Cutter
I want Megan back more than anything in the world.
Well, more than anything except to tour with the band until I’m old and gray and for my dick to keep rocking equally as hard from this day until my last.
But right now, standing in the near-darkness at the end of my dad’s drive, while the chill of a spring morning creeps into my bones and my balls protest my too-thin choice of running pants, I would trade a year of reliably firm boners to be back in bed.
I didn’t get to sleep until well after midnight. I’m a night owl—always have been—and my circadian rhythms don’t give a shit that I promised I’d go running with the early birds this morning. The late night, combined with the early wake-up call yesterday, leaves me feeling hungover, even though I didn’t drink a drop, and my eyes refuse to open past the “pissed-off squint” position.
Which is perfect. I’m already prepared when Theo swings around the corner in her Jetta and blasts me with her bright lights.
I lift a hand, blocking some of the glare as I stare daggers toward the driver’s seat.
The lights flip off, and a moment later Theo’s hisses softly, “Sorry. I didn’t realize they were on bright. I’m still asleep. Get in.”
Grumbling under my breath, I shuffle around to the passenger’s side and slump into the seat.
“Good morning,” Theo says, her voice rough. “You look like shit.”
I growl in response as I lean the seat back and close my eyes.
“I mean, you’re still a unicorn, because you’re always a unicorn, but you look rough. Are you still drunk?”
“No,” I murmur. “I didn’t drink last night. I’m just exhausted. It’s too early to be alive.”
“Agreed.” She sighs as she shifts the car into reverse and backs out onto the silent street. “I can’t remember the last time I was up this early. Probably high school.”
“I hated high school.”
“I know this about you.”
“I hate people knowing things about me.”
She hums. “Yes, I know that, too. You also hate running and scrambled eggs and people who think horoscopes are real.”
“Horoscopes are stupid. The arrangement of random astronomical bodies in space at the moment of your birth has no fucking impact on who you are as a person.”
She laughs. “Yeah. I’ve heard the song. I like it. One of your best, I think.”
“Thanks.” I sniff, creaking my head to the left to watch her steer us out onto the main road leading to the marina district. “How did you know I hate scrambled eggs?”
“Kirby used to make them for dinner all the time when we were all hanging out at her place while you guys practiced in the basement. You made horrible gagging sounds the entire time the rest of us were trying to eat. It was gross.”
I grin. “But it worked. She stopped making eggs and switched to mac and cheese.”
“She did,” Theo agrees, lifting a hand to cover her mouth as she yawns.
“Why didn’t you ever cook for the crew?” I ask. “You worked at your parents’ restaurant, right? You probably knew a thing or two about food.”
“I knew more than a thing or two,” she says, “but I don’t cook for free. Or for ungrateful wretches like teenage Cutter Comstock.”
I grunt. “Yeah. He was an ungrateful dickhead.” I reach over, nudging her knee with my knuckle. “Sorry again. For being a dick in high school. As I said before, that was more about feeling like shit about myself than wanting to heap shit on anyone else.”
“Yeah, I know,” she says, her voice trailing up at the end doubtfully.
“You don’t believe me?”
“No, I do. I just…” She glances my way before returning her attention to the road. “I just don’t know why you felt that way. I mean, you were this gorgeous, popular guy in a super cool band. Every girl in school wanted to date you, and every guy in school wanted to be you. I know you and your dad didn’t always see eye to eye, but from the outside looking in, it doesn’t seem like you had it so bad.”
“I didn’t. Not compared to people with real problems.” I shrug. “But having your mom run off the day after you’re born because she decided having a kid was lame and then having your dad act like your dreams are stupid dreams, even though they’re the same dreams he had when he was a kid, isn’t necessarily easy.”
Her brow furrows. “I didn’t think of it that way. But yeah, you must have felt unsupported at home.”
“Unwanted is more like it.” The words spill out through some early-morning crack in my defenses. I try to play it off with a laugh, but Theo is already reaching out to take my hand. Her fingers are fucking freezing, as usual, and I can’t resist tucking them between mine and doing my best to warm them up.
