by Sybil Bartel
“I can’t afford to not work.” Giving the only excuse I had that didn’t involve my brother, I silently pleaded for him to not ask me again. Not in that tone of voice, and not with that look in his eyes.
“It won’t cost you anything, and I’ll cover your expenses while we’re away.” His gaze held mine. “I know what I’m asking you to do.”
“No, you don’t.” He couldn’t possibly. He was asking me to step aside and let my brother die. I didn’t want to make this conversation about Marcus. I’d stupidly wanted something that was just me and Ben, but I was a fool for even thinking that was possible. Misplaced anger surged, and I lashed out at Ben. “You have no clue what you’re asking.” I turned away from him, and the stupid tubing pulled free.
With patient, gentle movements, Ben retucked the plastic tube behind my ears and refitted it under my nose. “I know this is about more than you leaving.”
“Don’t pretend you understand.” It was insulting.
“Marcus needs to be on his own. He needs to hit bottom, then pick himself up and fend for himself.”
Bitter anger bled out, misplaced and irrational, and I threw it all on Ben. “You have no idea what my brother went through. How easy it is for you to sit here from your expensive condo and tell someone they need to pick themselves up. Just because you have money now, doesn’t mean you can throw it at every problem. I’m not coming with you, and I’m not leaving my job or my brother.”
“I’m not throwing money at this. You know that’s not what this is.” The dominant tone to his voice I’d only heard on occasion surfaced. “You need to get away, Elyssia.”
Bullshit. “So you’re going to pay me to go with you? Why? Because you feel guilty I got hurt, or because you think my brother needs to be alone? He’s already alone. Every minute of every day, he lives alone in his head with horrific memories of war that you and I will never have to live through because he carries that burden for us.” My breathing, my adrenaline, they ratcheted up to match my temper. “Marcus doesn’t ever get to run away. He can’t leave his memories behind and go on tour with a famous rock band. He can’t escape, not ever.”
Ben took my hand in both of his as if I hadn’t just yelled at him, and his complex blue eyes met mine. His voice dropped. “Can you escape what happened to you?”
The gravitational pull of my world shifted, and for three precarious seconds, I was spinning. Then I went into a freefall, and the last pieces of my heart broke for a man I could never have.
“I’m not going with you.” I pulled my hand away.
FUCK. I NEVER THOUGHT she would say yes, but fuck.
I switched tactics. “You’re clearly not safe here.” If she wasn’t going to tell me what happened and I couldn’t convince her to come with me, then I was calling Neil and Talon’s friend, André Luna. He owned a personal security firm in Miami. I’d never hired him, but I’d heard his company was the best in the business, especially in dangerous situations. I’d beg him to get someone up here to watch out for her. I didn’t give a fuck how much it cost. I wasn’t leaving without knowing she’d be safe.
“And I’d be safe on the road with a rock band who gets mobbed by screaming fans?” she countered.
“It’s not like that.” Most of the time. And the times it was, I could protect her. We had security details at every stop on the tour and she’d never be alone.
“Right.” She turned away from me.
Goddamn it. “What do I have to say?”
She pulled the covers up around her. “Say anything you want.”
It’d been strained between us since she’d turned legal, but up until now, that strain was all me. I’d kept her at arm’s length. I didn’t smile back when she smiled at me. I didn’t engage her in conversation unless she spoke first. I didn’t give her a single fucking thread of anything to grasp on to where I was concerned. I was polite, but fucking distant. Now I knew what the hell that felt like, I wanted to take every goddamn day back I’d wasted with her.
“Move over,” I demanded, kicking off my shoes.
She didn’t budge. “You said you were taking the couch.”
Fuck. “If you want me to, I will.” I hated not seeing her face.
She didn’t respond, but she also didn’t move over.
I walked to the other side of the bed and laid the fuck down.
She tried to hide her surprise, but I knew her too well. Her expression remained stoic, but her eyes widened slightly.
