LOW: A Rockstar Romance (45 page)

"Grip's stronger, too."

"You finally found a doctor who doesn't have his head up his ass?" I accepted the mug gratefully and cupped my hands around it.

Diggs leaned against the counter. "New guy, young, barely out of diapers. Hell, he might be your age." I swatted him and he chuckled. "Doesn't seem right to call him ‘Doctor’ since he's barely old enough to shave, but he listens and he's willing to try new things. Turns out I had nerve damage in my wrist, of all the shit luck." He shook his head ruefully. "Falling off rigging will fuck you up pretty properly, you know, but no one took the time to really figure up
how
properly. He's the one that discovered the nerve damage that caused the tremor in the first place. Everyone else wanted to believe there was something wrong with my head."

"Well, there
is
something wrong with your head," I teased.

"Ooh, good burn. Where'd you learn to roast a guy like that?"

I grinned at him. "From the best."

"Damn straight," he puffed proudly. "Now how's my girl?"

I sipped my coffee and considered. "Really fucking confused, Diggs."

"Yeah? About what."

"Pick a topic."

"Heh, yeah, being young sucks that way."

"How would you know?" I smiled.

"Little shit. I was young once, you know. I remember how it felt."

"Did your dad suddenly decide to get married when you were nineteen?"

Diggs inhaled deeply. "Nah. Never had that to deal with, thankfully."

"What the hell, Diggs?"

He shook his head. "Guess they figured it was time."

"It just seems so… out of the blue."

"Well, you know Annie; that's how she works. Makes a decision one day, and suddenly, that's how things are going to be forever more. My guess is that she woke up one day and told Nails to either get a ring or get the fuck out. And we both know your dad ain't going anywhere."

"No." I shook my head. It was true. For all his faults, my father loved Annie—worshipped her, even. "Guess you're never too old to change the path you're on."

Diggs raised his one good eyebrow. "Listen to you, all philosophical. You're too smart to be hanging around the likes of me."

"Shut up." I smiled, pride pinkening the tips of my ears. "I like hanging around you. You're not an arrogant asshole."

Diggs smirked. "I'm guessing you're talking about someone in particular?"

"I plead the Fifth."

"He got worse when you left, you know," Diggs confided. I looked up sharply. That wasn't what I was expecting to hear. "No, it's true. Jax and your dad got into this huge-ass argument right after you left for New York. None of us heard what he was saying, but we could hear the crashing and we saw the broken furniture afterward. Ever since then, he's been a real little shit to deal with… I mean, more so than normal. Annie was really hoping you coming home would settle him back down again."

I slowly sipped my coffee, hoping like hell that my pounding heart wasn't as loud as it was in my ears. My dad and Jax had fought? About me? He wasn't supposed to know—no one was supposed to know about what had happened, about Jax and I getting together. No one was supposed to know why I left. I had announced that I was eighteen and ready to strike out on my own and that was that, they had accepted it. I had cut ties, cleanly and easily, or so I thought.

"Well it isn't working," I said lightly, or so I hoped. "He came home drunk the other night. Said some stuff…"

"Ah, shit. Sorry about that, Lily. He can be really mean when he's drunk, takes after his mother that way. The two of them drunk together… boy, batten down the fucking hatches."

I flashed back to the broken chair, Jax and his mother staring each other down, each ready to draw blood and my heart did a funny sideways flop. "Must make for interesting dinners around here."

Diggs shrugged. "Nah, we're used to it. Hell, I used to wipe that kid's ass. I watched him grow up in all this craziness. He's a good one, if you look past the surface. Way, way past the surface."

A noise in the doorway made us both look up. "Mornin'," Jax rumbled, rubbing his hair as he walked into the kitchen.

I had no idea how much he had heard. His face was impassive, his eyes bloodshot and still at half-mast. The knuckles on his right hand were still scraped and reddened, and seeing them gave me a small, private shiver.

"Mornin'," Diggs said calmly. "You just get home?"

