Текст книги "The Singles"
Автор книги: Emily Snow
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Текущая страница: 18 (всего у книги 45 страниц)
I digested each of his words slowly, letting the harsh reality of the hand Mason Scott had been dealt seep into my skin. “I’ll always be there for him,” I murmured against Oliver’s chest. “And I want to meet him too.”
“Good.” I didn’t miss the relief in his voice, or the worry marring his bronzed features when he pushed me away and turned my attention back up to his face. “I love you, Gemma.”
It was so sudden, so unexpected, I just gaped at him, blinking for several seconds. “You ... love me?”
“I don’t give a damn if it’s only been a couple months or if you were Lizzie most of that time, I. Love. You. I’ve known it since before I figured out who you were.”
“But I lied to you.”
“And my mother lied to you. You did what you had to do to fix things, and I’m doing what I need to do to fix them.”
By telling me he loved me. When I lowered my face down to my hands again, I felt him stiffen beside me, but his next words sounded reassuring. “Gemma, you don’t have to say—”
Reaching between us, I covered his mouth with the tips of my fingers. “My life has been nothing but chaos the past few days. Over the last several weeks, I went from being Gemma Emerson the escort, to Lizzie Connelly the assistant, to Gemma the heiress.” I took a deep breath, fisting my free hand into my dress. “And through it all I haven’t been able to stay away from you. I haven’t been able to get you off my mind. I can barely breathe without thinking about you.”
He closed his fingers around my wrist and slid my hand up to kiss the heel of my palm. “This is a first for me.”
“Falling?” I whispered.
“Yes, falling. Wanting to be with someone so much it ripped my heart out through my throat. It’s—”
When he struggled for the word, I looked over at him, my brown eyes stinging from the tears. “Beautiful. It’s beautiful, and I love you too.”
His broad shoulders relaxed and a soft smile lingered at the corners of his mouth. Brushing his knuckles over my face to wipe away the tears, he asked, “Where do we go from here?” At my silence, he added, “Where do you go from here?”
I let out a throaty laugh. God, I wished I knew the answer to that. “I honestly don’t know. I thought I’d go back to Las Vegas. My home, but—”
He made a sound of disapproval. “Don’t. Come home with me.”
*
When we walked through the door of his hacienda-style home in Malibu an hour later, every time we pulled away from each other to rip off another article of clothing, I saw the place with brand new eyes.
I wanted this to be my home.
I wanted to forget every awful thing that had brought me here.
I wanted to move forward, to forgive.
But first, I wanted Oliver.
As he pinned me to his king size bed, his muscled body flexing over mine, a soft sigh drifted past my parted lips. “Please don’t stop,” I moaned. He grazed my nipple with his tongue, and I lifted my hips against him. “Please don’t.”
Make me forget—at least for a little while.
“More?” he rasped against my damp flesh.
I lifted my head a little, taking in the sight of his mouth touching my breast, and nodded feverishly. Without a doubt, I wanted more.
Relinquishing his grip on my wrists, he pushed himself up so that our tongues met. I draped my arms over his shoulders. Threaded my fingers through his light brown hair while our tongues and bodies and hearts met.
“I want to make love to you, Gemma.”
Once again, that word—my name—coursed a tremor through my body. Love. When I came to Los Angeles, I’d never imagined my road would end with that word being spoken to me.
“Say it again,” I whispered into the darkness as he nudged his erection between my legs, testing the wetness he found there. He slid the head of his cock into my body, and I cried out. “One more time.”
“Which part?” he teased.
I let out a cry of pleasure as he pushed himself completely inside me, clenching my sex around him. “Love,” I moaned.
“I’m going to make love to you,” he repeated, a grin tugging his lips just before he lowered his head to kiss me again.
Racing my hands through his hair, I pulled his head back and his dark brows furrowed together. “And my name, Oliver. Say that again too.”
“Gemma.” He opened my legs a little wider and splayed his palms on my thighs. “Gemma.”
Lowering my lashes, I curved my body to his, letting the mesmerizing softness of his husky voice creep across my skin over and over. We moved together, crashing and drowning.
When the orgasm hit me, drawing a harsh gasp from my throat, he flipped us over so that I was on top of him. With his fingers feathering my cheeks, imprinting into my skin, we let go together, our bodies trembling.
As we lay next to each other in the darkness, he traced one fingertip around my belly button, moving it in lazy circles that brought a smile to my lips.
