Chapter Six
CHAPTER SIX
“ W hy the fuck are you FaceTiming me?” I asked the second after I answered.
Hendrix was a diehard texter, who only called when it was necessary—so, basically, when he was in the car, or vice versa.
“Damn, you look fine,” he said, ignoring my question altogether, as a wide grin spread across his face.
I’d been in the middle of getting ready for the party when my phone started to vibrate from across the room. He’d caught me in the middle of trying to tie my tie, which was difficult in its own right but more so when I didn’t have a proper mirror to use.
The round teak mirror above the dresser was nice but way too small when you were a towering six foot three. Clearly, Macon hadn’t designed this rental for himself.
“While you’re here,” I grumbled.
I held the strip of fabric out in front of me. He sighed.
“Put the phone on the dresser,” he instructed. “I don’t know why you still can’t fucking do this.”
“I don’t know,” I answered. “Maybe it’s one of those things that if you’re not taught at a young age, you simply can’t do it.”
“Bullshit. Presley can do it, and she learned from a YouTube video in five minutes.”
Presley was one of the Creed sisters, and, yes, if you couldn’t tell, they had all been named after famous musicians.
Their family was… unique .
“I confess,” I deadpanned, “I just like asking you for help.”
“I knew it. We’ve been living together so long that you’ve become dependent on me. What will we do when you finally con some poor woman into marrying you? How is she going to compete with all this?” He motioned to himself in a dramatic fashion.
“Well, since that’s never gonna happen, I guess it doesn’t really matter, does it?” I said, but the moment I did, Elena’s face popped into my mind, and I felt my insides twist.
I hadn’t seen her since I’d walked out of the living room earlier today.
Her questions regarding Macon didn’t anger me.
They made me feel exposed.
Like she’d peeled back the thick layers I’d so carefully constructed around myself that no one else managed to reach.
And…I didn’t know what to make of that.
So, I’d hightailed it out of there and hidden in my room for the rest of the day.
Really mature, Zander.
Now, it was nearly time to go, and I had about a hundred different emotions going through my head. I was on edge at the very idea of showing up at a party in my hometown after all this time.
Who would be there? What would they say?
I still hadn’t thought about what I was going to say to my brother tomorrow. How did I tell him good-bye? I’d been so confident when I got here yesterday, but after seeing his face today, so heavy with emotions, it had made me waver.
And the one that had me in the most knots…I couldn’t stop thinking about the fact that after I hopped on that ferry, I’d never see Elena again.
“Oh, damn.” A familiar feminine voice came on camera. “Is that my long-lost brother from another mother?”
“What the fuck?” Hendrix said, turning to his sister with a mixture of surprise and horror. We had just been talking about her. “Did I somehow summon you here? Where the hell did you come from?”
She just grinned, her freckled face beaming up at me. “Your door was open, and I came to say hi. Siblings do that, asshat.” She turned her attention back to me.
“Hey, Presley.” I grinned as she shoved her legitimate brother over to make room for herself.
She was nearly a foot shorter than him and half his size. But he made a grunting noise as she slammed into him and retaliated by pushing her back. I shook my head at their antics.
“You look hot,” she commented. “And I mean that in a completely platonic, sisterly way.” She held her hand palm up, as if it pained her to even utter the words.
“Noted.”
Hendrix had never had to give me the don’t fuck my sisters talk because I’d never once looked at any of the Creeds as anything but family. I found Presley about as attractive as a baby kitten. Or a potato.
Not that she looked like a potato. Never mind.
“Are you trying to tie that?” she asked, pointing to the train wreck wrapped around my neck.
“He doesn’t remember how,” Hendrix explained. “I was going to refresh his memory.”
She rolled her eyes. “Oh, please, Hen. You barely know how to do it yourself.”
Her brother seemed to scoff at that.
“If you want a woman’s opinion, get rid of it. Unbutton that top button, maybe the next one, too? And it will look much better.”
