Strung Out (Needles and Pins #1) (64 page)

This time she echoed the answer of the past, but instead of spilling her guts, she stayed silent, and he couldn’t take it any longer.

“Did he do something?”
He’d kill him!
“What did the fucker do?” Despite the violent emotions shaking through him, his tone was gentle. “If Colt did something to make you feel like this—he cut the rest of his words off when there was a definite eye flinch and her hand moved from Rascal’s lucky head to rest on the sheets that covered her stomach. “He did, didn’t he?”

“Sort of.”

And with those two words slipping in a sad sigh from her lips, his fury flamed. “I’ll fuck him up… I swear to all that is…” Already, he was fumbling for his phone. The second the black screen was in his hands, he discarded it. He was in the motion of swinging out of bed, tromping directly to his Ducati, and teaching the fucker what ‘hands off my sister’ meant, when she stayed him with a hand on his back.

Bare skin to bare skin is what actually stopped him before he even heard her next words.

“What the hell! What’re you doing?”

“I told him not to touch you… Damn, I might kill him!”

“He didn’t!” She was closer now— on her knees behind him. “I told you last night. It isn’t that way between us.”

“It looked that way.” He propped his elbows to his knees and dropped his face to his hands. The image of them in the car macking hurt his head.

“I know what it looked like. But it was just one stupid kiss. Can we not talk about it? “

“Depends. Is that what’s eating you?” Because if it was that bothering her—one stupid kiss—his bandmate still had a fist ready to meet his face.

Her forehead landed on his shoulder like old times. But her being behind him, instead of beside him skipped his pulse in a wild new way. He wished he could always be in front of her like this―be her shield from all of her demons.

“No. I’ve got shit on my mind. It’s not anything about me and him.”

He lifted his head. Dust particles floated in the sunbeams coming in through the blinds. “Can I ask you something?”

“Maybe.”

“Why his house?” When she remained mute, he prompted, “Why Colt’s house when you left here?” Again, she refused to reply and he expelled a frustrated breath. “Why did you go there and not a hotel?”

“Hotels aren’t in my budget right now.”

The answer was so senseless, he wanted to laugh. Yet, hints had been there all along. Memories bubbled to the surface… Snatches of conversations here and there. Deep inside, he knew it was no laughing matter.

That night in the TV room, he hadn’t fully understood. He’d thought her mother’s expenditures had made money tight—not that she was completely broke.

He turned, taking in the flush of embarrassment in her cheeks. The tinge of humiliation in her eyes.

“That’s why you’re working your way through school? Is that why you didn’t fly stateside and go to the concert with Ivy?” Suddenly he wanted to punch someone again. “Why didn’t you tell someone?”

“I didn’t know until it was all gone. I was old enough to make sure the electricity wasn’t disconnected while she was passed out drunk or stoned. One of those days, was when I found out the checking account had my name on it. It took weeks of poking around before I figured out I even had an inheritance at one time.”

The image of a young girl making sure the utilities stayed on—taking care of herself and her useless parent—wrenched his gut into a knot. “You should have told someone!”

“Like who? The accountants who had already paid shrink bills, psychic bills, chin lifts and tummy tucks? Like fucking
who
?”

“Like me!” He’d been living like a king all these years while she’d worked in a
bar
for fuck’s sake. “Like fuckin’
m
e. I would have given you anything you needed. I would have taken care of you.”

S
he stretched out on the sunning pad, bringing one knee slightly up, and lifting her arms above her head. She didn’t have to look toward the studio to know Gage was watching. His gaze was a pleasant tickle on her skin, and the sounds he cajoled from his guitar pulsated a pleasure point in the pit of her stomach. The combination caused a sweet, hot burn between her legs.

She was falling in love with him. Either she had been since her teen crush days and had right this second realized it, or she had fallen hard—yesterday morning with seven words.

I would have taken care of you
.

Did he have feelings for her? Or did he watch her with fire in his eyes and continuously make up excuses to touch her out of desire only?

Rock stars. Bad
.

She worked on her self-brainwashing technique.

Rock stars. Trouble
.

But Gage was Gage. The boy who had taken care of her. The man who wanted to.

She finally turned to look. He was stretched out in a lounger, guitar in his lap. The amp was still in the house and her eyes followed the cord snaking across the wood from his chair by the pool to the room behind him.

What he was playing was amazing.

“Is that the new song?”

He answered without stopping his chords. “Hell, no. You’ve heard Fire Flight.”

“Yeah.” Most Fire Flight songs were in your face loud, angry. This tune was bluesy, haunting. “I like this. A lot.”

“Thanks.”

“Seth said you were teaching him some techniques.”

“Colt and I’ve both taught him. He’s learning in stereo.” A quirk of the ‘engaging smile.’ “He’s going to be a monster.”

“No doubt,” she agreed. Gage had won awards and Colt had played in two top grossing bands before Fire Flight. Both had graced music and guitar magazine covers. “You think you could teach me?”

Now where the hell had that come from?
She panicked once the words were out. One moment she had been in a blissful haze, hypnotized by the music, his voice, and the contrast of the white cottony clouds against the blue of the sky. And the next she was asking for guitar lessons? She had no desire to learn!

“Yeah. Sure!” He sounded surprised, but eager.

