by Nalini Singh
“Noah can mimic other singers—he used to make us piss ourselves with laughter in school when he pulled out that trick,” David told her. “I don’t know who he was channeling the wedding weekends, but let’s just say we were suddenly hot property on the wedding circuit.”
Eyes warm, David played his fingers through her hair. “I already knew they were my best friends, but that’s when I knew I couldn’t abandon them and our dream, that whatever happened, we’d figure out a way through it.”
So much history tied the four men together, she thought, so much loyalty. “And you have. You’ve stuck together through everything.” Fame, booze, drugs, women, none of it had torn them apart.
David reached out to cradle her jaw. “I can stick with you, too, Thea,” he said, his voice compelling and strong and potent with emotion. “Just give me a shot.”
That night, Thea watched David sleep and accepted that he could hurt her more than Eric ever had. She’d cared for Eric, but though they’d suited each other in many ways, there had been no visceral tug, no emotion so deep that it terrified. But it hadn’t been a cynical choice on her part to be with him. On the contrary, it had been one driven by her heart—Thea had believed the fireworks would come.
Her parents, the most in-love couple she knew, had only met once before deciding to marry. At the time, Lily had been an unmarried single mother living in a conservative, traditional village. She couldn’t financially afford to go to a bigger city, and she’d needed the emotional support of Thea’s grandparents, with whom Lily and Thea had lived. The circumstances had meant her marriage prospects were dim at best.
So when Lily was introduced to a young man from another village, a man who wanted a family but who had similarly dim prospects because of a partially paralyzed left arm—the result of a childhood accident—she hadn’t hesitated to say yes to a proposal.
“I could see in his eyes that he was gentle and kind,” Lily had once told Thea. “I desperately needed kindness at that time of my life.” Tears in her eyes, she’d smiled. “Even more, I needed a man who would love you and treat you with care—and on the day Wayan came to ask for my hand, he was waiting in my parents’ garden when you snuck outside.”
Lily’s smile had grown deeper, her voice softer. “He didn’t know I was watching as he dusted you off after you fell, then held you in his lap and told you stories. I knew I would marry him then, honor him, but I didn’t know I would love him until six months later when he laughed while digging my first garden for me and said no one ever told him marriage involved such physical labor.”
Thea could still remember the blinding love in her mother’s eyes as she said, “I looked at him and I thought—why have I never noticed how handsome my husband is when he laughs, this strong, loyal, kind man who loves me?”
Lily had wiped away a tear. “He told me two weeks after our wedding that he’d fallen for me a month before we officially met, when he’d seen me laughing and playing with you outside your grandparents’ house. He said he felt he’d won the lottery with our marriage.”
Thea smiled at the memory of the mischief in her mother’s expression during this part of the story.
“That day in the garden,” Lily had said, “was the first time I was ever forward with your father. Let’s just say he did another kind of physical labor on that half-dug garden patch. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a man so happily surprised.” Delight in her laughter. “Love has many guises, Thea. Sometimes it’s a stroke of lightning as it was for your father, other times a slow building storm as it was for me, but the one thing that never changes is that it must be nurtured. You can’t kick a heart and expect it not to flinch.”
This, Thea admitted, unable to resist brushing her fingers over David’s stubbled jaw, was lightning. She hadn’t permitted herself to notice it when they’d first met, had convinced herself he was simply one of those people who would end up a lifelong friend; they’d had such an instant and strong connection.
Now, on this night when New York slept beyond the windows, she felt a single tear slide down her cheek. “Don’t kick my heart, David,” she whispered, knowing whatever Eric had done to her, David could do far worse. With Eric, the storm had never had a chance to build. With David, it was a wildness in her heart.
“Thea.” A mumble of sound, David’s lashes rising.
She kissed him, halting the questions he might have asked, hiding the vulnerability that pulsed in her. As his arms came around her, his body warm and strong, his scent dark and male, she repeated her plea, this time in silence.
Please don’t kick my heart, David.
David tasted wet salt in Thea’s kiss, and the sign of pain snapped awake his drowsy mind. But it was immediately obvious that Thea didn’t want to talk, her skin silken against his as she poured herself into the kiss. It wasn’t in David’s nature to ignore the hurt of the people who mattered to him, but he decided that tonight, he would speak to Thea not in words, but in actions.
Shifting so he was braced over her, he cupped her jaw and kissed her slow, gentle, with all the love that had been building inside him since the day they met. She was it for him. Today, tomorrow, every day to come. And tonight, his Thea needed tenderness, and he would give it to her, though his cock raged as it always did at her proximity, shoving against her.
“Damn it,” he muttered at the feel of her warm dampness, his spine going rigid. “It’d be easier to keep a handle on myself if we weren’t nearly the same height.”
A startled-sounding chuckle, no tears evident in her voice. “I like that we’re so close in height.” Arms wrapping around his neck, she spread her thighs for him while nibbling on his lips. “Everything’s so intimate when I can always see your eyes, feel your breath.”
Able to make out her face even in the darkness since they were so close, he rubbed his cock against her, watched the pleasure roll over her. Eyes heavy-lidded, she said, “Come in me.”
