CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Hendrix
H e looks like a dream. One marred with shadows but that owns the light somehow. His arms are crossed and a pair of sweats hang loose on his hips.
His eyes say yes, but his body falters, hesitating at my request.
Probably much like mine did earlier when he dropped that bomb on me. The me wanting you and not being able to have you part .
I scoot back against the headboard, tugging the blankets over my lap. Sleep has been hard here. Sure I crash into slumber at some point, but these hills are too quiet, too still.
I’m used to the city—the hum of traffic, the rumble of trash trucks, the occasional scream of someone cussing their ex out on the street below my apartment. That? That’s a lullaby.
“Can’t sleep?” I love his voice like this. A little low, a lot rough from what I can assume were his hours in the studio.
“No. It’s too quiet here.”
A smirk tugs at the corners of his mouth. “I can yell profanities down the hall. Play the drums outside your door. Go on long, rambling delusional tirades to make noise. Would that help any?”
“Tempting,” I tease.
“I know a thing or two about tirades. I promise I could unleash one like you’ve never heard before.” He shrugs and gives me that boyish smile.
I huff out a laugh and pat the bed beside me. “Come sit. Tell me about the song you were working on.”
His jaw ticks. “It’s shit.”
“So you said, but to my untrained ear it was beautiful.” I pat the bed again, not wanting to be alone anymore. “Please?”
Jase moves across the space and stops at the foot of the bed. His eyes hold mine, almost as if he’s questioning my request and his response to it when he was the one responsible for the sexual tension vibrating between us.
He exhales, drags a hand through his hair, and then takes a seat at the foot of the bed, the mattress dipping with his weight. “I can’t seem to get it right.”
I frown. “Get what right?”
“The song, the lyrics and beat,” he says, his expression unreadable.
“Isn’t that part of the writing process?”
“Yeah, but... we have a contest between the four of us—Hawke, Vince, Rocket, and me. Each one of us has to write a song for each album. We’ve been doing it ever since our first debut album years ago.”
“Four best friends competing at the highest stakes. What could go wrong?” I say sarcastically.
“Exactly. And over the years, at least one of theirs have topped the charts. I’m the only one who hasn’t.” He snorts. “This time, I want it.”
“I thought drummers didn’t like the limelight.”
“I said we were underappreciated.” His lips curve. “I didn’t say that we don’t love the limelight.”
I shake my head. “Why are you so hard on yourself?”
His eyes meet mine, something flickering there before he looks away. “It’s not sounding the way I want it to. Something is missing. Besides, saying it was shit isn’t being hard on myself. It’s called being honest.”
“I liked what I heard.”
He chuckles, but it’s not his usual cocky laugh. It’s self-deprecating. “No. What Hawke and Vince write is beautiful. Effortless. And Rocket has this inherent knack for kick-ass bridges. Mine... it sounds like a struggle.”
“Maybe that’s how it’s supposed to sound.” I study him, watching the tension in his jaw. “Maybe that’s who you are. Beauty often comes after struggle.”
His gaze snaps to mine, sharp, like I hit a nerve. Then, just as quickly, he laughs it off. “You have no idea.”
Maybe not. But I know enough.
A yawn sneaks up on him, and before I can process what’s happening, he lies back on the bed, his head right beside where my hand is resting on the comforter.
I stiffen.
And then, slowly, I let myself relax.
My fingers drift to his hair before I can think better of it, threading through the freshly showered strands.
I shouldn’t be doing this. Touching him. Not with the words spoken earlier, the needs they stirred in me, and a flimsy cotton tank top and my tiny shorts as the only barrier.
But when Jase exhales, when the tension in his shoulders falls with the sound, I hate to say it, but my chest constricts even though I don’t want it to.
What is it about this man that’s gotten under my skin so quickly? With Paul it took weeks before I went out with him let alone slept with him. But Jase is proving to be an exception with his boyish smile and need to celebrate firsts. And then there’s the way his body felt against mine as he taught me how to play the drums. My body and mind are at war with each other, but both are shouting what if ?
“That feels like heaven,” he murmurs.
Don’t do it, Hendrix. You’ve just had your heart broken by Paul. You were just betrayed and screwed over. Don’t let that justified weakness open you up to being hurt again.
This is how it started with Paul, did it not? Sweet. Kind. Apologetic after an argument. Compliant when they’re a little too brutal with their words.
I squeeze my eyes shut and try to forget.
“I’m so sick of this shit, Hendrix. You want and I give but what do I get in return? Nothing. Nada. A failing bakery and a girl who fucking sucks in bed.”
Paul’s voice echoes in my head. Words I knew to be untrue at the time but that I allowed to wear me down until I started to believe them. I shove it away.
