouldn’t be able to resist it.
I needed all the help I could get just to get close to her these days.
“Hello, Natalie,” I greeted, lowering my voice. I was rewarded with the sight of gooseflesh popping up along her arms. She loved my voice. Yeah, I was fighting dirty tonight. But all was fair in love and war and all that bullshit.