There was no way it would happen. There was no time. That thought was slightly comforting. Less comforting was the thought of leaving.

A few more measures drifted over the pool and then dwindled to a pause. “You ever going to order the linguine?” he asked.

They had hashed over what they wanted for dinner and had decided on Pace, an Italian restaurant that delivered in the area.

“What are you going to do when I leave?” She grumbled about the chore and didn’t immediately leave her comfortable position to wade over to her phone.

Was her leaving getting to him too? His eyes seemed sad and distant for a moment before he recovered and retorted. “Same thing I did before you showed. Throw wild parties. Fill the pool with naked models who will order me food and bring me drinks.”

She laughed. But the sound seemed fake to her ears. The thought of nude women doing Gage’s every bidding was so not funny to her. But since he was being big brother taunting her, she served up sassy-little-sister-on-a-stick right back. “You sure you had all that going on? Pool looks empty to me. When I came I was
hoping
you’d have parties with hot rock stars hanging all day.”

One second later, he had vacated the chair and was in the water. Five seconds later, he’d reached her teak island and was hauling her off as she screeched.

“You need to cool off, little mermaid!”

“No, I don’t. I really don’t.”

His grip relaxed, allowing her to slide down his front until she was standing in the knee-deep water. When she shivered, it wasn’t because she’d cooled off! Quite the opposite.

“What would you do with these hot rock stars?” His challenge was a husky rumble near one of her ears.

Her gaze glided from the hand underwater on her waist, up his arm, taking in the decorative ink—barbed wire music scores ran up the inside of his arm and beginning at the bend, spiraled up his biceps and triceps. “Hot rock star… Half naked in the pool…” She used his own images against him. “Hmm. I don’t know…”

In retaliation, he hooked an arm beneath her knees, prepared to unbalance her.

“Don’t… I don’t want to be all wet again…” She was laughing so hard at his antics, she didn’t immediately grasp what she’d said until his expression became even more animated.

“No? Are you sure?”

She’d hiked head-on into that one. His eyes were still alight with mischief. But they also glittered dark and dangerous. In the position he had maneuvered her into, he could drop her, and she’d fall backward, dunking under before she caught herself. Or he could hold her closer… and kiss her…

Either way, she’d end up wet.

“Very sure.” It took every ounce of willpower to force the two words out.

She could call Derrick as soon as her plane landed in Belize. Or she’d have a fling. What she wouldn’t do was cross what was becoming a very thin line—perhaps even a dotted one—between stepbrother and lover.

The plunge into the water startled her. She’d been so sure Gage wouldn’t drop her when she’d drifted for a few seconds into her thoughts. Her elbows hit the smooth bottom, and she pushed above the water, sputtering and wiping the hair from her face.

“You ass!” She skimmed the surface with her hands, raining a series of splashes until he was deluged and dripping.

He didn’t even fight back, simply shot one of his smirks and hastened back to his chair and his ever-ringing phone.

As she stood on the edge of the pool drying, she watched his conversation. He was speaking and throwing glances her way.

He ended the call, and his expression was apologetic. “That was a friend I thought might be able to come up with Bradley Walker’s cell number. He doesn’t have it.

“Oh.” She swiped the towel one last time over her face and then looped it around her neck. “Thanks, anyway.”

“I’ll keep thinking. There’s bound to be some way to do this.”

“What if we just ring his bell?”

“Ring his bell?” His brows shot up, and that naughty gleam danced in his eyes again.

“Dammit! Are you twelve?”

“We will.” Gage seemed earnest. “We will ride up to his gate and buzz him if it comes to that.”

She narrowed her eyes, wondering if she was supposed to be catching some double entendre, but he only plopped back down into his seat with the guitar.

“Food’s here.
” She stuck her head into Gage’s studio.

“Not too hungry right now. Go ahead.” He spoke from the couch. His feet were propped on the back and his arm rested over his forehead. “I’ll get something later.”

“I thought you were starving?”

“I was. I drank a beer. Now I’m not.”

“You okay?” Would she always have this uneasy feeling when he seemed off? His face looked pale, despite the afternoon by the pool.

“Don’t look at me like that.”

“What?”

“And don’t do that.”

“What!”

“Don’t pretend you’re not thinking it.”

Aggravated with his attitude, whether or not it was innocent, she turned without a word. After fixing her plate, she ate supper alone in front of the super-screen television, watching sitcom reruns. Two shows later, she switched off the television and went upstairs to clear the food if it was still out and untouched.

Music pounded through the house. The hard angry beat sounded more like the piece he was working on for Fire Flight’s studio session, which was coming up fast. It looked as if he’d dished himself up a serving. She put her plate in the sink and followed the sound waves to ask if he wanted seconds before she put the food up.

Gage’s pallor still seemed different. He was twisting back and forth in a castor chair, and the song she was hearing thundered from the speakers. He didn’t turn the volume down when she entered, and she stood right inside the door, enjoying the hard beat. When it ended, Gage’s phone came alive with Colt’s voice.

“Too hot. Thought you were going to drop the bass. And what’s with the delay?”

Gage slumped some in his chair, and seeing the light go out of his expression, she threw up her hands as she advanced into the room whispering. “Was he always such a douche?”

“He’s right.” Gage hit a switch, and the computer screen went dark.