Dirty Rock: A Rock Star Romance

by James, Vicki

  I didn’t have to think about my next move. I carefully pushed Molly away, and I took a step back to create some distance. Without complaint or protest, Molly slipped back into her seat and offered me a wink before she picked her glass up again.

  “Did she see it?” she asked quietly.

  “She saw it.” I cleared my throat awkwardly.

  “And?”

  I looked back up at Jules who was handing her glass over to Big D. She quickly turned on her feet and headed away from the gang towards the back of the bar.

  “She’s walking away.”

  “Which direction?”

  “I dunno. The toilets, maybe.”

  “Now’s your cue, doll. Go get her.” Molly gave me the side-eye. “She’s going there to either cry or scream. The truth is waiting for you. Whatever she’s feeling, now’s the time to find out. Go and grab your girl.”

  She didn’t have to tell me twice. Pride or not, I wanted to find out what the fucking truth was. This messing around and not knowing was killing me. My feet moved without instruction, and before could think about it, I was jogging through the small crowd of people, chasing Julia Speed like my life depended on it.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  “Jules!”

  I pushed past people, not caring if they were calling for my attention or giving me the eye. I didn’t care if they were man, woman, or beast. If they were in my way, I soon got them out of it.

  When I turned the corner, I saw my girl taking a left, following a sign that declared the toilets were that way. I ran after her, skidding around the bend like a fucking mad man only to catch up to her and grab her by the elbow.

  “Get off,” she hissed, shrugging me away, but I held on tight and spun her around. The look she wore killed me, but I swallowed my own pain because this fucking mattered. She mattered.

  “No. We’re doing this.”

  “Screw you.”

  “Any time, any place, anywhere.”

  “Arrogant fuck,” she whispered.

  “You’re not getting out of this. We need to talk.”

  “Why? So you can make me feel even shittier?”

  “Me?” I snapped. “Fuck, you’re the one all over crooner boy out there, with his slimy smile and roaming motherfucking hands.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.” She frowned, scrunching her face up in disgust as she tugged against my hold on her.

  “He’s all over you like a poisonous snake, and you can’t even see it. Or maybe you don’t want to see it.”

  I always thought I’d have to convince any woman I got with that I’d be faithful—for them to not get suspicious or paranoid about the attention I received. It turned out I was the one who needed reassuring—the one crippled with jealousy I couldn’t tame.

  “You’re crazy. This whole thing is crazy. It’s over, Rhett.”

  “You don’t get to decide how this ends.”

  “And you do? Jesus, you’re such an arrogant arsehole.”

  “You made me what I am, baby. Enjoy the fruits of your labour.”

  “I made you what you are? Oh, no. That’s all on you. It’s how you’re made up. It’s who you are.”

  “And who am I, Jules?” I bent at the knee, forcing her eyes to latch onto mine. “Tell me. Who am I? Because you know me better than I know myself, right? That’s what you’ve always said. What am I to you? Or are you too scared you’re not going to like it when you realise that I’m actually fucking something and someone who matters. Someone you can’t live without now.”

  She froze, blinking wildly, only to look away like seeing me caused her physical pain. She tried to tear herself away, but I grabbed her other elbow and pulled her closer.

  “Julia goddamn Speed, will you look at me?”

  Lifting her chin with a single finger, I forced her attention back to me. When I saw unshed tears in her eyes, a weird stabbing sensation hit me straight in the gut. It felt like I’d been kicked in the balls.

  Or worse.

  I’d fucked this whole thing up.

  “Are you crying?”

  “Should I be?”

  “Fuck no,” I exhaled heavily.

  “Really? Because you seem intent on forcing these tears out.” She pushed my finger away from her chin with force. “I don’t want you.”

  “Don’t do that.”

  “I don’t need you, Rhett.”

  “Don’t.”

