by Lisa Suzanne
“You look beautiful tonight.” He smiles a little sadly as the look in his eyes seems to smooth over as quickly as it appeared. “Even more beautiful than I let myself remember.” Just as he says the words, the bathroom door swings open and his date stalks across the foyer toward him.
I don’t really know how to respond to that, and it doesn’t matter because the woman he brought here tonight approaches us. “I’m sorry again,” I say a little louder to his date. “Is there anything I can do?” The elevator doors glide open.
She eyes the drinks in my hands warily. “I think you’ve done enough.”
I press my lips together and nod, and then I step into the elevator and head back up to the roof. The doors close, and my chest feels hollow as I note the symbolism, like those doors sliding shut are really closing on my dreams.
I eye Rose’s drink in my left hand then take a long sip of the champagne in my right as I wish I had a free hand to swipe at the tear that splashed onto my cheek the second those doors closed.
CHAPTER SEVEN
By the time I get back to Rose, she’s already got another drink in her hand and she’s dancing with a group of girls we used to hang out with. I hand her the gin and tonic anyway, and she giggles as she holds up both glasses.
“Double fisting, just like high school!” she yells to me, and I laugh. She’s drunk already, and I’m only on my second glass. I really should’ve grabbed two glasses for myself, but I haven’t had champagne in a long time, so I expect it to hit me pretty fast.
I try to get my bearings back, but this whole night was so much easier before I ran into him...or, rather, ran into his date. I stare up at Gavin, and he smiles down at me. This time I’m sure that was intentional. It helps me get my mind back in the game, but then as I watch him sing, his eyes widen ever so slightly as he looks toward the bank of elevators I just got off. I turn to follow his gaze, and out steps Chase with his date. It’s dark up here, so no one will notice her wet dress...but I know it’s wet, and for some reason, a tiny sliver of vindication rushes through me.
I turn back to the stage only to find Gavin’s eyes on me. As soon as I meet his this time, though, he looks away. His hair is messy from sweat and as gross as I think sweat is, it’s really freaking hot on the man singing up on that stage.
“This is our last song,” he says, and they launch into another one I’ve heard before. “Locked Up” might be their biggest hit, now that I think of it. It’s definitely a rock song, but it’s got a vibe that makes me want to dance, and as I really listen to the words for maybe the first time as Gavin belts them out, I realize it’s a love song.
Standing there, tears in your eyes
I pretend again, but it’s all lies
I can’t be the only one
That feels the need to run
My heart is locked because of you
It’s all locked up, all locked up
And the one who holds the key
Is the one right next to me.
Stolen glances across the room
While you’re holding his hand
They make me believe
They give me reprieve
My heart is locked because of you
It’s all locked up, all locked up
And the one who holds the key
Is the one right next to me.
Whispers in the dark
Got me all locked up again
But the one who holds the key
Will never set me free.
When the song ends, the crowd goes wild—me included. Gavin grins and gives a little wave before he and the rest of the guys head off the stage and through a door presumably to clean up before joining the party.
“They’re fucking awesome live,” Rose declares. She finishes the drink in her left hand and starts up on the one in her right.
“I feel like I missed half the show.” I hold up my champagne glass, and I’m about to explain what held me up when Rose cuts me off.
“They only played seven songs. Just their six biggest hits plus one new one. I need to talk to them and get them on my vendor list. You missed the new one, but it was incredible. I can’t wait to hear it on the radio.”
She’s babbling in her excitement, and I try to inject some pragmatism into our conversation.
“You think a band as big as them is going to play weddings?” I ask, my voice full of doubt.
“For the right amount of money, a band as big as them will play anywhere.”
Reagan hops up on the stage and takes the mic. “Let’s hear it one more time for Beyond Gold!”
The crowd goes wild again. Once we simmer down, Reagan says, “Hors d’oevres will be served shortly, and the silent auction is now open along the back wall.” She points in the direction of tables I hadn’t even noticed were set up—not that it matters, really, since I won’t be bidding on anything. The food, though...that I’ll partake in.
“Come with me,” Rose says, and I follow her over toward the auction tables, something I was hoping to avoid. There are too many things there I’ll want but have no way to afford them. Even at just a quick sweep of the tables when I’m actively trying not to look, I see an all-expenses paid vacation to Hawaii, a football signed by a bunch of Broncos players with Chase Camden facing to the front, and front row tickets and backstage passes to a Beyond Gold show.
I sigh. A decade ago there was a possibility, but today none of these things could actually be mine except in my dreams.
I suppose that same statement holds true for Chase, who I spot near the bar with his gorgeous date. They’re chatting up some of the other guys who played on our state champion high school team, and I suddenly feel transported back over a decade—twelve years, really, to just before Chase and I got together and he’d taken Brittany Andrews to the Homecoming dance. I danced with Gavin all night while I wished it was Chase.
“Chase brought a date,” I say. I nod over in their direction, and Rose shakes her head. I let out a short giggle. “And I spilled our drinks all over her dress. That’s what took me so long.”
Her eyes widen. “On purpose?”
