Westside Series Box Set

by Monica Alexander

  * * *

  As I came in through the back entrance of our hotel, I was distracted by a video Kelsey had just sent me of Gavin. He’d all but mastered the trick I’d shown him, and it seemed he’d kept practicing after I’d left an hour earlier. Kelsey had said he’d wanted to show me how awesome he could board. It was kind of a proud moment for me.

  But since I was distracted, I didn’t see Sabrina walking toward me until I saw her shoes. They were leopard print ankle boots with a heel I quickly started imagining digging into my lower back as her long legs wrapped around me. A week without her had made me want her more than was probably healthy, but she was just so damn sexy that I couldn’t help it.

  “Oh!” she said, coming up short right before we ran into each other. “Hi.”

  “Hi,” I said to her, shoving my phone in my pocket as I tried to wipe my mind clean of the array of impure thoughts I was having. “How are you?”

  “I’m, uh, I’m good,” she said, sounding nervous, which was completely out of character for her.

  “Good. That’s good,” I said as I tried to ignore the sexy strip of her stomach that was showing between her black top and her short flippy black skirt. “I haven’t really seen you for the past few days. Everything alright?”

  I forced myself to focus on her face, but her glossy lips served to be more of a distraction.

  “Oh, sure. I’m fine,” she said quickly, but I could see in her eyes that she was lying. “Everything’s great.”

  I could have called her on it, but something stopped me. I didn’t know what I’d done or why she’d pulled away, and I was almost afraid to find out. Asking too many questions could lead to too many answers I didn’t want to hear, especially when I wanted her as bad as I did.

  “Are you going somewhere?” I asked her instead.

  She forced a smile. “I was just going to go for a walk. I wanted to clear my head before the party tonight.”

  “No,” I told her, as soon as she got the words out. “No way.”

  Sabrina looked at me in question. “Excuse me?”

  “It’s not safe, Sabrina.”

  “It’s the beach,” she countered. “And this is a really nice hotel.”

  I sighed. “You don’t know Miami. It’s fine one block, and the next one over is bad. You can’t trust that nothing will happen, and there are too many people out there who’d love to take advantage of a girl like you.”

  “A girl like me?” she questioned in offense, taking what I’d said completely the wrong way.

  I let my gaze slip back down her body, drinking in every inch along the way. She had a black leather biker jacket on over her top, and even though it covered more skin, it only added to her sex appeal. She was so sweet and sexy all at the same time. That was what did me in with her. I loved the good girl with a twist way that she carried herself. It was so hot.

  I took a step closer to her. “Yes, a girl like you. A beautiful, sweet, kind, smart, sexy, beautiful girl.”

  I watched her cheeks flush as she said, “You mentioned beautiful twice.”

  I felt my mouth twist into a smirk. “Yeah, well, I really meant it. You’re beautiful, and I’d be lying if I said I didn’t miss seeing that beauty up close and personal over the past week.”

  She took a step closer and looked up at me. “I missed you too.”

  “What did I do wrong?” I asked her. “What happened?”

  She shook her head. “You didn’t do anything, Phillip. It was me. I was embarrassed about how I acted.”

  “Sabrina,” I said as I set my hands on her hips, my thumbs grazing her bare stomach. “There’s no reason for you to be embarrassed. You’ve seen me lose it before.”

  Hell, I’d lost it a few times in front of her.

  “I know,” she said, shifting her gaze to the ground.

  I lifted her chin with my finger, forcing her to look at me. “Don’t look away.”

  “Phillip,” she said softly as I felt her lean toward me. It was like it always was when we were near each other. We couldn’t stay apart if we tried.

  My name on her lips was like a whisper, all breathy and sexy, and I wanted her so badly in that moment that I almost couldn’t stand it.