I brushed a strand of her soft hair off her face, and like an asshole, thought of what it would feel like wrapped around my fist. “You doing okay?”
She stared at me for a long moment. “What are you doing?”
Trying like fuck not to touch her. “I never thought the first time I shared a bed with you, you’d need oxygen.”
She pulled my comforter closer to her. “I’m sure a lot of girls need oxygen around you.”
I didn’t smile because she didn’t mean it as a joke, but she should have. “Ask what you want to know, Elyssia.”
“I don’t have anything to ask.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Why are you still lying to me?”
“I don’t need to ask you a question to know that you and your band have a lot of fans.”
“Are we going to dance around this?” Because I was tired of staying away from her.
Heat touched her cheeks. “Pretty sure I’m not doing any dancing.”
No, she wasn’t. I was the one changing the rules. “You want me to go first?” I didn’t wait for a response. “I’m not who Marcus says I am, not on the road and not when I’m home. You know me enough to know that.”
Her voice dropped to a whisper, and her gaze strayed. “I’m not sure I know you at all.”
I reached out and tipped her chin so I could see her eyes when I said what I had to say. “I don’t sleep around.” Not since I figured out no matter who I fucked, none of them were her.
She went perfectly still. “I didn’t ask that.”
Despite the oxygen making me angry as fuck every time I stopped to think about why she needed it, her beauty took my breath away. She was so damn gorgeous and innocent, I wanted to mark her as mine. “You wanted to ask.”
“What are you doing?” she barely whispered.
I held her gaze and did what I should’ve done a long time ago. I fucking jumped. “I came home this week for you.”
Nothing in her expression changed. “The band’s not here?”
Shit. “They are.” I paused for only a fraction of a second before I answered, but it was enough.
She gave me her back.
“Elyssia.” Damn it. “Stop turning away from me.”
“I’m tired, Ben.”
My timing shit, this whole fucking trip a goddamn mess, seeing her injured—I couldn’t not touch her anymore. I gathered her soft hair in one hand. “Lift your head, baby.”
Her whole body went stiff. “Why?”
“Because I’m going to hold you. Lift.”
She raised her head, and I slid my arm under. When she tentatively rested against my bicep, I didn’t settle for the win. Greedy as fuck, I went for more. “Trust me,” I murmured, pulling the covers back and lifting the hem of her shirt.
She sucked in a sharp breath that made her cough.
“Shh, baby. Give me a second.” Swallowing down rage at the mottled bruising on her back, I gently placed the still cool ice pack against the worst of it, then pulled her shirt back down.
She let out a ragged breath. “Thank you.”
I was going to kill the motherfucker who did this to her. “Welcome,” I ground out, settling my arm over her waist, which was thankfully not bruised. “Let me know if this is too much pressure.”
Her chest rose and fell with a breath, but she didn’t say anything.
I took her hand and wove my fingers through hers. Her soft scent everywhere, I never wanted to let her go. “This okay?”
“Yeah.” Her voice, her response,
they were both strained.
Damn it. “You need to let me know if I’m hurting you, Elyssia.” Her hand was so damn small. Her whole body was small. She was barely over five feet, but I’d never noticed until this very moment how damn fragile she actually was.
“You….” She cleared her throat. “You’re not hurting me.”
I fucking exhaled and kissed her temple. “I want you to get some sleep.”
Except for the sound of the oxygen, my bedroom filled with a kind of silence I’d been craving for years. But she didn’t relax in my arms and her breathing didn’t even out into a pattern of sleep.
I brought our clasped hands to my lips and kissed her knuckles. “Talk to me.”
“I’m not that girl,” she blurted.
“What girl?”
“A fan.”
My ego took a hit. “I’m not asking you to like my music.”
“I didn’t say I didn’t, but you’re leaving in a few days.”
I wasn’t sure where the hell she was going with this, but I stupidly grasped at the opening. “That’s why I want you to come with me.”
“I can’t.”