“I was going for slow.” He kissed his way down her throat, one of his hands on a pert, sensitive breast.
“Slow sounds good—but with you in me.” Raising her hips, she acted the temptress, her voice a coaxing whisper. “David.”
Shit, he was so fucking useless at denying her. Squeezing her breast, he grabbed protection from the bedside drawer and sheathed himself while Thea kissed and petted and drove him crazy. Her moan was deep when he pushed into the scalding heat of her, her spine arching in a graceful curve. Sweat breaking out over his skin, he gritted his teeth and bent his head to pay homage to the breast he didn’t have in his hand.
He knew exactly how responsive she was to caresses on that part of her body. Instead of sucking hard, he licked out his tongue over her nipple, blew on it. She shuddered, the heel of one elegant foot running over his ass and the back of his thigh as she curled into him.
“How can you be that flexible?” he said, taking small bites of her breast between each word.
Her body shook, the laughter in her voice making his lips curve. “Yoga. Want to do it with me?”
“If by doing it with you, you mean me sitting there watching your tights-and-sports-bra-clad body contort itself into impossible positions, sign me up.”
He switched breasts, luxuriated in her breathy “Your mouth should be illegal.”
David had never been that confident when it came to women, but he was beginning to be very confident when it came to Thea. She hid none of her reactions from him, made him feel like a sex god—“Fuck.” It was torn out of him as her body rippled on his cock, tight internal muscles clamping down.
Thea bit his jaw, kissed his throat. “Your fault. You sucked my nipple and did that thing with your tongue.”
Pulling out and pushing back into her in two short, shallow thrusts, he somehow managed to take hold of the reins again, keep from coming then and there. “Are you planning on doing yoga tomorrow morning?”
Her eyes shone at him in the dark. “I brought my workout clothes.” Weaving her fingers in his hair, she tu
gged him down, a sinful, gorgeous smile on her lips. “Now, come here and let me show you just how flexible I can get.”
There was kissing, there were whispers, there was more laughter. Their bodies slid against one another, warm and a little damp with sweat, her fingers in his hair and her nails scratching his back. Shoving one hand under her, he cupped the toned curve of her ass, angling it to take him deeper.
Her cry shattered the night, her kiss shattered him, and then his brain stopped working. There was just Thea, the woman he loved, and the soft cocoon of darkness that was the bedroom, the outside world held at bay.
Chapter 10
A month after New York, and Thea’s mood sparkled as bright as champagne. David was now officially on tour with Schoolboy Choir and had been for the past three days, and rather than feeling jealous or worried about what he was getting up to with the groupies while she held the fort in Los Angeles, she was stupid with happiness.
He called every single day, frequently more than once—often just to talk about something funny he’d seen or heard that he wanted to share with her. Their conversations weren’t long during the day, and sometimes he’d message her instead, but it made the distance disappear. Each time she saw his name on her phone, she felt a smile crack her face.
At first, Thea had hesitated to contact him in that sweet, wonderful way in return, not wanting to appear needy and vulnerable, but then she’d remembered something her mom had said back when Thea had been a teenager.
A relationship can’t thrive without flowers, Thea.
She hadn’t really understood then, had thought her mother was talking about physical bouquets. Now she knew different. And she knew the flowers had to come from both sides.
So she began to send David pictures of the ridiculous things she often saw around Beverly Hills and Hollywood—like the cat on a leash wearing a cowboy hat and miniature cowboy boots, and the G-string-and-demi-bra-clad protestor holding a placard in front of a lingerie shop. That placard decried the objectification of women. Except the protestor kept happily posing for photos with male tourists whose Hawaiian shirts might as well have been covered in drool.
I say she’s trying out for a reality television show, was David’s return message. Bet you five bucks and an hour of naked yoga.
Sucker bet. She already gave me her business card.
A day later, she returned home to find that a chubby-cheeked pink teddy bear had been delivered to her place. According to the handwritten note inside the shipping box, David had won it in one of those claw machines where the player puts in a quarter or two then tries to get the claw to pick up the prizes inside.
I ducked into an arcade instead of a bar during my walk this time, he’d added. Winning this for you felt way better than breaking up a bar. No black eyes or bruised ribs, just a gift for my girl.
Heart a pile of goo, she hugged the silly, romantic bear. And if she decided to keep it on her bed while David was away, there was no one around to tell her it was a weird thing for a grown woman to do.
Not that she’d have cared if her friends did tease her. She was too happy.
The following day, she called him from the grocery store. “It’s my turn to make dinner for the book club. Teach me something I can’t mess up.”
He laughed and told her what to buy for a no-fail potato dish. The conversation, the growing connection between them, it was easy, happy, scary.
Her heart ached, being away from him. Until he hit the road, they hadn’t spent a night apart since New York. But the ache was a tender, beautiful one, and it paradoxically brought them closer. Because this was the first time their relationship had been tested—and they were coming through with flying colors.
Even when Abe almost drank himself into a coma six days into the tour and ended up in hospital, their bond didn’t falter. She did her job, managing the media, while David did his, keeping the band together. He was furious, but he refused to allow Schoolboy Choir to splinter… and the scary thing in her heart grew even bigger and more powerful in the face of his unflinching love and loyalty.