"Yep."

"Did you take an aspirin?"

"Yep," Jax said, reaching for a coffee mug. His rumpled sweatpants were slung low across his waist and he wasn't wearing a shirt. I tried my best not to look at the rivers of ink that spilled across his broad back, but they were so intricate and detailed that I had to.

A parade of animals marched across his lower back, wolves and tigers and lions ready to snarl and pounce. Winding up from the menagerie was a tangle of thorns twining upward into a profusion of roses, deep red and dangerous as they opened up into blooms across his shoulders. When he turned to the side, I saw they continued onto his biceps, the dark red fading into brilliant blue as the roses morphed into something else.

I was squinting, leaning forward in my stool. If he would just turn, I could make out the rest of the tableau. "Jax?" I said, in spite of myself.

"Yeah?" he turned and faced me and I saw it: the blue lily emblazoned down his shoulder and onto his left pec.

A lily.

"Uh, can you grab the sugar bowl for me?" My mouth was completely dry.

He narrowed his eyes at me. I licked my lips and tried to look innocent, staring past him to the cabinets and clicking my nails against the granite counter.

"Sure." He smiled lightly and brushed his hand over his chest. Right over the lily. And that's when I knew he had seen me staring. He set the bowl down in front of me. "Here you go, Lily."

Chapter Eighteen

Jax

My tattoo artist had raised his pierced eyebrows when I told him what I wanted. "Are you sure, dude? It's not really fitting with the rest of the piece."

"It's a flower. You can make it work," I’d told him grumpily and laid back in his chair. He had sighed and started up the buzz of the needle and I closed my eyes as he tattooed a lily over my heart.

Did I regret getting it? Not really. Most of my tats were impulsive—fleeting notions that got under my skin. Of all of them, at least the lily meant something. I had never really given that meaning much thought until right now as I watched Lily's startled face take it in.

She knew exactly what it meant to me.

But what did it mean to her?

"You going to be around later?" Diggs piped up. "Your mom's got a list of things she needs done."

"Nah," I told him, still staring at Lily. "I got a show tonight, man. Need to rest up."

Lily looked even more startled.

"Ah, shit, man. I'm sorry. Completely slipped my mind."

I sipped my coffee. "No big deal," I told him breezily.

"You want me to stop by?"

"Nah, it's nothing. I'll see you later, Diggsy." I headed out of the kitchen.

"Later, man."

I mounted the stairs, waiting. Half of me wondered if I had fucked things up too badly, worrying that maybe she wouldn't follow me, wouldn't ask any questions. I've always been an asshole, but she had me feeling actually
bad
about it. It's one thing to joke around, it's another to say something to deliberately cut another person down.

But the pad of a bare foot on the living room floor made me smile in spite of myself. Yeah, I was an asshole to her. But she was a curious little kitten and wasn't about to let me get away without explaining my tattoo.

"Hey, Jax?" she called up the stairs.

"Yeah."

"Can I talk to you?"

I turned to look at her. "Why would you want to do that?" I was being honest. I really didn't know.

She stopped and bit her lip. "You're right. I really don't want to," she said frostily.

"But you're going to anyway."

"I just wanted to know something."

"What is it,
Lily
?"

She ducked her head. "So, it is for me?"

"What is?"

Her eyes smoldered. "Are you really going to make me ask the question? You know what I'm talking about."

I tapped my pec. "Puppy love and teenage hormones," I snarled. "That's all it was." I turned and headed for my room.

Her little feet pounded across the hallway floor, and I suddenly found myself yanked away from my door. I was surprised by her strength, but I was more surprised to see that she didn't let go of my wrist as she hissed at me, "You're a piece of fucking work, you know that? This?" She stabbed me in the chest with her bitten fingernail. "This was not on your chest when I was with you. Which means you got it after I left. Why?"