I had no clue what would happen tomorrow—or the next day—but I knew that the one thing I’d unsuccessfully tried to avoid had become the thing that would keep me grounded.
That would keep me home.
“Tomorrow, I’ll think about what to do next,” I finally said.
“Do you want me, Gemma?” At his question, I turned my head to look at him, vividly remembering when he’d asked me a similar question before.
“Yes, I want you.”
“And I love you,” he said.
“Yes, there’s that too.”
Supporting himself on his elbow, he brushed stray locks of my hair from my damp forehead. “Good.” His blue eyes penetrated mine. “That’s all I needed to know.”
-The End of Uncovered-
Acknowledgments
I want to say a big thank you to my incredible Wicked Mafia crew—Kristen Proby and Michelle Valentine. I’m blessed to have such amazingly talented friends, and I love you guys!
To my “Your Toxic Sequel Support Group” on Facebook, thank you ladies so much for making me smile on a daily basis and supporting my books.
Thank you to my INCREDIBLE beta readers: my sister, Holly Malgieri, Christine Estevez, Stacey Mosteller, and Stacy Kestwick. Another huge thanks to Jenny Sims with Editing4Indies for her sharp eye and amazing patience!
To Letitia Hasser, my cover designer ... your artwork rocks my world, woman. You are one talented lady!
To all my amazing author friends—you guys kick ass. I’m so blessed to be a part of such a great, caring community. Lots of love to you all.
To the bloggers in the romance community—THANK YOU! Your support and love for my books mean so much to me. I appreciate you all more than you could ever imagine. Thank you for taking such good care of me and all the other indie authors.
And to you—thank you so for being so amazing. Your enthusiasm and support for my books amaze me on a daily basis, and I feel so blessed to have you. Thank you for all the emails, reviews, and Facebook messages!
Savor You
A Novel By
EMILY SNOW
Savor You Copyright
Copyright © 2013 by Emily Snow Books
All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission from the publisher in writing.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Synopsis
Kylie Wolfe and bassist Wyatt McCrae have been bad for each other for the last several years, but it’s impossible for them to end their toxic push and pull. Not when their attraction is constantly fueled by lust and proximity—she’s her older brother’s Lucas’s assistant and Wyatt is his best friend and band mate. So when Your Toxic Sequel makes a move to record a new album in Nashville, Kylie decides to make the latest break with Wyatt official by getting the hell out of town.
She’ll spend a week in New Orleans. A week to immerse herself in the Mardi Gras scene. One week to not think about the last time she was in New Orleans, seven years ago with Wyatt. Seven days where she won’t have to see Wyatt every day just to fall ridiculously in love with him all over again—where, if she wants to, she can have a normal, no-strings attached fling that won’t end in heartbreak.
Too bad Wyatt ruins everything by showing up, as gorgeous and demanding and awful for her as ever. Wyatt refuses to let Kylie give up on him. Not without reminding her why they both fell so far and hard in the first place. Not without making her savor the good memories and what could be their last chance with each other.
The Playlist
1. “Love Hurts” by Incubus
2. “Lonely Boy” by The Black Keys
3. “Future Starts Slow” by The Kills
4. “Say It Ain’t So” by Weezer
5. “The Red” by Chevelle
6. “All Lips Go Blue” by HIM
7. “Falling” by The Civil Wars
8. “Crazy on You” by Heart
9. “Love the Way You Lie” by Skylar Grey
10. “I Miss the Misery” by Halestorm
11. “Send the Pain Below” by Chevelle
12. “I Get It” by Chevelle
13. “Sweet Nothing” by Calvin Harris, Featuring Florence Welch
14. “Try” by P!nk
15. “By the Way” by Theory of a Deadman
16. “Fade into You” by Mazzy Star
17. “The Promise” by In This Moment
18. “Careless Whisper” by Seether
19. “One More Night” by Maroon 5
20. “Love-Hate-Sex-Pain” by Godsmack
21. “You” by The Pretty Reckless
22. “Never Let This Go” by Paramore
Dedication
To my readers . . .
Thank you so much for reading my books, supporting my work,
and making my life all kinds of awesome.
You guys kick ass.
Prologue
Seven Years Ago
For the second time in less than half an hour, the ancient hotel television flickers twice and then shuts off. I hold down the remote’s power button until pain shoots through my thumb. Finally, the TV turns back on, static taking over the screen for several seconds before the picture is clear enough to watch.