“I’m sorry,” she says. “My parents didn’t always understand where I was coming from, but they always supported me and made me feel loved and special. I’m sorry you didn’t have that. You deserved it.”
“Nah, I was a little shit.” My throat goes tight. “I didn’t make it easy for my dad. And he was raising me alone, working two jobs and bone-tired all the time. I can’t blame him for wanting me to go to college, get a normal job, and spare myself the fallout when my dream went belly-up.”
“Yes, but there’s a way to express that while still making sure your kid feels loved and accepted for who they are. I’m sure your dad did the best he could, but that doesn’t mean it was enough. And it’s okay that you were hurt by that, and that it’s taken time to heal.”
I try to swallow, but it feels like someone’s shoved a grapefruit down my throat. “I hate this, too.”
“Feelings?”
“Feelings with friends. I like my feelings alone, straight up, no chaser.”
She squeezes my hand again. “So we’re friends for real now?”
“I hope so,” I say, that breach in my defenses still allowing too-honest answers to slip out. “Contrary to what some might think, I don’t enjoy being disliked. Especially by decent people.”
“Being decent isn’t really enough to base a friendship on,” she says, her lips curving as she sneaks another glance my way, her face glowing in the first rays of sun creeping over the horizon. “If you want to be friends, I’m thinking it’s because you actually like me.”
A huff of laughter escapes my chest. “I guess I do. A little. More than scrambled eggs anyway.”
“Or running early in the morning. Or sharing your feelings.”
“Way more than either of those things.”
She releases my hand with a final squeeze and a dimple-popping smile. “Good. I like you more than those things, too. And I would like to be your friend. Fighting with people is exhausting, and I don’t have much energy to spare these days.”
“You should take some time off.”
“I should,” she says with a sigh. “I have two weeks of leave saved up, but I can’t shake the feeling that if I take more than two or three days off in a row, Gene will have replaced me by the time I get back.”
“Then you should take three days.”
Her throat vibrates with an uncertain sound.
“Seriously. You have to sharpen the saw every once in a while, or you’ll burn out,” I say as she pulls into the lot across from the marina where we usually park our tour buses in two rented spots while we’re in town. But since we’ll be flying to our dates for the next four months, Shep arranged space for the buses at his parents’ friends’ farm outside of town.
Their absence reminds me how little time I have to get back on Megan’s radar as a viable romantic prospect.
I pull in a breath of cool air through my nose as I climb out of the car, willing my brain to wake up. “So what’s the plan?” I stretch my neck from side to side before bracing a hand on the hood of the car and reaching back to grab the top of my foot for a quad stretch. It’s been so long since I did anything for exercise but lift weights or shoot hoops with the roadies I’m likely to pull every muscle in
my body on this run if I’m not careful.
“I don’t know.” Theo circles around to join me, mirroring my stretch position. “I figured that was your territory. I’m just going to run and try to look super into you while I do it.” Her nose wrinkles. “Though I confess it might not be easy.”
“Looking super into me?”
She laughs. “Nah, the other part. Running usually makes me feel like I want to throw up.”
I grimace. “Me, too.”
“And sometimes, I…actually throw up,” she adds as we change legs.
I snort. “Yeah, me, too. We’re screwed, aren’t we?”
She grins. “You know what they say, the couple that barfs together, stays together.”
“Because they’re so gross no one else wants to be around them?”
“Exactly.” She releases her foot with a laugh, shaking her arms and legs. “What other stretches should we do? Calves?”
Theo keeps talking, saying something about shin splints, but at that moment, my gaze drifts to a golden halo bobbing across the parking lot, headed our way.
I’d know that shine anywhere. Megan gives off her own light. She glows like an angel, but I was too stupid to appreciate it the first time we were together. I was a fucking idiot who thought women that beautiful—inside and out—were easy to find. By the time I realized that I should be falling all over myself to commit to her for as long as she would have me, it was too late. She’d moved on to someone “more serious,” and I was left to wander the world, taking my comfort where I could get it.