Two spots of color flamed on her cheeks and I could see the pulse on her neck. Everything inside of me wanted to pull her to me, to press my lips to that throb, trace a line of sucking kisses down to her perfect breasts. "Because," I told her truthfully, "at least this Lily is in my life permanently."

Her breath caught just as my lips found hers, so I wasn't sure if it was my words or the kiss that startled her. I snaked my hand under her hair and cupped the back of her head, loving the way she fit in my hand as I drank her in as deeply and fully as she would allow.

She let out a frustrated little sigh that turned into a moan as my hand found her waist and pulled her closer. Her tank top slid up slightly, leaving a warm swath of skin bare at the small of her back. I brushed my fingers lightly along her spine, the way I knew she liked, the way I knew she craved, and she sagged into me more fully, parting her lips and circling my tongue with hers.

A full year's worth of longing for her bubbled up inside of me and suddenly I was a man possessed. With a growl, I swung her around, pressing her back against the wall. Snaking my hands into her hair, I grabbed the length and yanked her head to the side, exposing the curve of her neck. She let out a stifled moan as I kissed that sweet, rapid pulse, and then let my lips travel lower. I pressed against her hard letting her feel what she did to me, had been doing to me, had always done to me since the day I met her so long ago.

"We shouldn't…" I didn't let her get the rest of her words out. To hell with what we should and shouldn't do—I needed to do
this
. I needed to cup her breast in my hand, swiping my thumb over her nipple so that it puckered into a tight bead before I tugged her shirt to the side to take it into my lips. Her protests died away into a sharp moan.

"Make noise for me, Lily," I begged her. I needed to hear those soft sighs again, the ones that made me feel like the center of the world. "Let me know exactly what this feels like." I plunged my hand below the waistband of her jeans. "Ah, shit, I wish you knew what
this
felt like. You're so hot and wet for me, aren't you? Did you miss me as much as I missed you, Lil?"

"Shut up," she whispered, pleading. "Someone will hear you." She moaned as I slipped a finger inside of her.

I looked toward the staircase. There were voices downstairs, low and indistinct. "You don't want to get caught?" I was too lost to stop now. "Then you'll have to be quick, Bit. Come for me," I swirled my thumb over her clit, raking circles to draw gasps from those rosebud lips. "I want to feel you cum around my finger, right here."

She wrapped her arms tightly around my shoulders, pressing against me as hard as she could, her whole body undulating as I slipped another, and then another finger inside of her. "Shit!" she hissed, biting her lip and burying her face into my chest. I felt her tummy tighten, the muscles of her core fluttering like a butterfly. "Oh, God!"

I growled and buried my face in her neck. Her body heaved and those noises I craved hearing tore from her throat, savage little wildcat noises that nearly had me cumming along with her. "Perfect, yes, oh my God, you're perfect." I was babbling like an idiot, but I didn't give a fuck any more. I covered her mouth with mine, relishing the taste of her one last time before I pulled my hand away.

"Jaxson?" My mother's whiskey-soaked voice floated up the stairwell.

I ignored it. "Come to my show tonight," I told Lily. "I want you there in the audience."

Her eyes were shining as she stared at me for a moment. Then, finally, she nodded. I went downstairs to see what the fuck my mom wanted, feeling on top of the fucking world.

Chapter Nineteen

Liliana

There were too many people in this house. Every time a voice called from downstairs, I wanted to shrink into an even tighter ball. The shouts and sounds of scraping made me wonder what the heck they were building, but I was too terrified to go and check. I was afraid what had just happened would be written all over my face.

Jaxson's eyes, nearly black with desire. His fingers, his lips…

Any semblance of pride or self-control I could claim was blown away in a frenzy of lust.

The way my body moved, how it knew exactly what he'd do next, anticipated it like an addict jonesing for the next high.

That lily on his chest had broken me.

His voice in my ear, so confident, so cocky, telling me exactly what to do.

But I didn't need to stay broken. I rolled over in bed and pressed the heels of my hands to my eyes, squeezing them shut as the memory bore down on me like a freight train.