“Piece of crap,” I complain, before flinging the oily remote onto the bed. Everything about this place is worn down, barely functional.
Out of all the places in the country that I could have driven to get away from home—Atlanta—I came to Livingston, Texas. And out of all the hotels where I could have spent the night, I picked the same discount inn that I’d stayed in a year and a half ago when I’d tagged along with my brother’s rock band during their tour of a bunch of bars in the Southwest.
If anyone asked, I would claim I picked this place at random, but that’s not the truth, and I absolutely refuse to lie to myself regarding the reasons. Yesterday, when I was driving, I chose the sentimental route. I came to the place where I’d spent a few of my happiest moments with one man right before diving blindly into a different relationship—and a hasty, but thankfully brief, marriage—with someone I barely even knew.
Liz Phair’s “Extraordinary” blasts at full volume, startling me. Scooting up into a sitting position, I grab my phone, which is lying facedown beside me on the full-size bed, buried under a corner of the bedspread. My older brother Lucas’ name blinks rapidly on the display. “What now?” I growl, staring menacingly at the tiny screen.
He’s been calling for the last several hours to check up on me, blatantly ignoring all my requests to leave me the hell alone.
I irritably accept the call. “Lucas.” My voice holds a note of warning, which he’ll probably ignore, knowing him. Before I continue, I suck in a harsh breath to avoid coming right out and telling him to piss off. I love my brother—really, I do—but I also love my space. Which, at the moment, I’m not exactly getting, even though he’s eleven hours away. Grabbing the TV remote, I jab a button on it to mute the sound of Veronica Mars even though the damn television is probably going to give out at any moment anyway. “I’m fine. Please...stop.”
“I’m worried about you. You and Brad are completely done, and that’s a good thing because I couldn’t stand that shithead. But then, you leave? And you go to Texas? What the hell are you doing in Texas, Kylie?”
I sift my fingers through my long black hair, letting it cascade over my right shoulder. Why does Lucas have to overanalyze everything? Doesn’t he have his own relationship with his crazy-ass wife, Samantha, to fuss over?
“I’m not a kid. You don’t need to take care of me. Don’t you have Sam and Falling Anarchy crap to deal with?” Like always, I cringe when I say his band’s name. It’s the worst name I have ever heard, and I’ve been bugging them for a couple of years to change it.
“Are you fucking with me? You’re barely nineteen. I’ll always want to take care of you. You understand that?”
When I grumble that I do, he adds, “Besides, Mom and Dad are freaking out, too.”
I work the outside of my upper lip between my teeth and glower up at the dingy water stains on the popcorn ceiling above me. I should have expected Lucas to bring our parents into this mess, and of course, it only makes me feel worse. Doing this is a low move on my brother’s part because he knows I hate letting them down. My parents have never judged me, never gave me anything but love, but my fear of disappointing them had been my negative driving force for years, forcing me into an unnecessary prison of my own making. Lucas doesn’t know this, but he also shouldn’t use my mother and father against me.
I swallow hard. “Tell them—tell them I love them, and I’ll call in the morning, okay?”
Just as I’m about to abruptly end the call by flipping the phone shut, so I can go back to the high school angst playing out on screen before the TV decides to screw up again, Lucas says smoothly, “Wyatt’s worried, too.”
The instant I hear Wyatt McCrae’s name, I freeze. I haven’t seen him in months, since before I met and married Brad in a spur of the moment decision that had been fueled by a broken heart and too many shots of vodka, but the mere mention of him still shakes me to my core. Wyatt was my first everything.
Squeezing my eyes shut, I shake my head and remove my thumb from the phone’s power button. “God, Lucas,” I snap. Why does my brother have to be such a sneaky, traitorous ass? “You told him I left, huh?”
“He was with me when Brad called asking if I knew where you went. He was—” Lucas begins.
I don’t hear the rest because there’s a booming knock at my door. It’s rhythmic, and it takes me a second to realize that I know this beat. In fact, I know it well. It’s Chevelle’s “Send the Pain Below.” Only one person I know would be playing that song.
Dammit.
Eighteen months ago, in this same hotel, I had Chevelle playing on repeat when Wyatt McCrae had snuck into my room. I was still seventeen, but something had changed between Wyatt and me during that tour with their band. That night, he’d made love to me, slowly, hesitantly. Perfectly. The Chevelle CD was still spinning when he left early the next morning, well before the rest of the band woke up.
