Shaking my head, I flung my hands up. “I’m outta here.”
“Romeo, what the hell?” Bulk grabbed my arm when I stormed through the room towards the doors.
Shrugging him off, I left him staring after me as the doors slammed behind me.
I DOWNED THE whisky, motioning to the bartender for another. He nodded in reply, snatching my glass up and shoving it under the optic, refilling it with the golden liquid. I placed a tenner on the bar when he slipped it back to me.
Shaking his head, he tilted his chin towards the other end of the bar. “Paid.”
I slowly turned my face to my admirer. My heart stuttered when a dark haired guy twisted his lips in my direction. His broad chin and neck were covered in dark stubble, his deep green eyes watching me intently.
His eyes seemed to bore through me, his gaze touching every single inch of my soul as he lifted his glass and dipped his head.
Turning away, my eyes shot around the room. It was just a random bar I had found, my face unknown, my status irrelevant to the regulars that frequented the place. There were all of four people, two old men playing dominoes and a couple eating each other’s faces in a booth at the back.
I stiffened when I felt him slide onto the stool beside me. He slid another whisky in front of me, his soft eyes roaming over my face when I turned to face him. “Nick,” he introduced. I didn’t reply, just continued staring at him silently. “Forgive me if I have the wrong impression here, although I’m quite sure I don’t,” he said quietly as he took a sip of his drink.
I swallowed, trying to calm the flutter in my stomach with the way he looked at me. I picked up the fresh glass of alcohol and downed it before slipping off the stool, grabbing my jacket from the back.
“No,” I replied just as quietly, “you don’t.”
He nodded, downed his own drink and followed me out.
“WHAT DO YOU think about white?” Jen asked as she stood in front of the mirror above my fireplace, lifting strands of her hair, assessing each then letting them fall back to her shoulders.
“White?”
“Mmm,” she mused. “Or maybe blue?”
“What the fuck, Jen, you’re not eighty.”
She sighed, grimacing at herself before moving her eyes to mine as I sat on the sofa behind her. “I dunno, Zo. I’m getting old, I need to feel young again.”
I lifted a brow at her. “You’re hardly old.” I took a sip of my wine and smirked at her. “I’ve told you, let me paint you, that’ll make you feel young.” She scowled at me then sighed and sat down with a hefty flop. “What’s wrong?”
She flicked her eyes to me, shrugging dejectedly. “I hate it, Zo. All the young bits of skirt that paw him constantly. The way they look at him, thrust their perky tits at him.”
“It’s just his job, Jen. Boss would never touch, you know that.”
“I know but, I dunno, one day he might look at me and think ‘Fuck, where did Jen go, the young girl I fell in love with?’ and then…”
“Then nothing!” I scolded her. I could understand her. Being married to a member of the hottest group around must wear on a marriage. But she was married to Boss, and if I knew anything in my life, it was how much love this man had for my best friend.
“Jen!” She turned to me when I grabbed her hand. “That man waited years for you to go back to him. Years! He offed his own brother for you.” She flinched at my words. “You tell me what man does that?”
“I know. I’m just…”
I narrowed my eyes on her. My jaw dropped as I stared at her. I could read her better than I could anyone. “You’re frightened when you get fat he’ll go shag someone else.”
She swallowed and turned to look at me. A small smile crept across her face before she grinned at me.
I squealed at her, pulling her into a hug. “When are you due?”
“I don’t know yet, we only found out yesterday. There’s only you and E that know so far.”
I nodded, my arms still wrapped around her. She pulled back and gazed at me. “Now I’ve told you my news, you tell me yours.” It seemed she knew me as well as I knew her.
I gulped, tensing with how she would take my news. “You remember Samantha who trained me up as an artist.”
She nodded, her eyes watching me warily. “The Samantha who is opening a parlour in Miami?”
She knew, before I could tell her but she remained silent, waiting for me to voice what she was thinking. Nodding, I squinted at her. “She wants me.”
She hesitated, her eyes assessing me. “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”
I nodded.