  I stepped closer to her so our bodies were almost flush and eased her back against a nearby wall. My hands braced the wall on either side of her head as she looked up at me with eyes that held so many things I didn’t want to think about. I wanted her, but I didn’t want the emotions and the feelings that she was eliciting when my gaze locked with hers. I wanted this to be clean, no muss, no fuss, with no emotional baggage that I’d have to deal with later. I sucked at emotions, but I couldn’t walk away from Sabrina no matter how many emotions I felt seeping in around the edges of what we were doing. I couldn’t think about that. Not tonight.

  “Don’t go for a walk,” I told her. “Come upstairs with me.”

  Her hands moved to my waist, and her tongue darted out to touch her bottom lip. I leaned toward her, wanting to kiss her so bad that it physically hurt.

  “I can’t,” she said, but it sounded like an empty protest.

  “Please,” I said as I moved my lips so close to hers that they were almost touching. I could feel her soft breath warming my lips.

  “It’s too complicated,” she said softly.

  I shook my head. “It’s not. It’s not complicated. It’s really simple.”

  She sighed, and I felt her sink against me. “Okay.”

  That was all it took. One word from her, and my lips crushed hers, and I devoured her, taking every moment I’d missed to kiss her over the past week and putting it all into that one kiss. It was the best feeling. The familiarity of her mouth, how she moved against me, how we were so in sync that what we were doing just made sense.

  A soft moan escaped her lips, and I knew she could feel my cock pressing against her leg. It was one of those situations that had we been alone, I would have been inclined to lift her skirt and take her right up against the wall. Just the thought of that was so damn hot.

  “Upstairs,” I murmured against her lips. “Now.”

  Her hand moved between us, massaging me in a delightfully torturous way, teasing me and making me want her too much. I was going to lose it if she wasn’t careful. And I knew there had to be security cameras nearby. Some guy was probably getting an eyeful of what I was getting to experience firsthand. That made me a little gleeful.

  “God, you’re so sexy,” I said as my hand slid down her side and I moved my hips, grinding slowly into her hand.

  “Phillip,” she said in a breathy moan.

  “What do you want?” I asked her.

  “You,” she said almost instantly, and it was all I needed to hear.

  “Done,” I said as I looked down into her soft brown eyes.

  She smiled, and then she slid her hand into mine. Wordlessly, we walked back to the service elevator so we could go up to her room and shut out the rest of the world.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Sabrina

  “Thank you, Miami! You’ve been an awesome crowd,” I said as I blew a kiss to the fans who were cheering for me.

  I’d just finished the last song in my set, and my adrenaline was pumping wildly along with my heart. That moment at the end of my set, when I stood before the roaring crowd, had to be my favorite moment of any day. Following closely behind it was the moment when I walked off stage and saw Phillip waiting for me, because I knew he’d been watching the whole show. Just knowing he was there gave me a little extra happiness as I played and sang my heart out for the crowd. And I knew I always put more into the show when he was watching.

  But aside from that, I simply loved performing my own songs. For the few years that I’d been a teen pop star, I’d sung peppy hits that other people wrote, and I’d pranced around on-stage, shaking my ass. It had been humiliating most of the time, and I’d hated what I stood for. It was all so superficial.

  Now I got to sing songs that I wrote. I got
to play music that meant something to me, and I was proud of the product I put out. I’d known it was risky to try to make a comeback with a completely different sound, and it was even riskier to add folky sounds to my slower, acoustic songs, but every night that I stepped on-stage, I was delighted to know that it had paid off.

  The fans knew my music, and they sung along the whole time. Even if they’d bought tickets to see Westside and they were only seeing me perform because I happened to be the opening act, I didn’t care. They liked my music, and that was all that mattered.

  “Westside will be out in a little while,” I teased them, and they roared even louder. “So get ready to yell and scream for them.”

  As soon as I said that, the noise they were making went up a few decibels, shaking the floor of the arena.

  I smiled. “Thank you again,” I said as I waved to them. “Goodnight.”

  I walked backward, waving the whole time until I hit the marker that told me it was time to turn. The curtain went down just as I hit that spot, and I turned toward the exit of the stage to see Phillip leaning back with his arms crossed over his chest.