I didn’t argue. I liked ties about as much as I liked taxes, so anything to get me out of them sounded like a fantastic fucking idea. I pulled the tie over my head and tossed it on the bed behind me, already feeling more like myself. Just as I was done undoing the buttons, a knock came to my door.
“Uh, come in.” I looked at my phone, a tiny bit of panic settling in, and two sets of blue eyes were glued to the screen like I was in some sort of live-action soap opera.
I hadn’t exactly had time to explain to Hendrix where I was or who I was with…
Elena walked in, and I swore I stumbled. Standing seemed like an impossible task, but the room sort of shifted nonetheless.
Holy hell.
This woman could kill a man in that dress.
And what a way to go…
It was red, tight, and made my mouth fucking water. With tiny straps and simple lines, it accentuated her abundant curves. The hem hit just below the knee. Her legs looked endless, and the sky-high heels she wore would no doubt be starring in my dreams tonight.
“Uh, hey,” I managed to say.
Did my voice just crack?
Her gaze lingered on me, moving up and down my body before she noticed the phone perched on the dresser. She did a double take. “Am I interrupting something?”
I turned just in time to see my best friend and his sister wave, both sporting wide grins.
Jesus.
“Um, no. Just checking in back home.”
Her eyes seemed to widen slightly as her gaze darted between me and the two people on my screen, and soon, I realized how she could have misinterpreted what I said.
“That’s my best friend and his sister .”
Not my girlfriend.
“Oh, hi,” she said awkwardly, although she did seem to visibly relax at my clarification. She bit into the bottom of her red lip for just a second before stopping herself. “I just came in to see if you wanted to go to the party together.” She paused, her cheeks turning a gorgeous shade of pink. “I mean, not together, but you know what I mean. Do you want to share a ride—a car?!”
God, she looked flustered and kind of miserable.
It was fucking adorable.
I grinned. “Yeah. I’d like that. Give me a second, and I’ll be right out.”
“Yeah, of course. No problem.”
She made a beeline to the door.
“Bye!” my idiot friends called out, both waving again like idiots.
Gonna kill them both.
So very slowly.
She glanced back and waved back, clearly amused. I waited until she left before I turned around.
“Who the hell was that?”
“Where the hell are you?”
Both questions were thrown at me in unison. Compared to the other Creed siblings, Presley was closest to us in age and at that moment, they’d never looked more alike. Sandy-blond hair, striking blue eyes. Mischievous grin.
I let out a long-suffering sigh.
Would they forgive me if I just hung up and turned off my phone?
“When you sent me that text this morning that said all was well, did you forget to mention something? Or someone?” Hendrix prodded.
“Look, it’s kind of a long story. One that I obviously don’t have time for, but to answer one of your questions, I’m at one of Macon’s rentals.”
“One of?” Hendrix’s brow rose. “I thought your brother was a small-town sheriff. How the hell does he own multiple properties?”
I shrugged, grabbing random shit, like my wallet and keys, and shoving them in my pockets. “Hell if I know. How does a runaway with mediocre talent get to travel with world-famous bands?”
“Dude, nothing about you is mediocre,” Hendrix said, staring at me intently.
Presley and the rest of the Creed family didn’t know about my offer, and it unfortunately had to stay that way for the foreseeable future.
“I second that,” Presley chimed in, looking up from her phone as she typed something out.
If she’s texting the rest of the family about this…
“If that’s true, it’s because of your dad. He made me into what I am today.”
Hendrix shook his head. “Nah, he merely coaxed it out of you. You can’t squeeze blood from a turnip.”
“What?”
“You’ve never heard that saying?” He seemed appalled.
“No.” I laughed as I finished getting ready. I didn’t do dress shoes unless I absolutely had to, so I went with a nice pair of boots.
Presley must have noticed me reaching for the blazer I’d thrown on the bed because she suddenly interrupted the conversation again. “Did you bring your bomber jacket?”
I turned toward the camera. “It’s like the seventh circle of hell out there, Pres.”
She merely lifted her brow.
I sighed. “Yeah, of course, I brought it.”
There were two things I never left home without—my guitar and my leather jacket.