“I am so pissed off,” he said to her after Abe woke up. “But I will not let this destroy us.”
Having already ascertained that Abe would be fine, though his mood was apparently belligerent and aggressive, Thea focused on David. “I’ve never heard you this angry.”
“It’s like he doesn’t give a shit,” David said. “Everything we’ve been through together and he couldn’t fucking knock on my door and say he was spiraling down?” Raw anger. “Hell, he wouldn’t have even had to speak. He could’ve just turned up and I’d have got it. Instead, he’d rather fuck himself up to the point where he might push us to the breaking point.”
But Schoolboy Choir didn’t break, and Thea knew David had a lot to do with that. Furious or not, he managed to rein in his anger enough to ameliorate the tension. Fox, Noah, and Abe all had red-hot tempers. Left alone, Thea had no idea what the three men would’ve said or done, but she knew it wouldn’t have been good.
When she spoke to Molly a few days later, following Abe’s release from the hospital, her sister told her the atmosphere remained edgy. “They’re continuing to make amazing music together,” Molly said, “but it’s going to take time for things to get back to normal.” A small pause, hope in Molly’s tone as she added, “Angry or not, they’re family to one another, will figure things out.”
“Yes.” Thea tapped a pen on her desk. “At least the media interest has died down.” With the agreement of the band, she’d allowed reporters to assume Abe’s hospitalization had resulted from drugs. His problems with cocaine were well documented and no longer newsworthy past a single cycle.
“How are you handling all this?” she asked Molly, thinking of the way Molly’s parents had died and the ugly events that had preceded their deaths. Her sister was already having a tough time navigating a relationship in the glare of fame—this horrible reminder of a past that continued to cause her deep pain was the last thing she needed.
“Better than I thought I would,” Molly said. “Fox has been flat-out wonderful.” Voice husky, her sister spoke again before Thea could reply. “What about you and David?”
Thea stopped tapping her pen, embers heating in her stomach. “He makes me so happy, Molly.” Blowing out a breath, she admitted the rest. “It’s terrifying.”
“I get that,” Molly said softly, and her words held the perceptiveness of a woman who felt the same fear-entangled happiness. “But he adores you, you know.”
Thea’s voice was a rasp when she replied. “I know.” It made her breathless to think of the emotion in David’s eyes when he looked at her. “And… I’m starting to believe it might last.”
Because her trust in him, it kept intensifying, kept becoming stronger.
Knowing how stressed he’d been with the Abe situation, she arranged for hot room service to be waiting for him after the next concert, the dishes his favorites.
He video-called her the minute after he walked into his hotel suite, an adorably astonished look on his face. “Thea, you did this?”
Sitting in bed with the teddy bear beside her, Thea blew him a kiss. “Eat before it gets cold.”
She kept him company while he did so, their conversation effortless.
Then one day, she called him after a bad day at work. It was instinct to think of talking to him, she was so used to sharing her day with him by that point; it wasn’t until he’d picked up that she realized this wasn’t going to be a happy, easy conversation. But it spilled out anyway, everything she’d been holding inside all day.
David didn’t tell her to stop obsessing over work, didn’t switch off. He listened, agreed with her that the man she’d been dealing with was an asshole—really that’s all she’d needed—and the next day, her drummer sent her flowers. Unique and wild and with thorns. Thea smiled each time she saw those flowers, and in a moment of mischief, had a bouquet of lush, fragrant peonies in baby pink delivered to the next hotel on the t
our schedule. They were waiting for him when the band checked in.
“The guys are giving me hell,” he told her on the phone. “I told them they’re just jealous they don’t have a woman who sends them flowers.”
Thea laughed and thought of the flight she was taking tomorrow. “I can’t wait to see you.” It still took her conscious courage to say things like that to him, but his responses always made it worth it.
Like now.
“The others will never let me live it down if this gets out,” he said, “but I’ve been marking off the days on this little pocket calendar I carry around.”
He devoured her when she arrived. She did the same to him. Their physical connection just grew hotter the more they learned about one another’s bodies, but it was the emotional tie that made Thea feel as if she were walking on air. She was beginning to believe they might just make it, even in the hothouse atmosphere of a rock star’s life.
On that thought, she slipped on her heels several hours after she arrived, then walked out of the bedroom to find David finishing off a phone conversation with one of his brothers. Schoolboy Choir had performed in front of a sold-out stadium crowd the previous night and had tonight off. David and Thea had spent most of the previous four hours in bed.
She loved sex with him, but what she loved even more was being snuggled up to him while they spoke, their eyes connected and their bodies tangled.
“Jesus,” he said after hanging up, “you’re going to give everyone a heart attack in that dress.”
Thea twirled for him, the sparkling little dress in midnight blue having a deep vee in the back in contrast to the prudishly modest neckline in front. Long-sleeved but ending only a few inches south of her butt, it was sexy and elegant at the same time. She’d paired it with skyscraper heels in black patent leather and left her hair down because she knew how much David loved playing with it.