And yes, I’ve banged some very cool girls—pretty, smart, talented women, many of whom I still consider good friends—but there’s never been anyone like Megan.
I have to show her that I’ve changed.
I have to show her that I know how to love her the way she deserves to be loved.
Acting on instinct, I grip Theo’s hip, shifting us both until she’s leaning back against her car and my hands are braced on either side of her face. Her eyes go wide, but before she can speak, I ask, “Can I kiss you like I love you? Just to see if I still remember how?”
She swallows, blinking faster, but after a moment, she nods.
Knowing Megan will be passing by any second, I lean closer, threading my fingers into Theo’s thick hair, making a gentle fist as I press my lips to hers. Her mouth is as warm as her fingers are cold, and when her lips part beneath mine, I taste a hint of mint toothpaste and a clean, mineral top note that reminds me of a Chardonnay I had in California.
I thought I hated Chardonnay, but then our manager brought a case of this organic stuff backstage after the show as a “congrats on selling out” present. One sip of that fine-ass shit changed the way I thought about white wine forever.
And I’m pretty sure Theo could change the way I think about kissing people who drive me crazy. We might not be the most compatible personality-wise, but when it comes to skin-on-skin, tongues-tangling, hands-roaming, pure, unfiltered chemistry, we’ve got it all figured out.
Her arms go around me as she moans, and my hand fists tighter in her hair. I pin her between my body and the car and deepen the kiss, trying to think about Megan and funnel everything I feel for her into the way I’m kissing the woman in my arms.
But when Theo shifts her hips, brushing against where I’m already hard, all I can think about is the night she was in my bed, when I wanted to be inside her so badly I felt like I was going to lose my mind when she fell asleep before we could finish. I’d lain awake for a solid hour after, listening to her breathe, comforted and tortured by the feel of her warm and soft in my arms, wondering if it was possible to die from blue balls.
I skim my hand up Theo’s fleece-covered waist to her ribs, cupping the bottom of her breast through her running clothes, desperate to feel her nipple going tight beneath my fingers again.
Before I can reach for the zipper on her jacket, she rips her mouth from mine and pushes me away.
“No. None of that,” she says, breath coming fast as she motions in the general direction of her chest. “Not in public. Or private.”
“Sorry.” I drag a hand through my hair. “I got a little carried away.”
“So I noticed,” she says, her cheeks pinker than they were before. “We should wait a few minutes before we head over. Give you some time to…” She points toward my hips as her eyes lift to the sky.
I reach down, shamelessly doing the necessary adjusting to make my running pants less obscene. “Nah, I’m good.”
“Well, I’m not,” she mutters, pressing her hands to her cheeks.
I smile. “So I haven’t lost my romantic kissing touch?”
“No. You’ve still got it.” Her breath rushes out. “But I don’t think you should kiss me that way in public. If Megan sees a kiss like that, she’s going to think you’re taken for good.”
I cross my arms over my chest, sniffing as I peek over my shoulder, where Megan is now calmly crossing the street without a backward glance, giving no clue as to whether she saw Theo and me together or if she even recognized me as the male half of the make-out session.
I turn back to Theo. “I don’t think so. She’ll just think I’m in love again. And then when we break up, she’ll know that’s what I’m looking for. The real thing. Like I had with her.”
Brow furrowing, Theo shifts to the right, her gaze settling on the woman behind me. When her eyes return to mine, they’ve gone cool. “So that was for Megan’s benefit?”
I shrug. “I went with my gut. That’s okay, right? You said I was in charge of the game plan.”
Theo nods stiffly. “Sure. Whatever. I mean, I personally wouldn’t enjoy seeing a guy I used to love getting that intense with another woman, but whatever you think is best. You know Megan better than I do.” She pulls an elastic from her jacket pocket and starts smoothing her hair away from her face. “So let’s go. I’ll run and pretend to be in love, and you do whatever you’re going to do. But violate rule two again, and I’m going to knee you in the nuts.”
