(Complete Rock Stars, Surf and Second Chances #1-5)

by Michelle Mankin

  “I do not brag. I don’t need to brag. And what conquests do you mean?”

  “The girls you sleep with.”

  “The ones I fuck?”

  “Yes, that.”

  “There’s no sleeping involved with the women I have sex with.”

  Hollie’s lips parted as if the idea appealed, then pursed once more to become a conduit for her flames. “Whatever terms you want to use. You charm them to have sex with you, then you leave them immediately afterward. That’s a conquest. A notch on your belt. Bragging rights to the other guys, and a warning to intelligent women to stay away. Am I right?”

  “You think only stupid women want to hook up with me?” My eyes narrowed. We’d had a discussion like this before, and it had stuck with me. Fucked with me. The way she framed it made it seem less satisfying than it already was.

  “You said it, not me.” Her eyes were liquid metal, reflective and bright.

  “My sex life seems to fascinate you as much as my cock does,” I fired back. “Why’s that, I wonder.”

  “It does not.” Her arms snapped straight at her sides, her fingers clasped into fists. “Except that you keep throwing it in my face all the time. Why’s that?” She gave it to me as good as I did to her.

  “Let me show you.” I reached out and snagged her. With her mere inches away, it was only a matter of grabbing her by the upper arms and hauling her into me.

  The unexpected and significant force snapped her head back. Her eyes widened in surprise. Her body went taut, and her lips parted to draw in air to fuel her next charged volley.

  “What are you doing?” she asked, her voice a husky rasp that crackled, igniting the tinder of my need.

  “You know very well.” I searched her gaze. It was dewy with lust while her skin felt like satin beneath my grip.

  “No.” She denied it, even as her curvy body molded to the hardened planes of mine, buzzing with the same need as I was.

  “I’m going to give you what you want.”

  Her lungs expanded as she pulled in a shuddery breath that pushed her phenomenal tits harder into my chest. She likely felt every throb of my pulse where her ample hips cradled my turbulent erection.

  Holding Hollie was like trying to shape a lightning bolt in my hands. She was the most compelling woman I’d ever met. I wanted her—had wanted her from the first moment I laid eyes on her. But she’d been underage then, and the way I’d felt before had been tameable.

  It wasn’t anymore.

  I lowered my head, slid my hands up her arms, and found the end of her ponytail. Wrapping the length of silk around my fist, I told her, “I’m going to fuck your sexy mouth with my tongue.” The blush on her cheeks deepened, spurring me on. “Then I’m going to fuck your sexy body in that bed. Then I—”

  “No.” Shaking her head, she took a step back, her eyes immediately watering as she yanked her hair free of my grip.

  “What the ever-loving fuck?” My entire body vibrated with want. My arms were ramrod-straight tuning forks at my sides, my hands trembling, the pads of my fingertips humming with need for what had been denied me.

  “I do not want what you want.”

  Hollie enunciated each word and wrapped her arms around her chest as if she were cold, but I knew very well she was the opposite. Her eyes were smoky. Her cheeks remained flushed. And her pretty pink tongue darted out to moisten her dry lips.

  “You’re lying.” I spat out the accusation, pissed as hell at her for slamming on the brakes.

  “Listen.” Her eyes wavered, a rogue wave in a sudden churning sea of emotion. “You’re right, okay? There’s some interest on my part. I admit it. I . . . But then that’s my problem. Another problem.”

  I remembered only then the shitstorm she was currently weathering. Shame slammed down on me. I felt like a heel for forgetting, but it was hard to rein everything in when I was also jazzed up on a boatload of sexual frustration.

  What hold did the bodyguard have on her? Why did she mourn him when he’d been with someone else while she’d been filming in Switzerland?

  Unfaithfulness made him a total dickweed in my book.

  Their sordid story was all over the internet, the details unavoidable. Well, unavoidable if you clicked on all the links as they came up, because if Hollie was fascinated with me, I was equally fascinated with her.

