Several emotions passed through her eyes. Hurt. Longing. Desire. Hunger. For me or the damn churros I wasn’t entirely sure but I’d take whatever I could get at this point. I just wanted to spend time with her again.
“Alright,” she agreed. “But I need to get a jacket and put Chulo up. He does fine at the beach by the pier but Sunset has too many crumbly cliffs and he has a tendency to wander off.”
“Ok.” Elation spiked within my heart that she was agreeing to come. I tried not to read too much into it but I failed abominably.
“Stay here,” she ordered her expression stern before she shifted and pointed to the pale blue couch in the living room just behind her. “Don’t wander.” She hurried off, dog in tow his plume like tail wagging. I watched her cute ass sway until she disappeared into what appeared to be a kitchen on the other side of the room.
Before I had time to scoot back and get comfortable she reappeared sans Chulo. She glanced at me nervously before moving past. Her bare feet padded on the hardwood surface of the stairs as she flew up them.
Needing to distract myself from thoughts about Simone disrobing without me, I looked around for something to read. The coffee table was empty except for one thick photo album. Curious I picked it up.
My sudden intake of air did nothing to relieve the tight pressure inside my chest. With shaking hands and burning eyes I flipped rapidly through the pages that contained images of her, of us and the band on our SoCal mini tour back when she had still been mine. The sweetest of sorrows pierced my heart.
I didn’t hear her return at first. I had frozen on a picture of her. The one at San Clemente the morning after we had made love on the beach, the same day Ash had given her the camera. Her eyes sparkled, her face was lit from within. Pure captivating beautiful Mona fire. I remembered it had been Ash and not me who had taken the picture.
“So beautiful.” I ran my fingers reverentially over the image knowing she was watching silently, caressing the one dimensional image before I looked up to acknowledge the real beauty. I knew my eyes were burning with an emotion she wasn’t ready to receive from me yet but I didn’t care.
“I loved you so much,” she whispered emphasis on the past tense. The sweet sorrow began to blaze painfully within my chest. I closed the book carefully and set it back on the table.
“Interesting reading you were doing last night,” I guessed. I hoped. How could she look at those pictures and only remember the bad? “I thought you told me yesterday that you had put them all away.”
She opened her mouth maybe to deny it but she snapped it shut. A wry ‘I’ve been caught and I might as well own up to it’ look filled her gaze instead.
“Busted,” I said.
She nodded.
Seemed she was still quick to let things go that were minor. Could we get beyond the major?
“C’mon, gorgeous.” I stood and slipped my arm around her. “You look cute as hell in that hoodie and it would be a shame not to get your churro before it gets cold.”
After I helped her into the passenger side of the jeep, rounded the hood, fired up the engine and maneuvered onto Sunset Cliffs Boulevard, she proceeded to rock my world some more by giving me an opening I’d never in my wildest dreams imagined receiving.
Maybe it was the Broadway music flooding the interior. The same music we had made love to that unforgettable first time.
Or maybe she noticed how hard I had to grip the steering wheel to keep from touching her after inhaling her familiar sweet gardenia scent.
Or maybe it was just the churros.
“You were the best thing that ever happened to me, Lincoln Savage. And the worst.” I turned my head to look at her. The surface of her eyes was glassy. I would be lying if her confession didn’t make mine sting just as sharply. She turned away after detonating that bomb, dropping her chin to her chest and twisting her hands together.
The center of my chest was raw as if her words had been shrapnel but I managed to get the jeep down the road and through the couple of stop signs necessary to get us to the cliffs. I slid the jeep into a parallel parking space, flipped the ignition off and rolled the power windows down. I needed to hear the thunderous roar of the waves below us and I needed to feel the soothing ocean breeze on my skin. Formulating my thoughts I stared at the blue water of the Pacific and watched an arc of spray blast into the air when a stubborn wave smashed into the craggy rocks below. I felt like those damn rocks, ravaged by the years apart from her.