I was a walking cliché, and I knew it.
“No one is gonna wear those stuffy suit jackets when they all get inside anyway, so you might as well look hot for…” She pressed her lips together. “What’s her name again?”
“I don’t think I told you, and it’s not like that.”
“Okay.” She grinned, not believing me for a second. “Wear the jacket, Z.”
“Wait, are you two, like, sharing that rental?” It was like I could see the light bulb flipping on above his head.
“Yep.”
“Dude,” they both said in the exact same way.
Regular siblings were weird. Creed siblings were on a whole other level.
“Wait, what happened to your other accommodations?”
“Fell through,” I lied. “Macon helped me out.”
“That’s like a sign from God,” he said as I slipped the bomber over my shoulders and finally grabbed my phone off the dresser, eager to get this call over with so I could go see Elena in that dress again. “You sharing a roof with that hot piece of?—”
“Hendrix,” I warned him, “don’t.”
His brow shot up. Yeah, that was new.
I’d never shut him up over a girl before.
“Well, at least think about it. Maybe think on it for a while. A day or two. Maybe a week.”
“You know I am leaving tomorrow,” I reminded him.
“Yeah, but what if you didn’t? It’s not like you have anywhere you need to be.”
“Yes, I do,” I argued. “I need to be home, which isn’t here. Not anymore.”
Stop. Staring. At. Her. You. Creep.
I’d managed to get us safely to the restaurant without crashing into a tree or swerving into oncoming traffic, but it wasn’t without difficulty.
That damn dress.
Being on the road for so long had done something to me. I’d grown leaps and bounds in my professional career, but my personal life had taken a hit. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d gone on an actual date or felt any sort of real connection beyond a few fleeting moments with a random stranger.
But the moment Elena had walked into my room in that dress, everything in my body had risen to attention, reminding me what it felt like to truly want another person.
No, not want.
Need.
“This used to be a pizza place when I was a kid,” I commented as we walked up to the restaurant named Portofino.
I grabbed the door, and as she stepped in, my hand slid to her back as I followed her in. I didn’t even realize I’d done it at first, but the moment I felt the heat of her skin burning through the thin fabric of her dress, I pulled away.
My hand fisted at my side like it was angry with me for forcing it away from her.
First my friends, and now, my own body was betraying me?
I let out a slow, measured breath.
If I could just get through tonight, then all this would be over. No more Ocracoke, no more family drama.
No more Elena…
My heart galloped a little at the thought, and I immediately shoved it aside, choosing to take a look around instead. The venue was small and intimate. With brick interior and low lighting, it came off as upscale and romantic. We were mostly on time, so a healthy number of people had already arrived. The restaurant was closed for the event. Macon’s best friend and his husband were the owners, and he’d said tonight was their wedding gift to the couple.
Pretty damn nice gift…
“Do you want to check your coat?” Elena asked, bringing my attention back to her and all those lush curves. There was a tentative note in her voice.
“There’s a coat check? In the summer?”
A tiny grin tugged at the corner of her bright red lips. “I suggested it. I’ve been to tons of events, and no one ever thinks to offer a coat check when it’s warm, and if the venue is small like this, well, let’s just say, everyone benefits when there’s a place for the men to stash those suit jackets.” She held her palm up. “And before you say, ‘Why don’t you just drape it over the back of your seat?’ let me just tell you that no one wants pictures with a room full of jackets.”
She had a point.
I chuckled at the way her face grimaced. “Not even sure why people wear them in the summer in the first place.”
Her gaze slipped down my chest. “Says the man in the leather jacket.”
My hands smoothed over the supple leather. “This is my safety blanket. It knows no seasons.”
She shook her head, clearly enjoying the easy way in which we’d slipped back into this lively banter we had going. “A man with a safety blanket. Now, if that’s not a red flag, I don’t know what is.”
“Yeah, but it’s a manly safety blanket ’cause it makes me look hot. So…” I shrugged, causing her to laugh, but I didn’t miss the way her eyes lingered.
Take your fill, Elena.