  When I didn’t immediately respond, she said, “Maybe . . .” More tears that I didn’t see coming filled her eyes. “No, definitely, I shouldn’t have come. I’ll stay in the guest bedroom so I won’t be a bother, then take the earliest flight I can get back to LA tomorrow.”

  When she backed another step away from me, I panicked, completely fucking panicked at the prospect of her leaving when I finally had an opportunity with her. To fuck her.

  Of course, that was all I wanted. To take her. To possess her. To mold that fire into a mutual conclusion we both wanted. My fascination would be indulged and then I could finally set it aside, and she could do the same.

  But she had to remain here for us to finish this.

  “You should have come,” I said gently. “Until you brought it up, I think you’d forgotten what happened back there.”

  “I can never forget.” She shook her head.

  “Deny it, if it makes you feel better. Deny this,” I waved my hand back and forth between us, “if you want to. But I think you’re honest enough with yourself not to do either. You’re strong enough to put me in my place and deal with whatever shit you need to straighten out while you’re here.”

  She went completely still and tilted her head slightly as if contemplating my words.

  “I’ve got food in the other room, most of the shit on your list too. Stay back here and hide as long as you want to, then come out and join me when you’re ready to be honest.”

  I backed away. It wasn’t easy. In fact, it was one of the hardest things I’d ever done, and I’d done some difficult shit in my life, for fucking sure.

  But I knew, I fucking knew if I pushed too hard and too fast to get what I wanted, I would lose it.

  Hollie was like a developing swell on the ocean. I could see the potential. All the ingredients were there—wind, current, velocity, and power—to transform it into the perfect wave. I just had to be patient, to watch and wait, and then press when the opportunity came along.

  If I played it right, we would both have the fucking ride of our life.

  Chapter Ten

  * * *

  Hollie

  My legs wobbly, I sank backward onto the bed while staring at the doorway left vacant by Diesel’s departure, reeling from his words.

  No secret smile. Not this time.

  Attractiveness was skin deep. What he’d said was more significant than he knew, an approval that resonated within me like the tolling of a bell.

  Was I strong enough to straighten myself out and hold my own with him?

  He thought I was. Recognition from a tell-it-like-it-is guy like him meant those weren’t just empty platitudes. Diesel always called it exactly how he saw it. He thought I was strong and capable, and he wanted me.

  With him, I felt a lot of things. Excitement. Anticipation. Irritation. It was difficult to untangle them. But maybe more importantly, I didn’t feel scared.

  Well, except for the time at my birthday party when he’d backed me into the wall. Max had rescued me then. But what if he hadn’t?

  I’d wanted Diesel to kiss me back then. And I wanted it even more desperately now.

  Oh, how I wanted it now.

  I glanced down at my hands, turning the palms up on my lap and running the pad of my thumb over my fingertips. They continued to tingle from the contact with his chest. The hardened slabs of his muscles had vibrated beneath my touch as if I had power over him.

  Did he want to kiss me as much as I wanted to kiss him?

  Longing rose within me, a longing that shamed me. I shouldn’t feel this way so soon after losing Max.

  Even though I did, I could
never act on it. I was carrying another man’s child. Widowed, though never a wife. Alone, though I wondered how together Max and I had ever been, considering he’d never shared his secret with me.

  I turned my head toward the empty doorway. The desire to get up right now and close the gap that separated me from what I wanted, from who I wanted, was strong.

  It seemed as though something important hung in the balance, and whatever decision I made would swing the scales toward it. Afraid of choosing unwisely, I was torn. I could dive back under the covers and cower like I had in LA, or I could have the courage to reach for what I wanted.

  Suddenly, music drifted into the void of my indecision . . . the soft notes of a piano that sounded like tinkling raindrops on a windowpane. Rising from the bed, I was halfway toward the door before I consciously recognized I was in motion.