“You were my shield, Mona. My buffer from the hell my life was before you. The hell it turned into after you left.”
“Do you really expect me to believe that? You’re a rock star now, Linc. You have tons of money. You can have anything you want, any woman you want whenever you want, however you want.”
“The rock star part is debatable. For a while we were maybe. But you were there in the beginning. You know it’s all marketing, logistics and a lot of fuckin’ luck. I have some money now, sure. I can buy things. And there were other women. But none of them were you. They didn’t care about me. They just wanted to sleep with someone famous. That’s not a life. That’s purgatory. But the real reason my life has been hell is because I’ve had to live it without you.”
She inhaled sharply but I didn’t turn to look into her eyes. Gaze straight ahead I laid it bare.
“Ash told me everything.”
“Meaning what exactly?” she asked slowly and carefully.
Yeah she, Ash and I were a minefield that needed to be carefully negotiated.
“Everything,” I said turning my head to finally look at her. She had her seatbelt off and her legs folded to her chest. Her eyes widened.
“But only just recently, Mona. I don’t think he ever would have told me if not for…” I pressed my lips together. That part wasn’t for me to share. I returned my gaze to the ocean, fingers tightening around the steering wheel. I worried about Ash. “We have an outdoor concert Friday night at Humphrey’s by the Bay. Ash wants me to bring you so he can talk to you himself. I told him I didn’t know if you would come.”
“I’ll come.” She covered one of my hands with one of her own. The elation that surged through me from just that one meaningful touch, a sign that she still cared was crazy, but that was her. Still the tenderhearted girl I had fallen in love with back then and that I had never gotten over. She was still there behind the beauty of the grown woman who sat beside me. The turbulence that had raged within me since I set out to win her back settled like a wave coming home to a welcoming shore.
Keeping my gaze forward, I plunged into deeper, potentially more treacherous water.
“When you left me at Huntington Beach I didn’t believe you’d ever come back. Why would you after we fought and I said such horrible things to you?” I blew out a ragged breath remembering how quickly I had unraveled without her to hold the seams of my life together. “Your love, Mona and the kind of loyalty you showed me all along, defying your father, leaving your home and your dreams behind for me…” My heart swelled and my throat closed. There weren’t words to do her justice. I still had difficulty fathoming the depths of her. “You were too perfect for the boy I was. Too unbelievable a gift for someone so broken and confused.”
“I’m not perfect, Linc. I wasn’t. I told you so. I should have stayed with you. I should have tried harder to find a compromise.”
I shook my head. “It was all on me, babe.” I turned to look deep into her beautiful golden eyes and saw that the light wasn’t completely out, just dimmed. There were embers that I could stoke to a flame if she would let me. “You were right about everything you told me back then. I was holding back. I was afraid. I was so busy trying to find myself that I lost track of you in the process. You were like the perfect wave but instead of turning around and swimming toward you with all I had in me I went the opposite way, the wrong way.”
Any direction that took me away from her was the wrong way.
I took her hand that still covered mine and br
ought it to my face brushing my nose to her wrist inhaling deeply, filling my lungs with her sweet fragrance and pressing my lips to the pulse point that was as close as I could get to her precious heart…for now.
“I’m sorry, so sorry that I didn’t believe in you or in us enough. When your mother told me you had re-enrolled it was confirmation that one of my biggest fears had come true. I went completely insane after that. Full on self-destruct mode. Booze and drugs. I tried everything to drown the memories. None of it worked, though. Nothing was right after you left. Not a fucking thing.” I looked into her eyes and saw the corresponding darkness and desperation that had burdened us both since San Francisco.
