Let it Burn: Sons of Sinners Part 2 (A Rock Star Romance)

by Grace James

  God, those eyes. They’d be the death of me.

  And his touch…I knew how dangerous that was.

  I forced myself to look away as I pulled his hands off me. “You can’t.”

  “Princess –”

  “Just stop,” I begged him. “Please, just stop.”

  “No.”

  Abruptly, he dropped to one knee in front of me, his hands reached out to grasp my hips, making me gasp, “What are you –”

  “This isn’t how I was gonna do this. I was gonna ask you to come away with me to the cabin – but fuck it.” He gripped my hips tighter as he spoke. “Princess, you know I love you –”

  “Stop.” The word was a whisper that he ignored.

  “I loved you even when I had no right to, and I won’t ever stop. I might fuck up – no, I will fuck up – but you just gotta keep calling me on it, baby. ‘Cause I love that you call me on it. I love that you know me better that I know myself – and will you fucking look at me?” When I didn’t, his hold on my hips got even harder. “Princess, look at me,” he ordered.

  My brain thought Hell no, but my eyes found his again anyway. Traitors.

  And when they landed on him, everything inside me responded.

  Shit.

  He let go of me and shoved a hand into the front pocket of his jeans, pulling out a small, blue velvet box.

  My hands slapped over my mouth.

  When Blake spoke again his voice was raw with emotion. “Amy Scott, I want you to be my wife. I wanna marry you and prove to you every day that I am still the man you fell in love with. And I do love you with everything I have. And I won’t. Ever. Leave you again.”

  “Oh my God,” I breathed into my palms.

  Blake opened the box and held it up to me. Inside, there was a thin, vintage looking, silver band with a dark blue sapphire set between two small diamonds.

  “It was my mom’s,” he explained. “I asked my dad for it yesterday. And I know it’s not much and it’s not as fancy as you deserve, so we can get another if you want, but I wanted you to have this one as well.”

  “No, it’s perfect,” I told him honestly. “I wouldn’t want another, but…” I trailed off and shook my head. I just couldn’t believe it was real. I mean, marriage?! It was the last thing I expected. It was crazy! Wasn’t it?

  Blake looked up at me with eyes like clear blue pools of light, hiding nothing. I could see the love there, glowing like sunlight filtering through water as he said, “Marry me, Princess. I can’t even remember how it feels not to be in love with you. Don’t make me live without you.”

  I didn’t want to live without him either, but what kind of crazy person agrees to marry a man that’s already run out on her twice?

  I sank to my knees in front of him, putting my hands over his – and therefore the ring box – and gently pushing it shut.

  Blake’s face fell, his jaw clenching.

  “Take me to the cabin,” I whispered. “Take me back to where we started, so that this time we can do it right…”

  He dropped his forehead to mine as our hands tightened simultaneously around the promise inside.

  “…and then ask me this again.”

  He pulled his hands from mine and wrapped his powerful arms around me, crushing me against him as he buried his face in my hair. “Even if it takes the rest of my life, I’ll ask you every damn day until you say yes.”

  104

  Okay, so, this isn’t the part where I tell you that everything was suddenly perfect. It’s not the ‘and they lived happily ever after’ ending that every little girl is practically brainwashed into expecting.

  Firstly, I have never seen my dad look more murderous than he did when I told him I was going to give Blake another chance.

  And when Mel called me a few days later, her reaction involved phrases like, “Tell him from me that if he hurts you again, a picture of his dick will appear on milk cartons – ‘cause I’ll make sure he never uses it again. I know people!”

  Even Hayley, who was usually the most supportive person in the world, didn’t have anything more positive to say than, “Okaaaay…well, I guess third time’s the charm, right? Wait – is that even the right saying? Hang on, let me ask Google.”

  And then there was the relentless media intrusion. They found out about our breakup and subsequent ‘reunion’, so I was once again thrown into a world where I couldn’t even go to the store without being stalked by a hoard of flashing cameras.

