Taking Something (9 page)

“Sneaking out again?” Gia smirked. “For breakfast?”

I took a seat on one of the stools across the island from her and just smiled at her jab. I watched her for moment. She was repeating the same actions as before. Making breakfast for Sadie. Slicing fruit. Buttering toast. Placing it meticulously on a white lacquered tray. What a tedious job.

I'd made a point to be up and out of the house by the time Gia had arrived. Telling Sadie that I’d wanted to get started on work before our studio session started. The truth? I needed to breathe. I needed some alone time to remind myself why I was doing what I was doing. Neither Sadie nor Gia helped do that. Both of them made my head hurt. Sadie with her neediness and Gia with her get-the-fuck-away-from-me.

“How about you pour me a cup of coffee, sweet pea?” I finally spoke, breaking the trance her graceful hands had on me and pointing at steaming coffee press between us. She sighed and placed the knife she was holding down on the counter. With her empty hands firmly placed down on the marble, she looked up at me.

“Look,
sweet pea
,” she lipped. “I've got enough people to wait on and one of them actually pays me for it. If you want a cup of coffee, I suggest you get up off your self-entitled ass and pour one.”

My feet were on the floor and leading me around the counter to the cabinets before I had a chance to realize what I was doing. It must have been the look in her eyes. Or maybe I just felt like not being a jerk. I needed to be on her good side before I asked her the question I'd been thinking about all night.

“Mugs are in the one next to the fridge,” she told me, picking up her knife to continue her job.

“Thanks,” I replied, grateful that her civility was quick to return, and grabbed a mug. I moved over next to her. The sweet smell of the fruit coupled with the scent of her shampoo or soap—or maybe it was just her—had my mouth watering. Then she looked over and smiled at me, watching as I poured the coffee. Barely any makeup was on her face and her chocolate hair was flowing down to the middle of her back, un-styled.

Not my normal type, but something about her had me swallowing hard. And apparently daydreaming, because as I was watching her, I decided I was going to fill my hand with scalding hot coffee instead of the mug it was holding.

“Son of a bitch!” I seethed.

Gia reacted quickly, pulling a washcloth from the drawer and soaking it with cool water. She was at my side, placing it on my stinging hand.

“Let me see,” she said sweetly, her eyes full of concern. She pulled back the rag and lifted my hand up. “I don't think it's going to blister.”

God, she's beautiful.

The look of concern on her face. The feel of her hand in mine. I had to remind myself to take a breath. I wanted more than anything to reach out and touch her face. Her warm, caring, concerned face.

“Thank you,” I said, removing the rag from her hand and placing it back on the burn. She released her hand from mine and I took a step back. There was only one other person who had looked at me the way Gia was and we all know how that ended. I couldn't let myself get wrapped up in the idea that another person could actually care about me. And I sure as hell didn't deserve her compassion. I had been a total dick to her.

“That's beautiful,” she said, reaching over and trailing her fingers across the moon tattoo on my right forearm. I wanted her to run her fingers over my skin again. All of my skin.

“Um, thanks. I got it for this girl. Lila,” I rambled, staring down her hand as it slowly traced the outline of the ink. She quickly pulled her hand away at the mention of Lila.

“Like a girlfriend?” She stepped back, putting a little distance between us. “Do you have a girlfriend back home?”

“I don't,” I managed to answer. “She's my best friend. Maybe could have been something more.” I looked down at the tattoo and thought about all the ways I screwed things up with her. “I ruined any chance of there being anything between us. Wasn't honest about the way I felt.”

What am I doing?

I'd never talked to anyone about what happened back then. Not even Lila knew the full story. The story that included exactly how heartbroken I had been that day when she told me she loved my brother more than she loved me. That I wasn't enough. That I'd missed my shot.

Now here I was, spilling my guts to a girl I barely knew in the kitchen of another girl I barely knew who just so happened to be my new girlfriend.

“I made a few mistakes. But no. I do not have a girlfriend back in Chicago. Lila is happily married to my brother and very, very pregnant with his baby.”

She nodded, and the way she looked at me told me that she understood exactly how I was feeling.

“Why are you worried about if I have a girlfriend back home? Jealous?” I grinned, thinking for split second that maybe our conversation was somehow only about the two people standing in the kitchen.

She shook her head. “Not at all,” she said with finality. “I'm asking because you do have a girlfriend here who will be up in about twenty-two minutes.” She pointed at the clock on the microwave. “Remember her?”

“How could I forget?” I said under my breath as I moved back around to my barstool, welcoming the solid island between us. “So, I've got a question for you, Gia.”

“Okay.” She went about her business as if I weren’t even there.

“I'm wondering why exactly you gave up singing, acting, all of it?”

Her back was to me, but I could see the weight of the question by the way her breath drew in then stalled and her head dropped.

“Not something I'm ready to talk about it with someone I barely know.”

“That's fair.” I took a sip of my coffee. Touchy subject apparently. “That's not the question I should have led with. What I really want to know is if you still sing?”

“If you're a singer, you don't just quit singing, Nick,” she answered softly. “I may have quit singing for a living, but that doesn't mean I forgot how or don't still do it.”

