Promise Me Forever (Top Shelf Romance)

by Kate Stewart

  His eyes flick to me briefly, sliding over my arms and shoulders in the tank top I’ve tucked into my black jeans. He hasn’t looked at me, has barely spoken to me since we landed in Dubai. As much as I’ve pushed him away, avoided him, I miss looking into his eyes and seeing the things we don’t say to each other, but feel, even though I’ve never voiced those feelings to him, and probably never will. One day I’ll look into his eyes and they’ll be void of whatever he felt for me before. It’ll be gone because I killed it. Maybe it’s already dead.

  “And we’re done.” Paul lowers his camera and squints up into the bright sun overhead. “Just in time.”

  Grip relaxes against the ATV, running big hands over his head. His hair has grown just a little since he cut out the locs. Still not long enough to pull.

  Right. Must stop thinking of someone else’s man in terms of pulling his hair when he comes inside me since . . . he never will.

  “Any chance I could take this thing out?” Grip asks the guide who brought us out here, patting the huge ATV.

  “To-to ride, yes?” the man asks in his stilted English, his expression uncertain.

  “Yeah.” Grip’s smile is all persuasion. “Come on. I’ll sign a waiver or whatever anyone else would do.”

  “Alone?” the guide asks with a frown.

  “I was gonna take her with me.” I’m knock-me-over-with-a-feather shocked when Grip tips his head at me. Since he’s barely acknowledged me in days. “You down to ride, Bristol?”

  Maybe it’s the desert heat suddenly beading sweat on my neck, sand in my throat so I can’t breathe easily. Maybe I didn’t eat enough at lunch, and I’m lightheaded. More likely, it’s Grip’s gorgeous eyes waiting on me, resting on me when he’s barely looked at me in what feels like forever.

  “Um, well . . . I guess so.” I search his face for some clue in this puzzle.

  “Good.” He nods and turns to the guide. “There’s a set path, right?”

  “Yes, but . . .” The poor little man still isn’t sure, but sighs and relents. His supervisor probably told him to give the rich Americans whatever they want. Being guests of the prince probably doesn’t hurt our case. “I’ll get papers.”

  “And you’ll take them back?” Grip points to Meryl and Paul.

  “Yes, of course.”

  I glance at Meryl because I feel her glancing at me.

  “So I guess I’ll see you guys back at the hotel,” I direct my comment to Meryl and her curious eyes. “The party is at eight o’clock.”

  “I’m not sure how to dress for a royal Sweet Sixteen Party,” Meryl says, splitting her attention between me and Grip, who’s signing paperwork.

  “I’d skip it if I could. I’m so ready to go home tomorrow.”

  “I guess I’ll have everything I need for the story,” Meryl says. “I think it’s going to be awesome, especially with Grip hitting number one, and this gorgeous setting for the cover.”

  “Yep.” I listen to Meryl with half an ear as Grip walks over.

  “Thanks for everything, Meryl.” Grip’s slow smile makes a little bit of color bloom on her cheeks. I, unlike him, am not oblivious to her crush. “I can’t wait to see how it turns out. See you at the party tonight.”

  Without waiting for her response he returns to the guide who has the helmets for him.

  “Come on, Bris,” he yells, swinging his leg over the ATV.

  “See you tonight,” I tell Meryl hastily as I go to join him.

  The guide gives us some quick instructions. Grip nods, but it’s obvious he’s only half-listening. He and Rhyson love these things. The prospect of riding one on the Red Dunes has him excited and impatient to get on with it.

  I climb on the back, not sure about this. Not sure why he asked or why I’m going. I slip my arms around his warm, hard body. My fingers brush against ladders of muscle peekabooing through the rips in his shirt. I jerk my fingers back, unprepared for the jolt the intimate touch sends through me.

  “Hold on,” Grip says, his voice a little muffled by the helmet. “Or fall off. Those are your options.”

  Riding wrapped around that hot, hard body, my thighs bracketing the power of his? The center of my body fitted to the curve of his ass? And the primal growl of this desert beast carrying us over the sand, vibrating beneath me for the duration of the ride? As horny as I am, I’ll come before the ride is over. Not a good look. Using the electric boyfriend in my suitcase would be less mortifying.

