by Jamie Shaw
Why did you sneak out?
I rub my stinging eyes, hating that he knows that’s what I did. He doesn’t ask where I am, because I’m sure Joel told him, but he knows I’m avoiding him. Because we’re not going to be friends anymore and it’s all my fucking fault.
“Ro,” Dee says, her voice soft but insistent, “tell him how you feel. I’ve seen the way he is with you, babe. That’s not the way a guy treats a one-night stand. He doesn’t pick her when he has skanks throwing themselves at his feet, and he doesn’t hold her until she falls asleep every night. Adam likes you.”
I ignore her and type back, Sorry about last night. I know you don’t want a girlfriend. I didn’t mean to be one of those girls.
Dee and I fall into a nervous silence, staring at my phone until Adam’s next text rings through.
One of those girls?
I don’t wait for her to coach me this time. Instead, I answer honestly. The ones that want more from you.
When seconds without a response turn into minutes, I know I must have said the wrong thing, and I scramble to take it back. Friends?
But Adam never responds to that text either, and by the time we leave IHOP, I feel like the world ending would be less terrifying than going back to his apartment. I feel like I’m walking face-first into bad news when all I want to do is run from it.
“Well you’re going to get an answer one way or another later tonight,” Dee reminds me.
We’re supposed to go to Mayhem—Adam invited me back when the guys were touring—but after last night? I think I’d rather walk on the sun.
“I’m not feeling so well . . .”
She glares at me before I slip into her passenger seat, and she’s still glaring when she slides into the driver’s seat beside me. “If you hide from him forever, things between you two really will be over. Is that what you want?”
I shake my head no, and she gives me a wicked smile.
“Good, because I know just what you’re going to wear.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
THAT EVENING, AFTER waging World War III in front of Dee’s closet, she and I reached a compromise. I’m dressed in a stretchy black skirt and a slinky silver top, courtesy of Dee, but I’ve paired them with long black leggings, sparkly silver flats, and a chic black jacket.
“Stop being so nervous,” she orders as my foot bounces up and down. I’m sitting on her bed with my legs crossed, chewing on my thumbnail with my jacket tossed to the side because I’m roasting in my own skin.
“I’m not.”
I so am. What’s Adam going to think when he sees me? Is he going to think I’m pretty? Desperate? Classy? Boring? Will he wait until after the show to kick me out or will he do it right away?
“You look fucking hot,” Leti says, pulling me to my feet. So does he—dressed in dark denim jeans and a tailored lavender button-down. “Let’s see a little spin.”
I reluctantly do a carefully footed twirl, and then I plop back down on the bed and laugh when Leti takes Dee’s hand and she does a much more dramatic version. She’s decked out in a blood-red peek-a-boo dress with eyelets in all the right places, and gorgeous black ankle boots that even I wouldn’t mind borrowing.
Dee always dresses to the nines, but she’s never spent so much money on a pair of shoes before. We spent the entire day shopping, and she dropped an entire week’s salary on them. I can tell the outfit is for Joel’s benefit, despite how many times I’ve warned her over the past few hours about what a player he is. I did my best to recount some of the raunchier things that happened on the bus, but I think it only made her want him even more.
“You know Joel is going to be with other girls tonight, right?” I ask, trying to prepare her.
She flicks her hair over her shoulder and ushers us from the room before flicking off her light switch and smirking at me. “We’ll see.”
It isn’t until I see his jaw drop when we approach him at the bar in Mayhem that I realize how talented she is at playing this game. He has two girls clinging to his sides, but as soon as his blue eyes land on Dee, his arms drop from their shoulders. He gravitates toward her like he can’t resist her pull, and then his arms wrap possessively around her.
“Let me show you the bus,” he purrs, and she giggles up at him.
“Maybe later. Where is everyone?”
Joel finally notices me then, and his eyes bug out of his head. “Whoa, Peach!”