It was his first major television interview. I recorded it on the DVR, intending to watch and then rewatch it again and again. My Jaxson was poised to become a star in his own right.

The interviewer was a tall, crisp blonde with a curve to her lips that made everything she said seem like innuendo. I hated her instantly.

Jaxson sat on his chair like a prince on his throne. I paused the playback for moment to appreciate the simplicity of the white T-shirt and leather jacket combination I had chosen for him. They had pancaked his face in too much makeup, but somehow it didn’t detract from his rugged masculinity.

I hit the play button and leaned back, snuggling down into the couch. He would be home soon and I wanted to watch it all before he got here.

The interviewer's collagen-plumped lips twisted again. "What was it like? Growing up the son of Annie Blue?"

My heart skipped a beat in sympathy. Of all the questions she could open with, she chose that one? The one Jax hated the most?

But he smiled gamely and my heart swelled with pride. "You know, to me, she's just Mom, you know?" He showed the interviewer his dimple and I inwardly cheered at how well he handled the question.

"There's been a lot of buzz around you, even before you headed into the studio. People seem fascinated by Jaxson Blue. Why do you think that is?"

He smirked that cocky grin of his. "Because they think they want my life."

"Is your life that wonderful?"

"It has its moments."

"What are the moments that make it wonderful?"

I leaned forward, already blushing.

He leaned back in his chair. "You know, kicking back with friends, making music. The simple things, really."

Okay. That was vague, but well put.

"You mention friends. Is there anyone you're particularly close with?"

Jaxson ducked his head. "The guys in my band, for sure."

That was a lie. He barely knew them.

"Anyone else?"

The interviewer was fishing. That stupid twist to her lips, I bet she thought she looked sassy or something. I wished I could reach through the TV and slap her, but this interview had been taped this morning and the damage was already done. I paused the TV again and smiled to myself. Here it was. It was about to be common knowledge.

"Close like how?" Jaxson looked penetratingly at the interviewer and she crossed and re-crossed her legs.

"A special someone in your life?" She batted her eyelashes.

When I saw Jax lick his lips, I paused the TV again. That was his tell, it always had been. He was about to lie. What was the lie? I hit play.

The Jax on the screen flicked an invisible piece of dust off his jacket. "Nah," he shook his head. "No one important."

I stabbed the off button in horror.

Was I really that pathetic, that I could forget the public heartbreak, just like that? Was one look at him all it took to strip me of my dignity and leave me a breathless ball of need?

It had been a year since anyone had touched me with the same sort of skill. Jaxson knew my body better that I knew myself, the right mix of rough and tender, the way I just shattered when he was inside of me. The aftershocks of the orgasm he had given me still trailed up my spine, leaving me boneless and breathless, a combination of complete satisfaction and the insatiable desire for more. I wanted him again, there was no denying it. I was never going to stop wanting him, pride and dignity be damned. I wanted what he gave me, that tight ball of heat that collected in my chest before exploding outward in fireworks across my skin. I craved him like chocolate. No, something more dangerous. Heroin?

Yes. I was a Jax-junkie. I had wanted him this whole time I was hating him, and now that I had my taste, I wanted him even more.

And who says I can't have him?

The thought sent me sitting bolt upright in bed. Who said? There was no rule that said I didn't get to enjoy myself while I was here. In ten days, our parents would be married and I would go back home again and it would be like nothing had happened.

I could have him, drink my fill, and then be done with him forever. Get him out of my system. On my terms. Once and for all.

A little fling, for old time's sake. A tiny bit of revenge for thinking he could cast me aside.

The small, rational part of me cried out in protest, that this was a terrible idea, but desire silenced it. I was a grown woman now, older and wiser after heartbreak. I deserved something casual and light with the hot guy who knew what my body needed. Meaningless sex, just like millions of other people enjoyed every day. That's all it needed to be.

It didn't have to mean anything.

It was fine. I wasn't doing anything wrong.

Everything would be fine.