by S. Ann Cole
Jessica tittered and winked at me. “Devious plans.”
Tex spoke around a meaty chicken leg. “Jess, you’re a good girl, you don’t have a devious bone in your body.” He pointed the chicken leg at me. “That one, however…I’d keep my distance if I were you.”
“Tex,” I growled, irritated, “if you allude to me being evil one more time I’m gonna slap you across the face with a pancake.”
Jake choked out a laugh, while the brunette and Xavier’s blonde both gasped, as though they couldn’t believe some nobody from nowhere would have the audacity to address the great Tex Laklin so rudely.
“Oooh, I’m scared,” Tex said, waggling his fingers like a ghost and widening his eyes.
I couldn’t understand what the dude’s problem was. Ever since that night out on the balcony, he has developed a strong aversion to me for whatever reason.
“Oh my God,” murmured Jessica through a quiet laugh, “I’ve known you for less than an hour and I already love you.”
Without thinking, my eyes flick across to the Davian. He was glancing somewhat worriedly between me and Jessica, as if trying to understand what the hell was happening.
But I had no problem being Jessica’s buddy. You don’t always have to hate someone to screw them over. In fact, half the time, the people we screw over are the ones we actually do care about.
From the corner of my eye, I noticed Xena leaned forward and looked down the table to see who I was looking at. Xena looked from me to Davian and then Jessica. With a slight crease between her brows, she straightened her posture and peered at her brother, who was looking at no one but his macaroni pie, shoving forkful after forkful in his mouth in quick succession.
Xena could watch and assume all she wanted, I wasn’t intimidated.
Davian looked away first, firing up a hushed conversation with his soon-to-be father-in-law, who was ignoring the entire table and stuffing his face much like Xavier. This prompted me to look down at my own plate, realizing I was the only one not eating.
Reaching for a bowl of green salad, I dug in like everyone else.
Dinner progressed in the fashion one would expect a table of boorish, immoral, dissolute men would: loud, raucous, crude jokes through full mouths, unapologetic belches, lots of “perfect tits” and “sweet piece of ass” tossed around, lots of empty threats and bets thrown at each other.
I tried to ignore Jessica and Davian’s feet-loving under the table, and their open flirtatious glances to each above the table.
Davian’s neck was stiff as he showed off with his new fiancée, which told me he was straining to avoid my glare.
I kept transferring said glare from him to Xavier, who had eaten to his content and was now staring off at nothing while his blonde chatted animatedly with Xena.
I wasn’t sure who I was madder at: Xavier, for moving on so fast from me to that fame-hungry opportunist, or Davian, for shamelessly flirting with Jessica right in front of me.
“…was so like that shocking and disappointed feeling I got when I found out Ezra was A.” This was the blonde speaking to Xena.
Hating the grating, nasal sound of her voice, I leaned forward and glowered down the table at her, butting into her conversation. “Ezra wasn’t A.”
As she started to respond, Jessica backed me up. “Ezra was just a reporter writing a true crime story on Alison.”
“I know, I wasn—”
“Yeah, it was that Shauna chick, wasn’t it?” This was from Jake.
“Nope,” Zach piped in. “Alison. Alison is A!”
Everyone paused and looked to Zach and Jake.
“Told y’all Ice Steamers are a bunch of fags,” said Mark, Ninety Miles’ drummer. “Grown ass, bad ass, clit-sucking rock stars don’t watch flicks like Pretty Little Liars.”
Davian smirked and raised a brow at Mark. “How do you know ‘Pretty Little Liars’ is the name of the flick they’re discussing?”
When all eyes turned to Mark now, his face went beet-red, his eyes darting to his band members who were watching him expectantly. He cracked under the pressure. “Alright, alright, I watch it, too, okay! But only to see Hanna. Chick gets me rock hard every time. Dying for a hook-up with that ass.”
