Where Lightning Strikes (Bleeding Stars #3)

by A. L. Jackson

  He feigned a gasp and a heart stab with a slow, agonizing death as he dropped to his knees.

  On all things holy, it had to be Ash who was the nut job and not the girl.

  Giggling, Shea ran her hand over her belly that seemed to have doubled in size since the wedding. Baz set his hand protectively over hers.

  Tamar had her attention on Shea, focused on the two-intertwined hands on her belly. She smiled their way. It was soft, sweet Blue that shined through in her expression while I was doing my best to look away.

  It wasn’t like I didn’t like kids. I fucking loved Kallie, that sweet little girl who tagged around at our heels like we were the coolest things in the world.

  She was always telling me wild stories about butterflies and fairies and all things unattainable, her tales always chasing after that absurd happily ever after. The kind she hadn’t been around long enough to know not a whole lot of people ever found. Funny thing, I didn’t mind listening. Maybe it was because she reminded me of my little niece.

  But there was something about Shea’s protruding belly that left me feeling cagey. Itchy and agitated whenever she was around. Still, I’d gone and gotten stupid and gave her that damned bear like doing it could possibly be a good idea.

  But this was Baz’s baby we were talking about.

  And Baz deserved it.

  He deserved it all.

  I attempted to shake off the thoughts. That was one rabbit hole I didn’t need to fall down, even though lately Blue had seemed intent to drag me into it.

  Instead, I tried to relax and stretched my legs out on either side of her. She wound her arm around my leg and pressed her head to the inside of my thigh. She shifted her head back and looked at me upside down.

  Those big, blue angel eyes were wide and playful, and she whispered so only I could hear. “For the record, your friends are crazy.” She pointed at Ash. “That one…bat-shit.”

  With the way she was looking at me? Everything inside went haywire. All abuzz and alive and excited.

  Fuck.

  I liked her.

  “But you love them,” I countered, one corner of my mouth lifting.

  Everything about her softened. “Yeah. I do.”

  I touched her face and she sighed a breathy sigh, and my dick twitched again. Fuck, maybe it was me who was twisted. Because I wanted this girl in a way that just wasn’t right.

  “I’ll match that, Zee,” Shea said, still messing with my crew. “Two hundred bucks says Ash is going to be painting all the upstairs bedrooms pink and blue.”

  “You’re on,” Zee shot back.

  Tamar’s smile was soft and hinting at things I didn’t want to see. At things I couldn’t give, and again I was wondering just what the fuck I’d gotten myself into and how the hell I was going to get out of it.

  Still, I got stuck there, in that warmth of those wells of blue, trapped by the body of a red-headed enchantress.

  Temptation.

  I felt it in my gut and trembling around my blackened heart.

  I looked away, to the ground.

  Loyalty.

  That was the one thing I had. The one thing I got to count as good. I had to cling to that.

  My phone buzzed in my pocket. Three times in quick succession.

  Blowing out a breath, I dug it out and swiped across the screen. I tried to hide the irritation I felt flash across my face.

  Motherfucker.

  I told this asshole not to bother me again. Appeared he didn’t get the message.

  I scrolled through his texts.

  Have you thought any more about our offer?

  Have it on good word your boy Stone is about to split.

  Don’t let this opportunity pass you by.

  What the hell? This guy had to have been a used car salesman in a former life.

  And it didn’t matter what he had to say. What he threatened Baz might do. Still, I felt it in the knots that suddenly tied my insides, this thick band of defensiveness for my crew all mixed up with a dangling thread of dread.

  With a dry chuckle, I tapped out an answer.

  Fuck off.

  That was about as clear as I could be.

  “Care to let us in on the joke?” Ash asked.

  Probably should have before. In private with just the guys. But I guess now was as good a time as any.

  “Joke is, this bastard Banik…the manager of Tokens of Time?” I said it like a question, talking while I looked down at my phone and pressed send. “He somehow thinks I’m gonna up and leave Sunder and pick up for their piece-of-shit lead who left the rest of the band high and dry.”