  I stumbled and stopped, clearly seeing for the first time that the obstacle in front of me was a core lack of faith in my ability to control my own life. Samuel’s criticisms and my present circumstances had exacerbated that lack of self-esteem. Determining to do better, I straightened my spine, sucked in a big breath, and continued into the other room.

  Just a few steps down a shallow hallway returned me to the main living space. A short walk, but for some reason, I was more than a little breathless when I arrived.

  Diesel sat on a bench at an upright piano on the other side of the room, his back to me, his gaze focused on the window to his left. The ebony finish on the instrument he played was worn and scarred, with burn marks on it as if it had been scorched by fire. A tarp lay beside him on the tile floor. The piano must have been covered when I’d first come in, otherwise I would have noticed it.

  Rooted in place, I was torn again between watching his wide shoulders flexing, and taking in the expansive view of the ocean and the sunset over it through the wall of sea-facing glass. Another significant something I’d initially overlooked because of him. Diesel seemed to eclipse everything when I was in his presence.

  Up the scale he went and then down, his arms moving, and his fingers pounding emotion into the melody. The artistry of him creating music became my preferred vista. Loud, the volume of his composition lifted like a crashing surf, then it softened, descending like a tranquil homecoming until it faded away into the unknown.

  In the hushed silence that followed, I clapped. Diesel swiveled around and nearly tripped on the bench as he stepped over it to stand.

  “You make a decision?” he asked without preamble, his eyes narrowed, his expression indecipherable.

  I nodded. “What’s for dinner?”

  “Unhealthy shit.” His lips curved. Was it projection on my part, or was he truly pleased I was staying?

  “My favorite.” I so rarely got to indulge with Olivia supervising everything I ate.

  “It’s probably cold.”

  “It’ll be fine.” My mouth framed an appreciative smile. “Thanks for going to get it.”

  I followed him to the small table only a few steps from the piano. Well, a few steps for me; it was only a single stride for him. He turned a chair around and straddled it, his arms over its rattan woven back as he reached for one of the paper bags.

  Unfolding it, he peered inside. “Fish tacos. This is the fried one. The other sack is the grilled.”

  I pointed to the latter. “I’ll take that one, if it’s okay.” Grease would contribute to the inevitable nighttime nausea.

  “Makes no difference to me.” He pushed the other bag across the table toward me.

  It had a Manoa’s Paradise logo, which was a sketch of the bar we’d passed earlier and the name. He noticed my interest in the design as I ran my fingers over it before opening the bag.

  “My dad drew that. He and Manoa are friends from way back.”

  “It’s wonderful. It looks just like the building.” I dug inside the bag and withdrew two foil-wrapped packets.

  “Double order.”

  “I can’t eat a double.” I started to slide one of the packets toward Diesel, but he stopped me, his large hand over mine.

  And with just that touch, the ease of us sitting down to eat dinner together suddenly changed. Electricity sparked from his skin to mine. The voltage of it surged up my arm, a fire-tipped arrow that resonated heat in the center of my chest.

  “You need to eat more.” He cleared the huskiness from his throat and withdrew his hand.

  I stared down at my pale fingers on the worn mahogany tabletop. They seemed wrong, lying there without the coppery covering of his that they’d worn only a moment before.

  “You’re barely much more than skin over bones anymore.”

  I lifted my gaze from my wishful thinking and found myself ensnared by the unexpected concern in his dark brown gaze.

  “I don’t feel much like eating lately.” My stomach did an uncomfortable flip as the smell of the food reached my nose.

  He cocked his head, and my mind got lost in the show of watching curls as dark as the finish on the piano skim the stretched tendon along his neck. “What the hell have you been doing for meals?”

  “In LA?” I asked, hoping he didn’t mean Switzerland. Everything I ate there had come back up.

  “Yeah.”

  “I have a service that comes into my condo and stocks my refrigerator with pre-prepared stuff. I just microwave it.”

  Diesel frowned. “That’s a lot of radiation. Nukes the vitamins out of everything.”

  I shrugged. “Necessity. I work all the time.”