“How would you feel about singing for a living again?” I could see her thinking about. Very intently. I could tell because her eyes narrowed out and her teeth tugged at her bottom lip. “I've got something you should listen to. It's going to be a huge hit, and your name came up in a conversation I had last night.” I'd managed to pry Sadie off my arm long enough to sneak outside for a cigarette and to pull up the file Landry had sent me on my phone. It was a sure thing. Like a number-one-on-the-charts sure thing. Especially with Landry attached.

“My name? Why would my name come up? I never even had a song on the radio.”

“My guess? You left a lasting impression on Landry Westwood back in the day.”

The color drained from her face at the mention of his name and her eyes darted around the room as if she were looking for the right response.

“Pass,” she finally said. “Hard pass.”

“You haven't even heard the song,” I argued. “It's amazing.”

“I don't care if it's a guaranteed gold record.”

“Platinum, at least. It’s something you should seriously consider. The kind of opportunity that only comes around once in a lifetime. Well, twice for you.” I smirked. “You don't want to regret this like your first shot.”

“I don't regret walking away,” she defended. “You know nothing about my situation. So don't act like you do.”

“So tell me,” I said a little more insistently than I'd meant it to come off.

“Why should I?” she asked, her eyes pleading with me to give her a good reason. But I couldn't. Or at least I shouldn't. The last thing I wanted to do was get wrapped up in her story, no matter how badly I wanted to know. Lila had been right when she said I needed to shut it off with her. I had to worry about me.

I quickly changed the subject. “I'm handing you a guarantee here.” I was asking her to be a part of something huge. Something that garnered fame, fortune, opportunity.

Who doesn’t want that?

“I can't.” I could see her eyes start to glaze over.

Shit. Waterworks.

Maybe this was why she got out before.
She wasn't strong enough to handle the pressure.

“Hey, my bad. It’s none of my business. Please don't cry.” The last thing I wanted to deal with was a crying chick. Especially this early in the morning.

She looked up at me and smiled. “I won't. I don’t cry in front of strange men,” she promised, pulling down the long sleeve of her t-shirt and wiping the corners of her eyes.

“All of a sudden it’s a stranger-danger situation? Well that just plain hurts, Gia.” Without thinking, I reached out and wiped the remaining tears from her eyes. I had the strangest urge to taste her pain on my fingers.

What hell is this woman doing to me?

My plan of surprising Landry with Gia's agreement to join him might as well have been wiped away with the few tears that managed to escape her eyes. I felt a tinge of guilt but quickly pushed it aside. I didn't have time for sympathy. Whatever her issues were, they had nothing to do with me.

“Can I ask you a question?” she said.

“Of course,” I replied, pulling back a step. I would have answered anything at that point. Anything to keep her from breaking down again.

“If Landry approached you with a guaranteed hit, why didn't you try and convince him that your new girlfriend was the perfect fit? Sadie would die if she knew you offered it to me first.”

How did I answer that without looking like a complete asshole? If I told her that I was trying to impress Landry by getting her to agree to sing it, then I could forget about her thinking I had Sadie's best interest in mind. If I told her that Landry didn't want to sing it with Sadie, there was a chance that she would tell Sadie and Landry would find out I’d thrown him under the bus.

I stared into the big brown eyes that I swore could see straight into my brain and thought about my next move very carefully.

I cleared my throat. “Landry mentioned that you were an incredible singer. I thought it might be nice if I could arrange for the duet. Plus, Landry seems like a really nice guy. Like we could be friends.”

“Ha!” she scoffed.

“What?” I nearly flinched back from the force of her outburst.

“Landry Westwood is anything but nice,” she started, dropping her voice back down to a decibel that wouldn't wake Sadie. “And if you think for one minute I'm going to be the reason you get in good with him, then you can just bounce right on out of here.”

Now who's being defensive?

I probably should have just thrown Landry under the bus. It would have been a lot less painful for me if she knew he didn't want to sing with Sadie. At least then she'd be telling him to get lost instead of me. Judging by the way her face looked when I mentioned Landry's name the first time, I was pretty sure that she'd already told him to.

“It's not like that, Gia.” I tried to put up a good defense. “I'm new in town. It doesn't hurt to try and impress people. You of all people should know that. You know what it's like to be new in this town.”

“I sure do.” She nodded with the weight of her past life evidently clear. “I also know it's every man for himself, so you better just find another way to impress Landry Westwood because I'm not having any part of it. And you better hope like hell that Sadie doesn't find out about this, because if she does, your tatted-up ass is as good as done in this town.”

I leaned forward into her space, feeding off of her fiery words.

“Nick Kline doesn’t do done, sweetheart.” I paused to let my stare penetrate hers, making sure to get the full effect of my intensity across. “And for the record, it’s gonna take a lot more than idle threats to find out if there are any tats on my ass.”

L
ILA HAD
warned me that crossing Sadie would be a bad career move, and now I was pretty sure Gia was hell-bent on being anti-Nick. I should have pushed for Sadie to be the one to sing that duet. I should have convinced Landry that they would sound great together, chemistry or not. Sadie should have been my focus. Not Landry. Not Gia. Sadie.

I wanted to blame it on the fact that I'd been trying to impress people my whole life—from my mom and her hoards of deadbeat guys to Lila. But the truth was that I was more than a little curious to hear Gia sing or at least hear the reason why she’d stopped. I'd probably never get that chance now. She wasn't speaking to me. At least she hadn't since three days ago when she told me to piss off.