  Funny they were basically asking me to do the same.

  Silence fell over the entire living room. Tension whipped through and filled up the old walls, a dense cloud of it sagging from the ceiling, making it hard to breathe.

  Guess I really should have said something earlier. Their shock was palpable.

  Stagnant.

  As if any of them could think for even a second I could walk away.

  Confusion and anger pulled tight across Ash’s face. “And why the fuck does he think you’d go and do something like that?”

  Warily, I looked around the room, gauging how much to say. Sebastian was on the couch, still as stone, like he was preparing himself for what I was getting ready to say.

  I gestured to him with my chin. “Banik seems to think Baz isn’t going to stick around all that long, and I might as well cut my losses before Sunder goes south.”

  And maybe it was fucked up, because I was staring Baz down while I said it, searching for his reaction, just waiting for which way this was going to play out. Wondering how I was going to feel.

  Because I was willing to let him go.

  I wouldn’t even put up a fight.

  Maybe it was more of that selfishness. The need to pay off a little part of my debt. Or maybe it was because I cared enough that I actually wanted him happy. Part of me wanted him to make a break for it because I’d been feeling him needing to cut ties for a long damned time.

  Why wouldn’t he when he had something so damned good?

  Baz shook his head. “Asshole has not a clue what he’s talking about.” His gaze bounced between Zee and Ash and me. “Any of you really think I’d up and leave without warning? Without talking this through? We’ve been through too much shit together for that to ever happen. Banik is full of shit. Anything he’s trying to lure Lyrik away with is nothin’ but assumption.”

  My eyes flicked between him and Shea and her belly, and the words were tumbling out before I could stop them. “Baz, man, you know we’ve got your back. Whatever you decide. None of us are going to blame you for leaving, because songs aren’t ever going to be as important as family. We owe you that.”

  Five years ago, I’d promised him I’d be there while he was in jail. I’d promised I’d take care of the band in his place. Watch over his brother. Make sure everything didn’t fall apart when he’d sacrificed and gave me the one moment I wasn’t ever supposed to have.

  I’d do it again. And I’d keep doing it.

  Still, admitting it out loud felt like I was stabbing myself in my own damned back.

  I shouldn’t have been offering it right then, anyway. Not with an audience. Not with Shea. Least of all with Blue.

  She’d shifted, facing me more. I felt pinned beneath her stare. Beneath all the questions and concern and outright confusion pouring from her. I felt trapped with the way it felt like she were digging her fingers into my skin, sinking in and going deeper.

  Invading.

  Intruding.

  Penetrating.

  Fuck.

  The entire room jumped when a beer bottle slammed against the wall. It shattered the silence. Shards of glass rained down and pinged across the hardwood floor. My attention flew to Ash who glared down at me from the middle of the room.

  Anger.

  Disappointment.

  Sympathy.

  I sucked in a steeling breath.<
br />
  It was the last I hated most.

  I’d dug my own fucking grave.

  “What the fuck, man?” he accused, head cocking to the side in contention. “You get to make that decision for the whole band? You made it before, remember? You just fucking walked away and look where that got you.”

  I was on my feet before I processed the action. Anger rippled through me on roaring waves, and I was fucking shaking, trying to hold myself back. Bitterness fell sharp from my tongue. “I came back, and look where that got me. It wasn’t the leaving that was the issue.”

  Furiously, he blinked, and he dragged both hands down his face in frustration. “Seriously, man…you think that was because you came back? It was because we were fucked up. All of us. We fucked up and a whole ton went to shit. And I know you bore the brunt of it. Lost the most. But five years are gone, man, and you’re still making us pay for it.”

  “Ash,” Sebastian uttered a low warning as he untangled himself from Shea and climbed to his feet.