“Understood,” I say, falling in behind her as she starts toward the group of runners gathering by the marina entrance.
“And just for the record, I also don’t understand how you can be crazy in love with Megan and still get a you-know-what for me.”
I shrug. “I don’t know. There are times when sex and feelings go together for me, but usually, I’m good with just the physical part. And you’re fine as hell, Squirt. What am I supposed to do with myself? I mean, hard-ons are going to get hard. It’s literally what they do. I’m tough, but I’m no Superman.”
She rolls her eyes. “You wear more eyeliner than I do, tough guy.”
“Which shows how tough I am. I’m not going to bow to heterosexual male gender norms. I look good in eyeliner, so I’m going to wear eyeliner and happily beat the shit out of any homophobic dick who disagrees with my freedom to rock a smoky eye.”
She harrumphs, but when I glance down at her, she’s smiling again.
“So we’re on the same page?” I ask.
“No, we’re not. Eyeliner is hard. I’ll never master the cat eye, let alone a smoky eye, no matter how hard I try.”
“Yeah, you will.” I loop my arm around her shoulders, drawing her against my side. “I’ll teach you. We’ll have a tutoring session before I leave town, get you set up with mad eyeliner skills. It just takes practice.” I drop my voice, my heart thumping hard in my chest as we cross the street, getting closer to Megan with every step. “Should I say hi first? Or wait for her to notice us?”
“I’ll say hi to my friend Shawna. She’s standing close to Megan,” Theo whispers back. “Follow behind me and notice Megan if she doesn’t notice you first.”
“Got it.” My mouth is dry, and my palms have started to sweat. The quad muscles I just stretched go wobbly as I follow Theo through the crowd, getting so close to Megan I can smell her lavender lotion, the same kind she wore years ago, which will always remind me of bonfires by the beach and Megan
freshly showered after a long day in the sun, sitting on my lap and watching the stars come out over the water.
Fuck…
I hadn’t realized seeing her for the first time in so long would make me so nervous. I don’t get nervous.
But I don’t usually care this much, either. Caring is fucking awful. This entire morning has been a shitshow of weird feelings, and now I’m passing Megan by and pretending I don’t see her when, in reality, I’m about to jump out of my skin.
I’m about to make a break for the porta potties farther down the pier—fake a bathroom emergency to avoid trying to “notice” Megan without looking like an idiot—when Theo reaches back and takes my hand. Her fingers threading through mine and the “you’ve got this” glance she shoots over her shoulder quiet the storm inside.
A beat later, I turn and meet Megan’s gaze, a surprised smile stretching easily across my face.
“Cutter! Oh my God, I didn’t realize you were in town.” She beams at me, shock and pleasure filling her sky-blue eyes. “How are you? The band? Life? Everything?”
“I’m great, and the guys, too. Shep just got married on Friday.”
Megan’s smile dims a watt or two, but her voice is warm as she says, “I heard that. I’m so happy for him. And Bridget. They’re both lovely people.”
“They are.” I want to pull her in for a hug and swear I’ll never let her piece of shit ex hurt her again. Instead, I force myself to say diplomatically, “I heard from Colette that you were in the middle of a crap-tastic divorce. I’m so sorry, Megs.”
She presses her lips together as she nods. “Thanks. I mean, I don’t think any divorce is easy, but this one has been really rough. John is fighting me every step of the way.” She sighs, forcing a smile. “But I’ve still got a beautiful little girl and my health and this gorgeous day to run in while my mom watches Beatrice, so…things could be a whole lot worse.”
“Still, you deserve better,” I say. “You deserve the best.”
Megan looks like she’s about to say something, but breaks off as Theo appears at my side, tucking herself against me. I curl my fingers around her upper arm, hugging her as I add, “Speaking of the best, this is Theodora Devi, the patient woman who puts up with me. Theo, this is Megan, the woman who used to put up with me a long time ago.”
Bang on Loosely Page 6
