“My Meghan?”
Nodding, I say, “I guess so. I had no idea about her debt trouble. Of course I’ll help her out. I could probably up her pay a bit, and the benefits we’re offering will help, too.”
I was pretty sure he was hearing nothing of what I was saying by the look on his face.
“That’s crazy, man. But thank you. For considering it. She’s amazing. I know she’ll be an asset here.”
Standing, we shook hands.
“Yeah, I bet.”
Even though I agreed, I had a sinking feeling in my gut that told me this couldn’t go well.
If Aiden and Meghan didn’t work out, I would be out of a receptionist.
If Kaelyn decided she wanted nothing to do with me, she wouldn’t be the only feisty woman I would have to deal with.
As I walked him out, I told myself it would be fine. Aiden was a good man. Meghan would be perfect for our team and when it came to my girl, all I could do was hope that she would find a way to forgive me in the same way I fervently hoped I would someday learn to forgive myself.
No sense in worrying about it now. There were only two things that would take priority for me.
Getting well and finding a way back to my girl.
The gentle strum of the instrument lulled my worries over the past day to the very back of my mind, allowing a rush of calm to come over me. The achingly familiar melody playing from my fingers caused my blood to heat with the desire to quench the thirst I had been affected by for so long now. It was our song. Kaelyn and I. During the early morning feedings and the rare date nights we could find in our busy lives after Lily was born. It was our song on the night I found out about my diagnosis and the darkness started to spread through me, the future so dark I couldn’t fathom being in Kaelyn’s light.
As I began to sing, the memory of her gorgeous smile flashed behind my eyes.
It was still our song.
“What day is it? And in what month?
This clock never seemed so alive
I can’t keep up and I can’t back down
I’ve been losing so much time.
Cause it’s you and me and all of the people
With nothing to do, nothing to lose
And it’s you and me and all of the people
And I don’t know why I can’t keep my eyes off of you”
I paused, the buzz behind my eyes morphing into a full on aching, the pain making it hard for me to keep my head from dropping.
“Shit,” I murmured, one hand coming up to try and alleviate some of my headache. It wasn’t fucking working. Still, I pushed on.
How will I ever get back to writing if I can’t keep a simple melody together?
“All of the things that I want to say
Just aren’t coming out right
I’m tripping on words, you got my head spinning
I don’t know where to go from here”
The words flowed from my mouth, my fingers alternating between each chord and my breathing coming out rough in my concentration. Every time I tried to think of the next line, I could remember it, but it was as if the words were distancing themselves from me, becoming just a blur the harder I reached for them.
“Cause it’s you and me and all of the people . . .”
I couldn’t remember now, no matter how hard I tried. My blood was heating with not desire, but anger.
I should be able to do this. It was one song. One song I had known by heart for years.
Tilting my head back and rolling my neck gently, I told myself to take a breath.
I’m fine.
It didn’t matter that Dr. Rhodes had already told me that some of the simple things I did on a daily basis may prove to be difficult. The placement of the tumor could affect cognitive function. Memory. Even knowing the cause for this didn’t make it easier. I had always relied on music when I was lost in my life, feeling as if the entire world was against me at a time. But music?
It was always there. Like a gentle breeze in the summer air, it calmed me instantly and allowed the problems that felt so huge in my life to become bearable. At least for a little while.
Couldn’t even have that anymore.
I hadn’t hated much in my life. My mother had always told me that there was no use in harboring that negative energy. Forgive. She would tell me.
But I hated cancer. I hated the disease that had taken my mother.
My father’s wife.
My sister’s best friend.
My mother was the glue in our family and without her, we weren’t the same. I didn’t think we ever would be. Most of all I hated cancer for taking away the one special thing I had to remember her.
My music.
Frustration bellowed through me, my anger so full I couldn’t keep it inside any longer.
I paced the room, my hands roughly grabbing at my head, a stark desire to rip off the damn coverings I always had over my head pulling me under. It was one thing I wanted to keep to myself. Because the moment the world around me saw my bald head, I would be pitied.
Oh, poor Lucas. He used to be such a strong man.
Oh, he should wear a wig or something. Poor, boy.
When my fist hit the wall, piercing pain hit me, but it didn’t stop me. My knuckles met the concrete within the well painted exterior and all the breath left me. The burst of energy that had seized me, waned and I dropped my head in defeat.
I was lost. Broken. Angry.
I didn’t want to turn around when I heard the door behind me slide open.
A pair of wide, honey eyes pierced me, concern etched into the spots of gold and green within them and I froze.
She was here.
“Oh, Lucas,” she said, the words falling from a mouth painted in red, her gorgeous lips thinning as she neared me.
I didn’t move as Kaelyn wrapped slender fingers around my bicep and pulled my arm through the gaping hole I had left in the wall. Her kind eyes were all I could focus on as she cradled my injured fist and probed it open with her fingers.
“Does it hurt?” She blinked up at me, our hands still molded together, her mouth was only a few inches from mine. I was drawn to her. Pulling a gentle hand down the side of her angelic face, I shook my head.
