Chapter 17
(Steel)
One of the perks of having a day off, especially when we were booked into the hotel, was having the opportunity to get a workout in and hit the pool.
For me, it was not only the best way to keep my muscles loose and prevent them from aching after a grueling session lifting weights, but being in the water also let me clear my head.
The indoor pool was empty at this time of morning, when the sun was barely high enough for glittering gold rays to streak into the domed space.
Whoever had designed the area needed a gold star, because the glass around the pool offered a beautiful view of the mountains in the distance.
I was just finishing my thirty-third lap when feet appeared directly in front of me, dangling into view over the edge of the pool.
Pulling up short, I blinked several times to clear the water from my eyes, since swiping at my face with a wet hand didn’t help.
The last face I expected to see was Johnny Amaral’s.
Glancing around, I saw Draven dressed in board shorts, spreading a beach towel out on a chair, his guard stationed beside the door, and Johnny’s behind the chairs they’d claimed.
Guess they’d decided on an early morning swim too, not that Johnny looked dressed to get in unless he had swim trunks beneath the cutoff jeans he had on.
“Can I help you with something?” I asked, curious as to why he’d interrupted me when I was never assigned to the members of Blissfully Immune and, aside from Rebel, had very few interactions with any of them.
“Naaa, but I think maybe I can help you,” Johnny said.
“And what, exactly, do I need help with?” I asked, feeling slightly amused now as I closed the distance between us to lean against the side of the pool so I wouldn’t have to keep wasting energy treading water.
“Well,” he began. “Getting your head out of your ass, for one, and not being a dick to my best friend, for another.”
With that comment I went from amused to pissed off in less than a heartbeat. “You’re out of line.”
“No, I’m not,” Johnny declared, a cheeky grin on his face adding to the level of pissed off I already felt.
“Look, I don’t know what Rebel told you, and I’m not sure I care right now,” I snapped. “Since it has nothing to do with me.”
“When you trample on the feelings of someone I love, it has everything to do with me,” Johnny declared.
“He had a hand in it too," I grumbled, unable to deny that his protectiveness struck a chord with me, considering my own tumultuous feelings about his band’s infuriating guitarist.
“He knows,” Johnny replied. “Believe me when I say that he earned one hell of a lecture too, so don’t think I’m picking sides. I’m just trying to make sure you two don’t waste a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”
“And what opportunity would that be?”
“To fall in love with the person, or people, you were meant to belong with.”
“I hate to break it to you, but I don’t think love was what Rebel had in mind when he hooked up with me.”
“So? I doubt it’s what you had in mind either,” Johnny pointed out.
“Only now, you’re both all broody, and with the exception of the times when he’s eyeing Kit, Rebel’s eyeing you like he’s trying to piece together some puzzle he doesn’t understand.
To be fair, he’s kind of an ass when it comes to relationships; we all are, so it’s not surprising he fucked things up and wound up pissing you off in the process.
If you care about him, you’ll forgive him and start spending time with him again.
He was much happier when he was ditching afterparties to go watch hockey with you. ”
“From what I heard in the park, his ditching afterparty days are over.”
When his eyes immediately darkened and that grin smoothed out into a hard, firm line, it completely transformed his face. For a moment, Johnny looked dangerous, which caught me completely off guard.
“Knightly is a whole other issue that spans back over a decade,” Johnny said.
“So, they know each other?” I asked, unsure of how I felt about that.
“Oh yeah. Though I didn’t think they were still on speaking terms.”
“I guess your best friend doesn’t tell everything.”
I’d gone for glib, but when Johnny’s eyes narrowed to a glower, I decided that making light of this situation might not be the best thing for me to do if I truly wanted his help figuring out what to do about the feelings I harbored for Rebel.
But did I?
It only took a few seconds for me to realize that I did and that this might be the only chance I was going to get before Rebel moved on to someone else.
Like Kit.
I spotted them in each other’s company more and more since that night at the campground when our conversation had been interrupted.
On one hand, that might be the very best thing for him.
Kit was a fellow musician, like Rebel; when the music stopped, they got to go off duty, well, maybe not completely, not with all the afterparties and radio station appearances.
There were podcasts and news articles too.
I hadn’t had a clue what all they endured until I’d started paying attention to just how full their schedules were.
It made Rebel’s behavior and his desire for time to just be himself far more understandable.
But was there a place for me in all that?
I’d been glad to see him venture out to explore Estes Park when we’d been camped out there, but I had noticed that when we were lodged in a city, he rarely left his room these days.
It was like he was refusing to go out anywhere he might be photographed being escorted, which was going to happen eventually, regardless of how determined he was to prolong the inevitable.
Maybe I should have done a better job getting to the heart of his resistance to being protected, instead of filling our time laughing, dissecting hockey games, and pinning him to any surface that would support our weight.
Damn, now I had yet another regret.
“Wow, it looks like something's finally resonating with you,” Johnny said, snapping me back to the moment.
“Is this how you like to spend your spare time?” I asked, realizing, almost immediately, that I was deflecting the same way I accused Rebel of doing. “Playing matchmaker.”
“Well, I have to admit that I am extremely proud of the way things turned out for Jagger, Kayden, and Robbie, even if they did issue a hands-off order on my formerly favorite Lucky Charms.”
“I won’t even pretend to know what you’re talking about there.”
“Someday I’ll tell you the story,” he declared. “But only if you fix things between you and Rebel. I was serious when I said that I hadn’t seen him that happy in a very long time.”