  “Another option would be not to ride at all.” I scoot back and lift my leg to get off.

  “Too late.”

  Before I can get any further, Grip revs the engine and takes off. I’m forced to hold onto him tightly or get dragged by one leg.

  “Motherfucker,” I mutter through my helmet.

  “What was that?” Grip shouts over the engine.

  “I said you could have warned me,” I scream back.

  I’ve seen Rhyson and Grip ride at the beach, but this is so far beyond that. The dunes climb so high and drop so low, making my stomach loop with each crest and valley. No matter how much I try to put some distance between our bodies, the motion of the vehicle, the speed of our ride pulls me inexorably into him. My breasts flatten against the wide, solid expanse of his back and shoulders. His muscles shift and flex beneath my arms with every rise, fall, twist and turn. Involuntarily, my limbs stiffen as I fight the pull toward his body, not just gravitational, but the sensual tug he always exercises on my senses.

  “Relax, Bristol,” Grip shouts over his shoulder. “Or you’ll take us both down.”

  I give in, allowing the force and speed to collide our bodies. My legs mold to him, my nipples pebble at his back. I know I’m wet, and him securing my arm tighter around his waist with a rough hand doesn’t help. To distract myself, I take in the scenery rushing past us. We soar over this mountain of scarlet sand, so high if I reached up to touch the azure sky, my palms might come away blue. The sun, high and saffron, splashes violet and pink through the clouds, a child playing with watercolors. Vivid color saturates the landscape, like a fresco stretched and painted, left out to dry in the sun.

  We stop at the pinnacle of a dune, and just sit there for a few moments, the quad an idling beast beneath us. Grip kills the engine, swinging one leg over to get off. I carefully follow suit.

  I steal a glance at Grip, who has walked a few feet away and surveys the same vibrant vista that captivated me during our ride, the helmet hanging from his hand. I take a few steps until I’m right in front of him, ready to ask what we’re doing out here and why he brought me if he has nothing to say. The guide gave him a black bandana to wear over his nose and mouth, protection from the sand flying from our wheels. With just his dark eyes and the slashing, inky brows visible above the bandana, he looks part outlaw, part Bedouin prince. He stows the helmet and pulls the bandana beneath his chin, revealing the rest of his face, the lips finely chiseled and full, the strong, square chin. He squints against the sun, his bold profile sketched into the horizon behind him, and my heart performs a perfect ten somersault.

  It’s so quiet, the air rides a fine line between peace and desolation. It’s like we’re in a vacuum, void of time. Like we’re the last two people on a deserted planet, and everything except him and me and what’s between us dissipates. Every thought escapes me, except one.

  “I miss you,” I whisper.

  His head jerks around, his eyes meeting mine, going so narrow his long lashes tangle at the edges.

  “You don’t get to say that to me, Bristol.”

  I know why he says it, but it still feels like rejection.

  “Grip, I just mean . . . your friendship. With things the way they’ve been, I miss us as friends.”

  “My friendship?” He cocks his head, a humorless laugh escaping him and echoing over the dunes. “We’re not friends. Not right now.”

  “We are,” I insist. “I need that.”

  “You need.” Grip wads the bandana up in one hand and clenches the
back of his neck with the other. “I’ve let you have that, let you do that, for too long. Ignore what I need. Fuck what I want. I’ve settled for whatever I could get from you for years.”

  I want him to stop, but anything I could say to stop him stalls on my lips, so he just keeps going.

  “Even this set up, you managing me, was an attempt to be closer to you,” he says, anger powering his words. “And what do you do? Go off and start dating that asshole. Choosing him when I’ve been patient. When I’ve been here.”

  The explanation I should have given him weeks ago fills my mouth, collects on my tongue. I know if I tell him the truth about Parker, it could mess things up with Qwest. And I want to. Even though it may mean the end of them, I want to. I’d rather have the back and forth of him wanting and me resisting than not having him at all. It isn’t fair, but sometimes we do things that aren’t fair to protect ourselves. To survive.