“Not as much as this does.”
I moved our hands to my heart and kept them there, even when she tried to pull hers away, to gain some distance from me. I needed her to know how much she still affected me.
A brush of her breath cascaded over my face, and I breathed in the scent of peppermint.
Jesus, I’ve missed that smell.
Lowering her eyes to our joined hands, Kaelyn nodded and as if by the carnal pull between us, her head hit my shirt with a light thump as she pressed her cheek against my chest. My heart twisted as her warmth seeped into me, and I wasted no time wrapping my arms around her small frame, nestling her head underneath my chin as I held her fiercely.
Her breath was quiet against me as she started to sing. Her sweet voice hit my ears with the force of a train, causing my breath to stop completely. She was singing our song.
My breath stilled, and taking hold of her chin, I lifted her head and forced her eyes to pierce mine again. I could get lost in these eyes, forever.
Missed these eyes.
“You remembered.”
Nodding, she gave me a shy smile, her eyes holding none of the sadness she’d had the last time we spoke. I thanked God for it. I was going to need every strength I had if I was going to win her back. Her smile gave me a bit more.
“I think you left the mic on. We could hear your take.”
My eyes lifted from hers to peer through the glass door behind her. Asher stood, dressed down in a pair of light wash jeans and a grin a mile wide across his face.
Yeah, I was going to owe him one.
“You heard me?”
Moving a bit away from me, she pulled my left hand into her palms, whispers
touched across the bruised knuckles I’d given myself.
“At least that hasn’t changed. Your music still touches people, Lucas.”
Looking up at me, she took my face in her hands and pulled until my forehead dropped to hers.
“It touched me.”
Time seemed to stop in that moment, the current of need and attraction so potent between us you could slice it in half. Her peppermint breath calmed me. The touch of her hands over my heart caused the stirring of hope within me. And the closeness of her sexy as fuck body made my cock ache with a desire to undress her right in the studio, for all of my family to see.
It had been so long and I had missed her every moment. It didn’t matter that I had been the one to cause that distance between us. I would be the one to find a path to her, once again. Hell would freeze over before I would put that in jeopardy because of my desire to have her again.
I would have her again, someday.
In that moment all that mattered was that we were together.
We had mountains ahead of us before I could truly call her mine again.
It was only the beginning.
At the sound of the door opening behind us, I stepped back, my hands pressing against the hard muscles of Lucas’ cotton clad chest until he released me. His gaze fell to my mouth as I asked his brother to give me a tour of the rest of the building and my core pooled with desire in response. I stepped toward him again, not bothering to notice the presence of his brother behind me, waiting.
“The girls wanted to see you again. Do you want to come over, tomorrow?”
I couldn’t believe I was offering this, but my girls were all that mattered to me. And I wanted to see him again. I needed closure. If not for my daughters, then for purely selfish reasons.
A million questions bounced around the walls of my mind and all I needed was the answer to one.
Just one.
Why?
With a slight upturn of his mouth, he nodded. The twinkle of mischief in his eyes told me he wanted to see more of me, too. Stepping away from him, I rushed to the door, not bothering to look back at him. I knew he was watching me go. I knew those smoky olive eyes were watching me, like they always had.
The man was going to ruin me if I kept letting him affect me this way. The trouble was, I had no idea how to shield myself from this man. He was everything to me, even through the years of pain and rage. The years of questions and doubts and self-blame. Even through the birth of the child he’d never known about or our divorce that had shattered any semblance of hope I had had for us.
I still thought of him every time I closed my eyes.
Lucas Jones.
How was I supposed to let go of him now that he’s waltzed back into my life?
“Kaelyn?”
My head whipped a bit too fast toward the familiar voice of Lucas’ younger brother, Asher.
“Uh, sorry, what did you say?”
With a grin, he shook his head and moved toward the wall of recording rooms that lined the back wall of the reception area. Everywhere I looked there was glass. It was breathtaking.
“I love the glass doors, there is so much light, here.”
Smiling, Asher nodded.
“Colby designed it all. She is so good at this. I had no idea until I walked in and saw it.”
Stepping back, I looked over to where the youngest of the Jones clan sat admiring her laptop screen at the desk in the center of the open space.
She’d designed all of this, in just a few weeks.
She was amazing.
“You need to get her out of this stuffy office, Ash. She should be in design school, or maybe even starting her own business. This is amazing!”
He smiled fondly as her head rose, the affection between them so clear.
I missed that, especially after moving so far away from my family.
I loved Texas, but I missed Chicago so much.
My parents. Aria. Farah and Jaden. All of our friends.
“You miss it, don’t you?”
Blinking my reminiscent thoughts away, I moved down the hall as we ventured deeper into the large office Asher shared with his father. He had invested a lot into this place.
“Hmm?”
“Chicago. Don’t you miss it?”
Nodding, I sat down on the love seat that was placed in the center of the room, accompanied by a small chair and end table. It was probably for clients to sit and relax as they waited.
“The city, it was where I grew up. I wanted Lily and Avery to grow up there, with my parents living only up the street and our friends and family surrounding us.”