She didn’t say she didn’t want to come, she said she couldn’t. Her brother, I got it. I didn’t fucking like it, but I got it. My lips a fraction of an inch from her neck, I couldn’t fight the pull anymore. I left a soft kiss on her neck. “You want to know what happens if you don’t come with me.” It wasn’t a question, and I had every intention of answering it, but she beat me to it.
“I live my life.” Her throat moved with a swallow. “You live yours.”
“No.” I nudged the oxygen line with my nose, then kissed just below her ear. She smelled like fucking heaven. “You wait for me, and I come home to you.”
She drew in a sharp breath. “You’re talking as if….” She trailed off.
“As if I want more?” I squeezed her hand. “I do. A lot more.”
Her body, her breath, they froze. Then she fucking crushed me with two damn words.
“I don’t.”
I’D LIED.
I’d had to.
But the cruel untruth was stabbing into my chest and making me want to scream at the world and all of its merciless injustices. But more, I wanted to turn in Ben’s arms and give him what I didn’t have to give, for however long he would take it.
Except I couldn’t have Ben and keep my brother’s secret. It didn’t matter that I’d waited eight years to hear Ben say he wanted more. Marcus was my priority.
Biting my lip to keep from crying, I apologized for everything and nothing. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t.” His arm under me shifted. Then he let go of my hand and rolled to his back to turn off the lamp on the nightstand. “Get some sleep, Elyssia.” He didn’t put his arm back around me.
The light still on in the hall, the room fell into partial darkness, and I fought tears even harder. The weight of the painkiller was trying to pull me under, but I didn’t want to go to sleep with this awful tension between us. I couldn’t handle both him and Marcus mad at me.
The bed shifted slightly as Ben brought one of his legs up. “The painkiller should’ve knocked you out by now.”
“I don’t want to fight with you.” God, I didn’t want to fight with him.
“We’re not fighting.”
“You’re angry with me.” I could feel it in every one of his muscles.
Completely out of character for him, Ben sighed. “I’m not mad at you. I’m angry at the situation. I’m enraged at whoever did this to you. I’m frustrated that you don’t trust me, and I’m mad at myself for waiting so damn long.”
I stayed quiet for a moment, hoping he would elaborate on that last part, but he didn’t. “I can’t leave Marcus,” I quietly reminded him.
“You won’t leave him. There’s a difference, but I get it.” He slid his arm out from under me and got up. “Can I get you something? Food? Tea?”
I dared to look at him. “You have tea?”
“Earl Grey.” His hands went to his hips like he was daring me to question him further.
I accepted the challenge. “You drink Earl Grey?”
His unwavering blue-eyed stare held me prisoner. “I drink water.”
I couldn’t stop it. Two tears escaped and slid down my face because this wasn’t about tea. This was about a man who’d been waiting for me as much as I’d been waiting for him, but life was cruel and I was sister long before I’d become a woman who liked tea. “I’m sorry.”
His chest fell with an exhale, and his expression shut down. “Me too. Tea?”
My stomach in knots, I shook my head. He turned to walk out, and I panicked. “Ben?”
He paused but he didn’t turn around. “Get some sleep, Elyssia.” He pulled the door shut behind him.
I didn’t know how long I stared at the door, or how long I silently let the breaking of my heart crush me. I wanted Ben to come back, I wanted Marcus to be okay, and I wanted my mother. But none of that happened, and I fell into a fitful sleep until my hair was brushed from my forehead.
Two fingers landed on my wrist, and I opened my eyes.
A fitted T-shirt straining against his huge biceps, Ben adjusted the tubing around my ear. His presence had startled me, but it was the tattoos snaking up both of his arms that shocked me. Without thinking, I reached out and touched the monochromatic swirls of tribal ink that hadn’t been there last year.
His eyes immediately cut to mine.
“When did you get these?” My throat dry, my voice cracked.
He picked up the water bottle on the nightstand and handed it to me. “A while ago.”
I took the water. “I didn’t know.”
He dropped his gaze and adjusted the tubing pulling against my cheek. “Go back to sleep.”