  Ash pointed at him. “This needs to be said, Baz. Out loud. Too much time has been spent tiptoeing around this shit. Pretending it doesn’t follow us everywhere we go. Pretending Lyrik isn’t still stuck back in that day.”

  He swung his attention back to me. His voice dropped lower and strained with the plea. “It’s time to let it go.”

  My entire face pinched. Pain sheered through my chest like that day was yesterday.

  Because he was right.

  I was still living in that day. I woke up every morning just to die over and over again.

  “Let it go?” The words grew louder, my cool evaporating like sizzling mist. “Let it go?” I demanded as I took an incredulous step forward. “I lost everything. Everything. And I’m going to be paying for it for the rest of my life.”

  Because there were some things you weren’t ever going to make amends for.

  Ash knew better than pulling this shit. Throwing it in my face. Especially with outsiders looking in.

  “But that’s what you don’t get,” he said. “You don’t have to keep paying for what you can’t change. And I can’t sit around watching you suffer for one more day. Not when being free of it is right there. Right in front of your face, and you refuse to see it.”

  He made no secret of the fact he was referring to Tamar. Like I could ever actually have her. Like I could ever be with her the way she deserved.

  Anger and hurt rolled over me like a heavy, roiling storm. Closing in. I could feel myself coming unhinged. Fiber by fiber. Memory by memory. It was a loss so intense it almost knocked me to my knees.

  Fuck.

  I wanted to scream. To beat something or someone.

  I shouldered passed Ash before I did something stupid like launch myself at him.

  The fucked-up thing was he was the same guy part of me couldn’t help but blame, even though I knew none of it was his fault.

  All of it was on me.

  “Lyrik, man, come on…don’t fucking do that,” Ash called behind me. “For once, stop being a fucking hothead and listen. All of us…we just care about you.”

  Care.

  Nice.

  Glad he was doing such a bang-up job of caring in front of those who had no business in any of it. Bringing it out into the open for them to see. Shedding light on what was written on me like the blackest stain.

  “Lyrik,” he shouted.

  I ignored him because I was finished with his bullshit. I shoved through the old-fashioned double doors that led to the massive kitchen and stormed into the renovated space that was larger than the apartment I was renting.

  Inside, it was dark. Except for the moonlight streaming in from the big windows overlooking the sprawling backyard, the milky rays striking against the silver flecks in the white and gray granite countertops.

  Pressing my palms to the island that took up the center, I dropped my head between my shoulders and tried to catch my breath. To purge the memories from my mind. To stop the barrage of images from slaying me. Cutting me in two. To stop the assault of their faces that struck me again and again.

  Thunderbolt after thunderbolt.

  The loss.

  The loss.

  The loss.

  The swinging door creaked and let in a flood of light as it opened, before it swung closed.

  I was no longer alone.

  The air grew thick. A charged intensity shimmered through the room. It only added to my agitation.

  The girl was doing her best to completely destroy me.

  “Go,” I gritted out.

  I squeezed my eyes closed.

  Shuttin’ the world out.

  It was for the fucking best. And I sure as hell didn’t need her to see me this way.

  Pissed and vulnerable and hurting. But it seemed ever since she made her way into my life, all of it was there, just simmering below the surface.

  High heels clicked on the wooden floor. Blood pulsed through my veins, harsh and hard. Beating faster and faster with every step of her slow, guarded approach.

  My lungs squeezed.

  She hesitated, her presence full and soothing and probably one of the damned most frightening things I’d ever felt.

  I couldn’t do this. I needed to fucking stop before I fucked this up more than I already had. Before my guilt grew greater and I had nothing left to stand on.

  She wrapped her arms around me from behind.

  I stuttered out a breath.

  God, she felt so good.

  She pressed her face to the middle of my back.

  “It goes both ways, you know.” Her voice swam through the room, honey and warmth. My body processed it like a song.