He handed me a cola from the fridge and I took it with a slight smile.
“But you left, right?”
“I had to. Well, I didn’t have to, but I think I needed to. Everywhere I looked, I saw the memories Lucas and I shared. There were so many reminders, I just couldn’t handle it. I couldn’t live in a house that we had bought together in hopes of staying there forever and raising our children. We had so many dreams, Ash.”
Taking my hand, he nods. He knows first-hand what went down between his brother and I all those years ago. He may be the only one that could truly understand.
“I know how much my brother loved you. When he left, he was a fucking mess. I’m not sure if that helps, but he was. He didn’t know what to do. I think he was a bit lost.”
Nodding, I pushed away the snappy comment on the tip of my tongue about how he’d left me, high and dry with a young daughter that needed him. I needed him. Our baby girl had needed him, but he hadn’t stuck around long enough to learn about her.
He was just gone.
“Come on, let me show you the view.”
Asher patted my leg as he moved and I followed him to the wide window next to his desk and chair. Spreading the mahogany curtains, the sunlight instantly spilled into the room. As far as the eye could see, there was water. It was so beautiful. Nodding, I looked at him.
“It’s almost worth dealing with your idiot brother, Ash. Thank you.”
Laughing heartily, he gave me one of those wide smiles of his.
“Which one?”
Shaking my head at him, I didn’t hide my smile.
He always had a way of lifting my spirits. He was funny and kind. Just a few of the traits he’d gotten from his mother, the lovely woman she had been. The door to his office opened and Lucas stepped inside, the air around me thickening instantly. My eyes moved up his large frame, landing on the black ink that I could see through his white cotton shirt. My mouth fell open in response.
“Oh, I have to go, Meghan is waiting on me. Thanks, Ash”
I hugged him, giving him a smile and ducked underneath Lucas’ arm as I passed the door.
The quicker I got away from him, the better.
The moment I stepped outside of Wrecking Ball Records, the gust of fresh, hot air that rushed over me helped to calm the bundle of nerves that had formed in the pit of my stomach. I looked up into the Texas sky to see that the sun was already setting. Shit. I really don’t want to walk home in the dark. Meghan had texted me that her car was in the shop and I’d reassured her that I could walk the mile and a half from the record studio and home. But as I watched the sun getting lower in the sky, I was hesitant.
“Kaelyn, what the fuck are you doing?”
The rough concern etched voice belonged to Lucas as he neared me from behind, his presence heightening my nerves at once. I turned and my eyes instantly took in the mass of the man that stood in front of me. He’d grown from the young man he once was and now he was all man, all muscle and tone. Stop ogling him for God’s sake!
I berated myself, yet as if of its own volition, my eyes continued their admiration.
“I—uh, I’m walking home.”
Shaking his head almost angrily, he invaded my space and took my hand in his.
“Where is your car, Kaelyn?”
Droppi
ng my eyes from his, I tried to move my hand from his grasp. But he didn’t budge, his grasp on me firm and secure. I blinked, my gaze stuck to his as he moved forward and whispered his finger over my cheek, moving a stray piece of my hair behind my ear.
“I don’t like to drive alone,” I breathed. His eyes narrowed, then softened as he must’ve remembered why.
My brother, Jeremy had been my best friend growing up. He’d been the strong, silent type, a protector at heart. When I was in college, he and Aria were in a car accident. He was killed, instantly.
My chest pierced with an old and familiar pain at the memory. I blinked away the sadness and the squeeze of Lucas’ hand eased the memory away.
“Can I walk you home?”
Nodding, I looked into his big, olive eyes.
God, his eyes were so beautiful. I remembered them being the first thing I noticed when we first met.
A sense of calm fell over us as we walked side by side, our hands achingly close as they fell between us. Every once in a while, I risked a look at him in hopes he’d miss it. Every damn time he saw me and threw me that shy smile of his, one that weakened my defenses, just a bit.
“This is it,” I breathed as we turned into my driveway and a large, callused hand captured mine and stilled me.
There it is. That spark of attraction. The buzz of need. The light of hope. It’s still here.
“Do you always walk?” he asked, raising his eyebrows as if he expected me to lie. I’d like to, because I knew that if the protective streak he used to have is still there, he’d insist to walk me every time I needed to go somewhere. I did have Meghan. She usually drove so I hadn’t really had a need to drive for a long time. In all honesty, I couldn’t afford a cab and it wasn’t really that far. Only a few miles. I actually enjoyed the walk and the time to think without children to care for or dinner to make or a lobby filled with customers to please. When I ventured into work on the weekends, I had a tiny sliver of time to just be me. The woman.
“On the weekends, yes.”
Lucas’ shoulders tensed, a sure sign that he didn’t like this.
“I’m fine, Lucas. You don’t have to worry-”
“Let me walk you up.” Pressing a hand to the small of my back, his touch caused a shiver to rock my frame, the attraction between us sizzling within my core.
Breaking Lucas (Trinity series Book 2) Page 13