“As in she wants a relationship, wants you? Or she wants you to go all the way across the world, give up your life here, uproot Jakob, dump your friends to go live in some strange place where all you know is one single person?”
“Okay,” I whispered. “I hadn’t expected that.”
She scoffed. “What that I would be concerned about you?”
“Jen…”
“No, Zo.” She shook her head, anger dominant in her features. “I… you... Christ. It’s just a long way, a big risk. What if… what if it doesn’t work? Then what?”
“Then I come home,” I answered sharply, slightly miffed at her negativity.
“Just like that?”
“Yes, Jen, just like that.”
She shook her head at me. “It’s just stupid.”
“Oh really?” I stared at her, slightly hurt. “I had at least expected you to be glad for me, to want what is best for me.”
“I do,” she snapped. “That’s why I’m not sure it’s what you need.”
“What?” I stared at her, my mouth hanging open, stunned at her attitude. “What do I need then, Jen? Because to be honest, I don’t have anything I want. I never did.” She started to say something but I cut her off. “Whatever it is I get, it’s always snatched away. Shane, my parent’s… Daniel.”
She closed her eyes, sighing quietly. “Oh, Treacle.” She pulled me against her, embracing me so hard I thought she was going to snap a bone in my back.
“I need… I need a life Jen. Jakob and me, we both deserve one.”
“I know you do,” she said softly. “But Miami?”
“What is there here? I want… need a fresh start. Somewhere I can put it… him behind me.”
“You still love him?” Romeo, or Daniel as I always called him, was a forbidden subject for us. I had erased him when he walked out of my door thirteen months ago. He had taken a piece of me with him and every time I had talked about him after, my soul missed him with an ache that physically pierced something inside me. I refused to let him hurt me anymore, so he was taboo, unmentionable.
“I dunno, Jen.” I sighed, picking up my glass of wine from the table, downing the contents in one, realising now why Jen hadn’t touched her own. “I hate him for what he did to me. For never letting me in. I never quite understood where I went wrong with him. I actually thought he loved me, and I let him in.”
My gaze roamed to the picture of Shane and me on our wedding day, sat in its place on the mantle. “After Shane died, I thought I would never feel for another man again. I didn’t want to feel for another man again. But stupidly, in good old Zoe fashion, I let him in. Allowed him to start fixing this bloody splintered thing inside me.”
Jen slipped her hand in mine, her fingers threading into mine.
“And then just as I started to heal, he broke me, all over again. I felt the loss of him as much as I did Shane. But with Daniel, it was worse. Shane didn’t choose to leave me, he had no option; he died. But obviously I was never good enough for Daniel.”
“Zoe, I don’t think it was a matter of not being good enough. I’ve never seen Romeo with anyone a second time. You. You, were the only one ever that he had any sort of relationship with.”
“I wouldn’t have called it a relationship,” I scoffed. “We fucked, occasionally and on his terms.”
“For two years, Zoe.
” She smiled at me like two years made any difference. What did it matter whether it was two years, or two weeks? If he didn’t want me then he didn’t want me, time had nothing to do with it.
“Well, whatever.” I sighed, pulling my shoulders back, refusing to talk about things that could never be changed. “This is an opportunity that’s too good to turn down.”
She relented, nodding and smiling softly. “Okay, if this is what you need, then I’m behind you.”
“You mean that?” I asked. Jen was important to me. We had helped each other through after Shane’s death, her brother and my husband had left this world leaving too big a hole in our lives, and the only way we had gotten through it was to lean on each other.
“I’m just gonna miss you.” Tears pooled in her eyes, triggering my own. “When do you go?”
“A few months yet, she’s still renovating the place.”
She nodded. “Then for three months, you do not leave my side. I need you with me. I need my fill of you before you go.” I quirked an eyebrow at her choice of words.
Rolling her eyes, she laughed and slapped my arm. “I mean it, Zo. In fact, this weekend, Bulk and Spirit are getting married.”
Shaking my head, I put up a hand to stop her. She grabbed it, pulling it back down. “I know you said you weren’t going. Well now you are. Adam will have Jakob. You need to relax, party for a change.”