  He smiled at me. “Great show.”

  “Thank you,” I said, curtsying for him.

  I saw lust in his eyes as he looked down at the outfit I wore for my final few songs. It was a short black romper that hugged me in all the right places and showed off my long legs. Paired with black ankle boots, it was a look I knew was sexy as hell. I also knew that Phillip loved it.

  Seeing the look in his eyes, I wanted to grab him and drag him away so I could have him all to myself again. I’d only lasted a week without him before I’d caved and had given in to what I’d wanted all along – once before the party the night before and then twice after the party before I fell asleep in Phillip’s arms. And now I only wanted more.

  When I’d woken up this morning, I’d expected him to be gone, but he was there, asleep next to me, looking so peaceful and serene. After relishing in the fact that he hadn’t left, I’d buried my face in his neck, inhaling his familiar, comforting scent as I woke him up with kisses and let him make love to me again.

  We ordered breakfast in bed, and the morning quickly turned into one of the best ones I’d had in a long time. If only it could last. If only Phillip could be the kind of guy I wanted him to be. If only he felt the same way about me that I felt about him. But no matter how perfect our time together was, I knew our feelings for each other were so different.

  But even knowing that, I also knew I couldn’t stay away. The week without him had sucked. I’d missed him so much, and it was even harder when I saw him multiple times in a day. It had been torture, and had he approached me at any point during the week like he had the night before, I knew I would have caved just as easily. I was completely weak when it came to him, and I knew that was going to get me hurt in the end.

  “What’s on your agenda for today?” he asked me as he’d taken a bite of his pancakes.

  He had a little dot of syrup on his lip, so I leaned over and kissed it off. “I was hoping we could just do this all day.”

  He smiled. “I’d love that, but I have to be at the studio in two hours. We’re recording a song, and Leah’s going to bring Gavin by so he can see us record.”

  “Oh, okay. That’s sounds cool. I think Gavin will like it.”

  Phillip nodded as he chewed. “I told him to bring his guitar. I figure it’ll let him feel like he’s a part of the process.”

  “That’s really sweet, Phillip.”

  He smirked sheepishly. “I try.”

  He was so cute when he talked about his godson. I don’t think he had any idea what it did to me. It was just so sexy to see a man love a kid who wasn't his as much as Phillip loved Gavin. It made me think things I definitely shouldn’t have been thinking where he was concerned.

  “So how is Leah?” I asked him in an effort to pull my head back to center.

  Leah was why I shouldn’t have been thinking the things I was. If Phillip had feelings for her, I was just someone to pass the time with. And if she ever changed her mind about wanting to be with him, I was certain he’d kick me to the curb in an instant. If only I didn’t love him.

  “She’s good,” he said. “I was over there yesterday for a few hours. It was cool.”

  “And?”

  I felt weak for prompting him for more, but I needed to know.

  “And what?”

  “And is there still something there – with you guys?”

  “No,” Phillip said quickly, meeting my gaze. “We’re just friends. I wouldn’t be here with you if there was something going on with Leah and me. I can promise you that.”

  I nodded. “Okay.”

  I wanted to say so many things in that moment, but I held my tongue. Phillip’s previous words filtered through my mind, and I was reminded that we wanted different things. I knew it would have been so much easier to be in his shoes. It sucked to be the one who felt like they were on the losing end. I’d much rather have detached, emotionless sex, but with Phillip, I knew that wasn’t even a remote option for me.

  “They’re coming to the show tonight,” he told me. “You should get to know Leah and Gavin. I think you’ll really like them.”

  I nodded, my mindset suddenly brightening at the idea that he wanted me to get to know the people he considered family. That had to mean something.

  “I’ll do that.”

  “Kelsey will be there too, and Leah’s bringing Dan, her boyfriend,” Phillip continued. “I haven’t met him, so maybe let me know what you think of him. I want to make sure he’s good enough for her.”