  “I’ve let you make all the rules, but I’m changing them. I have to,” Grip says before I can decide what I should say. “I was going to wait, but now’s as good a time as any. You won’t be managing me anymore.”

  And just like that, the words I would say are sawdust in my mouth.

  “Wha-what?” I never stammer. I have this one part of him, of his life I’ve allowed myself, and he’s taking even that away, and it makes me stutter. “What do you mean?”

  “Sarah’s going to handle my day-to-day—”

  “Sarah?” My strident voice punctures the surrounding quiet. “Sarah isn’t a manager. She’s my assistant.”

  “I know.” Grip nods, his expression pinched. “Like I was saying, she’ll just handle the day-to-day stuff ’til I find a good fit for my manager.”

  “I’m a good fit!” Stupid tears dampen my eyes, and emotion watermarks my throat as the hurt rises inside me. “You have the number one album in the country. I’m not saying that’s because of me, but—”

  “Of course I know you’re a huge part of that.” He frowns and tosses the bandana back and forth between his hands. “This isn’t about that.”

  “I did a good job.” My voice falls to a dismayed whisper.

  “I don’t want to be your job.” He blows his frustration out in an extended sigh. “I never wanted that. I wanted . . . more, and now that we’re both with other people and it’s obvious what I wanted can’t happen . . .”

  “What?” I demand, crossing my arms under my breasts, steeling my heart. “Then what?”

  “I thought if I couldn’t have a relationship with you, I didn’t want anything.”

  His words crash land in the pit of my stomach. I grasp desperately at my composure, determined he’s got as much of me as he’ll get. My dignity at least is mine.

  “But I was wrong, Bris.”

  His anger fading, his voice almost gentle, he reaches for my hand and dips his head to catch my eyes. I resent how my insides start melting.

  “I do want us to at least be friends,” he continues. “Right now I don’t like who we are. Sniping at each other. The arguing and antagonism. It isn’t us. I think we just need to go our separate ways and let things even out, so down the road, we can be friends again.”

  “So you just ruin a great partnership?” I shake my head and snatch my hand away, refusing to believe this is his solution. “When we talk to Rhyson about this—”

  “He already knows.”

  “He knows?” Betrayal chokes my words. “You talked to him about this already? You decided this without talking to me first?”

  “It isn’t a decision we’re making together,” Grip says. “I decide who manages me, and it just can’t be you right now.”

  I’m done with this shit. I shove my helmet back on and take my spot on the back of the ATV, waiting for him to get on.

  “Bristol, let’s talk about this.”

  “Oh, now you want to talk?” I snap. “After you’ve gone to my brother and gotten me fired?”

  “Fired?” He frowns. “Come on. It isn’t like that. You have plenty of other artists you’re managing.”

  He doesn’t get it. Of course I have plenty to do. Between Kilimanjaro, Luke, Kai, Rhyson and Jimmi, I could have two more assistants and still need help with everything I do for all of them. But if Grip and I aren’t lovers, and we’re not working together, and we can’t even be friends, then we’re nothing. I haven’t been “nothing” to Grip since the day we met.

  “Take me back to the hotel,” I say woodenly.

  “Bris.”

  I pour my anger into the look I level on him.

  “Right. Now.”

  He probes my eyes, and I make sure all he sees is anger. I stuff the hurt, bury the pain, keeping an impenetrable shield over my face, over my heart. He finally climbs onto the quad and starts the engine.

  As we ride back, I resist the forces, physical and otherwise, that would slot our bodies together. He doesn’t encourage me to hold him any tighter. He doesn’t urge me to relax, to hold on, now that he’s letting go. Maybe he senses that anything he said would bounce off me like a coin from a sheet drawn taut. I just want to get through this ride and back to the States. The glamour that shrouded these ruby-tinged dunes on our ride here lifts, leaving stark reality. What I thought was peace is actually the loneliness of an arid land. The Bedouin prince doesn’t want me anymore, and all that’s left is this dry, barren desert.

  It’s nothing but dust and sand.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Bristol

  HELL HATH WINGS.

  This airplane is pretty much airborne hell. If I’d thought the flight to Dubai was torture, the flight home would give Dante new inspiration.