God, I don’t look that different. So I have some freaking eye shadow on and Dee worked her magic on my hair . . . and I’m sparkly—super freaking sparkly . . . Not a big deal!
Joel laughs and takes a step back to rake his eyes over me. “Damn.”
I’m cherry-red from the roots of my hair to the tips of my toes when Dee says, “Where is Adam?”
“Yeah,” Leti adds. “Weren’t you guys supposed to be onstage already?”
The tussle Dee and I had by her closet, and then the fuss she made over my hair, made us ridiculously late. I was hoping Adam would be onstage so I wouldn’t have to have the inevitable awkward conversation with him without at least getting a few drinks in me first, but of course, God hates me.
“He wouldn’t go on until Peach got here,” Joel says, pulling out his phone to text someone.
Dee winks at me while he’s occupied, but I feel the sudden need to be near a trash can in case I need to throw up. He wouldn’t go on until I got here? That can’t be good . . .
Joel hasn’t even finished typing the text when Shawn materializes at the other end of the bar, stopping dead in his tracks when he sees me. His eyes get just as wide as Joel’s did, but he recovers much more quickly. “I was worried you weren’t going to show.”
“Why were you worried?” I ask, feeling more worried than anyone.
Shawn just smiles at me, and then he smacks the back of his hand against Joel’s shoulder. “Time for the show.”
Joel smiles widely at me. “You need to go to the bathroom or anything?”
I raise my eyebrow. “No . . .”
“Good.”
He and Shawn lead me to the bar and sit me on a stool, somehow convincing the people on either side of me to get up and leave so that Dee and Leti can take their spots.
“Stay right here, okay?” Joel asks, already backing away from me.
“O . . . kay?”
“Best seats in the house!” Shawn calls as he walks away, and then he and Joel disappear in the crowd.
“What was that about?” Leti asks, still staring at the spot where Shawn and Joel were swallowed up.
I have no idea. All I know is that I need a freaking drink. I spin around on my stool and order an extra strong vodka cranberry, forgoing the straw and taking a big swallow when it arrives. I sip on my drink and talk about anything but Adam until the crowd starts screaming and I know he’s just taken the stage. Dee and Leti immediately spin around for the show, but I’m too busy ignoring the chills racing up my spine.
“Hello MAYHEM!” Adam shouts, and the crowd rewards him with a chorus of deafening screams. “How is everyone tonight?!”
His voice coats my insides like spiced honey, and I finally turn around to face him. My heart hiccups and trips over itself when I take in his shaggy brown hair, his ripped-up jeans, his mountain of bracelets and wristbands. He tugs the disheveled hair from his eyes, his black fingernails combing it back until it falls thick on one side. In a fitted black button-down rolled to his elbows, he looks utterly irresistible, and I squirm in my seat remembering everything he did to me last night.
Adam waits until the guys have finished strapping their guitars around their necks and the crowd has quieted down before he smiles and says, “I’m going to start the show a little differently tonight . . . See, I met this girl.”
All of the blood drains from my face, and I swear I can hear Dee gas
p even over the girls screaming their heads off in the front row.
“Her name’s Rowan, but I call her Peach, and this morning she broke my heart.”
Dee’s grip bites into my arm, but I’m pretty sure my body would require blood flow to actually feel it—which would require my heart to beat which it is definitely not doing. I broke his heart? He’s got to be joking . . .
Adam smiles that smile that kicks my useless heart into overdrive. “I fell asleep with her in my bed last night, but this morning, she was gone.”
I’m pretty sure the girls in the front row are yelling at him to forget me, but Adam ignores them and continues. “Ever since I met this girl, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about her.”
Joel puts his hand to his forehead and swoons down to his knees, cooing into his microphone, and Adam laughs.
“Last night, I wanted to tell her all sorts of things I’ve never wanted to tell anyone, but I was an idiot. I thought she just wanted to be friends.”
“What’d ya want to tell her?” Shawn prompts, leaning into his microphone with his head turned toward Adam.