“He seems happy enough hanging out with Kit.”
“Ohh, someone’s jealous,” Johnny replied, that cheeky grin firmly back in place.
“Too bad. You brought this on yourself, not that it’s a bad thing, unless you’ve got something against open relationships.
Or poly. It seems to me like it would be the best thing for everyone involved when you really think about it.
Rebel can be kind of needy and attention-seeking, and you do have a job to do that keeps you from giving him all the time and affection he craves, so why not consider the possibilities? ”
“And you think he’d be good with that?”
“Pfft, I know he would,” Johnny admitted. “Especially if that meant that he got everything he craved without having to go out and hunt for it.”
“Wait…he was serious about that?” I asked because I’d taken what he’d said at the bar for a pickup line and a way to divert attention away from him being down at the bar without a guard.
“Listen closely, because I’m only going to say this once,” Johnny declared.
“Rebel isn’t exactly comfortable with people knowing about some of his preferences.
That’s the real issue he has with having someone shadow him.
He’s afraid they’ll see something that he doesn’t want them to and judge him for it or talk about it behind his back.
Having you guys with us, that's something that had to happen. But trusting people doesn’t come easy for him.
If you knew how many times people have taken one look at him, judged him, dismissed him, or tried to use him as a means to an end, maybe you’d have a better understanding of why all of this is so difficult for him.
He’s not trying to be a problem; he's just trying to protect himself.”
“Which is our job now too.”
“Exactly. So, help him let you guys do a better job of it, and for fuck’s sake, if you care about him, make sure he knows it and that you’re willing to work with him to figure out how to be comfortable with letting himself be loved the right way.
He needs that. I think you both do. You haven’t exactly looked so jolly yourself these past few weeks. ”
Sighing, I ran my fingers through my soaked hair, unable to deny the truth in his words.
I’d been snarly, snapped at a few of my fellow guards, and barely kept from confronting Sully about the comment he’d made about how someone like Rebel shouldn’t be so good at slipping his guards the way he’d done before Sully had glued himself to Rebel’s hip.
“I’ll talk to him,” I relented. “But don’t count on it doing any good. He wasn’t very receptive the last time I tried.”
Even as I said it, I recalled the way he’d started to relax near the end of that conversation at the campground and even opened up to me about his sister.
I hadn’t even known he’d had siblings, which just spoke to how caught up we’d been enjoying our time together.
Cutting loose like that didn’t come naturally for me, but it had with him.
That alone was all the confirmation I needed that he’d actually been good for me.
If I could tame the brat in him or at least get him to tone it down enough that he didn’t get me fired, there was a small chance that I could uncover the man I could spend the rest of my life with.
There were pieces of himself he’d shown me glimpses of in quiet, tranquil moments when it felt like we were the only people in the world, that I longed to explore deeper.
“I’m not asking you to promise anything,” Johnny said. “I’m just asking you to try.”
“That I can do.”
“Then I’ll get out of your way and let you finish your swim,” Johnny said, retracting his feet from the pool.
“Thanks,” I replied as I pushed off the wall, thoughts of Rebel and Johnny’s words floating through my mind as I swam.
The man Rebel had shown me he could be had captivated me and lured me into opening my heart.
Going back to being the closed-off, prickish asshole I’d been before spending that time with him wasn’t going to get me what I wanted and needed in my life.
For so long I’d been committed to following orders, doing my duty, and going through each day with a rigidness that bordered on being mechanical.
Letting myself feel for him, as painful as it was right now, had reminded me that I was still a person.
A man with needs and dreams of his own, ones that didn’t involve spending the rest of my life alone, monotonously plodding through my days searching for purpose.
I’d planned to swim fifty laps this morning and had been on lap number thirty-three when Johnny had interrupted me, but four laps into my renewed swim I realized that I wasn’t in the mood to finish that fifty.
When I reached the side of the pool closest to the door, I heaved myself over the edge, snatched my towel off the chair where I’d left it, and nodded to Cooper on my way out the door.
Some of the things Johnny had said, about Rebel not being comfortable with some of the things he enjoyed, reminded me of the shock in his eyes when I’d pinned him to the wall and held him there, kissing him until neither of us could breathe.
I remembered the way he’d wrestled me for control in those early moments of passion, only to melt beneath me when I’d pinned him to the bed and ordered him to let me take care of him.
Now that I really thought about it, each time I’d growled in his ear, each time I’d given him an order, and each time I’d demanded that he stop squirming around trying to rush to get us where he wanted to be, he’d responded with complete compliance.
Fuck.
It hadn’t even registered for me just how well he’d listened.
Now what Johnny said was starting to make a lot more sense.
Had I found myself a sub who’d never truly had the chance to let that part of himself be free?
If so, him going into brat mode when I couldn’t meet his needs made a hell of a lot more sense, as did his not replying to the text I’d sent him.
If I’d focused on him instead of instantly getting annoyed when he’d started whining at me in the hallway, I could have set up a beautiful scene for us later in the night, simply by ordering him to his hotel room and telling him to have a meal delivered, put on a movie, and get in the bed naked to wait for me.
Instead, I’d told him to fuck off, even if I hadn’t used those specific words, and denied us both the opportunity to see just how wild the night could have been, with him hyped up by need and anticipation.
I had the whole night built up in my head.
And I’d been a damned fool and crushed him.