  A single tear fell down her cheek, breaking my heart and making her pretty brown eyes sparkle under the subtle lighting of the corridor. Her fight was weak, and eventually, her shoulders relaxed.

  “I hate you,” she whispered

  “Stop it, baby.”

  “Don’t call me your baby. I’m nobody’s. Especially not someone who insists on hurting me.” She fought back, slamming a balled-up fist against my chest. It made me flinch just a fraction before I held firm again. “I’m not your baby.”

  That fire I adored so much was rising, and it made me smirk as I held her gaze. Thank fuck it mattered to her. Thank fuck she cared enough to get angry. I could work with that. I could do something with that anger.

  “What should I call you, Jules? My girlfriend?” I ran a finger across her jaw. Taking a step forward made her take one back, so I took another, and another, and another until her spine hit the wall and forced a rush of breath to fall from her lips. “My lover?” I raised a brow. “My fuck buddy? My friend with benefits? Tell me what you want me to be for you, and I’ll be it… so long as I can be something. Anything. I’ll take whatever you’ve got to give because I’m desperate for you, and I’m not ashamed to admit it. I’m not scared to be real now.”

  “Rhett, don’t.”

  “You can stop me whenever you like,” I whispered before my lips fell to hers tenderly, no force or anger or desperation there. I was oddly calm, despite my racing heart, and I kissed her with all the respect she deserved. She didn’t respond. Her mouth was frozen, but I could tell from her breathing she was enjoying the feel of us being together again.

  There was some kind of destiny in our kisses.

  Like we were always supposed to come to this.

  I trailed my lips from hers and began to move my attention to her jaw, the apple of a cheek, across to the sensitive spot below her ear, before I planted a delicate kiss in the curve of her neck. “Tell me what you want,” I begged against her skin.

  “I want to hate you,” she whispered.

  I pulled back to take her in, missing her taste already, my heart full and ready to break wide open. “But you can’t anymore.”

  “I can. I just don’t like the way it feels inside.”

  “Trying to hate me hurts you, Jules, because you fucking love me.”

  Her eyes widened. “What did you just say?” she whispered.

  “I said you love me. You just haven’t realised it yet.”

  She opened her mouth to add protest, but I pressed a finger against her lips before her lies fell free.

  “And that’s okay,” I assured her, holding her sweet gaze. “Because I know now. I know you will realise it, just like I have. We’re going to happen, baby. You and me. Pretty girl and Sinatra. It’s inevitable, and it’s going to be a forever thing. I can’t give up on us now. I’m addicted to this kind of fight with you, and I refuse to walk away from the one thing that makes me feel alive inside, even when I’m surrounded by nothing but silence… and you.”

  I trailed my finger down to her chin and neck, slipping it between the valley of her breasts. I glanced down to look at my finger there, and I saw her chest bouncing heavily, and the way her nipples tightened beneath her top. I dragged the pad of my thumb over her breast.

  “Everyone has that one person, Jules. It turns out you’re gonna be mine.”

  Taking a step back, I pulled away from her completely. Her shoulders sank against the wall, and she bit down on her plump bottom lip.

  Even though it killed me, I turned around and walked away, running my tongue over my lip
s to get one more taste of her in case it was my last time.

  Time.

  That word again. I had to give her it, not knowing whether it would be a second, an hour, a month, or a year.

  People cast me funny glances as I walked back through the bar, and I caught Tessa’s eyes, seeing she was grinning brightly at me. I gave her a wink and a smile because for the first time since she’d come into Presley’s life, I knew what it felt like to crave someone so badly that they became all you could think about—all you dreamed about.

  When I reached my place beside Molly, Elle slid a tumbler of whiskey on the rocks my way, and I downed it in one hit, gasping when I slammed the glass back on the bar.

  “Well?” Molly asked, not looking at me as she stared at herself in the mirror on the back shelf.

  “Told her I fucking loved her.”

  “You actually said those words?”

  “Close enough.”

  “Well, well, well. And how did she take it?”