“I knowwww!” Jake jumped in. “She got that porn-star look down pat, man. Whenever she’s on screen all I see is my big cock sliding into that pretty little mou—”
“Okay, this is where the grown-ups leave,” said Benny. His chair made a loud screech as he got up and addressed his daughter with a smile that said she meant the world to him. “Leftovers. Sending my assistant over for mine later. Yeah?” To the bands, “Boys, meeting in two hours at Guest Rest.”
And then he bounced out with his date. Quite an odd pair. One fat and round, one skinny and straight as a stick. A ball and bat.
As the men fired up again, and Jessica and Davian continued their foot-loving under the table, I decided it was time I ditched this feast, too.
I was about announce this to the table, but paused when I noticed Xavier pushed his chair back and stood, his height and looks slaying me.
If he was leaving, then I would wait for a few minutes after he was gone before I left.
Apparently, he was wasn’t leaving.
My heartbeat kicked into high gear when my peripheral vision caught him rounding the table and heading in my direction.
Pretending not to notice this, I plucked my phone from my purse and feigned texting. Maybe he was just coming to this side to get a corn-on-the-cob or something, considering it was the least touched food on the table and was all the way down on this side.
I was scrolling through old messages on Whatsapp when I felt the arresting weight of his presence behind me, and then a big warm palm on my shoulder, sending heat, searing heat, through me.
Forcing himself between my chair and Jake’s, he rumbled, “Can we talk?”
Squeezing my quivering thighs together, I donned a bored expression as I dragged my attention from the phone screen, and transferred it to his achingly beautiful face. “No.”
“No” wasn’t acceptable, apparently, because he knocked a gasp out of me when he dragged my chair with a loud scrape across the floor tiles, silencing everyone at the table.
Shooting up from the chair, I fisted my hands and glared up at him. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?!”
He merely shrugged, as if dragging my chair out and creating a scene was no big deal. “Need to talk, Chino. Losing my mind.”
“You’re really going to do this right now? Right here? In front of everyone?”
“Other people here?” He glanced around with a frown. “Never noticed. Only face I’ve seen since I walked through that door is yours.”
Was he drunk?
I pointed to his blonde who was gaping at us. “You came here with her! You forgot that?”
Xavier’s hands went up, palms forward, like I had him at gunpoint. “Didn’t. Didn’t come here with that chick.”
“I saw you last night with—”
“Night didn’t end how you think it did. Felt like an asshole when I saw you, so I didn’t stab her. Went straight home instead.”
Well, how to respond to that? On the one hand, I was overjoyed he didn’t sleep with blondie, but I was also pissed he kissed her. And I was doubly pissed about Jessica and Davian’s under-the-table flirting.
I had a lot of pent-up anger in me at the moment and no idea what to do with it, so without thinking, I opened my palm and slapped him across the face.
The sound echoed in the stunned silence of the room, detonating as loud and rattling as a bomb.
Xavier’s jaw clenched, and I wondered what he would do. In the next second, he was reeling me in with a hand to the nape of my neck and smashing his mouth brutally down on mine, unleashing his rage in a series of tongue lashes.
We were both panting when he ferociously ripped his lips away from mine, but that didn’t stop me fr
om slapping him across the face again, harder this time, even though my palm was already on fire.
“Jesus H. Christ,” someone muttered.
“You do not break up with me again!” I shrieked in Xavier’s face. “Ever!”
“Chino,” he growled, thrice as exasperatingly frustrated as I was. Then our mouths were fused again, and we were all but tearing each other’s hair out.
“This film is rated X,” someone else said. “If anyone here is under the age of eighteen, please quietly leave the room.”
“Shit’s our luck that popcorn’s the only thing not on the table,” another said.
For me and Xavier, there was no one else in the room. In that moment, I knew exactly who I went to the dinner for, and I knew exactly who had my blood boiling with rage more. The fact that he could break me down like that in front of an audience…
When our lips broke free, I tried to slap him again, but he caught my hand mid-air. “Nuh-uh, Chino.”
Bending at the waist, he grabbed me around my middle and tossed me over his shoulder like a bedtime pillow. “Gonna make you pay for the first two. Right now.”