“So, will you be able to part with it? Do I need to hold your hand or…” she teased as she showed me the way to the coat check.
A young girl, probably in her mid-teens, was already busy taking tweed blazers and suit jackets in various shades. Elena shot me a triumphant grin.
It was a brilliant idea. No one wanted a room full of sweaty dudes.
It only took a minute to get up to the front, and the poor girl nearly dropped the whole roll of tickets on the floor when she looked up at me. Her eyes widened, and that was when I spotted it—the black bracelet around her wrist.
A Manic Fanatic —their term. Not mine. Basically a diehard fan, usually of the teen variety. Although Asher had told me some wild stories involving some meet and greets and stay-at-home moms.
“Are you…” she stumbled on her words before she could out my stage name to Elena.
I shrugged my coat off and shoved it into her arms, giving her one of my most panty-melting smiles. “Could you make sure to give this one extra attention, darling?” I normally avoided my North Carolina twang like the plague, but right now, I’d do anything to keep this girl quiet.
And that included making a teenage girl blush.
“Yes!” she nearly squeaked. She pulled the coat to her chest, and I tried to ignore the way she breathed in the smell of the leather. She glanced up at us when she realized what she’d just done. Her face went cherry-apple red. “Here’s your ticket!” she said, ripping one off the large roll and handing it to me.
“Thank you.” I gave her a wink, and with a hand on Elena’s back, I got us the hell out of there.
“A fan of yours?” she asked, a mischievous grin on her face.
“Nah,” I said casually, shaking my head. “She probably just confused me for someone else.”
Elena eyed me suspiciously. “She seemed to recognize you pretty quickly.”
Yeah, that was because she had. It wasn’t the first time it had happened. I’d toured with some big bands in the past, but not long enough to be recognized.
Not until Manic.
The first time had been standing in line for coffee in Melrose. The girl was in her mid-twenties and gorgeous. She walked up to me with a hesitant smile. I returned it tenfold, wondering if it was my damn birthday or something.
But then she’d asked, “Are you Zander Tate?”
It was a name I mostly saw on paper—a decision Lance and I had made a long time ago to separate me from my career.
And my career from my past.
Hearing it out loud…
I didn’t know if I’d even answered the girl.
I just remembered leaving the coffee shop, knowing my life would never be the same. It was about to get a hell of a lot worse.
“I’ve toured with a few bands that are pretty notable.” That was the understatement of the century. Manic at Midnight had just won a Grammy for the fourth year in a row despite losing their lead guitarist. “It’s possible she saw me with one of them.”
“How notable?” she probed.
Think, think, think.
“I did a few concerts with Vertigo,” I said casually.
Her eyes widened. “No shit?”
I nodded. Vertigo was an up-and-coming band. Their first single hit the charts and not too long ago, and since then, they’d been gaining notoriety. Clearly, Elena was a fan.
I was, too. They were a good group.
“I love the lead singer’s voice. She reminds me of a young Amy Lee.”
I was once again blown away by her musical prowess. “They actually did a cover of an Evanescence song at the end of one of their shows I did.”
“Seriously?” Her voice was nearly an octave higher. I loved it.
“Yeah, it was pretty epic,” I replied, now kind of regretting it. Had I given her too much information? That concert could be found with a Google search.
“Elena!” someone said behind us.
She turned, and I caught the side of her face light up with recognition.
“Molly!” she exclaimed, pulling the blonde into a tight hug.
I watched the encounter with a mixture of trepidation and curiosity.
How often did Elena come to Ocracoke that she knew its residents so well?
The two women pulled back, and Elena turned. “Not sure if you remember?—”
“Zander.” She said my name like she was seeing a ghost.
I kind of wanted to respond by leaning forward and whispering, Boo , but I didn’t.
“Hey, Molly.”
Before I could barely get the words out of my mouth, the woman reached out and pulled me into a tight hug. I nearly groaned.
No one has any fucking boundaries in this town.
“All right, Mols. I think that’s enough. You’re gonna suffocate the poor guy.”