  “Horribly.” I smirked.

  “Are you scared?”

  I pressed my lips together and shook my head. “Weirdly… not one fucking bit.”

  “So, where is she?”

  “Back there.” I chucked my chin. “Thinking it over.”

  “Dangerous thing for a woman like her to be thinking about loving you in return.”

  “Don’t I know it.”

  “Love has to last a lifetime for it to be worth it.”

  “She’s already worth it. No matter what happens next. The first time has to happen sometime, right?” I laughed quietly, reaching for Molly’s glass and holding it to my mouth.

  “The last man who took something of mine that didn’t belong to him regretted it, Silly Little Rhett.”

  After draining it, I dropped her flute down and leaned against the bar. “The lesson I’ve learned tonight is that you’ll only ever regret the things you don’t do. Not the things you took a chance on.”

  Molly shook her head before she clicked her fingers at Elle and leaned over to order us both another drink.

  I cast my eyes in the direction Jules was hiding, and within a second, my confidence took a nosedive and made my stomach swirl. She was talking to Uncle Dex, who was standing beside Presley, and the three of them looked my way at once.

  Before long, Hawk joined them, and I could tell Jules wanted them to help her leave.

  No.

  No.

  That wasn’t the way it was meant to go.

  I couldn’t look at the car crash that was about to collide against my own heart, so I turned away.

  “You okay, honey?” Molly asked quietly.

  “I think she’s leaving.”

  “What?”

  Molly spun in her seat to get a look for herself, and I dropped my chin to my chest and closed my eyes, waiting for confirmation of my girl’s departure.

  “Oh my,” Molly whispered.

  My fucking heart sank.

  Until I felt a hand on my elbow—a squeeze of familiar fingers against my jacket.

  My body was spun around and pushed back at once, the middle of my spine colliding with the edge of the bar as Julia pressed her hands against my chest and rose up on her toes.

  She was there in front of me. Bright eyes, pinked cheeks, parted lips, and a face I wanted to wake up to the next morning.

  It seemed like the whole bar stopped to look.

  Music faded away.

  The chatter died down.

  The only sound I connected with was her breathing as she let her soft lips rise at the corners.

  “Don’t you dare make me regret this, Rhett Ryan.”

  Before I could promise her that I wouldn’t, she slid a hand around my neck and pulled my lips down to crash against hers… and every problem I’d ever had drifted away to nothing.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Julia melted in my grip; her fingers greedy in my hair. My eyes were closed until her breath stuttered, and I forced them open to take her in.

  A very un-Jules-like, shy laugh fell free before she buried her head against my chest. I wrapped her up in my arms and rested my chin on the top of it. The shit-eating grin on my face probably looked ridiculous, and when my eyes met the rest of the guys’ around the bar, I couldn’t shake it off. I was greeted with a mixture of wide eyes, open mouths, smirking lips, and smug faces. Some clearly had their suspicions. Others, like Coops and Big D, looked utterly fucking horrified.

  “Is everyone looking at us?” Jules mumbled into my chest.

  “Nah. No one’s noticed a thing.”

  Jules lifted her head to look at me. “Everything changes from this moment here, you know that, right? We can’t go back now.”

  “Are you trying to scare me?”

  “I mean, maybe. A little bit. Why aren’t you freaking out?”

  “You’re freaking out enough for the both of us.” I smirked.

  “Thank God Dicky isn’t here.”

  I scowled down at her. “He’s going to find out now anyway. What would it matter if he was?”

  All the concerns she had rested in the small scowl she was wearing—the one that contradicted her rosy cheeks and pounding heart. I was convinced she didn’t know how to be happy without feeling guilt. She had so much responsibility for the band. As the one who was in charge of our public image and the way the world saw us, she was the one who could make or break us. But she wasn’t just that person to me now. She was more. She was the woman whose skin I couldn’t get enough of. The woman who fit right. The woman who made sex more than sex ever had been before she came along. She was the lazy smile I woke up to, the soft breaths I fell asleep with, and she was the one I wanted to hold… just like this. She may have been responsible for so much, but I was responsible for her now, and it didn’t scare me. Not one bit.