  See? Not exactly the stuff fairy tales are made of.

  But Blake was as good as his word.

  He did ask me to marry him every day.

  And I said ‘no’ every time.

  It even became a bit of a running joke, if you can believe it. We’d sit down for breakfast together and he’d say, “Marry me, Princess?”

  I’d make a big show of thinking it over before I’d reply with something like, “You know I love you, but not yet. Ask me again tomorrow?”

  He’d smirk and shake his head, or roll his eyes, or sometimes act wounded. Occasionally, he’d pull me onto his lap, nuzzle into my hair and just hold me.

  But he’d still ask me again the next day, because he understood that I needed time. That we needed time.

  And that grand gestures aren’t enough to last a lifetime.

  Relationships are built on more than just a ring and a promise.

  They’re made up of a million tiny moments.

  105

  One of the first things that Blake and I did was get a place together back in Las Vegas.

  And, yeah, I know that moving in together probably sounds like a crazy first step after everything that had happened between us – my family and friends would definitely have agreed with you there.

  I think the only person who was happy about it (other than me and Blake) was Harvey, because it also meant that I’d turned down the job at Alcamuse and was going back to work at The Academy.

  The thing is, Blake and I weren’t exactly in an everyday situation.

  It wasn’t like we’d just met. We’d loved each other for years – and we figured we’d already spent too many of them apart.

  Of course, we rationalized the whole thing by talking about how I couldn’t stay in my apartment because it was once again swarming with paparazzi, and how Blake couldn’t go back to staying at the Bellagio forever – he needed to get a place anyway, so it just made sense that we found somewhere together, right?

  But what it really boiled down to was that we were in love and we were done wasting time.

  We rented a house in the same gated community as Hayley and Derren. Our place was smaller and more modest than theirs, because that’s what we preferred, but it was still gorgeous. It had hardwood floors throughout, one of those walls of glass that opens completely onto the yard to ‘bring the outside in’, and a pool surrounded by palm trees.

  The day we moved in, I was standing in our new bedroom, looking at my canopy bed which the movers had just deposited in the center of the room, and worrying about how out of place it looked amongst the modern and tasteful interior.

  “What’s going on in your head, Princess?” Blake’s deep voice came from the direction of the doorway and I turned to see him leaning one shoulder against the doorjamb.

  “My bed doesn’t go with the room. It looks ridiculous.”

  His lips tilted into a grin. “It looked ridiculous in your apartment, too.”

  I shook my head, biting my lip as I looked back at the purple ruffles which frothed around the white frame. I heard the whisper of his boots on the carpet as he came up behind me and slid his arms around my waist, pulling my back against his front.

  “This is about more than our ugly bed. What’s going on?”

  Something struck me about that first sentence. “Our ugly bed?”

  I felt a puff of breath skim across my head as he chuckled. “This is our house. Stands to reason that’s our bed.”

  “But you hate it,” I said quietly.

>   “No, I don’t.”

  I turned my head to give him a look. “You just called it ugly.”

  “Just ‘cause something’s ugly doesn’t mean you have to hate it. Look at Kane, no one hates him and he’s ugly as they come.”

  I laughed and shook my head. For the record, Kane was far from ugly. “You know what I mean,” I persisted. “None of my furniture fits in here.”

  Blake pressed a kiss to my neck, just under my ear. “So why don’t you call Hayley and go shopping? Take my credit card and pick out whatever you want.”

  I didn’t say anything.

  Because he was right, this wasn’t just about my ridiculous bed, or the fact that my little two seater couch looked lost in the large living room.

  I was standing in a beautiful house – which was way nicer than anywhere I’d lived before – and I wasn’t going to have to pay so much as a cent for any of it. Blake had already told me he wouldn’t even let me make a token payment.

  The only thing I was contributing was my furniture, and now even that seemed pathetic.