I lift a shoulder and raise a brow, but then I laugh to prove I’m just kidding. “I turned around and didn’t realize anyone was standing behind me. I was anxious to get back up here, and it just sort of happened.”
She covers her mouth with a hand as she laughs. “That’s amazing. What did Chase do?”
We pretend to look at the auction items as we talk. “He stood there and stared for a few seconds, and then he tried to help mop it up. She took off for the bathroom and he told me he was hoping he’d see me.”
She writes down a number on the trip to Hawaii. “He was hoping he’d see you?”
I shrug. “He sort of stopped me when I was getting on the elevator and he told me I looked beautiful. And then his date came back from the bathroom and that was it. I took the elevator up after the date gave me a death stare.”
Rose giggles again as she peruses a weekend getaway at a spa. She writes down a number on that one, too, and I just walk along beside her. “So now what?” she asks. She looks up at me after she sets the pen down.
“I don’t know. He’s here with a date. But you know who isn’t here with a date?”
She presses her lips together before she answers. “You.”
I nod sagely. “Yup.”
We mingle, we catch up with old friends, and we eat some hors d’oevres. So far, not a single person has asked about my family’s downfall, and when they ask what I do, I quietly tell them I’m in education and leave it at that. It’s not that I’m embarrassed to be a teacher...it’s just that a reunion is when you’re supposed to impress everyone with all your accolades over the years. Somehow I don’t think these people will understand how hard I worked to put myself through school when they’ve all had everything handed to them on silver platters their entire lives.
It’s nearly an hour after Beyond Gold left the stage that we hear a small ruckus over by the do
orway. Rose and I both turn to look in that direction, and I spot Gavin as he moves into the room. Everyone wants to catch up with him and Liam, and so the girl who was once upon a time closer to him than anyone else in this room will have to wait her turn.
I should be paying attention to the conversation I’m having with Rose and Violet, but I can’t help looking over Violet’s head at Gavin. I watch as the women in the room turn from successful, powerful, business-minded people to flirty teenagers in front of the rock stars. All four members of the band are here, and it appears that they’ve all come without dates...which apparently is an open invitation for some of my former classmates. It’s almost comical watching from across the room as they pose for photographs and women hang on them like they’re best friends when they didn’t bother to give Gavin or Liam the time of day back in high school.
Funny what a little success and a little money does to people...and not so funny what losing it all does to others.
His eyes meet mine as Reagan gives a cheesy smile for the camera, her arms tossed around both Liam and Gavin. I feel like he’s trying to tell me something just from that one gaze, but I miss whatever it is as he looks down at the camera to smile.
That smile.
God, I just can’t get over the fact that he’s all freaking man now.
A short while later, Rose and I are giggling and drinking some more when someone bumps my shoulder.
I turn to glare at the offender, but my expression immediately smooths when I see who it is. “Gavin!” I say with a big smile as I toss my arms around his neck for a hug like I always did back in high school.
But we’re not in high school anymore, and nothing proves that more than his next word: “Laney.”
I’d forgotten about his nickname for me. He was the only one who ever called me by the last two syllables of my name, and the way he says it now in one husky rasp close to my ear sends shivers down my spine.
We hug a few beats longer than old friends should, but my heart’s racing and my back’s still all tingly from hearing my name drop from his lips.
I don’t want to let go.
It feels good being back here in his arms, and it’s only now I realize how very much I’ve missed my friend. Life has certainly changed in very different and vast ways for both of us.
And his arms...they’re stronger than I remember. He is stronger than I remember, and leaner, too. He’s firm everywhere—not that he wasn’t the last time he hugged me, but this hug feels so different. So much better.
Meaningful.
Or maybe that’s just me projecting. Despite the chaos in my brain after my strange encounter with Chase, being here with Gavin after watching him perform up on that stage feels somehow like everything has fallen into place exactly as it should.
Except this is just two old friends sharing a hug of greeting. Nothing more.
I pull out of our hug first.
“It’s good to see you,” I say softly.
He grins a mega-watt smile at me that makes my tummy do this weird flip...something I’ve never felt before. I’ve felt butterflies and tingles, but a flip—well, that seems new. “You too.”
“Your songs are incredible.” I pat his chest, surprised at how firm he is there, too. “You are incredible. Watching you sing up there with your band was awesome. Truly.”
The big smile turns a little shy—something I hadn’t expected to see there based on the confident demeanor he’s projected since he walked out on that stage earlier tonight.
“Thanks,” he says, his eyes moving down to the ground.
I touch his shoulder gently, and his eyes move back to mine. “I mean it, Gav. I’m really impressed with everything you’ve accomplished.”
“Brooks!” someone yells, interrupting our moment. “We need to go.”
We both shift our gazes to the interrupter, and it’s the drummer of his band.
Gavin glances at his watch. “Shit, you’re right.”
“Delaney Lockwood,” another voice booms, and I turn around to see who’s behind me. It’s none other than Liam Ward, the lead guitarist of Beyond Gold and Gavin’s other best friend from high school. He pulls me into a hug.