“I should have called you at the very least no matter what your mother said, no matter what Ash believed, but I wasn’t capable of rational thinking at that time. I just kept telling myself that you had made the right choice, the best choice, that if I loved you I had to let you go. I’m sorry I hurt you. You were my hope. The light that made every bit of misery I had before you burn away. You are a fire in my blood that can’t be put out. My life has been empty since I lost you. I’ve just been treading water ever since. On the outside of my own life watching it pass me by.” I brought her hand to my cheek and peered deeply into her eyes vowing. “But now I’ve found you again, Mona and this time I’m here to stay.”
Chapter Fifty-Eight
* * *
Simone
I pondered Linc’s words munching a sweet cinnamon churro as he drove us downtown and parked in front of my shop.
On the way he had mostly talked about inconsequential things telling me about some of the places he had been on tour and how he wanted to go back to his favorites with me. He also told me more about Diesel the guy who had replaced Patch on bass. He was an old buddy of Linc’s from the qualifying circuit. He had quit competitive surfing over some kind of domestic dispute. And apparently he hated women. All women. I found that intriguing and wondered what had happened to make him so bitter.
But Linc’s words were what I thought about most, his apology and the declaration that had followed, affirming that our love had been true and meaningful to him, too. Those words seeped through the cracks that time and doubt had left behind and went a long way toward initiating the process of healing.
“Let me stay with you today.” Linc turned off the ignition and turned to face me.
“Pfft. Lincoln Savage stocking shelves and ringing up sales? Don’t be ridiculous.”
“I’m not Lincoln Savage when I’m with you. Just Linc. I had an identity crisis back then. I thought what was important was what I did or what I accomplished. It’s not. It’s more simple and yet much more profound. What’s important is who I am when I’m with you. The man who makes you light up. That’s the real me. The man I always want to be. You saw it in me back then. It took me a lot longer to see it myself, but that guy is still here, Mona. I’m sitting right beside you. I never went away. I just went into hibernation for far too fucking long.”
I was captured by his gorgeous eyes, the blue sparkling with sincerity. I knew he was telling the truth. I felt it. I saw it. And deep down I responded to it just the same as I had before. He was still the man I had loved and yet he was also more. I wanted to learn about that more. I wanted him to share that with me along with everything else he had done since we had parted. And even deeper down I realized that it wouldn’t be hard for me to fall for him again. It would be easy. Frighteningly effortlessly easy.
“Ok, Linc.” His eyes widened. He was obviously surprised I had agreed. “Come with me. You can help me reach the tall shelves. I’m sure you’ll charm the customers and heaven knows you certainly know more about surfing than I do.”
He got out of the jeep and came around to open my door his loose limbed stride confident and sexy. My gaze slowly meandered upward over the dark denim that encased his long legs, the worn belt around his trim waist and the heather grey Hurley t-shirt that clung to his chiseled chest in all the right places. I licked my lips and stepped out onto the pavement forcing myself to look away from all of that masculine perfection. My shoulder brushed into his side as he shut the door. Just the light touch was enough to make my legs shaky with desire.
I hurried to the shop hearing the beep of the locks acutely aware of his enticing heat the minute he moved in behind me. Heat that had recently felt so good pressed against me just skin to skin. He and I together had always been so incredibly good. No other man compared ever since that first gentle kiss at the Deck Bar when he had rearranged my world.
A fine tremor shook my hand as I popped on the lights. He scanned the interior much like he had the first time then his gaze returned to me. “What should I do first, boss lady?”
His words were teasing but his voice was noticeably thick, perhaps remembering the passionate tangle from the other day. Hmm, I needed to keep him busy and myself out of that kind of trouble. I smiled, a little wickedness rising up within me.
“Well…” I paused for effect. “I usually start by cleaning the restroom.”
• • •
After tackling that chore without any complaint beyond rolling his eyes Linc had followed me around the shop as though he were my shadow. A gorgeous nearly six foot two shadow whose scent gave me palpitations.
The dozen customers who came in gravitated toward him and he won them over effortlessly just as I had predicted. I was pretty sure they had all purchased more than they’d planned just to see him flash his dimpled smile.
I understood the allure. Completely.