  “Princess?” He pressed another kiss to my neck. “Talk to me.”

  I pulled in a breath, preparing myself for an argument. “I want to pay for something.”

  I waited for him to immediately tell me ‘no’ like he usually did when it came to me paying for anything.

  But, surprisingly, he didn’t.

  Instead, he turned me around in his arms and looked down at me with a soft smile. “That’s what this is about?” When I nodded, he asked, “Okay, then how about this? I cover the house and utilities and whatever, and you cover the groceries. Would that work?” I must’ve stared at him in silence for a full minute before he asked, “Well?”

  “You just agreed to let me pay for something,” I stated.

  “That’s what you wanted, right?”

  “Um…yeah…”

  “Then what’s the problem?”

  I frowned because this was not going how I thought it would – and that was good but confusing. “You just…gave in.”

  He looked at me for a long moment, and was clearly a little annoyed when he said, “No, I listened to what you wanted and compromised. We’ve both got to be happy with this or it’s not gonna work.”

  Huh.

  I curled my arms around his neck and pulled him down so that I could kiss him. “Thank you.”

  “Welcome.” He swept me up into his arms and strode over to the bed, tossing me through the air to bounce on the mattress. “Now, we should test this bed, make sure it didn’t get damaged in the move.”

  It might sound silly, but that was one of those tiny moments I mentioned – it was the moment when I really started to believe in us again.

  106

  That’s not to say that there weren’t tough times, too.

  I mean, there were reasons I kept saying ‘no’ to that proposal.

  God, don’t get me wrong – I wanted to be with Blake more than anything. I loved him more than I ever thought it was possible to love anyone.

  But I was scared.

  He’d already left me twice, remember?

  So, yeah, I’m not proud of it, but sometimes I threw that in his face.

  One time in particular really stands out in my mind. We were arguing because he’d got caught up in the studio and missed a therapy appointment – I hated when he missed appointments, because I knew how important they were – and I shouted something bratty at him, like, “If you can’t commit to an hour with your therapist, how can you commit to a lifetime with me? Consider this a permanent NO to your stupid proposal!”

  As soon as the words left my mouth, I knew I’d gone too far.

  Blake’s eyes went dark, and when he started to stalk across the kitchen towards me, a thrill of adrenaline shot through me. As he got closer, I waited for the explosion, for him to yell right back at me.

  He stopped a foot away, and…reached tenderly for my waist. He brought his face close to mine, so that his lips were just a breath away and said softly, “I can commit to a lifetime with you because you are my life, Princess.”

  He gripped me tighter and lifted me up onto the kitchen table, his lips covering mine possessively as he shoved up my shirt and pulled down my bra. His rough hands caressed my breasts, squeezing them and tweaking my nipples.

  My hands were fumbling with his fly, freeing his hardening shaft as his deft fingers pulled aside my panties and stroked through my slickness.

  Moments later, as he touched the blunt head of his cock to my lips, his eyes fixed on mine intently. “I fucking love you,” he growled, right as he pushed forwards and filled me up.

  My hands bunched desperately in the back of his shirt as he hammered into me, sending my orgasm blooming through me before he followed with a guttural roar.

  Afterwards, he rested his forehead against mine and slid both of his hands into the back of my hair, holding my head still as his eyes bored into mine. “Can’t keep punishing me for that shit, Princess,” he muttered. “I’m trying here.”

  Then he offset his obvious anger with one of the sweetest kisses he’d ever given me, before pulling out of me, tucking himself back into his jeans, and storming out of the house.

  He didn’t come back until late that night when I was already in bed.

  As soon as he climbed under the sheets next to me, I threw myself on him and apologized. Then he apologized too, for missing the appointment in the first place.

  So, it wasn’t always easy.

  In fact, some days were really hard.

  But, as Blake once said, “Doesn’t matter how much we yell at each other, we still wanna fuck each other’s brains out ten minutes later.” And he was right – but we didn’t just have the mind-blowing sex to fall back on.