I’d been so focused on Elena and Molly that I hadn’t even noticed the man hovering nearby. I looked and found another familiar face.
Molly took a step back. My eyes went wide. Apparently, she wasn’t the only one seeing ghosts tonight.
“Jake?”
“Hey, Zander,” he said, swinging a possessive arm around Molly.
“You two…” I didn’t even know what I was going to say, but they both held up their ring fingers.
“Married,” Jake said with a wide grin. “Four years. Two kids.”
Hadn’t these two broken up, like, eons ago? Jake had packed up and left after graduation, which broke Molly’s heart. It was literally all anyone could talk about for months. I remembered it vividly because it happened to be the same time Macon left for boot camp, and no one seemed to give a flying fuck about that. Well, no one but me…
Had I stumbled into some alternate universe?
“I think I need a drink,” I said, making both of them laugh.
“It boggled my mind, too, when I came back, but shit actually does happen when you’re not here,” Jake joked as all four of us made our way to the bar.
I suddenly turned. “Wait, you’re at my brother’s engagement party?” I questioned.
He sighed. “Yeah. Weird, right?”
“Does he know?” I smirked.
Jake and Macon had never gotten along. He never really explained it to me, but it went way back. If something had changed between the two of them, it had to have been major.
“He knows,” he said as we waited for the bartender.
Elena and Molly stood on the other side of Jake, quietly chatting. I tried not to get distracted by the way her ass looked as she leaned over the bar.
“Marin and Molly are really close. Molly’s even in their wedding.”
Well, I guessed that would classify as major.
“So, because they’re friends, you were able to put years of bad blood behind you? Just like that?” I didn’t know who I was asking for—him or me.
“No,” he confessed as I steepled my fingers along the polished wood. “Not just like that. But little by little. It helps to see Marin and Molly so happy when we’re all together. But we’ve talked some, and honestly, we’re just kind of letting things play out.”
“How so?”
“By realizing the past is just that—in the past—and there isn’t shit we can do about it. So, instead, we just have to focus on what we can control, and that’s right now.”
“But how do you forget about the past?”
He looked over at me, keenly aware that I wasn’t talking about him and Macon anymore. I knew I was his brother, but I was not that invested in the future of Jake and Macon’s friendship.
“No one’s asking you to forget. Hell, no one is even asking you to forgive. But at the end of the day, you have to weigh your trauma against whatever motivates you now—love, loyalty, the desire to make amends and see what wins.”
I let his words settle for a moment before I replied, but never got the opportunity. Elena and Molly joined us.
“We took matters into our own hands,” she said, handing me a beer. It was the same brand I’d ordered the night before.
“Beauty, brains, and you know what kind of beer I like? You might just be the perfect woman.”
“You wouldn’t say that if you heard about my last few dates.”
The thought of her on a date with another man conjured up irrational thoughts of jealousy, and I instantly shoved them down. “I think that reflects more on them than you, Louie.”
“You’re really sticking with that ridiculous nickname?” She shook her head. “I’m wearing Chanel today.”
I grinned. “Chanel just doesn’t have the same ring to it, you know?” I leaned forward, my lips brushing her ear. “And, yes, I’m keeping the nickname.”
“God, you really are trouble.”
“Oh, you have no idea.”
We stared at each other, and suddenly, the room felt so damn small. And so fucking hot. Just then, someone rang a bell, pulling us out of our trance. I cleared my throat, and she blinked.
Fucking focus.
I kept reminding myself I was leaving in mere hours, and yet somehow, every time I opened my mouth, I indeed got myself into trouble.
This was a disaster.
Everyone began to take their seats like fucking cattle, and I let out a slow breath. As I looked around, I realized how intimate this party was. Considering Macon was now the sheriff, I had expected the whole damn county to be here. But in actuality, there were less than fifty people in attendance.
That didn’t mean all fifty pairs of eyes weren’t staring at me. They definitely were.
“On a scale of one to ten, how awkward do you feel right now?” Elena asked as she leaned over.