There’s another knock—the same Chevelle song—but this time, each beat makes my heart throb a little more erratically. A wave of nausea crashes into the pit of my stomach, and I rub my suddenly sweaty palms on the comforter beneath me.
“You there?” Lucas demands.
“Oh yeah,” I say, immediately interrupting whatever it is Lucas tries to say next. “And, apparently, you took the initiative to tell Wyatt which hotel he could find me at.”
My brother makes a frustrated noise. “Now, Kylie—”
But I ignore his explanations and all-around bull because I know it will do nothing but make matters worse at the moment.
“I’ll call you back.” I hang up on him before he has a chance to argue with me.
There’s no winning against my brother. There never has been, and I doubt there ever will be. Since he’s bound to call me back, I hold my thumb down on the End button until the phone powers off.
Outside my room, Wyatt knocks on my door again, just a touch more urgently than the last time.
My breath comes out in short, heavy bursts, but I will myself to calm down as I pad barefoot across the threadbare mud-brown carpet. I don’t have any other choice but to pull myself together. I fling the door open and drag my eyes up. Wyatt sags against the doorframe and exhales. That same magnetism that drew me to him over a year ago, making me tell and show him things about myself that now make me flush, is vibrating through my veins once again.
I take a hesitant step forward despite the fact I’m not wearing anything but a tank top and boy shorts.
Wyatt runs the palm of his hand over the top of his short dirty-blonde hair. “You divorced that motherfucker?” he asks in a low voice. He drags his hand down his face and shakes his head to each side before training his vivid blue eyes on me. “Please tell me Lucas wasn’t shitting me.”
Stepping aside, I silently let him in, pressing my back up against the wood paneled wall behind me. I slam the door shut once he’s inside my cramped room. Now that I’m facing him, I try to drop my gaze to the strip of carpet between us, but he tucks his finger under my chin, stopping me.
“Ky, did you really leave him?” he asks.
My hasty marriage had lasted a total of four months before Brad and I both realized how little we knew about each other—like how there was practically no love between the two of us. Wyatt stares me down expectantly, and I force out a hoarse laugh. When I grant him a begrudging nod, he lets his head fall back in relief, muttering a curse.
“Yeah, I left him,” I whisper. “Turns out he was just as toxic as you.”
Wyatt’s mouth drags down into a frown. On him, even something so sour is beautiful, and it nearly yanks my heart right out of my chest.
“Looks like I’m your toxic sequel then, huh?”
Your toxic sequel. For some messed-up reason, the description fits him to a T. “Looks like you are. What are you doing here, Wyatt?”
He takes my hands in his, massaging feather-soft circles on the backs of them with his thumbs as if the slightest touch might break me. It won’t, and I don’t miss how his eyes dip down to my wrists. Angrily, I jerk my arms away from him, crossing them over my chest.
That he would actually look makes my throat feel like it’s shrinking while my heart feels like a clamp is bearing down on it. Months ago, on the way to this very hotel, I told him that I would never cut myself again, and thoughts to do so haven’t crossed my mind since, not even when shit hit the fan with my ex.
“Now that you’ve seen for yourself that I can actually follow through on my promises, will you please get the hell out of my room?”
Wyatt groans, taking a step toward me. I move away from him until the backs of my legs hit the bed, but he places his hands firmly on the slope of my hips, wraps his arms around me, and clutches me to him.
“I never doubted you, Ky.”
“Don’t lie to me,” I say, my breath hitching on the word lie. “You can do anything else, but don’t lie to me.”
“Fine.” He bends slightly, so his mouth grazes my ear, and as he speaks, the piercing in his lip rubs against the tiny sterling hoop in my cartilage. “I came here because Lucas wants me to bring you back to Atlanta.” As he says this, his hands skim around to the front of my panties. “I came here because I know exactly why you left Brad in the first place.”
He starts to slide down my panties, but I close my hands around his wrists. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” I demand, my nostrils flaring. “I’m not sure if you remember, but I’m not one of your groupies. And it’s really cocky to assume I left my husband because of you. We haven’t spoken since before I got married, babe.”
“Far from a groupie.” A sexy smile crawls across his face. “I’d never tell any groupies that staying away from them has been hell. I’d never tell them that I’m not leaving, no matter how much they order me to—I wouldn’t give a fuck about what they thought. But with you, Ky ... well, you know how that goes.”