Adam stammers, “Uh . . . stuff.” He chuckles and continues, “Right now, I want to ask her something.”
Joel strums a random chord on his guitar. “What are you waiting for, man?”
Adam takes a deep, shuddering breath and says, “Peach . . . you know I never make promises, but I’m going to make you one right now. I promise I would never, ever hurt you like your asshole ex-boyfriend did.”
Shawn’s smile is bigger than anyone’s. “That’s not a question, man.”
“I’m getting to it,” Adam scoffs, nervously raking his hand through his hair again. “God, this feels so middle school . . .”
The crowd laughs, and Shawn chides, “That’s not a question either.”
“I’m nervous!” Adam shouts, earning high-pitched declarations of love from at least five girls in front of the stage.
Dee whirls on me with her mouth gaping wide. Her hands are in her hair, and I’m pretty sure I’d be freaking out just as much as her if I wasn’t in total, utter, mind-numbing shock.
“Peach, I want to be with you.”
My breath hitches in my throat.
“We were never friends, and I’m tired of trying to be.”
My heart pounds in my chest.
“I want you to be my girlfriend . . . So I guess my question is, can I be your boyfriend?”
A blanket of shock wraps itself around me, and Joel motions like he’s cracking a whip. Shawn teases, “I think you should say ‘please,’ man.”
Adam flicks him off, but then he scratches his hand adorably through his hair and says, “Please?” I swoon along with every other girl in the building. “Think about it,” he adds, “and tell me after the show.”
“Ya ready?” Shawn asks, and Adam nods. They cue the lights-guy and the lights cut a second before spotlights cast the band in a blue glow. When the band starts performing its first song, Dee grabs my arm and hauls me toward the bathrooms, where we can talk without needing to shout.
She apparently didn’t get the memo, because without warning, she turns and screams, “OH MY FUCKING GOD! ROWAN!” She latches onto my shoulders. “ROWAN! OH MY GOD!”
“Did Adam seriously just ask me out?” I ask, still too shocked to comprehend what just happened.
“IN FRONT OF EVERYONE!”
My knees are suddenly Jell-O, so I kneel down right where we’re standing. “Oh my God.”
With me out of grabbing range, Dee latches onto Leti, and they jump around squealing like lunatics.
“Oh my God,” I say again, and then my eyes start to sting and I don’t know what to do with myself.
When Dee and Leti drop down to my level, waves of confusion wash over their faces. “Why are you crying?” Dee asks me, brushing her thumb across my cheek and then staring at her wet skin like it’s a foreign substance instead of real tears.
“Adam just asked me out.”
“I know! Aren’t you happy?”
I lift my gaze from the floor and tell her, “I’m in love with him, Dee.”
“Uh, DUH!” She starts laughing and pulls me in for a big hug. “I told you, babe! A blind person could see the way you are together. You two are perfect for each other.”
“What if he changes his mind?”
“Didn’t you hear a word he said?” Leti asks me, rubbing a hand over my shoulder. “That boy just told the whole world that he is your man.”
A smile breaks through my cloud of tears when I realize he’s right. Adam isn’t Brady. He made me a promise, and he made it in front of everyone, and he wouldn’t have done either of those things if he didn’t really mean it. Adam Everest never does anything he doesn’t want to—he told me that himself.
“I’m going to be Adam’s girlfriend,” I say, laughing to myself.
Dee squeals and lifts me to my feet, pulling me into a group hug that makes the night feel even more perfect.
I don’t go backstage until after the band does their final “last song.” The guys all shoot smiles at me as they exit the stage, but the person I’m waiting for is last in line. Everyone else gives us our privacy, and Adam walks up to me looking a thousand times more nervous than he did in front of throngs of screaming fans.
“I broke your heart?” I ask, and he gives me a sad smile.
“I thought I pushed you too far. I was worried you wouldn’t come back.”
A chuckle escapes me, and at the look he gives me, I rush to explain, “I thought you wouldn’t want me to come back.”