“I can’t.”
Jen jumped up when the door opened and Boss walked through. He always refused to allow her to get a taxi after our drinking sessions, saying the driver’s would recognise her and kidnap her, holding her for ransom. Jen and I had laughed but in all honesty, I think he actually believed it.
“Hey.” She smiled widely, kissing him on the lips. He scooped her up, kissing her back harder before smiling over at me.
“You okay, Zo?”
I nodded, looking over the back of the sofa to him.
“Tell her she has to come to the wedding, Ethan. She’s being arsey,” Jen whined, causing me to huff.
He frowned at me. “You’re not coming?”
Shaking my head, I ignored Jen and reached across to the table, snatching up my glass. “I can’t get a babysitter. Adam’s working Saturday night.”
“Oh that’s alright.” Boss smiled at me. “Bring Jakob to ours. Melanie’s watching the twins. One more won’t make a difference to her.”
“No, honestly it’s fine.”
“No it’s not,” he growled. “You’re coming. Jen wants you there for support. She’s walking Bulk down the aisle, and if I know Jen, she’ll be shitting herself. I’m afraid as her best friend, she needs you.”
“What is this?” I snarled, “Gang up on Zoe?”
Jen smirked. “We know how you like to play, Zo. You love a gang.”
I glared at her. “Fine. If you shut up, I’ll go.”
“Sorted!” Boss declared as he scooped Jen’s coat off the hook beside the front door. “Now I need to get Jen home. The mighty little Boss is feeling down.”
Jen shook her head as I rolled my eyes. “Needs a little pick me up, does he?”
“Never needs much of one,” he grinned, waggling his eyebrows.
“Just go,” I groaned.
I smiled to myself when he planted a tender kiss to Jen’s forehead, pulling her coat round her and buttoning it up. After Kyle and his sadistic ways, she deserved to be worshipped. Boss idolised her and I was three thousand percent confident he would never stray.
My heart squeezed. Shane had never been the most romantic of men, but he had made me laugh and had loved me effortlessly. I missed that connection with a man, not just the romance, but the laughter, the conversation, the sex, hell, even the arguments. I loved Jakob with all my soul, but there was only so much conversation he would take from me before his belly rumbled and his smiles turned into grizzles and once again, I was mummy, not just a crazy lady jabbering on about nothing in particular.
They both kissed me on the cheek, then left. Leaving me once again to the loneliness night brought.
I didn’t even bother to shower. I just curled up under the cold duvet, dragging a pillow to my front to hug, then drifted off to dreams of a man I missed immensely.
“I DID!” NICK claimed with a confident smile.
I narrowed my eyes on him and laughed as I pulled my jeans back on from where he’d tore them off me beside the bed. “Nah, you’re fucking with me.”
“Honestly,” he laughed with me. “I’m not.”
Shaking my head, I pulled on my t-shirt. “You mind if I grab some painkillers before I go?”
He blinked at me, a crease appearing on his forehead. He really was good looking, all masculinity, a rough edge, amazing hands and he had been incredible in the sack. Touched all the right parts, the right amount of pressure, and his perception of what I wanted, needed, was astounding. My stomach bubbled slightly but I shook it off.
“You’re not staying?”
I shook my head. “Nah.”
“Why?” He seemed a little hurt, his throat bobbing with a heavy swallow as the green of his eyes paled slightly. “I thought we… we were okay?”
“We are, it was… yeah, fantastic, you know,” I told him honestly. “I just don’t do this.” I felt strangely awkward. I had never had a problem leaving them before, yet there was something about Nick that I liked. But I knew I would hurt him. Hence the reason why I never had a relationship with anyone. I’d nearly been there with Zoe. She could have been the one, but I knew I would have hurt her in the end. I couldn’t commit, to one person, one sex. I liked both and I knew staying faithful to one for the rest of my life would send me crazy. So I fucked them once, and made sure to never duplicate a night.
“This?” he asked, his eyes darkening, watching me as I pulled on my shoes.