Liam has aged almost as well as Gavin has. He’s all lean muscles from playing guitar, and he’s sex on legs, much like the lead singer of his band who suddenly and unexpectedly has all my attention.
Rose sidles up next to me when she sees me talking to Liam. “Hey, Liam!” she says a little overly enthusiastically, and Liam hugs her next. They get into some small talk of their own, and I distinctly remember Rose saying in the car something about how I should forget about the guy I’ve held onto for so long and go for these bad boy rock stars.
Gavin tugs on my elbow, and I turn my attention back to him. “Come to my hotel and wait for me.”
“What?” I ask stupidly. Of course my mind immediately goes to sex, because why else would a hot rock star like Gavin Brooks invite any woman back to his hotel?
He chuckles a little, and I wonder if it’s because he can read my thoughts as they appear on my face. I’ve never been particularly good at masking what I’m thinking. “We have a club appearance we need to get to, but then the hospitality suite is ours for the night. Come over for a few drinks and we can catch up. Bring Rose, too.”
I glance over at my friend for a beat. She’s laughing at something Liam just said, and I know she’d kill me if I rejected his offer.
I nod. “Okay. But bring us to the appearance, too.”
He chuckles and raises a brow. “You sure?”
“Hell yeah I’m sure!”
He grins, says something to Liam so only he can hear, and turns back to Rose and me. “Follow us,” he says.
Rose’s eyes widen, and all I can do is smile as we follow the band through the room filled with our old classmates who eye us with jealousy and wish they were in our shoes...the one way I never imagined people at this particular reunion would be looking at me tonight.
CHAPTER EIGHT
There’s a big, black SUV waiting at the curb for the band. Liam gets in first with Rose right behind him, then the two guys I haven’t been formally introduced to yet, and Gavin helps me in toward the middle row of seats before he gets in last and closes the door.
“Have you met Dane and Ollie?” he asks, nodding behind us at the third row.
I turn around. “Dane,” one of them says, holding up his hand in a wave.
“Ollie,” the other says, and he does the same thing.
“Nice to meet you,” I say with a wave. “I’m Delaney.”
Both men glance at Gavin, as does the third man squeezed into the back row with Dane and Ollie. I don’t have time to process their quick glance as the third man says, “And I’m Rob, band manager.” He holds his hand out to shake mine.
I smile at Rob, and then a man in the front passenger seat who I hadn’t even noticed yells, “I’m Tony.”
I glance at Gavin with my brows furrowed in curiosity.
“Our agent,” he says, and I nod.
“So, Laney, what have you been up to since I last saw you?” he asks quietly as he tosses a casual arm across the back of the seat. His arm isn’t quite around me, but it sort of is. A man hasn’t held my attention long enough in the last few years to warrant that little tingle that zips through my spine this close to Gavin. I realize even as a twenty-eight-year-old woman that I want his arm to be around me. An eighteen-year-old me never did...just another thing that’s changed in all the time that has passed.
It’s an automatic response when I settle into the seat just a smidgen closer to him, and now I’m close enough to smell him. He didn’t smell like this back in high school. This is a scent I would’ve remembered. It’s rich and masculine, earthy and sensual. Kind of like the man himself. It’s warm and makes me think of the ocean. I think I’ve just puzzled out a woody amber mixed with the leather of his jacket when I feel him nudge me a little.
It’s only then I realize he asked me a question
and I haven’t answered.
I clear my throat. “I put myself through school. I’m a teacher now.”
He nods slowly, like that makes sense. “I thought the medical field was what you always wanted.”
I press my lips together as I look over at him. “A teaching degree is what my means could afford me when I had to make a snap decision ten years ago.”
His eyes darken a little even in the back of a dark car as I refer to the scandal that I’d always just assumed was painful for me because I was the one directly affected by it. I never took into consideration that it could’ve been painful for someone else—like Gavin.
“I could’ve helped you, Laney,” he says softly. “Why’d you cut me out?”
I look away from him. I have to. Those blue eyes are so hauntingly beautiful and different from how I remember. All the champagne from tonight is making it hard to think...or maybe it’s Gavin. That woody amber and leather smell is distracting me from our conversation.
“Do you really want to do this now?” I ask. He’s got this appearance to make and I don’t know what that entails. Doesn’t he need to focus? Talk to the guys in his band?
“I’ve been desperate to do this for ten long years.”
My belly flips at his words.
Historically, my belly never flipped for Gavin. Not once in the fourteen years I’ve known him. But tonight...it flipped. Twice.
And that flip may have also flipped a switch in me.
Maybe Rose is right. What if it’s time to forget about Chase Camden and his stupid warm chest and his late-night whispers in my ear and his dumb date and her very wet dress? It has been ten years, after all, and ten years ago he filled my stomach with butterflies, but tonight he was with someone else.
What if it’s time to let someone new in my life?
I can’t believe I’m having these thoughts—especially not after Chase gave me a flicker of hope by telling me he was hoping to see me tonight.
I lower my voice even though the conversations all around me are too raucous for anyone to hear us. I want this conversation to be solely for us. “I was embarrassed, Gav.”
