Falling Star (23 page)

Damn.

Marco followed Dean into the back room, carrying two brown bags. Dressed in his bike helmet and deli uniform. Jade shook her head, Dean ordered lunch just so he could get his hands on his boyfriend.

"I'm starving." She dug through the bags and found a turkey sandwich. While Dean and Marco greeted each other with a long sexy kiss.

"Break it up boys. No loving in front of the heartbroken girl."

"I offered to kiss you, you turned me down," Dean teased.

"I've seen you kiss—like a man who is used to kissing men. You'd leave scars. Besides, it would be like kissing my sister."

"You don't have a sister," Marco pointed out in that musical Italian accent.

She popped open a can of soda. "None of my brothers kiss men, so that's as close as I get."

Dean had just unwrapped his sandwich when Cassie squealed from the sales floor. A noisy murmur of voices, Ella's announcement of, "Hey, you can't go back there," and the hallway lit up like lightning flashes.

Jade stood, toppling the folding chair as she did. There was no doubt in her mind what caused the disturbance. Adam was here, and he'd brought the media with him.

"No." She shook her head and backed against the stainless sink. "I can't Dean. I…I can't."

Dean and Marco were halfway to the door when Adam stepped in. Tyrell was behind him, pushing the camera-snapping vultures back into the store.

Jade drank in the vision of him. He was the most beautiful thing she'd ever seen. Even better looking now than the day he'd bought Carley flowers. She saw past his un-tucked wrinkled blue shirt, stubbly chin, and the dark circles under his eyes, and saw the man she'd come to love.

Used to love.

His gaze found hers and held on. "Jade." He took a step toward her, and she arched her back over the sink.

"Dean," she whimpered.

Dean stepped into Adam's path. "Don't do this now, Nash."

Adam didn't break his stare to look at Dean, he held her prisoner of his gaze, and if she didn't know better, she'd think he was as hungry for the sight of her as she was for him.

His hands clenched and flexed. "I have to Dean. I love this woman, and I'm not going to let the goddamned media ruin the best thing that's ever happened to me."

Jade had never seen this emotion behind his eyes. He looked desperate, frantic, maybe even a little angry. He moved around Dean, and was blocked by Marco. Finally he tore his eyes away from her, and faced the men.

"Look, guys…I appreciate what you're doing. I'm glad Jade has someone watching out for her when I'm not around. But I'm back." He ran a hand through his hair, and faced Jade again. "I know she's hurting. Give me the chance to make it better."

"Jade?" Dean hadn't stepped away from Adam, and he didn't take his eyes off him either, but she knew what Dean asked. The murmur of anxious paparazzi floated from the sales floor, and three men squared off. She didn't have much choice. As much as she didn't want to have this conversation, let alone here in Earth Scents during business hours, she didn't want to cause an even juicier scene for the tabloids.

"It's okay Dean. I can listen to him." She covered her heart with one shaky hand, and gripped the edge of the sink with the other. Marco and Dean walked around Adam and toward the door.

"I'm right down that hall."

Jade wasn't sure who Dean's comment was directed toward, but she nodded.

Adam took two steps toward her before she raised a hand to stop him. "Don't." The word came out a strangled cry. She cleared her throat. "Don't come any closer. Just say what you have to say and go."

He winced, but didn't take the final steps to reach her. "I see your pain. I feel it too. I missed you so much over the past week and a half that I just wanted to—"

"No," she barked. "I saw how much you
missed
me Adam."

"Tell me." He inched closer, but stopped again when she flinched. "Tell me what you saw. Tell me where you saw it."

"Why? Is there more than one hot story about Adam Nash going around?" Her voice rose to a frantic pitch, but she couldn't control it any better than she could control her shaky knees.

"There's always more than one," he shouted back. "It's one thing after another out there." He pointed one finger toward the now empty hallway, then brought that hand back to drag it down his face. "I'm sorry, Jade. I'm not mad at you. It's the damned cameras in my face all the time. It's been a hell of a long week, and the last few days without talking to you have been…please, can I just hold you for a minute?"

"Maybe you should have brought Nicole Reece along if you wanted your hands on a woman."

He sighed, opened his mouth, then closed it, brought one hand out toward her, then dropped it. Then he swore. "That's what I thought." He speared her with eyes that suddenly looked more black than blue. "Jade, I did not sleep with Nicole."

She pinched her eyes closed, happy to have heard the words she desperately wanted to hear, but hearing him say
that woman's
name muffled her joy.

"I know some pictures got out, and I know that's what you're upset about." He started pacing, his long legs stiff and tense. "And I don't know exactly what you saw, or what you read, but when you stopped talking to me, I went over everything that was printed about me in the past few days, which just reminded me why I hate to read that garbage." He stopped in front of her, almost close enough to reach out and touch, but she clamped onto the cold steel of the sink's edge to resist the temptation.

"Yes, I saw Nicole Reece while I was in New York. We had dinner together. What the articles conveniently left out was the fact that her father was with us. He's the guy I told you about on the phone later that night." Her eyes snapped to his, and he nodded wearily. "Joshua Reece is a big fan of mine, and it was his birthday. Nicky asked if I'd join them for dinner, and that's what I did."

Jade did recall a phone call one night, when he told her about his old friend's father who joined them for dinner. She was sure he hadn't mentioned that his old friend was a woman, or that her name was Nicole Reece.

"You failed to mention who your
old
," she threw up air quotes, "friend was, or even that she was a woman."

"No I didn't mention that, but not because I was guilty of anything. I've always had an issue with people name-dropping all the time, trying to look important by who they know; I've just turned it into a habit to keep quiet about who I'm with and what I do." One more step, and he was close enough that she had to lift her chin to see him. "That's my fault. I guess I'm just not used to having someone in my life that would give a damn about anything I do. I should have told you who she was, but honestly, that's how I see her, as a friend."

