31. Kelsey #2
The way he rasps is a caress to my erogenous zones. I rub my thighs together, the heat building with all three of them caging me in.
“She’s going to destroy us.” He stares down at me with obvious distrust. “That’s why she’s here. It’s why I keep telling you to stay the fuck away from her. Why can’t you idiots listen to me?”
The animosity is not as thick as it has been, but that makes it worse. He really believes I want to destroy the band. Bronx and Golden didn’t do a thing to hurt me. Kodiak either. “Hang on a minute.”
“She’s going to come between us,” he talks over me. “And your dicks are letting her.”
“That’s not true,” I insist.
“Actually, we were just talking about her coming between the two of us,” Kodiak says. “If anything, our dicks are wanting us to come together.”
Bronx snorts very loudly.
Several heads turn our way in confusion, which makes Kodiak chuckle. Luckily, none of them heard what he actually said.
“This is not a conversation to be having with this many people around,” I remind them.
Everywhere we go security checks for bugs, yet stories can still get out.
Gossip certainly does. Something like this would run wild on the socials.
People who hate me would love to debate on how much of a tramp and a band wrecker I am.
“Stop worrying about the band. We’re solid, bro,” Bronx clasps Riot on the shoulder. “Seriously.”
“Tell her she looks gorgeous,” Kodiak says.
Riot looks at me. Really takes in the red hair. “She knows...”
“Knows what?” Kodiak rolls his hands, one over the other.
“Gorgeous. She knows she’s gorgeous, okay?”
Heat crawls up my neck. I busy myself with an imaginary loose thread at my neckline. I don’t want him to see that his words landed when they shouldn’t have.
“Great. Now maybe pull that stick out of your ass.” Kodiak’s mouth turns up smugly.
Riot scowls at him.
“Viens, mon amie.” The stylist grabs my hand and tugs me away from all three guys. He helps me back into my chair and announces, “We still have work to do.”
I take a full breath, the kind that should ease the tension inside me, but does nothing for the needy ache I have. “Can I pretty please eat my lunch first?”
He huffs but nods. “Five minutes.”
The three men share a short, quiet exchange before Kodiak and Bronx leave me alone with the stylist, his entourage, and Riot.
Riot brings the paper bag and drinks over. He unpacks two Seattle dogs loaded with cream cheese, sauteed onions, sriracha, and jalapenos.
My stomach complains like she hasn’t eaten in days. It’s weird. When I wasn’t eating every day, the hunger went away. But staying with the guys... having access to food... I’m ravenous.
In more ways than one.
Picking up the dog, I stuff one end into my mouth.
Riot watches me, his own hotdog hovered halfway to his mouth.
I bite down.
He grimaces and resumes focus on eating. But then his gaze drifts back to me, curious. “You want them, don’t you? Kodiak? Bronx? Golden too? Did you want them when we were together? Well, not Kodiak...”
I take another big bite and chew thoughtfully. It’s different than it was. Bronx and Golden and I used to flirt and play around but we all knew the score. They would never do anything to harm the band, and I was never going to do anything to hurt Riot.
But it turns out Riot hurt me and he blames me for harming the band. My stupid fantasies don’t seem like such a big deal anymore. “I’m not going to sleep with them.”
He tips his head to the side. “No?”
“Not because you’ve ordered them to stay away from me. You don’t have that much say in my life anymore. But because...” My fantasies used to end with him being consumed with wanting me, and then he did want me, but it wasn’t how I thought it would be at all.
My sexual fantasies still end that way because the way he plays my body... no one has ever had the dynamic we have between us. But after this morning that is never going to happen again. “They are my friends and I care about keeping it that way. I’m not trying to destroy the band.”
“That would be a hell of a lot easier to believe if you didn’t almost manage it last time,” he says.
He talks like I set out to burn it all down.
I lost my temper on a woman who was going out of her way to provoke me.
A woman who wanted and took my boyfriend and the father of my unborn baby.
A bitch who could call shots with the record label.
But I can’t find it in me to regret it. “I punched Sonatina. I walked away. That’s hardly grounds to accuse me of trying to destroy a band I put my heart and soul into helping get from your brother’s basement to the national stage. ”
“What about the money?” He puts down his food; his eyes locked on me.
“The money?” What the hell is he on about? Onion and a big dollop of sriracha drip onto the paper I’m using as a plate. “Is that supposed to mean something to me?”
His brow pulls tightly together. He rolls his lip inward. “The money you stole from us?”
The what I what now? Seriously. What is happening right now? “I have no clue what you’re talking about.”
“Just come clean and tell me what you needed the money for.” He leans forward, the cords in his neck standing out. “And maybe we can move on from here. Maybe we can find a way to forgive each other.”
Move on? I can’t move on or forgive him, ever, for what he did. It will always be tied to losing our baby. How can I separate the two when it’s because of who he cheated on me with that my life took the turns that it did.
“I won’t even be mad.” His lips barely move. He wipes his fingers clean, then grimaces at the offensively thin, papery napkin. “Be honest. And tell me why you needed it.”
“I didn’t take your damn money,” I snap, no longer hungry.
I put what’s left of my lunch down and scrunch it up in the paper until it becomes a ball.
“You saw my place, the meagre belongings I have left. You stole those that were the most precious to me. And my vibrator, which you have yet to give back.”
“I bought you a better one.”
“You bought me a quieter one.” And, yes, it might be so much better than my vibrator when it comes to clitoral stimulation, but his motives were selfish. Gah, it doesn’t matter. That’s not the point. He thinks I stole from him. “Do I look like I have your money?”
“Maybe not now.”
“Not ever.”
He huffs out a breath. “That’s the story you want to stick with?”
“It’s the truth.”
“Liar.” He gets up in one smooth motion. Then he smirks in a way that means trouble will follow. “In case you didn’t realize... I have your diary. I’m going to find out why sooner or later.”
The stylist chooses that moment to join us. He shoos Riot away. “Break time is over, mon amie. Hair waits for no man.”
Riot stalks out of the room.
That jerk isn’t going to find out why I took the money, because I didn’t. But there are plenty of secrets inside that book I’d rather he not help himself to.
I have to get it back.