“Are you staying?” I dared to ask.
Without a word, he moved to the chair across the room and sat. When he leaned his head back, I got the hint. I closed my eyes and somehow managed to fall back asleep.
I didn’t know what woke me a second time, but my gaze cut to the chair in the corner.
Sitting on the edge of the seat, his elbows on his knees, his palms on his forehead, Ben had his fingers spread out like claws in his hair. He inhaled deeply.
“Hi,” I whispered.
His head snapped up. “It’s time for your meds.” He stood and came to the nightstand. His stride precise and controlled, he didn’t move like it was the middle of the night as he reached for the bottle Talon had left.
“I’m fine.” I was sore, but my body wasn’t throbbing in pain with every heartbeat like two days ago. “I don’t need them.”
He set the bottle back on the nightstand. “You talk in your sleep.”
My breath caught in my throat and fear spread through my veins.
Slow, as if he didn’t want to, he brought his gaze up to meet mine. “I miss her too.”
Tears welled.
“Go back to sleep.” His expression pained, his eyes tired, he tipped his chin once and walked out.
Sometime in the early morning, he must’ve given up checking on me, or I’d gotten too tired to notice. The next time I opened my eyes, it was daylight. I had a horrible headache and my back was sore, but my breathing was almost normal. I sat up and the thick comforter pooled at my waist like a cloud. The sun was pouring in between the blinds, and when I stood to use the bathroom, I heard the muted beat.
Taking the oxygen tube off, but leaving the machine on because I didn’t know how to use it, I made my way to Ben’s bathroom. White, like the other one I’d seen off the hallway, this bathroom was just as modern but twice the size and boasted a giant sunken tub. I washed my face and brushed my teeth, then ran my fingers through my hair. Long, dark brown and thick, it pretty much looked how it always looked—wavy.
As I padded down the hall, the muted sound became louder. The door to the room where I saw his drum kit last night was closed. It wasn’t hard to figure out what he was doing.
Too shy to knock, I made my way to the couch and perched on the edge of the cushion. The buttery-soft leather was so smooth, I almost felt guilty sitting on it.
I knew I should call Marcus. Or at least check my phone for texts, but I didn’t know what I would say to him. Being in Ben’s house, I was ashamed to admit that the fear of what Marcus would do to himself was muted. In fact, everything felt muted. My sore body wasn’t as sore. The closed door to Ben’s practice space, the sounds from a busy downtown morning six stories below, the vague smell of coffee—nothing was overwhelmingly obvious. Except my pulse and every word Ben had said to me last night.
Inhaling, a full breath reached the corners of my bruised lungs, but the sharp pain was gone. Or muted. Like life from a rock star’s expensive condo. Muted and distant and not real.
Taking another deep breath because I could, I stood to go back to the bedroom to get my phone, and the drumming stopped. A second later, the door opened.
Shirtless, sweating, muscles rippling, so many muscles, Ben glanced at his open bedroom door, then his head whipped to the living room and his eyes unerringly met mine.
I held back a gasp, barely.
A cloud descended over Ben’s face, and he ducked back into his practice room. But before he disappeared, I got my second shock in as many seconds. A giant, continuous tattoo of a dragon covered his back from his waist to his shoulders.
My pulse thrumming, my heart racing, I stood stock-still. Ben Stark. Shirtless, with tattoos, so many tattoos. The high school boy I’d first met was gone, and in his place was a famous rock star I knew nothing about. My breathing, which had been better up until a second ago, turned shallow, and I was panting like I’d run five miles.
Before I could flee, Ben stalked back out of his practice room with a T-shirt on.
His eyes trained on me with razor-sharp focus, he closed the distance between us and stopped mere inches away. “Why are you out of bed?” It wasn’t a question. It was an accusation.
“I, um….” His usual scent—woods, clean—mixed with musk and spice and exertion. Despite the anger radiating off him, his presence surrounded me with so much temptation, I wanted to reach for him. “I woke up,” I said lamely.