"But the kiss—"

"There wasn't a kiss, Jade. On the way to her car, she thanked me for joining them, and gave me a hug. Nothing more."

Jade's whirling mind tried to pull all the information together to make sense of it.

"Her father was sitting in the car, but of course no one bothered to mention that. The whole thing lasted ten seconds. We got into the car, and they dropped me off at the hotel. I called you when I got into the hotel, remember? That was the night I ordered
Shawshank Redemption
on pay-per-view."

She did remember that phone conversation. She dug her fingers into her temples. The pictures weren't dated, and she didn't even stop to think about his phone call before she read the news.

"But what about the kiss?"

"I didn't kiss her."

"The pictures say otherwise."
And pictures don't lie
, she reminded herself.
Do they
?

"Jade, I didn't kiss her. She's just an old friend—"

"I read about that too." She pushed herself away from the sink. Adam was way too close, and she couldn't think.

He put both hands on her shoulders, halting her retreat, and she was stuck looking into those eyes. "I dated Nicky, yes. But it was years ago, and it was one of those things that fizzled out before it even started. We just sort of laughed at ourselves for trying to make something more of our friendship than there was, and went back to being friends. That's it. His hands on her made her want to collapse in his arms. She resisted, but only barely. He tilted her chin up until she was again captured by his blue eyes.

"The only time our conversation turned away from my music and her father was when she asked about you."

She licked her lips. She wanted to believe him. "She asked about me?"

"
Everyone
asked about you. Every time I got cranky, Henry threatened to fly you in for a booty call to get my head on straight. When I showed up late one morning for a breakfast meeting, they blamed my late-night phone calls, and Ty gave me a hard time when I dragged him into Tiffany's to look at rings."

"Oh." She blushed.

"Yeah. This isn't a game for me." His eyes danced over her face. "I walked around Manhattan with a goofy grin on my face because I couldn't get you off my mind. It's obvious to everyone how much I love you. Nicky even said she was sorry she asked about you, because I wouldn't shut up after that. I have never been this happy in my life. You're not just another woman in my bed. You're the woman in my heart—the one I love. The kind of love I've written about for years, but looking back those songs are so sterile compared to what this really feels like." He laughed. "Yeah, I sound like a sap, but I want you to know everything I feel so you never doubt again. Fame, fortune, notoriety, women, alcohol…even my dream of making music for a living didn't make me happy.
You, Jade
. You make me happy, for the first time in my adult life, and I can stop looking for pleasure in strings of women, or gallons of alcohol." He furrowed his brow. "God, Jade…I know I'm not good enough for you yet, but I'm trying."

Jade clamped both lips between her teeth. She had a stronghold on his shirt, now damp handfuls of silk the color of his eyes. She
so
wanted to believe everything he said. Her heart recognized him, her body missed his, and the warning bells in her brain grew progressively quieter.

"Now listen to me." He cupped her face in his hands and forced her to see the honesty in his. "I wanted you to stay away from those types of articles, and this is the reason why. I hope someday you can trust me more than you trust them."

Now she felt foolish. He
had
warned her. "But the pictures…and it's hard when they won't leave me alone."

"I know. I just want you to have enough confidence in me to hear me out. I love you, Jade. I don't want to ever lose you because of some damned reporter or photographer. If I have to take you everywhere with me, then so be it. It's a sacrifice I'd be more than willing to make," he teased.

She tried to smile, but her face was still too stiff. "I don't want to be that girl. I should be able to trust you. No matter what I see or hear."

"Then tell me you believe me." His voice dropped to that after-sex tone.

His explanations did make sense. She did want to believe him. He'd never lied to her before, and to top it all off, he was the man she loved. She looked up into his eyes and saw the truth there. She saw the worry, the desperation, and even the love.

How could she put the credibility of the tabloids over his word? She suddenly felt ridiculously childish for every action over the past three days.

She nodded, a frantic movement. "I do. I believe you Adam. Oh God, I'm so—"

"Huh uh." He stopped her with one long finger against her lips. "You believe me, that's all I need. You don't apologize for this one. Show me the kiss online, and I'll find the bastard who's sorry.

Without permission or apology, he wrapped her in his arms. "I love you Jade. Always…forever…only you. Tell me you know that. If you don't, then I've failed."

She couldn't hold back her tears. She cried because he was home. She cried because in his arms she felt like she was home, and she cried because her broken heart finally began to beat again.

She couldn't get close enough to him. She wanted to crawl underneath his skin and curl up inside him where it was safe and warm. His familiar scent filled her nostrils, and she breathed it in, reveling in the spiciness that was so alive. So
Adam.
She sniffed, and wiped her eyes with the back of her hand.

"I missed you." She traced the outline of one sinewy muscle by his shoulder. The sounds from the sales floor grew quieter. Either Tyrell had kicked them all out, or Dean enforced his "buy or fly" rule. It didn't matter; they were gone, and Adam was here.

"I missed you too. I don't want to let go of you." He bent his head and kissed her. Jade melted against him, thankful for his strength. He sipped at her lips, he licked them, and then he drew her tongue into a homecoming celebration.

"Do you think Dean would let me take you home? We really need to pack."

"Pack?" She opened sleepy eyes to blink him into focus.

"Among other things." He winked. "Don't tell me you forgot about our Vegas trip."

She had forgotten. "I just was sure that you…I mean."

"I know. Come on, I'll ask The Warden. Maybe you could take a nap with me, I haven't slept in days, maybe with your legs tangled in mine I can remember how. But before we go I need to hear one more thing."