She smelled like jasmine and citrus. I inhaled, and I had to stifle a moan. I wouldn’t be surprised if the mere whiff of an orange gave me a damn hard-on for the rest of my godforsaken life.
“Oh, definitely an eleven. Maybe a twelve,” I answered, nervously running my hands through my hair.
“Want me to go get your jacket?” she teased.
Now that you mention it…
I rolled up my sleeves, feeling stifled by the rigid material. But if I was being honest, it wasn’t the shirt.
It was the people.
I’d felt comfortable with Molly and Jake, but this? All the tentative glances and whispered conversations. I felt like I was on display, and all I wanted to do was bolt. I let out a staggering breath as I felt Elena’s hand come to rest on my thigh. My eyes jerked to hers, but before she could say anything, Macon stood, and everyone quieted.
“Oh, good.” He let out a chuckle. “I was really hoping I wouldn’t have to tap a glass to get your attention.”
“Believe me, so were we,” a bearded man next to him muttered, and everyone laughed. “No one wants to clean that up.”
“I—oh, sorry.” Macon hesitated before reaching down to grab Marin’s hand. She looked up at him with such devotion and affection that it made my chest ache. “ We were going to do this at the end of the meal, but knowing how all you fuckers drink, I suggested we do it now while you’re all still sober?—”
“Speak for yourself, Green!” someone hollered toward the back.
A chorus of laughter followed.
“I knew I should have uninvited you, Millie.” Macon shook his head, a smile tugging at his lips.
Molly’s little sister was here, too?
Before I’d left, Macon had hated all these people. Now, they were at his engagement party.
Part of me wanted to be jealous or angry. While I had been gone, he’d built an entire life here—one we would have killed for while growing up in our lonely little house. But mostly, I was just relieved. I could leave here tomorrow, knowing he was taken care of.
He would be fine without me.
“First of all, we want to thank all of you for coming,” Macon continued. “Even the loud ones.” He gave a pointed stare in Millie’s direction, and this time, I turned and found her.
She’d been hot when we were young, but now? Damn. She was sitting next to a man I was surprised to recognize. I’d read about him after the memorial the town had commissioned after a ferry explosion several years earlier. That ferry explosion had made national news, and I’d never forget how my hands shook while I looked up the victims’ names on my phone.
I’d never been so relieved not to see Macon’s name in my life.
I hadn’t realized the artist had become a permanent resident of the island. Or Millie’s husband.
“I know some of you had to travel to be here tonight, like Marin’s parents and siblings.”
Marin smiled down at an older couple sitting next to her, and then she turned her attention back to Macon and squeezed his hand.
“And my brother, who flew in from Los Angeles to be here tonight.”
Macon’s voice had grown hoarse at the mention of me, his eyes finding me in the crowd. The room grew quiet.
Oh God, why did I come?
How could I do this to him?
I suddenly wanted to flee. But Elena’s hand squeezed my thigh, bringing me back to the present, and I placed my palm down on top, taking a deep breath.
“I know a lot of you had planned on a fall wedding,” he went on.
That was news to me, and my brow lifted. They’d moved up the wedding?
“No one more than my pumpkin-latte-loving bride, but sometimes, life throws little curveballs, and you have to adjust.”
They both looked at each other, grinning.
Marin took over as I noticed my brother’s eyes grow wet with tears. “Our little curveball is due in December?—”
The restaurant went wild. Gasps, shouts of joy. Marin’s mother burst into tears, and among all that, Elena’s hand flipped over, and her fingers wrapped around mine.
Did she know?
I snuck a glance at her, but she seemed just as shell-shocked as me.
“If you’ll do us all a favor,” Macon’s voice boomed, quieting everyone instantly as he smiled ear to ear, “and lift your plates, Marin is dying to know what color to paint the nursery.”
Everyone raced to lift their plates, but I turned to Elena instead, her hand still wrapped around mine like a lifeline. She reached for her plate at the same time as me.
Discreetly taped under the plate, there was a heart.
And that heart was pink.
The news hit me like a bullet train.
I’m going to be an uncle.