  “You want to get out of here?” I asked quietly.

  Jules peeled herself from me, grabbed my hand, and began to drag me across the bar. I caught a glimpse of Molly as I left, and she offered me a sly wink and a raise of her freshly filled champagne glass. I owed her a song the next time I was in her company.

  Julia’s fingers squeezed mine as she came to a stop in front of Dex, Hawk, and Presley, who now had a very dreamy looking Tessa clinging to his side.

  “In case you were wondering—” Julia began.

  “I think we got it,” Tessa cut her off, beaming brightly.

  Jules looked around the four of them as if seeking some kind of approval. Stepping in beside her, I wrapped my arm around her shoulder and pulled her into me.

  “So, yeah, Jules and I have been fucking,” I said bluntly. “And I’m going to need you all to be okay with that because there’s going to be more of it. Fucking. Kissing. This.” I squeezed her shoulder.

  “Happy for you.” Presley nodded.

  “You are?” Jules asked, sounding surprised.

  Tessa reached out to touch her hand. “Of course we are. As long as you’re happy. That’s all any of us want. To see both of you happy.”

  “Yeah.” Jules looked up at me, smiling before she looked back at Tess. “We are. Well… for now. This is Rhett I’ve somehow fallen for. Who knows what’ll happen with this one?”

  The two of them laughed, and I tried not to take the hit personally, but I couldn’t help it. That stung.

  Could I really blame her? After everything she’d witnessed, after all the lows she’d endured alongside me. After everything she’d heard, the stories I’d told, and the way I’d made sure everyone and their dogs knew I wasn’t ever going to settle down… could I blame her for holding onto me with delicate fingertips instead of a tight, white grip?

  It wasn’t down to Jules to make me certain of us.

  It was down to me to make her certain of our future.

  “We need to go,” I whispered in her ear.

  “Need a ride?” Dex asked.

  “No, man.” I shook my head. “You stay. Have fun. I’ll call a cab.”

  “Where a
re we going?” Jules asked.

  “I have something to show you.”

  * * *

  “Rhett, this taxi is costing a fortune,” Jules said with her eyes on the meter while I clung to her thigh.

  “I’m good for it.”

  Her body was turned towards mine, while I faced forward, feeling a weird satisfaction in my chest.

  There was more than hope living there.

  Destiny or some other bullshit had settled right around my heart and was now tickling the little bitch with assurances of everything being just how it should be. How it was always meant to be.

  This was what had always been missing. The need to make someone I loved happy, not myself.

  After a long, long taxi ride, we hit the Strood that led to Mersea Island, and Julia’s face lit up in the back of that cab.

  “You’re taking me home?”

  “Something like that,” I said, looking around at the water on both sides of the road. Jules had told me how, when the tide rose around Mersea, this road became unusable, making it a temporary island until the water receded. Fortunately for us that night, the tide was low.

  The Uber driver eventually pulled up to the address I’d given him. I was feeling chivalrous enough to jog around the car to open her door and help her out, acting like some 1940s movie star that dare not be anything other than perfect for his virginal beauty queen.

  Jules looked around, confused. She obviously recognised the road. She recognised the area. She could hear the sea, and she could smell the fresh air I’d missed while being stuck in London.

  “Why haven’t we stopped at my house?” she asked quietly.

  “Because I thought I’d bring you to mine, instead.”

  “What?” she scowled.

  With a smug smile, I spun her around and held onto her from behind.

  In front of us was a worn down, out of date, pale blue cottage with a thatched roof. The garden was overgrown, the fencing around it looked like it couldn’t hold up a squirrel, and the trees falling in around it were tired and scraggly.

  But it was mine.