  We had love.

  No matter what we fought about, or how tough our days sometimes were, or how much pressure there was even having a relationship as public as ours was, I never questioned how much he loved me.

  Like, sometimes when I was at work I’d find a single pink water lily somewhere – on the end of the bar, maybe on the coffee table in my office – and know that Blake had walked in there and left it for me, but he’d always be gone by the time I found it.

  Little things. Tiny moments.

  107

  “Hey, Dad, just calling to let you know we’ll probably get to your place by around five-thirty tomorrow,” I said into my cell as I puttered around the kitchen, loading up the dishwasher.

  “Okay, honey…looking forward to it,” my dad replied, his voice a careful monotone.

  “Gee, could you maybe sound a little less excited? You’re making me uncomfortable here.”

  I heard him sigh. “Sorry, honey, I am excited to see you. Really.”

  I paused with my hand curled around the salad tongs, hating how awkward all our conversations now were. Blake and I were supposed to be driving up to my parents’ house the next day – which was Christmas Eve – to spend the holidays with them, and it was shaping up to be the most uncomfortable forty-eight hours of my life. My parents still weren’t thrilled about us being back together, let alone living together.

  There was a heavy silence on the other end of the line.

  I closed my eyes as I pulled in a breath, ready to fake a cheerful goodbye, when my phone was plucked from my fingers. My eyes flew open and I saw Blake lifting it to his ear. “Hey!” I whisper-yelled.

  “Hey, Mr. Scott,” Blake started.

  “Blake! Give me the phone!” I raised the salad tongues like I was about to take a swing at him with them. The last thing I wanted was for the two of them to argue – so far they had gotten by on total avoidance.

  Blake snorted out a laugh and stepped back, holding up a hand to ward me off. “What? No, sir, not laughing at you. Your daughter’s actually threatening to decapitate me with…baby, are those salad tongs?”

  “You bet your ass they are! Give me the phone!”

  “Hear that?” Blake asked, then paused to
listen. “Yeah, she’s giving me hell . . . I know, right? . . . Yeah. And, just so ya know, I asked her to marry me again this morning and she said no . . . yeah, thought you’d like that.” I started to lower the tongs as I listened to him add, “Look, I just wanted to say that I get why you’re not overjoyed to be spending the holidays with my sorry ass, but Amy cleaned the bathroom three times already today, and it wasn’t even dirty to begin with . . . I know, so she’s stressed, right? . . . Yeah . . . Thing is, I think she’d be a lot less stressed if she knew we weren’t gonna have a dust up over the Christmas dinner.”

  My mouth dropped open.

  Blake just grinned at me, and then chuckled at something my dad said before he replied with, “Exactly, we’ll take it out back if it comes to it.”

  “What are you doing?!” I hissed. Was he really joking about having a fight with my dad?

  Blake barked out another laugh. “Damn straight I’d get my ass handed to me. I wouldn’t dare punch you back, your daughter would kill me.”

  “I’m considering killing you now,” I muttered.

  He just winked at me as he said, “Okay, will do . . . Yeah, see you tomorrow,” and then offered the phone back to me.

  Tentatively, I took it and put it to my ear. If I wasn’t very mistaken, I heard my dad chuckling quietly on the other end of the line. “…Dad?”

  “Hi. Look, you two have a safe journey tomorrow, alright? And…I’m sorry if you’ve been worried about this. That’s the last thing your mother and I want. We love you, honey, and if you’re happy, so are we.”

  Those few sentences were the most genuine things he’d said to me since I left his house with Blake about three months before, and I can’t explain how relieved I was to hear them.

  My eyes shot back to Blake, who was standing with his arms crossed over his chest, watching me carefully. When I started flapping those stupid salad tongs and tearing up, he quickly stepped towards me and pulled me into a strong hug as I whispered into the phone, “I love you, too, Dad.”