My protests to his rear were ignored as he began marching out with me. Beating his back was futile.
I gave up fighting and managed to peek through my hair spilling down, as the claw clip had gotten lost somewhere during our mouth war and hair pulling.
Everyone was gawking at us, amused.
Except Davian. He was gripping a fork in his hand, watching Jessica across the table with a suspicious glare.
Jessica, who was staring at us, not amused, but…something else. Because her face, strangely enough, was as white as a ghost.
I was sated. I was floating. I was hot—no, I was warm.
I was safe. I was smiling. I was asleep—no, I was awake.
The mellifluous sound of adept fingers strumming guitar strings wafted around our white room.
I was lying naked on my stomach, and along my bare posterior, Xavier had laid out his old, battered guitar from the wall. He, too, was nude, propped up on his side, arched over me like a hook, as he strummed the guitar on my back. The peaceful silence between us sweeter than the tranquilizing melody he played.
Considering our last hour and a half, this moment of quietude could be considered the calm after the storm. We’d been so mad at each other that our make-up sex ended up being long, abusive, and punitive.
Like he’d promised, he made me pay for those face slaps.
I had bite marks on my inner thighs—which I hoped as hell would be gone by tomorrow for my next shoot—and Xavier had red welts on his face and fingernail scrapes down his back.
We were good again, and I was content. I didn’t have Davian, but Xavier would fill the gap for now.
“That tat on your wrist mean something?” came that deep, luxurious voice. “Been meaning to ask.”
The hairs on the back of my neck rose, and just like that, the placidity was shattered. Instinctively, I flipped my wrist downward to hide the ink there.
On my inner left wrist was an infinity sign that had two small, red hearts inside each loop. Sometimes I wore wide bracelets to hide it, and sometimes I forgot it was there. It definitely meant something, but that’s a something I couldn’t share with the hot, naked rocker beside me.
“Did I say you could talk?”
The strumming continued, even as I felt a shift, then his lips on my shoulder. “Don’t forget the size of my cock, Chino.”
“So, you’re saying because your dick’s monstrous it automatically makes you the boss?”
“C’mon, babe,” he said, licking his tongue across my shoulder blade, “you know the answer to that.”
Eyes closed, cheek pressed to a fresh white pillow, I smiled. “You’re unbearably hot when you’re quiet, but excruciatingly annoying when you open your mouth.”
He abruptly stopped strumming and removed the guitar from my back, setting it aside. And my eyes flew open when I felt his full weight on me. This big, weighty ass man stretched out his entire body along mine.
“Bastard!” I shrieked through a giggle.
He channeled my hair to one side so he could nibble on my earlobe. “How you like me now?”
“I just schooled your dick like a boss, Xavi. Your weight is child’s play,” I boasted, relaxing and letting his body mold itself against mine.
“Let’s see how long that lasts,” he mumbled. “Now, about the tat?”
“My son,” I lied.
He was silent for a minute, then, “You had the tat artist design that specifically for you, or did you pick it from his books?”
“The artist designed it. Why?”
“Swore I saw said tat somewhere before. Can’t quite remember where.”
I tried to think about tropical beaches and lazy sex to keep my heart calm, because Xavier was right on top of me, and if I stiffened he would feel it. And if my heart-rate suddenly tripped into irregular patterns, he would feel it. He would know I was lying, know I was hiding something.
“Guess the artist ripped off my design.”
He flexed his hips from side to side, and the awareness of his dick hardening against the split of my ass had my stomach curling with desire, my core pulsing, thirsty for a second round.
“Wanna meet your son, Chino.”
“Xavi…” This came out as a moan even though it wasn’t meant to. “I thought we discussed this already?”
“Not saying I wanna swoop in and be the kid’s dad, alright? Just…just feels like I have a jumble of disconnected fragments of you, and no matter how I try to piece them together, nothing fits, ‘cause all I have are lies and half-truths. Need all the pieces. Need all of you.”
He pressed a soft kiss to my neck, and when I sighed it hurt, like there were splinters in my heart. Every breath hurt.