  “I was so alone. Not just lonely, Lyrik. But alone. Hollow. Without anyone who understood. And then there was you…this beautiful, terrifying man who was pushing his way into my life. Demanding I let him see me for who I really was and not what everyone else saw. Now I’m standing here begging him to invite me into his. To let me see.”

  I gripped her hands that held tight to my stomach. “You can’t go there, Blue.”

  Over my shirt, she scattered a bunch of light kisses across my back. Still, they singed and scorched and seared.

  Scarring as she silently begged.

  “Blue.” I took her by one wrist and pulled her in front of me. “You walk into the room…”

  I swallowed over the lump in my throat when I saw the complete understanding on her face. Lifting her, I set her on the edge of the island and forced my way between her legs that were eager to accept me.

  I cupped her face. “You walk in the room and I don’t recognize myself. I forget who I am. Forget who I’m supposed to be.”

  Blue eyes searched my face and she flattened her palm across my racing heart. “Maybe you’re finally beginning to see who you really are.” Her voice softened. “The man I see when I look at you.”

  My mouth came down hard on hers to stop her from talking.

  I drove my fingers into all that silky red.

  I kissed her mad.

  Just like she was driving me.

  Tongue and teeth and desperation.

  Fuck.

  This was stupid.

  Needing her this way.

  But I felt like if I moved back even a fraction, I wouldn’t be able to breathe. That if I let any space come between us, it would be the end. That without this I couldn’t take one more step.

  Which was why I should walk the fuck away.

  Instead I slid my hands down her sides and wrapped her legs around my waist. She sighed a greedy sigh and crossed her ankles at my lower back.

  Then the girl rubbed herself on my straining dick.

  Torment roared like the howl of a wildfire in my ears.

  Deafening, consuming flames.

  But this fire?

  It felt so fucking good, I couldn’t let it go. Not when I had it for these moments that were fleeting fast.

  I lifted her from the island and carried her toward the narrow se
cond set of stairs leading from the kitchen.

  She clutched my shoulders and held on tighter. “Where are we going?”

  “Upstairs,” I mumbled at her mouth, refusing to come up for air because I might lose this. I might lose the feeling that I had something real for the first time in what seemed forever.

  Fingertips dug into the base of my neck. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?”

  “I think it’s a very fucking good idea,” I grunted at her mouth. My cock begging at the seam of her jeans seemed proof enough.

  I pressed her harder against me, loving that was all it took to make her moan.

  I needed her. Needed her touch and her smile and her panted breaths.

  “I want to make you come.”

  She whimpered a sound that shouted yes, while her words poured out their reluctance. “That’s not going to erase whatever just happened back there. Talk to me. Please.”

  I kept kissing her as I took the stairs. Erase. That’s what I was going to do. And I was going to write myself over that bastard’s blemish. Over the anguish and damage and ruin.

  For once…for once I wanted to have something good to offer.

  I wanted to offer it to her.

  Every remnant of what I had left to give.

  Her fingers dug deeper and her nails sank into my skin.

  And I knew…I knew she wanted to give it, too. But the difference between us was I didn’t ever want to forget.

  I hit the landing of the stairs at the back of the hall and fumbled with the knob of the door at the end. It knocked open and I was quick to kick it shut. The drapes on the windows facing out back were drawn open wide.

  I laid her in the center of the bed and stood at the side.

  “Whose room is this?” she whispered into the quiet.

  “Mine.”

  That was the thing about Ash. We fought. We fought like brothers. Because that’s exactly what we were. Not by blood. But by every single thing that counted. He’d had me pick out one of the rooms and told me no matter where I went, I’d always have a home.

  Blue eyes flickered with some kind of hope.

  Stay. Stay. Stay.

  Every rational part of me knew I needed to stamp it out. Tell her no. Warn her we had six weeks to go.

  That was it.

  The end.

  But I couldn’t make the words form on my tongue. Instead, I pulled off one of those sexy-ass heels and kissed the inside arch of her foot, then turned and did the same to the other.