“Why wouldn’t I want you to come back?”
“Because I wanted to be your girlfriend,” I murmur, the confession making my heart race even though Adam just told me in front of hundreds of people that he wants that too.
He smiles and curls his hands around either side of my waist. “Do you still want that?”
I stare up into the gray-green eyes that stole my breath before I even knew his name. Before he was a real person who comforted a stranger on a stoop, invited a classmate on a road trip, held a friend in his arms, and asked a girl he cares about to be his girlfriend. “Are you sure this is what you want?”
“I’m more sure of what I don’t want,” he says, the sincerity in his eyes pulling at my heart. “And that’s to ever lose you.”
My hands slide over his sleeves until my arms are wrapped around his neck, and then I rise onto my tiptoes, aching to kiss the beautiful mouth that just told me everything I wanted to hear. Adam drops his lips to mine, and the world falls away. That empty spot in my heart where I’ve wanted to keep him fills until it bursts, and then my fingers are threading into the back of his hair and Adam is lifting me off of my feet. I want him to carry me somewhere, anywhere private where I can kiss him for as long as I want to, but then a chorus of high-pitched whistles and cheers sounds behind us, and I laugh against his mouth.
He sets me back on my toes and gives me a smile that warms me from the inside out. “So is that a yes?”
“Oh,” I say, giggling when I realize I never answered him. My fingers twirl in the soft hair at the nape of his neck, and I smile at him with all the love I’ve kept hidden deep in my heart. “Yeah, Adam. Of course it’s a yes.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
WHEN WE EMERGE back onto the main floor of Mayhem, I’m swallowed by the chaos. Everyone wants to know if I’m the infamous Peach and if I’m Adam’s new girlfriend. Each time I confirm that I am, Adam lights up the room with his smile and squeezes me tighter against his side. He poses for pictures with fans but refuses to take his eyes off me while I play the role of photographer; he always smiles at me instead of the camera and makes my butterflies wild.
At the bar, I sit on a stool surrounded by all of my favorite people. Dee is busy arguing with Mike over his l
ack of fashion sense, Joel is egging them on, Leti is laughing at the three of them, Shawn is nursing a drink while he watches the show they’re all putting on, and Adam is pressed behind me with his fingertips brushing discreetly under my top and over my bare sides. I grip my glass with both hands, knowing that he knows exactly what he’s doing to me.
His whisper in my ear sends shivers down my spine. “It’s killing me not to kiss you right now.”
“Why don’t you?” I whisper back, already feeling the phantom of his lips on mine.
“Because I wouldn’t stop at kissing.”
His fingers slide higher until his thumbs are tracing the underwire of my bra and my toes are curling in my sparkly flats. I desperately need to get his hands out of my shirt or I’m seriously going to lose my virginity on the bar or on the floor or right here on this freaking stool.
I gently push his hands down, and he groans against my ear, but I don’t leave him hanging. Feeling reckless, I turn my head toward him and say, “Shots?”
His eyes spark with anticipation. “What kind of shots?”
I flag the bartender and order a round of tequila shots for everyone. When they arrive, I lift a lime wedge off the tray that accompanies them and spin around to face Adam. He spent the entire road trip trying to convince me to do a body shot with him, and now, I’m finally going to. “Open.”
I resist the urge to bite my lip between my teeth when his gorgeous lips part at my command, his eyes filled with a storm that promises to consume us both. I can feel other eyes on me too, but I ignore them and place the lime wedge between his teeth.
Adam closes his lips around my fingertips, the warm wetness on my fingers creating warm wetness between my thighs. I flick my tongue over the hollow of his neck before I lose my nerve, sprinkling salt onto his skin and dipping my tongue slowly, slowly into it. His fingers tighten around my sides when I suck the last of the salt off of his neck, and I quickly swallow the tequila shot. The fiery liquid blazes down my throat and into my belly as I lean forward to bite the lime wedge from his teeth.