“Look Nick, I’m sorry. I don’t commit. It’s just me. It’s nothing about you. You were fucking great.” I leaned over, pressing my palm against his cheek and giving him a tender smile. “I’m sorry.”
He paused, pulling his lips behind his teeth but nodded. “Sure.”
I closed my eyes as I placed a kiss on his forehead, inhaling his delicious masculine scent before I walked out of the room, refusing myself to turn back and look at his stunning torso that was on display from under the bed sheet as he sat against the headboard watching me.
“Paracetamol are in the drawer under the kettle,” he shouted as I walked down his hallway.
“Thanks!”
I found the kitchen, my eyes widening on the pristine white fixtures. Everywhere was spotlessly clean, reminding me of Bulk and his crazy OCD. Copper pans of various sizes hung from hooks above a huge range. Shelves were crammed full of spices and herbs. This man obviously liked to cook, the numerous tools kitting out his kitchen proof.
The kettle was situated on an island in the middle of the room, vast amounts of drawers and shelves underneath. Shrugging, I pulled open a few, searching for something to take away the headache that had developed now that the alcohol had evaporated from my system; probably due to the two orgasms Nick had given me. The first two drawers I searched were full of cutlery and random shit. The third drawer revealed something that had me storming back into the bedroom and flinging my fist into his face.
He scrambled off the bed, staring at me like I was crazy, his hand cradling his jaw, blood from his nose trickling over his knuckles.
I flung his journalists badge at him, my chest heaving with fury as it bounced off his bare chest, the clip on the lanyard nicking his skin slightly. Fuck! This was all I needed. No one would understand. When you’re in the public eye as much as 103 were, every single fucking detail of our lives was shared with the millions of fans out there. I’d managed to keep this a secret from both them and the guy’s for years, and now, through my own carelessness and sick need, everything was ruined.
He groaned, rubbing his face with his hands as his shoulders slumped. “It’s not what you think?”
“Fuck!”
I laughed without humour. “Really?”
“Romeo, listen…”
“Fuck you!” I spat. For some reason, I was hurt. I had liked Nick. We’d had a laugh, he’d been sensual, focussed on my pleasure. We’d talked too, both of us easy and comfortable with each other. Stupidly, I felt betrayed.
“Listen to me!” he shouted as he took a step towards me. “I didn’t sleep with you because of who you are, well not because you’re Romeo.”
“Really?”
“YES! Really.” He looked angry, his cheeks heated with blood as his green eyes glinted with deep silver flecks. “I took you to bed because I liked you, wanted you. My dick was hard as soon as you walked into that pub. I wanted you in my bed, not my newspaper!”
“Don’t bother hiding it!” I stepped into him, pointing a finger in his face. “If this appears in any fucking media, I will make sure my legal team wipe the fucking floor with you. You’ll be lucky if they wrap fucking chips in your paper after.”
“Romeo, I like you okay. I would never do that! I want to see you again for Christ’s sake!”
“What, so you could take pictures next time.” I looked around the bedroom, my eyes scanning every corner. “Or do you have a secret one somewhere?”
“Of course not!” he defended. “I’m not like that.”
“You’re a fucking journalist, of course you’re like that!”
“Well not this one. Okay!”
I snatched my arm back when his hand softly touched it. “Don’t!” I warned with an angry shake of my head. “Just don’t!”
I left him staring at me with an anguished look, shaking his head sadly as I fled from his flat.
The twat had a cheek to be angry with me. How dare he? He’d fucking done this on purpose. He’d make a killing from this. I suddenly felt sick, my career, my life; my demise flashing before my eyes.
Fuck the world, bollocks to my career, what the hell was I gonna tell the guy’s?
“BLOODY HELL,” I hissed when I lifted the huge bag of dog food from the trolley and virtually threw it into the boot, the weight of it sinking the rear of the car so much I wondered if the exhaust would drag on the way home. “Greedy shit.” Who the hell ate as much as Henry did? Whatever I fed him, and Jakob for that matter, it never seemed enough.
Finally Heaven (Room 103 Book 4) Page 2