  “Grip, what’s wrong, baby?” Qwest asks . . . you guessed it . . . sitting on his lap.

  “Nothing.” He sits with his hands on the armrest while she snuggles into the nook of his arm and shoulder. “I’m good.”

  “You sure?” She squeezes his shoulder. “You’re so tight.”

  “Just a long few weeks.” His head drops back against the seat. “I’ll be glad to get home.”

  “I know how to loosen you up.” She inches closer and whispers in his ear, a husky laugh invading the space where Will and I sit across from them.

  Grip’s eyes open to clash with mine. Despite my best efforts, I can’t look away. I can’t help but remember what he said to me that night on the roof. That I can’t keep my eyes off him. It’s true, but it shouldn’t be an issue any more since he won’t have me around. I deliberately look away and down to the phone in my lap.

  “Great idea,” Grip says.

  They stand and walk to the back where there is a bed. I don’t look up even at the sound of the lock turning. I guess it’s the Mile High Club for them. My jaw clenches. My lips tighten, but otherwise I show no sign that it bothers me.

  “What’s wrong with you?” Will asks from beside me.

  Okay. Maybe I’m not hiding it as well as I thought.

  I convinced Meryl that Will and I needed to discuss a few things, so she should probably sit with the photographer. Looks like I won’t fare much better with Will.

  “Oh, nothing.” I roll my neck and stretch in the wide legged jeans I chose to wear for the flight. “Just tired, I guess. You must admit it’s been a lot lately.”

  “Yeah, Grip’s on top.”

  “Qwest, too,” I murmur, rubbing the denim covering my legs. “’Queen’ is still number one.”

  “She’ll want Grip for her next album. You know that. We’ll need to coordinate.”

  A gust of air imitating a laugh rushes past my lips. “Oh, there’s no doubt she’ll want him.”

  Will turns in his seat to stare at my profile. I ignore him, taking my laptop from the bag by my seat and answering a few emails.

  “What’s up with you and Grip, Bristol?”

  My fingers pause over the keys for just a second before I resume typing.

  “What do you mean?”

  Will’s fingers cover mine over the keyboard.

&n
bsp; “Stop.” He waits for me to look at him. “I know there’s something going on. If it affects my artist, I need you to level with me. Are you guys . . .”

  I fill in the blanks. He has picked up on something obviously. I’m glad I can look him straight in the eyes and tell the truth. Though, I can look people straight in the eyes and lie just as easily.

  “Grip and I have been friends for a long time, Will, but it isn’t like that.”

  “You sure?” Will asks. “Sometimes I think I pick up a vibe between you guys.”

  “Like I said we’ve been together a long time.” I shrug, slamming my laptop closed. I don’t feel like faking work right now. “Friends for a long time. That’s all.”

  “Okay, good.” Will laughs his relief and leans back in his seat. “’Cause I’m pretty sure Qwest’s in love with that guy.”

  His words spear me right through the middle. I could see that for myself, of course. She’s completely into Grip. And he really likes her, but I know he doesn’t love her. I don’t want anyone to get hurt. If Grip stops trying with her, breaks things off, she’ll be hurt. If he keeps trying and really falls for her, I’ll keep hurting. In neither scenario am I brave enough to do anything about it, to stop this train I’m at least partially responsible for setting on its course.

  Sixteen hours just fly by when I don’t have to stare at Grip and Qwest the whole time. They never came back out. I guess they put that bed to good use. The thought of him inside her, of her wrapped around him takes my breath with a sharp pain. I grab my bag and head toward the exit. As soon as I step onto the tarmac, I spot a black SUV with a vaguely familiar figure standing to the side. The man who accompanied Parker that night in Vegas. I think Clairmont was his name.

  I already know who will step out of the vehicle before Parker appears.

  “You’re a lucky girl.” Meryl comes to stand beside me. “We can’t all have billionaire boyfriends to come home to.”

  “Lucky me.” I give her my fakest smile ever.

  Will joins us, accessorizing his roguish grin with a wolf whistle.

  “No wonder you looked at me like I was crazy when I asked about you and Grip,” Will says. “I almost forgot you have one of the richest men in the world on a string.”