“Give me the main piece of the puzzle, Chino. Let me in.”
I didn’t understand it. Why did he still want me if he knew all I did was lie to him? Did he care about me that much or was he a masochist? Maybe he saw me as a challenge, or a project, something to occupy his free time?
“I’m just not ready to let anyone into Jacob’s life yet, Xavi.” I tried to push up but he pressed me back down to the mattress. “What do you even care about a kid, anyway? You’re a twenty-nine year old rock star for crying out loud.”
“Care about Jacob ‘cause he’s an extension of you.”
“And,” I went on, ignoring his words, “it’s not like I have all the pieces to your life either. I’ve only met your sister and your uncouth band-mates. Let’s slow this down a little. Yes?”
Hot lips were at my ear now, breathing sexual heat all the way down to my toes. “You might’ve forgotten all those conversations we’ve had during those six months of text-dating, but I haven’t, ‘cause it’s brought me through a rough patch. Not mad you don’t remember all I’ve told you about the Xanders. And even though this shit isn’t something I like talking about, gonna take the time to tell you again, ‘cause, one: enjoy talking in your ear like this while sniffing your berry-scented hair, and two, ‘cause I want more of you.”
Expelling a breath, he began, “Mom was a French musician. Dad was her Californian producer. They fell in love, Dad migrated to France, they got married and had me and my twin brother, Xhett, who fell from a jungle gym and broke his neck when we were five. Xhett’s death took a toll on Mom, even more so because she was pregnant with Xena, so she quit music, sold our home in Brittany, and we all moved to California.
“Dozen years after that, Mom swore Xhett was visiting her. We’d often hear her talking to herself, and when we questioned who she was talking to, she’d look at us like we were crazy and say, ‘Xhett. He’s right here. Can’t you see him?’ Till one day, Dad went home and found her in the bathroom with both her wrists slit. Bled to death…”
His voice broke here, and he cleared his throat and tried to play it off, but I knew he w
as hurting. I felt bad that I’d caused him to dredge up such horrific memories. I hadn’t known. I didn’t remember talking about any of this with him. Was I that awful of a person? Who forgets something as heartbreaking as this?
“She left a note: ‘I’m going to meet Xhett. You all should come, too.’”
“Oh, Xav—”
“Mom’s death was too much for Dad,” he cut me off, refusing the sympathy. “She was his lifeline. So when she died, he checked out. By this time Ninety Miles was in the stars, fame and money, but I was barely holding it together. Checked Dad into a mental facility. Took a year before he started showing signs of betterment. When he was released, I got back a nostalgic man. It’s like during his insanity, his mind catapulted him back to when he first met Mom, and he decided to stay there. Dad found sanity in the past, ‘cause nothing in the present made sense to him.”
Deep sigh. “Told me he wanted to move back to France, to our old home. So I went there, bought our old house back, gave him whatever he wanted. Still do. Sis and I try to visit him as often as we can, but our lives are on the road.”
“Xavi,” I whispered, trying to peek over my shoulder at him. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
“You said that,” he said, voice tight. “Remember? First time I spilled my guts and told you all this?”
His ire was justifiable, and there wasn’t a thing I could say or do to vindicate my utter and complete selfishness, so I chose to tiptoe around it.
“The man with the guitar in the picture on your dresser, is he your grandfather?”
The sigh that left him was long and relenting; as though he’d been coiled up for another fight with me and my unexpected deviation exhausted him. “Great grand. Used to have a blues bar that was the shit back in his day. The guitar was his. Passed it and the bar down to my grandfather, and my grandfather passed them on to my father, who passed them on to me.”
“You have a blues bar?” I asked through a giggle.
Xavier’s hips began moving again, as his hand worked its way between my pelvis and the mattress, and moved down to the split between my thighs. “Uh-huh. Hasn’t been open since Granddad, of course, ‘cause Dad was all about Mom and France. But now that we’re taking a break from touring, been thinking about remodeling and putting up the ‘Open’ sign.”