He dips his head, bringing his lips close enough to my face for me to feel his warm breath against the corner of my mouth. I suck in a gasp of air through my nose, but he stops me before I can release it, crushing his lips against mine. Even though the kiss is short, it’s anything but sweet. It’s possessive and rough. Hungry and painful and even a little mind-altering.
But it sure as hell isn’t sweet.
Wyatt pulls back, his chest rising and falling heavily. “As for you and Brad, don’t try to pull that bullshit on me, beautiful. We could go years without saying a word, and we’d still manage to fuck with each other’s head. So, no, I’m not leaving you.”
“What if I make you?” I ask, despite how the pit of my stomach curls into a mass of knots and tangles. God, it hurts. I let go of his wrists and move my hand up to trace my fingertips along his square jawline, shivering at the contrast between his faint stubble and my soft skin. “What if I don’t want you here?”
“None of that what-if shit, Ky,” he says roughly, pushing me back onto the bed.
As I slide backward toward the pillows, he follows, opening my legs in the process.
“If you wanted me gone, you wouldn’t have let me in. You knew it was me before you even opened that door.”
By the time the back of my head bangs up against the faded headboard, my heart is beating as erratically as it did that first night with him. He stops in front of me, his muscular body positioned between my thighs.
“What if I ask you to leave afterward?” I demand.
My fingers tremble as I drag his white T-shirt over his head. He takes it from between my hands and tosses it off the bed, where it hits the curtain before falling to the dirty carpet.
“You want to ask me to leave?” He lowers his head, so we’re nose-to-nose. While his thumb strokes my collarbone, he glides the rough pad of his index finger underneath the strap of my striped top.
“Maybe.”
“Then, you can go back to Atlanta and forget this ever happened.”
I consider his words for a moment, and then I shake my head. I don’t want to forget. “I can’t do that,” I say aloud.
He already knows I can’t, or he wouldn’t have come here to begin with.
He pulls my strap all the way down and sighs heavily when my breasts push up over the fabric. He pauses once, and that’s only to make me a promise. “Then, you go back to Atlanta with me.”
***
It’s not until late, right before we fall asleep with our arms and legs entwined, when I ask him the single question that’s been burning in my mind since the last time we spoke. “What’s her name, Wyatt?”
“Who?”
“Please don’t be stupid. You know who and what I’m talking about.” I can’t bring myself to say it out loud yet because it still burns a hole into the deepest part of my chest.
He brushes strands of inky hair out of my face. “Brenna.”
I roll out of his arms and onto my back, squeezing my eyes tight so the tears don’t fall. “I don’t want to ruin things for you.”
“You won’t. When I’m with you...”
He doesn’t have to finish because I know where he’s going. I know how he feels because it’s the reason I came to this hotel of all places. It’s the reason that I let him stay with me tonight. When I’m with Wyatt, I lose myself.
“Do you think we’ll be able to fix each other?” I ask.
The bed squeaks as he rolls over. When I open my eyes, he’s propped up on his elbow, staring down at my chest. He touches the blackbird tattoo that’s a few inches above my left breast, running his finger over it. “What’s it for?”
“Changing the subject?”
“Just until you tell me what the fuck it’s for.”
“You let me down, and I wanted something to remind myself that I shouldn’t be that weak, that I should be careful.”
Releasing a low groan, he drags his palm up and down his face before gazing down into my chocolate brown eyes. He takes me in for a long time, and I meet his gaze, studying the way his Adam’s apple bulges angrily in his throat each time he swallows hard.
“Why do you have to say shit like that?” he demands at last.
“Because I promised you last year that I’d be honest with you. If you want, I can lie to you if that’s what makes you feel better.”
As he shakes his head, I race my tongue over my lips.
“Now, it’s your turn. What’s going to happen to us?” I ask.
He kisses the blackbird and slips his fingers into mine. He frowns when his gaze lands on my other tattoo, the one of my ex’s last name encircling my ring finger. I got it as an act of defiance the day after I married Brad. Now, I regret it like hell.
“First, you’re going to get this fucking thing covered,” Wyatt growls. When I nod, he continues, “And no more blackbird tattoos. Fuck, get a bluebird or something because we’re going to try again, and we’ll get it right this time.”
I bob my head once more because I’m hopeful. I’m so in love with this man that I’ll try a million times to make things work. “Okay,” I whisper, “I’m in.”