“Hey, gorgeous.” His shirt settled back into place and the tantalizing glimpse of skin disappeared as he popped the last box of Roxy flip flops into position on the top shelf. He had organized them all for me by sizes. I never seemed to have enough time to do that. “It’s noon. You want me to run over to the Mexican place and grab us a couple of takeout burritos?”
“Yeah, sure.” My mouth watered. Churro power could only take a person so far. “That would be great.”
He moved toward the door but I stopped him just as he put his hand on the glass.
“Linc,” I called.
“Yeah?” His sandy brown hair brushed over his shoulder as he looked back at me.
“Thanks for helping out today.” I swallowed powering through to say the rest. “It’s been really nice having you around actually.”
“You sound surprised.”
“I am a little, I guess.”
He looked a little sad for a moment then smiled the Linc dimpled special. My heart summersaulted just like it used to way back when.
“We were always good together, Mona. Better together than apart. It will be my pleasure to help you remember.”
• • •
The shop bell jingled just as I was putting away some of the winter things in the back. I was trying to be productive while I waited for Linc to return with our lunch. I climbed down from my ladder and dusted off my cutoffs, a smile accompanying my greeting when I peeked at the camera and saw who it was.
“Hey,” I began.
“Where the hell have you been?” Patrick’s voice echoed off the shop walls as he came barreling toward me in his Hodad’s t-shirt and jeans.
“You mean this morning?”
“Yeah this morning.” He stomped toward me limbs noticeably stiff and the closer he got the more I realized how worked up he really was. Waves of intensity rolled off his tall frame. “A guy tells a girl things like I told you and they share a kiss like the one we did and that guy has certain expectations, Simone.” Grey eyes stormy he grasped my shoulders and pulled me close removing all the distance between us. “You’re always at the beach. Every morning.” He stroked my cheek with a finger. “I was worried.”
I thought there had been a choice between him and Lincoln but I’d been deceiving myself. What man could ever compete? The only choice really was whether or not I was going to risk my heart being broken a second time.
“I had breakfast with Lincoln.” I pulled in a f
ortifying breath. “And he’s been here at the shop helping out today. You’re a terrific friend, Patrick. One of the few I’m lucky enough to have. One of the few people I trust.”
“Oh, hell no,” he muttered gaze sliding away. “Do not give me the I want to be just friends speech.” His smoldering grey gaze drifted across my features and lower before it came back up darker than before. “You seem…different,” he decided. “What’s happened?” He frowned. “Don’t tell me you slept with him?”
I brought my hands up to Patrick’s forearms. He was such a large guy my fingers looked puny resting on top of them and when I flexed my fingers I realized how rigid his corded muscles were. “That isn’t any of your business.” I kept my gaze level with his by craning my neck back.
“Not true.” His raven black brows came together over sexy eyes almost as mesmerizing in their uniqueness as Linc’s. “And I already laid out the reasons why beneath the pier the other day. What’s going on Simone? You’re not the type to get her head turned around just because a guy’s famous and some of his music videos have near a hundred million hits on YouTube. Something’s changed with you and with us. I can tell, and I wanna know what and why.”
“Nothing’s changed. Not really.” I pulled in a deep breath for courage before saying the words aloud. “But you were right. I am still in love with Lincoln.”
“Ridiculous, Simone. No way. How can you be? That all was so long ago.”
“I know it’s hard to understand but Linc and I are like two halves that make up one whole. We don’t work right apart. I think we were always meant to be from the very beginning. Even with so much against us.” Still against us. Unless I put myself out there again, came to terms with the past and gave us another chance to move forward. “You deserve to know the truth. That I wake up missing the comfort of his arms around me. That I go the beach every morning because that’s where I feel the closest to him.” Where the memories were the strongest. Where we made love so many incredible times. “And that I go to sleep…”
(Complete Rock Stars, Surf and Second Chances #1-5) Page 24