  I smiled at the thought of Leah having a boyfriend. That made me feel a little better.

  “You know you’re really cute when you get protective of the people you love.”

  Phillip smiled sheepishly at me. “The list is short. I’ve got to protect them, or I could lose them.”

  I knew exactly how he was feeling. Of course, I didn’t have anyone in my life like he did – except him. I’d lost all my friends when I’d turned to partying, and then I’d lost the second set of friends I’d made when I got sober. Since I’d been working again, I’d been too focused on my career to think about making friends. Maybe it was time for me to do that. As much as I wanted to rely on Phillip, I didn’t think it was really smart to do that. He could drop me at a moments’ notice, and I had to be prepared for that. Nothing was saying he’d be sticking around.

  “I wish I had someone like you in my life,” I said, not even thinking about what I was saying.

  “You do,” he’d said simply, but I wasn’t sure he knew what I’d meant.

  Still, for a few seconds, I let myself believe that things were different, that I could get what I wanted, and that he and I could be more than what we were. After spending the week avoiding him, now that we’d spent the night together, I realized just how much I didn’t want to lose him.

  And as he stood before me, hours later, dressed to go on-stage, I had the overwhelming need to claim him for myself again. I couldn’t seem to get enough of him, and the white polo with the popped collar and jeans he was sporting only turned me on. I loved the preppy look he wore so well, because I knew underneath it all was a perfect specimen of a man who was so incredibly sexy in all the right ways.

  “Sabrina, that was an amazing show,” I heard and forced myself to look away from Phillip’s intense gaze.

  It took me a few seconds to register that it was Leah, and she’d been talking to me.

  I returned her kind smile, and thanked her, right as Gavin pushed his way between his mom and Phillip.

  “Sabrina!” he said excitedly.

  I was surprised he even remembered who I was.

  “Hey Gavin. What’s up?”

  He grinned. “I learned how to skateboard yesterday. Phillip taught me, and we’ve been doing some tricks back here. You want to see?”

  I looked at Phillip in question, and he just shrugged. “The kid’s got
talent.”

  “So you were skateboarding instead of watching my show?” I teased him. “I see how it is.”

  “Hey, I could hear the whole thing,” he defended, and then he smirked at me. “You sounded awesome – as usual.”

  I grinned. “Thanks.”

  “Sabrina,” Gavin said, tugging on the sleeve of my romper. “Come on.”

  “I guess I’m being beckoned,” I said to Phillip and Leah, noticing Kelsey standing nearby.

  I’d met her three weeks earlier when we’d been in New York. She’d come to the show and then had come out with us to a club afterward. Phillip had shown me her picture before we met, but even if he hadn’t, I would have recognized her. She was a fairly prominent model who I’d seen in a handful of ads, not to mention the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show the year before. She was up-and-coming, but her career seemed to be fairly hot at the moment.

  And she was really sweet. It was obvious how much she cared about Phillip, but I liked that she’d taken the time to get to know me as well.

  I smiled at her as she followed us over to a space out of the way that was clear of people, and we all watched Gavin do the trick he said Phillip had taught him. Then Phillip joined him, acting like a kid himself as he showed Gavin a few more things.

  Then he turned to me. “You want to try?”

  “I’m wearing heels,” I reminded him, when in reality I’d never been coordinated enough to skateboard.

  He grinned at me, and then he turned to Gavin. “Looks like Sabrina’s out.”

  Gavin made a face. “How about you, Aunt Kelsey?”

  “I’m totally in,” she said eagerly to Gavin, grabbing one of Phillip’s boards that was resting against a nearby wall.

  He had at least three skateboards, and two weeks earlier, when we’d been in Philadelphia, he’d dragged me down to where our tour buses were parked, and I’d sat with Elisa to watch him and Van show off. He was actually really talented. It was cool to see him looking so relaxed as he goofed off with his friend. He did the same thing now as he raced Gavin back and forth, dodging roadies and other people who were hanging out near the stage entrance.