“You’re thinking too hard over there,” Jase says and reaches out to pat a hand on my leg beside him. But when the pat is done, he doesn’t move his hand.
Operation Live-A-Little.
This is temporary, is it not? My being here with Jase? The man stated he wanted me and here I am debating morals when I need to just say fuck it and do exactly what Jase suggested—live a little.
“Jase?”
He hums, his breath warm against my bare thigh.
“What did you mean when you said you couldn’t? With me?”
He stills.
For a long moment, he doesn’t answer. Then he sighs, rubbing a hand over his face before shifting onto his side and tilting his head up to meet my gaze.
“I promised my brother,” he murmurs. “That we wouldn’t cross the line.” He swallows. “Or rather, that I wouldn’t.”
My chest tightens. “Why?”
His lips press together, like he’s debating telling me the truth. Finally, he exhales. “Because I have a way of ghosting people once I do. You know, the typical guy thing. Chase until you get what you want, get it, then push them away.”
I hum, tracing a slow pattern against his scalp.
I appreciate his honesty. The truth in his words. And maybe the underlying whatever it is that he’s not speaking. I hear his admission—that he’s a player—but that’s not what I see and I want to understand the why behind it.
But that’s for another time. For when I can sit and tell myself I’m trying to justify why I want this man when I swore off wanting men.
Bite the bullet, Hendrix.
“That would make it difficult to carry out our pretend marriage if we weren’t talking.”
He huffs a laugh. “True.”
“I mean, if you want press, I’m sure the icy glares from the newly wedded wife from across the room at one of the functions we’re scheduled to go to would do it.”
“No doubt.”
“But I don’t exactly think that’s what Nathaniel and your agent were going for when they set this up.”
“Definitely not,” he says as his own thumb begins to rub back and forth over my thigh.
I hesitate, then push. “But wouldn’t it make it just as difficult if we avoided each other at home, but had to be all lovey-dovey in public and...”
“Why would we avoid each other at home?” he asks.
I take a deep breath and pray I’m not wrong in how I’m reading him or his comments because if I am, this is going to be morbidly embarrassing. “Because we both felt the same way. Because we both wanted to test these waters. Because the wanting goes both ways.”
Silence.
Jase sits up, shifting into a seated position, studying me across the dim light. His blue eyes darken, something heavy settling between us.
His tongue darts out between his lips as my pulse begins to race. “Ask me what you’re going to ask me, Hendrix.”
My throat is dry. “We already completed our first task in Operation Live-A-Little...”
“Hmm.”
“And it seems I didn’t promise your brother anything.”
His jaw tightens. “Ask me.” His voice is raw, almost desperate.
I’ll let you get used to the idea, Cookie. Pretty sure you’re a look before you leap type of girl whereas I just leap.
I swallow. “What if I don’t need to get used to the idea? What if I feel the same way that you do?”
He freezes.
I swear the air gets thinner, the space between us charged with heat. Need. Not that we’d admit that out loud.
“Why?” His voice is barely a whisper with more gravel than honey this time, and it tugs on parts of me deep down.
Because I want to feel beautiful and wanted and sexy. Because you make me step outside myself and see someone different from what I see and I love how that feels.
“No reason.”
He doesn’t believe me. I can see it in the way his fingers flex against his knee, the way his gaze burns into me. “That wasn’t a lot of time to think about it.”
I force a smirk. “Maybe I’m sick of thinking about things.”
He reaches out and links his fingers with mine. “Then why are you nervous? I can feel you trembling.”
“Because you’re intimidating.”
His brows pull together and he chuckles. “I’m gonna need more words than that, Cookie.”
I exhale slowly. “It means... clearly, you have more experience than me, and... I’m bound to not live up to what... never mind.”
Jase snorts, shaking his head. “My first inclination is to tell you you’re being ridiculous. My second is to ask who the fuck made you think that?”
“Forget I said anything.”
He leans back, studying me like he’s trying to unravel something. His expression darkens, his body going rigid. “Who?”
I force out a laugh, but it sounds brittle. “I—”
“ Fuck You, Paul .” He says the three words like a curse, dragging a hand through his hair. The muscles in his jaw tick, and his body tenses.
I can’t meet his eyes. My fingers in my lap look more interesting than anything else here.
He exhales sharply, and in the deafening silence, shifts to face me. He lifts my chin up with his finger so that I’m forced to meet his eyes. For the first time since I’ve met him, he looks like he’s barely keeping it together.
“Was it?” he asks.
“It’s not relevant.”
His chuckle is low and unforgiving and the warning in it, or the look in his eyes as he holds mine, has chills racing over my skin.
“How about this? I’m going to make it my mission to fuck the remnants and Paul and all his criticisms right out of you. And when I do, then you’ll know just how goddamn relevant it is.”