  “It’s good you’re taking a break.”

  “Fanny thinks so.”

  “I think you know so, or you wouldn’t be here.”

  I nodded in acknowledgment, my stomach doing more than tumble from his casual words. He believed I was in control of my own life. With Samuel torturing me, Max gone, and me pregnant, I felt like I barely had a handle on anything.

  But could the truth be more tenable? Maybe the reality put me somewhere in between.

  “What’s on your agenda while you’re here?” Diesel asked, crumpling one foil packet. There had been a taco in it just a moment before. He’d practically inhaled the food and reached for more, and I hadn’t touched mine.

  “I don’t think I want to do anything except stay here and look at that view.”

  I turned my head to stare out the window. My lips parted as I took it in, the horizon a powder pink with a lot of burnished gold. The setting sun seemed to make the crystalline surface of the ocean shimmer as if it were enchanted.

  “It’s beautiful,” I whispered.

  “Yes, it certainly is,” Diesel said softly, and I swiveled back to find his gaze on me.

  Chapter Eleven

  * * *

  Diesel

  Douche, don’t get all starry-eyed because of the way Hollie looks at your kitchen table with the sun in her hair.

  It was more than that. It was her deciding to stay. It was her being appreciative of cold takeout food. It was the fact that when I finished playing the piano, the expression on her face was as awestruck as it had been staring at the sunset.

  “The sunrises are even better,” I said.

  “I can’t imagine how they could be.”

  “You won’t have to take my word for it. You’ll see for yourself in the morning.”

  “Oh, I’m not sure I’ll make it up that early.” A crease formed in her brow.

  “Why not? Surf’s gonna be great.”

  “I don’t want you to change any of your routine for me. Sometimes, a lot of the time, I have trouble sleeping. But if I’m lucky, I can usually manage a couple of hours of rest toward the morning.”

  “Why?”

  “Why do I have trouble sleeping?” she asked.

  I nodded.

  “Lots of reasons.” She glanced away. “What were you playing earlier? Was it an original piece?”

  “Something I’ve been working on for my dad.”

  My gaze narrowed on Hollie as she continued to avoid eye contact. Sh
e picked at food she’d barely touched. Obviously, she didn’t want to talk about what kept her from sleeping, but I had a fair idea without her telling me what the trouble was.

  “How’s your dad doing?” she asked, leading me on a tangent away from herself. A stellar effort, she was a good actress.

  Since my fascination with Hollie had begun, I’d binge-watched everything she’d done. But as good as she was in front of the camera, it was comforting to see that she was pretty shit at deception in real life. After my ex, I had zero tolerance for manipulation.

  “He’s holding his own, I guess,” I said vaguely as she hit on a thorny subject matter.

  “Is he adjusting better to the assisted-living facility?”

  “Not really. He hasn’t made any friends there. He won’t ask for help when he needs it, and he won’t do any of the activities. The only social interaction he has is when I visit or Manoa does.”

  “That’s sad. I’m sorry. I can tell it’s hard on you.” She started to reach for my hand. It was only a scant inch away from hers, but she stopped short of touching me.

  Why was she reluctant to initiate contact when I knew she reacted as strongly as I did?

  “I’ll take you with me to visit him tomorrow, if you’d like to go.” I watched her closely. Every nuance. Every gesture. Everything and anything I could use to get us together, I planned to use.

  “Yes, I would. I’d like to ask him about his drawing. I like all kinds of art, not just acting. Do you think we could find some pencils in town, and maybe a sketch pad, that I could take to him as a gift?”

  “I’m sure we could find something like that.” My throat clogged with emotion. “That’s very thoughtful of you.”

  Hollie shrugged my compliment away. “I’d like to pick up a rental car too. I don’t want you to have to stop what you’re doing to take me places.”

  “I’m not doing anything I can’t rearrange.”

  “Ash says you spend all your daylight hours in the water, and about that many—”

  “Fucking around at night. Is that it?”